Friendship and Love Don't Mix (School assignment)

When I was younger, in Elementary school, I had a best friend who’s name I refuse to say because she goes to this school and I am not revealing who she is to you or anyone around me. Anyways, she was great, and I really cared about her. She was also the only person who’s house my mom let me go to. She was a family friend. 

What I did not mention in that statement, was that I was very, very, gay for her.

I never confessed, of course not. She was my closest, and now that I’m thinking about it, only friend. But that didn’t mean that I could just willy nilly tell her my feelings. I wasn’t even sure if they were actually romantic!

However, after what I imagine to have been a few months (My perception of time was very… warped, at this age), I decided that my feelings were romantic. And so, I had to figure out if I should tell her or not. And as it turns out, you can procrastinate on a love confession.

And so, that’s just what I did. Until one sleepover at her place. Keep in mind, these sleepovers were few and far between, and my memory is horrific. Especially concerning elementary school memories. So the entire situation is very.. Well, vague. And I will never be sure if she ever knew about my feelings.

However, while I was being picked up by my mom, I told her that I loved her. We were saying the usual goodbyes, and instead of ‘goodbye’ I muttered the dreaded words of ‘I love you!’ and, thank goodness for me, she said ‘What?”

 I swiftly responded with ‘goodbye!’ and I went into my mom’s car. My mom never knew about it. And if she did she never showed it nor spoke a word of it. But that moment was, in my opinion, a major achievement. 

See, while it was a very small interaction between us that she most likely would never remember, I was the opposite. Saying those words incited new found confidence, and sparked more adoration for a friend I’d known since PRESCHOOL. (Allegedly)

So, I tried to talk to her more, I believe. Honestly, it was all blurred. But I kept adoring her more and more and sometimes, i’d have to stop and wonder.. Did I actually like her?

Because, while I gained new love for her, I also gained doubt. I started to doubt myself, my relationship with her, and probably the entire system in which I thought love worked.

Love, for me, was very complicated and I understood that. For as long as I could remember. And I understood types of love! Love for Family, Friends, Partners, Pets, Ect.. But that didn’t mean that I could grasp how it actually felt.

What I also failed to mention, was that I, as a child, did NOT gain much emotional.. Maturity? I was mature for my age, heard it all the time, but emotions just came to me in a way that always seemed to be odd? So when I told her ‘I love you!’ I didn’t just panic and retract my statement purely from fear of ridicule.

I was also scared of playing with her feelings.

Love is an uncomfortable subject, a subject that to this day I am sure I cannot fully understand. My stunted emotional availability crumbled the hope of not only understanding, but entering into loved filled relationships for me. So that interaction, so miniscule between me and a friend. It brought a new meaning to words for me. Because not only did I have to try to actually put more effort into understanding emotions, but I also had to put effort into figuring out if I should tell her.

I remember, very distinctly, looking at an emotions chart (I never understood why a fourth or maybe even fifth grader needed that, but who am I to judge?) and wondering ‘But what does it mean?’

I saw happiness, I saw the cartoon smile drawn on the cardboard. I saw sadness, a big curve set downwards. But I didn’t entirely understand. With happiness, it brought a faux warmth in which I always had trouble recognizing. WIth sadness, it brought the biggest weight on my chest, a weight that at first scared me. Because I didn’t understand if what I was actually feeling was the feeling described. 

So you can tell me all about the feelings love brings, describe the stopping of your heart beating or the seeming pause in time or the heat of your face. But I will always, and have always, be unable to truly understand if what I am feeling are the silky words from books and poems. If the emotion brought within me is truly the horrifying pull into stress like shown so often.

And that singular, unimportant moment, in my life created the biggest proof of it. Because to this day, I will sometimes think of her. I will think of her curly hair, her outfits. The clothes her mom would give us when she grew out of them. I will sometimes wonder, could the relationship we had have gone further if I chose right? Could we still have been in contact, if I was just smart enough to talk to her?

And I think that maybe I could learn from it. But what lesson is there to learn, other than the fact that sometimes what you want is questioned. And you might never be able to understand it, and even after your opportunity to gain that want passes, you will never forget it. And sometimes, there's no solution.

Anyways this was half assed and just taken from memories of my childhood, hope ya'll like cringe romance shit