My First Love @joprbooks

My First Love

I honestly have no idea how it happened. I had always hated the cliché "best friends falling in love" thing, mainly because I had two guys for best friends. I never thought that it would happen to me.

I was young, I'll admit. Only 8 or 9. And in my defense, I only recently discovered the magnitude of my affections. But I digress. Even at a young age, I was a hopeless romantic, infatuated with the very idea of true love. While other kids my age were hiding their faces at the sight of an form of PDA, I would deliberately read and watch teen romance books and movies. I always found myself envying the female lead, because she was able to experience love, even for a short time.

I met Aubrey at church one Sunday when i was 6 years old. My family had recently left our previous church, and were in search of a new one to call home. Aubrey was the pastor's son. Don't ask me how, but we became fast friends, and from there, he became my best friend. We would always have play dates at his house, and I got along well with his brother and sister. They were homeschooled, so I only saw them on weekends during the year, but during the summers I would spend as much time with them as possible. There was a significant age gap, him being 2 years older, but I never gave it much thought.

I was about 8 when I realized that I liked this boy with the stuffed animal collection, who was obsessed with the idea of missions work but was deathly afraid to sing in public. I had recently gotten over a very short lived crush on the new kid at school, when I had come to terms with the fact that I had no chance of being noticed by him. I had never honestly considered whether or not my best friend was attractive, until then, that is. Nor had I thought about how nice he was, or how smart he was. I never actually considered what had drawn me to him when we met. Then one day at recess it hit me with a sudden force: I truly liked my best friend.

I think I was in denial at first. I mean, it went against everything that I wanted my friendships to stand for: that two people of the opposite sex could harbor purely platonic feelings toward one another. But eventually I gave into the fact that I had feelings for Aubrey, and that was when I began to attempt to draw his attention to this newfound attraction. I did what my 8 year old mind considered flirting. I wore makeup, mostly lip gloss. I dressed up more. I think I was nicer, though I'm not sure. I did everything I could to try to give away that I was interested. I used what I could from the books that I read, I even went to my friend Destiny for help, although that proved to be a mistake. You see, even though I was trying to get him to notice me, I wasn't sure I was ready for him to know about my little crush yet. In all honesty, I was intensively afraid of rejection. I didn't want him to think I was just some silly little girl who could be brushed off. When I told Destiny how I felt, I made her promise to keep a secret. I don't know why I thought I could trust her, considering she was the biggest gossip at our school, but I was 8. I had a messed up judge of character.

Anyways, it turned out that, while at my birthday pool party that year, she had pulled him under the diving board and asked him what he thought of me. Apparently, he pulled her under water and swam away. At least, that's how she told it. I had asked her about it when he told me that she told him, which occurred when my other friend told him that I liked him, which I won't go into detail about.

Our friendship was rather strained after that. I noticed that, after that incident, he would hang out more with his guy friends than he did with me, which told me quite clearly that although he was my best friend, I wasn't his.

I was about 9 years old when his dad announced that he was resigning from pastorship and that they would be moving all the way to Louisiana. To say I was crushed would be an understatement. I cried for half an hour that day, much to my dad's displeasure. Neither of my parents understood why I was so upset; as far as they were concerned, Aubrey was just a friend, as disposable as a plastic cup. It was June of the same year that Aubrey and his family moved, like they said they would. I never even got to say goodbye. I will never forget the look on his face when my friend told him about my crush. To this day I still can't tell if it was an amused expression, or a pleased one. Not that it matters. I haven't seen him in four years. And ya know what eats me up, every day that I spend thinking about him? I never got the chance to ask him if he thought of me as more than a friend. I wish I could have asked. Even if the answer was no.

I was 10 when I realized that I loved him. I still do, to a certain extent. I've moved on, for the most part. I rarely cry over him anymore, and I don't write sappy emails, never sending a single one. I still think about him regularly, but I've found a new object of my affection, as weird as it sounds. All I can do is remember that, "it is better to have loved and lost than than to have never loved at all."