Young "Love"

I met him at school. In the fifth grade. He sat on the other side of the room, but his piercingly bright eyes caught mine. He had freckles like me, and there was something about his quiet demeanor that drew me in. Only...I kept my distance.

In my mind, we were together all the time. We were closer than anyone has possibly ever been with another human being. In reality, I had no idea who he was. I'd never even heard his voice.

How does a 10 year old girl deal with this kind of fantasy? It's so logical. Obviously, she writes a note to the girl who sits in front of her, folds it up in an intricate pattern, hides it in the pencil sharpener that they share, and passes it forward.

My memory isn't strong enough to recall what the note said, but it must have been something like:

"♥ I think Brandon is the cutest boy in the whole world!!! Please don't tell anyone!!! If you do I'll just die!!!!♥" 

Roughly translated, according to the social structure of preadolescence girls, this meant: "please make sure everyone knows this so I don't actually have to do any of the work myself."

It worked like a charm. By the end of the day, my cheeks had taken on a deep shade of red that was beginning to seem permanent, but he knew about my feelings. I sat forward in my desk, back straight. I knew I was being watched, but I refused to give in. I had to pretend I was clueless. After school, my sharpener-sharing friend let me know she had also given him my phone number. I reacted as though I was mortified, but inside I was exhilarated.

Sometime later, I received a phone call. A mile between us, we sat together in silence. We held the phones to our ears, and relished in the perpetual quiet. Every few minutes one of us would briefly describe something that had just happened, but no actual conversation occurred. The call ended when one of our families explained it was meal time.

Just before hanging up he asked, "will you be my girlfriend?"
My response was a deeply profound, "I guess so."

You'd think this experience would have changed our relationship, but you'd be wrong. The rest of the school year went on like this. The two of us avoiding one another like the plague, pretending we were unaware that anything had happened. Our classmates teased us for being "boyfriend and girlfriend." Then we would go home, call one another on the phone, and sit together in awkward silence for hours. Occasional, innocent gifts and self-made cards on notebook paper were exchanged with flushed faces and a deliberate absence of eye contact. Mostly, nothing happened.

Then, one day, between long periods of quiet, he asked me to go to the movies with him. My mom drove me there with a friend. We sat next to one another in uncomfortable and forced poses attempting to convey nonchalance.  After the credits rolled, we said goodbye and ran towards our family cars.

Summer came and went, and we were 6th graders before we knew it. Our classes were on opposite ends of the new school. We never saw one another, but still the title remained. Our phone calls continued, though with decreasing frequency. It was becoming increasingly clear that I didn't know who this boy was. Like, at all. Never did.

All the same, he was my "boyfriend." We had decreed it, and so it must be.

Finally, one day I received a phone call. I sat on the floor in the dining room, doing my homework, listening to this complete stranger breathe. In the background, I heard one of his parents call him to dinner. He explained that he needed to go, but first he wanted to tell me something. My heart inexplicably skipped a beat.

"Okay?" I encouraged.
"Um..." he stalled. Then he took a big breath and quickly sputtered out, "I don't like you no more."
"Oh," I responded, somewhat bewildered. "Okay."

Then we hung up. I stared at the phone for a few minutes, confused. This was it. My first break-up, and I had been dumped. I should be sad, I thought to myself. Except, I wasn't. I was a little disappointed that I hadn't thought of it first, but mostly I was amused.

Slowly, I got to my feet, and walked into the kitchen where my mom was preparing dinner. I must have looked dazed, because she asked "what's up?"

"Brandon just broke up with me," I explained, trying to force tears, but failing.

My mom put down what was in her hands to ask how I felt about it.

I shook my head and told her, "he said: 'I don't like you no more!'"  I stopped to let out a quiet chuckle. Then I continued, "What a moron! He can't even string together a decent sentence!"

"THAT'S MY GIRL!" I hear my dad call from a nearby room.