Daphne Beauty

Yes! I will definitely tell you the story. 

We met in English class in 7th grade. He was the slightly chubby kid who always had a book and jiggled his leg when he read. I was the completely oblivious girl who laughed way too loudly and gave zero shits about class (I got really good grades without trying. It always felt like the busy work they gave us was just a means to torture me. I obnoxiously always thought I was better than the classes I was in. Don’t be that person.) We didn’t really interact much that year. Mostly just equally giving no shits in class (he was reading, I was doodling) and then getting good grades anyway forged a bond between us that we sustained through eye contact.

We both ended up applying for admission to a magnet high school that catered towards science and technology. We were accepted and our freshman year was when we really started becoming close friends. I liked the way I could make him blush and how fast he talked. He liked the fact that I had read almost every book that he had and was willing to take recommendations. We were mostly just friends, but one day he came up to me after English class and said “Willyougotohomecomingwithme?” All in one word. Just like that. I laughed at him and made him repeat it slowly (even though I understood it). Then I said yes. Homecoming was a train wreck. We were both unbelievable ill. I was high on Nyquil for the whole dance and he was valiantly trying not to faint. We danced once and spent the rest of the time in a stupor. I barely even remember it.

Sophomore year, though. I remember that one. We went together again (completely healthy) and had a really good time. We still remained “just friends” but everyone assumed we were dating or going to date.

Junior year he asked a different girl and I don’t think I’e ever been more jealous in my life. I spent the whole dance spying on them and trying to act cool and indifferent every time some annoying person was like “You didn’t go with him this year? Oh my goodness! What happened? Are you okay?” Ugh. BUT, towards the end of the dance, one of my guy friends apparently (I didn’t find out about this until this year) went up to him and told him that he was blowing his chance with me. He came up to me and held out his hand to dance just like in a movie. The song was “If I Ain’t Got You” by Alicia Keys and when it was almost over he told me that the girl he brought was just a friend. In case I was wondering.

Senior year, I went to homecoming with another guy (who surprisingly ALSO goes to my med school now. Fun fun.) I don’t think Le Boyfriend was jealous. I don’t even remember seeing him at all that night. We were best friends that year. Pretty much inseparable. Every day after class we played football or basketball or frisbee. He broke my ankle in basketball (he never did quite get it through his head that you CANNOT TACKLE PEOPLE IN BASKETBALL). 

New Years Eve, a group of us went to a developing neighborhood to shoot off fireworks in the construction site. He and I sat on a few beams of wood on the upper floor of an unfinished house. I waited for him to kiss me, but midnight came and went and he never did.

We went to prom together, but that was slightly disastrous. I just wanted to be friends and I knew he wanted to be more. I was too scared to actually start anything real with him, so the whole night was just…awful. We broke up after not even being together. 

And then we went to college. A LOT of stuff happened between us there. We spent two really hard years trying to stay close even though we were on opposite ends of the country. I missed him more than anything. The best part of school breaks was getting to see my best friend again. We spent every day we could together. It was kind of…sad though. Both of us were realizing how much we wanted to be together, but we knew that we couldn’t. I pushed it out of my mind. I dated other people. He didn’t.

Then this summer he took me on the most wonderful date-I-deserved-but-never-got-in-high-school. There was delicious food, dancing to a violinist under a bridge, reading on the bench in the library garden, and a kiss on the rooftop of a building we snuck onto. It was my first kiss with him and it was pretty much the most wonderful thing you could ever imagine. Just…perfect. At the time, we thought he would be living in a different state than me again, so we made no promises. 

And then he was accepted into the same med school as me. Two weeks later we were dating. Seven months later and we were so much more.

I reread this and it seems so…superficial. Empty compared to how it really felt. How much he has always meant to me. All the school dances and things…they weren’t really our cornerstones. They weren’t the things that made us strong. I can’t really explain it. It’s just the stuff that comes with trusting another person with yourself. Not just your heart, but you. Everything about you. Being comfortable enough with them to let them know your secrets and your weirdness and daily boring stuff. The teasing and the practical jokes. The books. The fights. The stupid way he chews his nails. All of it. It’s all of it together that made us who we are.