Kader asked, Who was your first love? How did it end? Are you still in touch?
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I first saw him in my freshman Biology class, wearing a red polo shirt. I used to walk by his desk to turn in papers or ask questions in hopes he'd look at me, which he never did. When we ended up at the same party the next year, he finally looked. That was all it took.
We were a wrong fit from the start, although when you're 15 and in love for the first time, you hold on for dear life even if you know you're holding on to the wrong thing. There was a lot of yelling, I remember that well, but how many teenagers know how to resolve conflicts maturely and discuss issues openly? So, a lot of yelling, insecurities, mind games, slammed car doors. It wasn't all bad, though.
Once, he wrote a paper in some class about his role model, and he filled two entire pages even though the exercise only asked for one. His mom showed it to me weeks later because he had written that paper about me. He wrote about what he liked most about me, what he admired, how he appreciated all I did for him. He said the very best things you can hope to hear at such a young age, things he so rarely said to me.
We officially broke up over one stupid fight, but we'd continue to hurt each other for months, years even on some scale. He made me crazy, and I think I made him sad. We were a wrong fit from the start, but we slammed into each for years trying to make it work.
It never did.
I don't know where that paper he wrote me ended up, probably torn to pieces in some angst-filled fit. I don't think of him often, truth be told, and I'd be pretty stunned if he ever thought of me, but when he does cross my mind, I always always always hope he's met someone who's a good fit, who doesn't try to crawl out of her skin to be the person she thinks he wants her to be, who inspires him everyday to be the person he was when he wrote me that paper.
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