Just tell me, okay?

I think what bothers me most about high school relationships is that no one wants to speak up.

Not just romantic relationships, though that kind of ties in here. But specifically relationships where one person clearly has feelings for the other, and yet chooses to say nothing. Then, some catalyst happens where the other person doesn’t reciprocate these feelings (that most of the time they have ZERO knowledge about) and the former person snaps and gets upset. A lot of times ending the friendship.

This has happened to me twice in my life, and honestly it still breaks my heart thinking about it. Don’t get it twisted, I am happily married and would never go back, but what ifs always creep up here and now of what would have happened if these boys would have just been honest.

For example, there is D. D and I did not start on good terms. We are both vastly different in personality, belief, how we speak, and interests outside of Doctor Who and orchestra. He dated a friend of mine and sucked as a boyfriend so I helped her break up with him. We eventually became friends when we just started getting to know each other more. He became one of my closest confidants. But from jump I made it clear we were platonic. And we were both okay with that. We were at each other’s houses all the time, and our parents loved the other like we were another one of their kids. We took trips with school and hung out. We could text each other on a random day and go hang out. A fond memory I have is going to see Ant Man and being the only two in the theater. We yelled and cheered at the screen the entire movie. Once, he picked me up and we randomly drove 45 minutes to my college roommate’s house to buy her Taco Bell. I went to college. He stayed home. But we stayed in contact. We hung out when I visited home on breaks.

I met a boy and we started dating. We got engaged. I was so excited for my friend to meet my fiancé. We all went bowling. They got along well. Another time, we were all going to hang out again. My fiancé was getting the car ready. I was in the bathroom. D was talking to my mom. He had been making small comments that were off. But I ignored them. That night, D asked my mom “you’re not seriously okay with them getting married right?” She was surprised, and said of course she was. And mentioned how happy we were. He said “well, I’m not okay with it.” He then seriously tried to convince her to help him break us up. He said that I should be with him instead. Of course she refused and told me right away. So he was no longer invited to my wedding. If he couldn’t support my wedding then I didn’t want him there. Instead of just talking to me about it, and clarifying how he felt about me, he just bottled it up. Tried to go around my back. Did he think I wouldn’t find out? Did he think my mother wouldn’t tell me? Did he believe that if my fiancé and I broke up I would come running to him? That was 2017. We have not spoken since. I don’t know if we would still be friends today. Maybe. He is now married and has a son. My second son is a few days older than his. It hurts me that he will never meet my kids.

Then, there’s R. R and I met in 8th grade. He was smitten from day one, and I knew it. He was nice. But I wasn’t interested. No real reason why either. He was nice. He had hobbies. We both are Christians. I love his mom. She even became my advisor in high school. I just didn’t have romantic feelings towards him.

He started walking me to my mom’s car, across the street to the middle school, then walking back to the high school for track practice, every day after school. My parents called him my shadow. One time, he lost his class ring. His mom was telling someone in my advising period about it. I was reading and minding my own business. She mentioned, louder so I could hear “I SAID I thought he gave it to a GIRL….” I laughed and confirmed I did not have it. R asked me to the homecoming dance our freshman year. I said no, I just wanted to go with friends. But he was more than welcome to be included in that group. He graciously accepted. A “friend” then told me she felt bad about me turning him down. So she asked him to the dance. I thought it was weird but moved on. She loudly announced at the dance that since he was her date, they had to dance first. But that he and I needed to dance too. So we did. It was my first slow dance and we held each other at arms length and swayed awkwardly. I kept having to move his hands up from sliding onto my butt.

High school got busy. We fell into different friend groups. But whenever we did see each other, we would talk and be friendly. Our senior year, we started talking again when I was working at the bowling alley. R’s church had a weekly league. We started talking more there and at school. I went to his house and he showed me how to shoot a gun for the first time in his backyard. We learned what it was like to just be friends. It finally felt like there was nothing attached. Maybe he had gotten over me? Or maybe he just accepted I felt differently.

