Love Hurts (Really)

 by Charlotte Bennardo

Ah, love is in the air... That first crush...

If we're talking about first crushes, I'm focusing on those that don't include Kindergarteners who say they're going to marry a classmate. Let's get right to those that really made our hearts throb painfully because WHAM! we were hit by Cupid's arrow really for the first time. We saw someone, maybe a classmate, a neighbor, someone at a gathering, and we felt our lives were forever changed, the feeling was so overwhelming. 

For me, it happened in high school, my sophomore year. I'd always been a late bloomer, but I had better things to do than get all giggly over guys. Yes, I found them attractive, and yes, I would have liked to been asked out on a date, but my life didn't center around this person noticing me. 

Until I met HIM. A friend of my brother's, popular around school because of his humor, it was his personality that made him so attractive (he was cute, yes, but not gorgeous, which made him more real and more attractive to me.). When prom time came, I practically held my breath, waiting, hoping, praying, dreaming-that he would ask me out. And just like in a Taylor Swift song (the one where she's sitting in the bleachers, not being a cheerleader), he never noticed me. Or if he did, he ignored me. The pain... 

Even with subsequent heartbreaks and now being happily married for many years, just thinking about high school, seeing his picture in the yearbook, reminds me of intense, and painful, and scarring, that first true crush is. And that's all I have to remember when I write scenes about first crushes, or even crushes in general, whether it's young adult or adult (especially since now I'm branching out into writing romance). 

You never truly recover all the pieces of your heart after your first crush, even after you've moved on.