My dating history.

I didn't have crushes when I was in elementary school. I didn't have them in junior high, unless you count my attraction to Cooper. I though Cooper was a rad guy, and he was pretty good to talk to. He was good at sports and popular with the guys and lots of the girls wanted to date him. Once I overheard him and another boy saying they thought I was pretty hot. It was after this that I thought maybe it would be cool to date him. But my bff also liked him so I didn't tell anyone until after we had changed schools. That was the whole crush. No excited to see him in the hallway, no nervousness or giddiness, no extra desire to talk to him. No desire to be near him when I saw him. I think mostly I thought I would be cooler if I was with him.

When I was in the seventh grade a boy lent me the book Eragon. His name was Tyler. He wasn't very cool but I liked that he liked books about dragons. We didn't become friends that year. The next year he had changed schools but somehow we started chatting regularly on msn. We talked about anything and everything and eventually he confessed his love for me and told me I reminded him of his girlfriend who had committed suicide. He wrote me love poems and we hung out at his house and sang karaoke. Once he even took me on a date to his fencing club where he tried to teach me to fence and then we layed in the parking lot and looked at the stars while we waited for his mom to pick us up. It was nice for me but I knew it was different for him. I liked to know I was loveable, but I never wrote him any poems and I would tell my non-step-brother about him and Jonn would say he was a loser and I would say he's sweet but I'd laugh about how silly his poems were anyways. I didn't feel anything for him but I beleived him when he said he loved me.

When I was in the tenth grade I was watching Van Helsing and in the end there is this kiss between Hugh Jackman and Kate Beckinsale and I'm all "oh I wish I was her" but then all of a sudden I'm all "oh fuck, who I am kidding? I want to kiss her, she's fucking hot" this launched a mild identity crisis where I was pretty sure I was into girls. Funny though, I was not the "oh I have feelings for my bff" type kid. That shit grossed me out. If I had to pick a tenth grade crush it would have been Morgan. She was two grades above me, we were in the school play together. She was smart and I thought she was pretty cool and liked being around her. That girl was funny. She was the first real girl I had ever thought about kissing. I don't mean that when I saw her I wanted to kiss her. But sometimes I would imagine a scenario where I kissed her. I also imagined myself as a world class gymnast in my free time. Not to mention the various ways I would escape a burning building and how heroic I would be in the face of danger. I counted how many cats I would save, and the windows I would smash through and how I would save my asshole brother even though he was mean to me and everyone would see it and consider me noble and perfect. This wasn't an if I kissed her in real life what would it be like and how can I get her to date me story. It was just another fantasy story I sometimes thought about. I never wanted it to actually happen, nothing could ever be as perfect as it was in my head, I just wanted to think about it. I still do this. I think about stuff all the time. I wouldn't even describe any of it as my personal desires, more like stuff I'm going to use to write a book one day.

I had a boyfriend in the eleventh grade named Thomas. We held hands at a cast party once, then he started hanging out with me and bff#2. We were friends for a while and I honestly would have benn 100% satisfied with that but eventually he asked me out and then all the grade 12 girls heard about it and they thought it was so cool and a bunch of them were jealous and so before I had the chance to agree to it we were pretty much going steady. I though it would be cool to have a boyfriend. The relationship was Tyler with the following changes. Add a jealous bff#2, swap msn for facebook and phone calls, subtract dead girlfriend stuff, swap fencing and karoke for various other dates, and swap the love poems for love songs. I thought he was sweet, but when he told me he loved me I couldn't say it back.

Throw in Curtis, a boy I'm still friends with cause he's rad and I like hanging out with him. We dated for many months we never got physical. He was really into me but eventually I broke it off cause I didn't have the time for him.

Fast forward to this year. Cue Girl. We make friends. I know she likes girls but it feels pretty platonic to me. We're going out one night and she says she likes me, but I don't think she means it in a serious way. We go to the club, I get wasted, we make out, I crash at her place. I don't remember most of the evening except that we definitely kissed and she has the softest cheeks ever. Cue several weeks of texting and suggestive jokes and hanging out and sleeping on twin sized beds together. I thought we were going to be good friends, she gets weird, we stop talking. Turns out she wanted something more and pulled away when she didn't get it.

Here comes Drew. Perfect marriage material. Smart, funny, playful. Such a good guy. I love to watch him with kids, I love to watch him be excited about things. The way he laughs makes me smile. I want to kiss him when I watch him play with others. But I don't want to kiss him when we're alone. And he knows it. Which makes me love him more. Nobody ever notices that I don't like them. But he does. And I can't help it. And I wish I could.