I think he started this, but at some point we found out what each other’s cars looked like. If one of us was leaving school before the other, we would find the other’s car and put the windshield wipers up. Sometimes we left notes, more so in the beginning. But it was our way of saying hello; saying “hey I’m thinking about you. Wanted to make you laugh.” At least, that’s how it felt to me. And it genuinely made me smile every time. I asked him to join a big group of friends and I to the spring dance. We all had a blast. One day at school, he gave me an old sweatshirt he had at the bottom of a bag because I spilled something on my shirt. I wore it for an afternoon and just went to his track meet wearing it, and made his mother laugh. We texted a lot. He would say goodnight to me in German, also sending words and what they meant in English to make me laugh because German is so different.

Prom season was fast approaching. At the time, I was unfortunately part of a friend group where there were some toxic people. High school in a nutshell. And I was easily manipulated because I just wanted these people to always like me. They all had dates to prom. I did not. I knew R would say yes if I asked him to go as my date. And of course he did. He wasn’t even planning on going otherwise. I was genuinely excited to go with him. But I can also admit that I had taken a page from my “friend’s books and had used the knowledge that he still liked me to manipulate him into going.

After I asked him, everything changed. R started waiting for me after each class to walk me to my next one. He even showed up somehow in a locked office I was in for an independent study, standing there in silence for several minutes just staring at me. I began to feel smothered again. I started taking longer to pack up my things or talk to a friend or teacher after every class so he would have to leave to not be late for his next class. I started considering telling R I no longer wanted to be his date. But I knew I had caused this by leading him on. So I followed through. He was still my friend, and I didn’t want to come portray blow him off. We still hung out after school some days, but I just needed some space. I know now, this was me, the pot, calling the kettle black. I should have spoken up.

Prom rolls around. We went with a group of friends to take photos, but we all drove separately. He didn’t dance with me more than one time, even though I begged him to. He sat in a corner with other friends. He told me at 9 pm he was bored and wanted to leave. We met some other friends who left even earlier at Olive Garden. The four of us went back to my parents house to watch Tv. Then, he went home. And I didn’t see him for a week after. Briefly, he stopped into one of my classes to give me a strip of Photo Booth photos from that night, but said nothing.

I found out that week, from a mutual friend, that R had been complaining to anyone that would listen that I was a prude for not sleeping with him after prom. As if we even had the opportunity to. I wouldn’t have if he would have tried, let’s make that very clear. But I was hurt. He still had feelings for me, or maybe he just wanted a hook up by that point. R never made a move. He never opened up about how he was feeling. He just reduced me to a girl who wouldn’t let him have sec with her, as a conquest he had lost. I ended up hearing this from multiple other people that week. So I cut off contact. This was a month before graduation and we completely stopped speaking. I didnt even confront him about it. We just avoided each other fully.

That was 11 years ago and it still breaks my heart that that is how it ended. Reduced to “well she wouldn’t put out” vs “well he wouldn’t tell me how he felt and just wanted to sleep with me”. If he would have told me he had feelings, or maybe made a move to hold my hand, even kiss me that night or any of the hundreds of opportunities before, I can honestly say I don’t know how I would have reacted. Maybe I would have given it a shot. I certainly thought about it to myself a few times after we rekindled our friendship. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. Or maybe I would have just expressed that I wanted to continue to be friends. After all, he was going to a college states away. I was staying in our state.

I still talk to his mother. A few years later, I ended up telling her what happened. She was grateful and apologized. R had not been having the best time by that point. The cross country program he had gotten scholarships for had been dissolved. His girlfriend, his first girlfriend, and he had broken up because she was abusive. He was moving schools. He had gotten to a very dire mental state and considered suicide. He had to take a full year off to recover. I honestly have no idea how he is doing now, other than what his mother tells me. When she and I talk, I always ask “how is R? Let him know I say hello.” But that’s about it.

I am back in my hometown now after 7 years. I have a husband and two amazing kids. I have reconnected with several people from varying experiences growing up. I still think sometimes “oh will I run into D or R?” Honestly, probably not. And I’m okay with that because that phase of my life is over. But that doesn’t mean when those memories drift into my mind on occasion, I don’t think of them, or mourn the friendships lost. I send them well wishes in my mind when I think of them. If I saw them on the street I would smile, say hello. It won’t ever be like it was.

I just wish what needed to be said at the time was said. Oh how differently things could have been now. I think that is why I felt compelled to write this today. Being back has brought out a lot of memories, and if these thoughts continued to knock around in my brain, I might explode.