Why I Couldn't Hit "Send"

For the boy who made me brave

For The Boy Who Made Me Brave

             I forget the dates of some of my friends’ birthdays. I’m embarrassed to admit it, but I’m the kind of person that relies on Facebook notifications to tell me whose birthdays are coming up.

            But it’s not my fault. I’ve never been good at remembering facts or dates. My brain is incapable of storing the important stuff, the stuff I actually want to remember.

            So why do I remember where I was at exactly 10:05AM on November 21st last year?

            Because that was the first day I drove you. And you were the second person to ever sit in my passenger seat.

            We were on Thanksgiving break and you asked me to join you for a drink at Starbucks because the holiday drinks were finally back. I was confused at first, because we were never good friends. We were only friends of friends. Plus, you were in love with my best friend and according to girl code, that meant you were off limits.

            But I happily obliged anyway because you were a mystery to me. And if I needed to eventually beat up the boy who broke my best friend’s heart, I wanted to know what his Starbucks order was. Because I’m a firm believer in the saying, “a coffee order says a lot about a person”.

            Besides, I had been craving a salted caramel hot chocolate all year.

            It was raining that morning and I hated driving in the rain. But I already agreed to our innocent rendezvous, so there was no turning back now.

            The drive to your house was treacherous. You lived on the biggest hill in town, and I curse that hill to this day. But you finally emerged from your house, with your gray zip-up hoodie and dark blue jeans. You didn’t even bother to put your hood on. You just sprinted in the pouring rain towards me. You caught me off guard, but I unlocked the doors just as you reached for the handle.

            Then, you got in my car. It was weird having you in the passenger seat, because you were nothing like the boy who gave me blisters. Before I could lay down the rules and tell you to buckle up, you reached over and changed the radio station.

            I didn’t even know you.

            And you touched my radio.

            My right hand sat frozen on the gear stick, and we sat there for a minute, listening to the rain pitter-patter outside and the squeaks of my windshield wipers and the vibrations of the pop song, blasting against my foggy windows.

            “What’s wrong?” you asked me innocently, clearly unaware of the effect you had on me.

            I shrugged because I was probably just overreacting.

            “Nothing,” was all I said. I gripped the steering wheel hard and put the car in drive. We listened to that obnoxious pop song the entire way.

            And that’s when I knew… I was in trouble.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

            “Why is it so crowded in here? It’s a Wednesday,” you said, baffled at the long line that reached all the way to the door and the lack of sufficient seating.

            I really wanted to give you a witty reply about coffee tasting better on hump days, but we were only friends of friends and it was too soon.