Part of this week’s prompt from the lovely Brigit Delaney who is doing a Journal challenge about getting introspective about our love and sex lives. 🙂

Dear Mr. Sandy Hair,

I remember you were the first boy I properly fell in love with at 13. I’d had a humungous crush when I was five until ten on Mum’s friends’ son, but you were my first teenage love love.

When I first saw you in class that day, the new boy, I remember how tall you were opposite the other boys and how you stood out with your flop of sandy blonde hair. A crush instantly developed.

From passing glances, friendly smiles and hanging out together in our big group of friends every day, we both knew something was up. Not even my best friend knew I liked you until long after. I remember that October night when our school did a fashion show and party.

I remember when it was my turn to walk solo and in the crowd of fellow classmates, I saw you plain as day, looking and smiling at me with that smile you only give to someone you like. I was on cloud nine that night and for a long while after. I remember how I used to sing and goof around with our friends and I’d catch you smiling at me.

I wanted to say something. But I knew you were only here for a year before you returned to your home country, and you wouldn’t be back for a long time if at all. In retrospect, we both knew our teenage eyes for the other couldn’t come to fruition, so we kept it quiet. But we both knew how the other felt.

I remember how in the bitterly cold winter that year, I was still cold in my thick, faux sheepskin coat and you offered me yours. We laughed as it swamped me like a tent and the sleeves were far too long. When I was all of 5’1 and you 6’2 (you must be a giant now) it was a hilarious sight! Even now, I still laugh at that!

We never held hands, we were never alone together, we never even hugged. We were at that weird age where we were just starting to hug our opposite-sex friends after realising that in fact, they don’t have ‘germs’. We hugged tour other friends, just not each other, because it would mean something more than friendship for us.

I remember how I tried to work through my feelings because I knew strong teenage crushes would happen. I didn’t want to say I loved you, but I knew I definitely more-than-liked-you, and that it was the first time this was happening in my teenage life.

I remember how other girls in my classes gossiped that apparently you said, when asked, that you thought I was cute. “Have you seen the way he looks at you?” one girl said, on one sunny day when they accosted me in a group, asking me if I liked you.

Then I remember that day when it’d be the last I’d see you before you left. I dreaded that final countdown of days. After hugging all my friends, we finally gave each other a hug. Our first and only. By our teenage standards, that was like doing the Titanic pose in front of everyone! We both knew it meant more when you told me “I’ll miss you.” and I said the same to you.

I remember pretending to be ok and then getting upset a few days later, weeping as I listened to Sheryl Crow’s ‘First Cut Is The Deepest’ on the original iPod my sister gave me. (God, I’m embarrassed to even admit that *hides my embarrassed crimson face behind my hands*)

We stayed friends after that, talking here and there through social media. I got over you but you’re a fond memory of those first teenage feelings.

All my love,

Violet xx

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*Picture – Pinterest