The Short Truths

- a social construct named desire

why did I love him, why....did I love him...

it wasn't because I was attached to him because he was the first guy to reciprocate my feelings.

no.

It was, possibly, because he was the first guy to make me feel desirable. To make me feel desirable in a way that was loud.

The first guy to make me feel like I could be the main character in a beautiful romcom.

All my life, you know, boys had...never liked me. I'd been too aggressive, too sassy, too independent. Not pretty enough, I suppose.

And even though I swore off dating until I was 17 & brushed off romance with a laugh, i still...had an awareness of how boys felt about me. I put on the mask of "I don't care-im-so-sure-of-myself", but inside, I wondered. I wondered if anyone would ever like me.

it wasn't until high school that my awareness started spreading to my lack of sexual experience & my body. I had loved my body. But then I became aware of all the things I lacked, in comparison to the girls around me.

I'm petite, I have small boobs, I'm demisexual. I don't have long flowing hair and stunning white teeth. I wear glasses. I wasn't the girl people fell in love with, right?

but when they did, when she did...I felt it was fake. It was impulsive, and out of nowhere, & confusing. Are you supposed to doubt the feelings someone has for you consistently? well, I did.

And it might've come from this insecurity, from all these insecurities. Which I never saw as insecurities before because...I always looked at myself through my eyes & never through theirs and then one day, I just started looking through their lenses and never stopped.

It's only in romantic relationships though. him and i...we tried, you know. And I guess it didn't work...which was, awkward. Realistically, I knew that I had been the one to do the growing and that I was more mature but...even though he was the first one to make me feel desired, he made me feel the most undesirable I ever had in my life.

You always dread it, you know? That embarrassing moment, well-

I'd been sitting on his lap while we were making out, you know. And his fingers went there and i...I was nervous, understandably so because I'd never ventured down there before myself. And i was trying to talk to him, trying to explain this to him, and he laughed awkwardly with the most awkward smile and said "We're so awkward" and I remember my heart just...dropping.

"Why would you say that?", I said, trying to keep my eyes from glistening. I'm demisexual, I know barely anything about sex and I'm here trying to get out of my comfort zone and you call it awkward? My stomach burned in that moment with the embarrassment, I was so...heartbroken.

I couldn't be me, I can't be me. I'm petite, but I have to make up for it in someway. I don't have big boobs, but I have to make up for it with a fat ass. I don't have long hair so I have to make up for it with extensions so that he actually has something to pull on.

I can never be my short, fierce, asshole of a self that barely knows anything about sexual interactions at 18 years old because...because that's not desirable.

when my guy friends describe to me a girl they find attractive, I learn the type of girls who are attractive. I learn that I am not one of those girls & it makes me...sad.

They like the tall, "leggy" girls with long hair and bright smiles and nice bodies.

I'm not going to tell you that one day someone's going to love me or you because...yeah, someone will.

but someday, I'm going to love me so so so so much. and that's what keeps me going.