12 Or was it just high school?

I can’t tell what you read of my posts. You like something every once in a while. Lately it’s been a love or two. But for long stretches I see no sign of you.

I sense you have some expectation of a mention, though. So here you go.

I don’t know what we were.

I was still in love with my second then, because I never stopped. Not that you and I discussed anything other than your bike and your … hat. Over the fence. From the neighbors’ yard to mine.

And then … did we talk about going to Honors?

By the time we actually got there in the summer, I’d had my first kiss, and prom, and … a million hormones were coursing through me. He ended that, but since I don’t have an off switch it was still there too.

And there you were.

She was my friend, close but not best. Yet she thought nothing of entertaining your interest even though she knew how I felt about you. And really, I wasn’t jealous, I was pissed she wasn’t honest with me as a friend. Once she was yours, whatever. I kissed the friendship goodbye.

Then that ended. And there you were again, one day back in the yard, maybe, or you called me, or … something.

That was when I didn’t understand about the Venn diagram. So did I love you? Probably. Maybe. Were you in the other circle? Absolutely. For better or worse, you made me.

It was a long time for high school. Almost if not all of senior year, and into the summer.

We could have been polyamorous, in case you wonder now. I don’t think you would’ve cared, and I know he didn’t. Except I ended it, because you were a self-centered prick.

We came back to a conversation again, both of us in California years later, and I told you not to be a self-centered prick again. But not about me that time, about someone far more important. I hope you’re glad you took my advice. I’m glad I gave it.

I think it was just high school.

And here we are. You seem different now. Feel free to comment.