A 17 Year Long Love Story

17 years ago, I was 13 and so was D. I would walk past him after PE in my red middle school sweats and cropped t-shirt and smile at him as he sat on the benches. I was smitten. He was probably the cutest boy at school — everyone thought so. And he liked me.

Over the next few years we would have boyfriends and girlfriends that weren’t each other and in between, we would sneak off behind the high school gym to flirt and talk while we waited for our sports practices to begin.

And then he left. He switched schools and all the flirting and talking stopped

We ended up in the same city for college and instantly got back to the flirting and hanging out. We would go on walks by the pier on our lunch breaks and get ramen in Japan-Town between classes. It was a fun and flirty, we’re going nowhere deal. We were kids still.

This is when I met my ex-husband to be. D and I were still friends, but it was different now. I was told I couldn’t hang out with him alone, and forced into never seeing him unless I snuck around and I hated sneaking around. Over the next 6 years we would talk a few times a month and leave the conversation at how are you’s. And one day I went to him for advice like I used to and we were immediately friends again.

Conversations became more frequent and with my ex’s rampant cheating and partying, he didn’t notice that I had a friend he forbade me to have a few years back and my life felt ok again.

We broke up.

I didn’t confide in D after the break up but I let him know and we exchanged in friendly banter over the next year of me being single and that’s when it hit me. He’s always liked me, it never stopped and I was still smitten.

Dating over the last year has been more on the difficult side and he made talking to the male species easy. He was clear with what he wanted, had pure intentions and let his feelings be known. So when we decided to take our relationship from friends, to a little more than friends, it seemed the most natural.

Go on a date with me, let me take you out at least once. If you don’t have a great time — we’ll stay friends. If you do have a great time, and you want to stay friends, we can still stay friends.

How could I have said no. So we went to get Thai food, family style. Which was my jam and not his — but we had a great time, like he said we would. I confessed all of my reservations, and then we went back to his place, and spent the next 6 hours talking, flirting, drawing in his sketchbook, all of the above. He took me home and I haven’t stopped thinking about whether or not waiting 17 years was worth it or should I have done this a long, long time ago.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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