First Time Around: Chapter 03

(Doug)

In which our hero takes a trip down memory lane.

It was first grade and her name was Melissa. It was all those years ago, and by some trick of memory I can still remember that.

I guess she was my first crush.
She, of course, didn't know who I was. Well, I assume she didn't. I didn't have many friends in the class and never tried to call attention to myself. Maybe she had some vague idea of a kid with my name in her class.

I remember that in my class we were required to have notebooks which we spent fifteen minutes at the beginning of the day writing or drawing in. Sometimes I would write something, some simplistic diary entry. Other times I would draw something in thick, shaky carbon graphite.

I remember turning to a page deep in my notebook, where I figured no one would look, and writing, in caps, Melissa. I then drew a frame around it and added some other decoration. It felt good to have my feelings personified in some way, even if it was just a hasty scrawl where I thought no one would see it.

And I remember lining up to go to lunch. Back then we had a rhyme... "First is the worst, second is the best, third is the one [insert favorite rhyme here]." I generally tried to be second, as did the rest of the guys. (Only the guys were stupid enough to really care about it.)

We were waiting and she asked me to watch her lunchbox for her.

Could she have known?

I said yes.

Could she have felt the same way?

I left the school the next year.