love, nena

Chapter 1

How I met you was nothing out of the ordinary for this day and age. Online. Especially growing up in a small town, we don't have many options so the online world becomes a way to suddenly see all the people that you may have never met or known exist in the next town over, which was exactly why I had joined online dating apps. Out of curiosity. I wanted to know what was out there. Outside of my high school yearbook and my college classes.

I had the app for a few months and despite my wavering self-esteem, I would willingly admit that I am a very beautiful girl and got a lot of attention. At that point in time, I hadn't even checked my stacking thousands of messages and rarely even checked the app as I had been busy graduating college and working at Hooters. However, by whatever force, I had checked that day and scrolled not even opening the plenty of messages, but I opened one. It was him, but I hadn't a clue then. He had sent a long paragraph unlike the rest of the guys just commenting that I was hot or something crude. He told me he had added my social media profile and hoped to get to know me there.

I added him there and we started talking. I didn't think anything of it at the time. Just a someone to text through the day. I had been talking to another man actually and hanging out with him on the weekends, smoking and chilling. Even doing shrooms. John. A light-skin man with dreads that lived in my town. I met him at the smoke shop and he told me he got fired from trapping out of it. I never did anything with John and he seems like an unimportant blip in the scheme of things, but it feels important to frame where I was at the time. Carefree, just working, going to school and not looking for anything serious. I didn't want a boyfriend.

Eventually, this mysterious man from the dating apps, Peezy, that was his street name, not his real one, and for the anonymity of this story, I will be referring to him as, wanted to meet me. We hadn't realized but he lived in a city an hour away from my town. For the shits and giggles, I hesitantly agreed. He hadn't had much on his profile at all. Just a singular video of him and photos of a bunch of guns. I kept looking over his profile. I wasn't sure if I even liked him or thought he was attractive. I remember the day I graduated, sitting at the lunch my friends and family had thrown me to celebrate and I announced that this man wanted to meet me, but I wasn't sure if I should. He seemed like nothing but trouble, but the thing about me was I loved trouble. My friends voiced their concerns saying I shouldn't and I laughed it off.

The day we were supposed to meet, he stood me up. I was kind of mad at first. I was shocked that I gave this man a chance and he just didn't show up and didn't say anything. A few days later, I got a message from him with an apology. He tells me that he got arrested and spent the last few days in jail. For some reason, my anger had subsided and I felt understanding for him and his situation. I said it was okay and agreed to reschedule. I invited him to my graduation party that week that my friends were throwing me at their dorm.  My friends asked me what I wanted, and because my favourite season was Halloween, I wanted a costume party.

A costume party in the middle of May. Weird but everyone had happily agreed. The issue then was getting costumes, in the middle of May, which as one could imagine especially in a small town, was quite challenging. So he agreed to drive down to meet me and go costume shopping and smoke with me, because my dating profile had cheekily said, "I bet I can out smoke you."

The day came when we were supposed to meet. It was just a warm spring day, down south, sunny, a bit humid and moggy, but freshly graduated with honors, I felt a weight lifted from my shoulders. I felt this freedom and hope that I hadn't in so long; I had a long and difficult last year of school and particularly the last semester, having dealt with a rape that I told very few people about. I had put on a dress I had bought but never worn, it was a bit risque. It was basically a bodysuit with fishnet attached to it, long sleeves and dress part down to my knees. I was having a bit of an alternative moment, with dark lipstick and dramatic eye makeup I had copied off a tiktok inspired by Tomie with freshly bleached blonde hair from my graduation.

My grandmother had been outside, tending to her garden, her favourite past time especially during the warmer months. She was watering her palm trees as I stepped out the front door. She had of course asked me where I was going. I told her I was meeting up with a guy from online and that he was almost here.

"Oh, be careful."

I reassured her it would be fine, quickly stepping off the porch and past the old nineties Toyota sitting in the yard. I was looking down at my phone, texting him. I decided to go stand out in the street so that he could find me easier. He was about to be here. I stood outside for a bit by my family's mailbox. I lived at a dead end where there was a stop sign and another road leading out. He told me he was at the stop sign and he was in a red car. I saw the red car and with stupid confidence and no fears, one that only comes with young naivety, I had hopped into this stranger's car. Finally, that moment came, I sat in the passenger seat and looked over to see who I had been talking to this whole time. And to my surprise, this was the moment that changed everything. The moment when I felt a feeling I had never felt before. A moment that stained my heart and mind, irreversibly, forever. This was one of those things that people wrote about, things that people never forgot about. He was that.

I had never believed in love at first sight, and even now, I hesitate to label it as something so cliche, yet, the moment I had looked over, something in me had been touched. And something changed. Our eyes had met and this moment had felt like we had been suspended in eternity. And part of my heart and soul likes to recall this moment and likes to believes that every moment in life exists still, somewhere, forever. Going on and on. So somewhere this special moment lives on, forever.

Immediately I had been taken in and enchanted by his eyes. His honey hazel eyes. But there was something about them that was so wild, unkempt, and mesmerizing, that struck me then and continued to for as long as I knew him. All my doubts had faded and suddenly it wasn't just some random guy I was meeting up with for shits and giggles.

Perhaps, the light from the window behind him had blinded me a little, like a halo, but eventually, the rest of his image began to flood in. I saw his tan olive skin, curly black hair, crooked big nose and big lips, he smiled.

Oh, I liked him.

I had never felt about someone like this before, and that was only the beginning.