this one is kinda long 😶 but i worked really hard on it so enjoy!
i had been in love with tyler since the beginning.
we were in kindergarten, and he had been sitting at the same table as me. i was instantly drawn to him, maybe because of his cute face or the kind smile he had worn. whatever it was, i wanted to be his friend. when i was little, i had no fear, so i talked to him and pestered him without any care in the world. and so we became friends.
when you're little, you don't understand love or relationships all that much, so my idea of loving tyler was constantly wanting to give him hugs and ruffling his hair, which had always left him flustered. he was okay with my childish attempts at flirting, but had never reciprocated any of it. he treated it more as if it was a joke, as if i was just some silly girl who liked to gush over him for fun.
my crush on him continued on throughout elementary school, all the way to middle school. at that point, my feelings for him had grown deeper. they became something much more complex than the infatuation i had with him when i was small. i started to truly realize why i liked him so much, started noticing those tiny aspects to his personality and appearance that consistently drew me in.
even by high school, my dynamic with him had remained the same. he and everyone else were aware of my blatant feelings for him, but i didn't mind. it wasn't something that i ever tried to hide. i would compliment him out of nowhere, in front of everyone else. i'd say something that would make him try to hide a smile, his cheeks turning red, just as they did when we were little.
it was natural for me to act this way around him. a lot of times, though, i would play it off as if i were half joking, and he'd chuckle to himself in fake annoyance. so sometimes i wondered if he truly knew just how much he meant to me. i wondered if he knew that even though i flirted with him so frequently and so casually, that i still meant every word that i said.
ever since we were children, i would ask him to hug me or kiss me, fully knowing that he would say no, but still trying just in case he ever changed his mind. it may have taken a while, but one year in high school on tyler's birthday, i had asked him if i could give him a kiss on the cheek. he thought about it for a second, and eventually ended up giving me permission to do it. so i did. i pressed my lips against his face and gave him the most passionate and loving kiss one could manage with a single peck. when i pulled away, he was stifling a smile.
then on my birthday, tyler had offered to give me a kiss just like i'd given him. it seemed that it had become some sort of tradition between us. of course, there was no way that i could deny that. so i waited excitedly in anticipation for his lips to make contact with my cheek, and when they did, i felt as if i were melting. i replayed that moment in my head over and over again for the longest time after that. i remembered thinking that i needed to be his. he needed to be mine. hopelessness washed over me as i realized that it wouldn't happen, because he didn't like me back.
it did hurt, occasionally. usually i was able to act like i didn't care all that much, but the truth was, i did. i wanted him to love me the way that i loved him. but he didn't, and i spent so much time trying to figure out why.
it hit me the hardest in senior year, when i saw him with a girl. my stomach churned and i pulsed with anxiety, desperately trying to process what was going on. when i had asked him about it later and he told me that he liked this girl, my heart sank to the floor and i wanted nothing more than to crumple myself into a ball and cry.
