We had to write a story in english about someone from our past, and of our memories of them. So I did my old friend (and childhood love interest). The picture below is her
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I always felt a butterfly feeling for her, ever since I met her in preschool. It’s hard to talk to her nowadays since she’s never online. If asked 10 years ago what I thought would happen with her and I, I’d have sworn up and down that we’d get married tomorrow and announce it to the whole school, and have recess all day. My adolescent mind couldn’t comprehend the fact of life and what was soon to come. I used to think the world rotated around peace. I used to think there were a natural order and a specific way of doing things, and everybody followed those rules, had families, and then died. At the age of 4 years old, it wasn’t uncommon for me to assume we were going to live forever in the tree-house, happily wed, eating spaghetti and ice cream every night, and not having a bed time.
All of these hopes and all of these feelings began in daycare the first time I laid eyes on her. I doubt I even knew what girls were, but it didn’t seem to matter at that point. All I knew was I liked her. When we were swinging once, she told me that if two people were swinging next to each other perfectly lined up and all, then they were going to get married. You’d have never seen a boy try his hardest to time something out, and get so angry when he couldn’t do it. That was all resolved with a kiss behind the time-out couch though, so the anger didn’t last long. One kiss a day before and after nap. That kiss never left me. It’s odd how people will remember the stupidest things from their childhood, but never the most important.
Kindergarten through first grade was a blank, but I remember talking to her a lot throughout school, up until 3rd grade, when mom moved to a different road and started a daycare business. We had a couple kids starting to come, which eventually grew, but the one kid I remember the most coming over was our new neighbor. To my surprise she was really cute and had all the cool stuff. To my surprise it was her! She would always come over and watch The Lion King with me at least a hundred times before running home to get some of her cat and lion beanie-babies so we could make our own Lion King movie. This game seemed to go on for hours. The life of ignorance seemed to fit both of us pretty well. I went over to her house a few times, met her family, and on holidays we’d make ornaments together in the kitchen while the adults watched TV. It was fun and all, but all I wanted to do was run away with her so we could go raise our own lions on a farm.
One day it reached the point where we’d give my brother the controller and let him play videogames for a while, and her and I would sneak under the bed and kiss. I’ve been embarrassed a few times in my life, but the most embarrassing moments happened as a result from being under that bed with her. Once being caught kissing, another being caught touching each others genitals. Thankfully it was innocent enough to get a small talk and a fudge-pop from the freezer, but it never changed. I asked her out without even knowing what “going out” even was.
5th grade was when I had to move. She and I lost contact after I moved until I was a sophomore in high school. Most memories are coming back to me now that I have the patience to write about her, but throughout the years she eventually became a fog as my head swelled up with a new environment and new friends. I’ve never forgotten who she was though, and that small part of me has always yearned for our childhood to return itself. I eventually found her again on Myspace and tried talking to her. She responded the first time I caught her online and we talked for what seemed like hours.
She had a boyfriend, new friends, moved out of home and was “doing great for herself.” I was proud of her and relieved she turned out okay. In a fit of excitement I went to her pictures to see how much she’s changed since we were kids. Unfortunately, the result wasn’t quite what I hoped for. I’m seeing more of her breasts and her fit super-model body than I am of her golden curly hair I used to play with until I fell asleep. The juice cups we used to drink are replaced with Alcohol of all names shapes and sizes. The ice cream we used to eat now has drinks mixed into it, and floats in a cup of depression and ignorance. This nightmare path she’s taken made me upset for a while, because I thought that maybe, just maybe, if I stuck around then I could have saved her from all of this. But I suppose that’s life and you just have to make do with what you have.
As times change, people change too. There’s no avoiding it. You can hope for a spaghetti dinner and ice cream every night. You can hope to get married. You can spend hours every night trying to figure out why you have a penis and she doesn’t. Then you can question how people could let themselves go, and get in with the wrong crowds. The only thing that is always known though, is that shit happens. And that’s what she told me the day she spoke.
