All the Right Moves
Tom Cruise's jersey number was 33 in the classic movie, All the Right Moves. Bam. Thanks, Wikipedia. This is going to be kind of a depressing post, about my unrequited love for a girl.
I have feelings for her. It wasn't supposed to happen, but it did. I was supposed to eat lunch with her because we were the only people we knew that had lunch that early in the day. So we sat every day and ate lunch and talked for 25 heavenly minutes. She had a boyfriend. I didn't. She would meet me in the hall, and we'd walk to the art room, but not before stopping by the bathroom first. We talked when we peed. I think that's a significant step in a friendship. Then, second semester, I would meet her in the cafeteria. Sometimes I would come in, right as she looked up. It's like our minds were in tune. She would tell me about her crazy weekend, and the parties she went to with her boyfriend. I would tell her about the TV shows I watched. She would talk about how sure she was that her boyfriend would be the last male she'd ever date. I would silently hope for their breakup.
Her boyfriend wasn't a bad guy. I actually met him first, during the first play I ever worked on. He was nice, and we had some inside jokes. Then, a year and a half later, I met her. They had only been dating for a couple months when I met her, and I already thought she was the bee's knees. I was just a little sophomore, trying to hide my gayness. She was always so coordinated. How did she do that? Did she only have perfect items in her closet that fit her perfectly? My closet consisted mainly of things I didn't have the guts to throw out. We became acquaintances.
The following year, I had the dreaded fourth lunch. Fourth lunch occurs at 10:19 on a regular day, and 10:29 on a homeroom day. This was WAY too early for any self-respecting human to eat (what is supposed to be) the middle meal of the day. I texted all of my friends. No one had fourth lunch. Then, at the last minute, someone told me she had fourth lunch, too. I texted her and we agreed to eat lunch together in the art room. From there, our friendship bloomed. We talked about anything and everything. I pretended I didn't have feelings for her, and it was all fine just fine. This went on for the rest of the school year.
I should mention that she is a year older, and therefore was a senior during our lunch dates. I knew she was going off to college the next year, but I didn't care. In that moment, she was everything to me. She became the person I wanted to talk to every day. I even took her to prom (she was still dating her boyfriend, so we went as friends). Repressing feelings isn't good. Ask anyone and they will tell you exactly that. But did I listen to my own intuition? No. So I repressed my feelings, and pretended that everything was fine. It was fine with me that she had a boyfriend. It was fine with me that we would never be anything but friends. It was fine with me that she would never reciprocate my feelings, because I didn't have any.
So when she asked if I wanted to come over to hang out at her place a month ago, I didn't think twice. We're friends, and she has a boyfriend, and she is going to another state in one month. Nothing could happen. But then she kissed me. It was like my dream was coming true. You can probably go back and read the post I made about it. She said she just wanted to do that, and she wanted to stay friends. I said I was 100% okay with that. I told myself I was 100% okay with that. I lied to myself. I wasn't okay with it. It's all I can think about. I want her to be jealous of me now, just how I was jealous of her boyfriend. So Saturday night, when I was at a party, I drank. Then I played spin the bottle. I kissed enough people to count on every finger of one hand. Then I told her about it. I wanted her to react. I wanted her to say that she was jealous. That she wanted to be the only one to kiss me. But she didn't. She said that she was proud of me. Proud of me for what? Drinking at a party and "having fun?" I did have fun. But I would've felt better if she told me she was jealous. Why am I still hung up on her? Why am I playing the victim in my tragic lesbian love story? I knew there couldn't be anything between us. She lives in Georgia, with all the nice artists who party (but not too much), and where her classes are fun and they find lizards on the ground, because it's classic Georgia.
I'm a mess. And it's all my fault.
