the day i quit my unrequited love

Jeremy (from elementary)

I’m honestly trying to remember much about him. It was such a long time ago, considering he’s the first in this list.  But since I am trying to start it off from the oldest, I have no choice but to start with him.

He’s one of those rowdy, dimpled boys. The kind that I found really charming and cute back in the day. He was also really popular with my girl classmates. I still can’t believe that at our young age in second grade he’s already been receiving handwritten love letters. How did I know? I sometimes find them in the trash. Those letters were probably filled with childish heart doodles and wrong spellings, but at that age, I can only feel surprised. He’s really overwhelmingly popular in our small elementary school.

As much as I feel cringe now, that I have liked this guy from before, it is only in fifth grade that I realized I am experiencing my first crush.

By then, I am already aware of the massive competition aside from his girlfriend (I don’t know if the name was Aubrey or something that starts with A) from another school. Talk about being a really early bloomer in their parts. Anyway it was not as big of a deal, since as I remember, roughly 10% of my classmates that time had relationships and the other 90% are either not really interested, or are just afraid of the spanking from their parents.

Somehow, it is an unwritten fact that Jeremy rarely dates anyone from our school. In addition, his relationships doesn’t really last longer than three weeks. Along the times I started to crush on him, he’s already dumped his girlfriend. The biggest competitor was then, replaced by Janet, our resident popular girl in class. I can still remember how I felt a little envious of how developed her body already was. At the time, I was a little flat chested with no signs of maturity. But even then, I am not really intimidated because I had the advantage of being Jeremy’s friend.

Anyway, we used to hang out. I sometimes help him with spelling, and teach him math. Meanwhile, he helps with my gardening. When he gets in this talkative mode he would tell me how he hates his parents and he can never understand why they had to split up and scramble over who gets to keep him. I didn’t understand too. But I felt like I also needed to share, so I would talk about how I hate it and it’s irrational for parents to boss their kids around. Our friendship was both beneficial and it was perfect until we were paired for a dance performance in our class in sixth grade.

Jeremy would tell me then that he was lucky that I was paired with him. He would not have agreed with anyone, otherwise, as he knows there were tons of our girl classmates who would gladly take my place. (It’s not like there’s an unknown secret in our classroom except for mine.) He’s aware of who among our classmates likes him. But truthfully, it annoys him when someone pushes themselves to him. He dislikes unsolicited assertiveness. And so, my company is what he prefers. The boy really believed that I am just a sincere and loyal friend.

I actually predicted what happened next, since Jeremy isn’t really one to be serious at any student matters at all. He doesn’t attend any of our dance practices. Veins are popped by the instructors, as he would prance around to god-knows-where. When it’s time for rehearsals, I would be paired with a girl classmate. Even with the shenanigans he would pull, I still practiced diligently. In the back of my mind, I knew that when the presentation arrives, few days before, he would pester me about teaching him everything.

One day, he actually arrived for practice. When I asked why, he told me that he just doesn’t have anything better to do to kill time. Unfortunately, his mindless statement was overheard by the dance instructor. And I remember his fuming anger. He resorted to finger pointing and releasing his pent-up anger on Jeremy. Meanwhile, Jeremy retaliated by saying that it’s not like it’s hard to dance. Talk about fanning the flames even more. But he’s Jeremy. No matter how he acts, even if wrong, I’ll think he’s right since I liked him.