Finding Love: Tales from a Gay Millennial

Chapter 1: Trent

I was in fifth grade when I apparently had my first boy crush.

I was a scout, and so I go out camping and stuff.

At one camping activity, I met this cute boy and I just couldn't explain this subtle feeling of joy whenever I saw him.

His name was Trent.

Trent was a handsome boy. Fair skin, pink lips, good boyish looks. He was very charming. He's kinda quiet though. Unlike me who was a bit playful and a big walking smiling emoji, he was rather reserved.

During the camp activities, he actively participated, and so did I, but he did so with a serious face – a handsomely serious face.

I don't recall if we were ever grouped together but all I can remember is that at each time he was nearby, I couldn't resist smiling. When we were in a station at the same time, I showed off a bit so he'd noticed me.

But as a young boy, I dismissed the feeling as just plain wanting a cute boy to be my friend, thinking at that time that it's wrong to have a crush on a boy. Coming from another school, I won't see him anyway.

After that, my life just went on as a normal lad. I played, watched cartoons, attended classes, joined some sports, had girl crushes, and more.

I remember even trying to give one of my girl crushes a bracelet, and was denied. It would have been my first heartbreak except that I kinda made a love letter in first grade and got dumped already.

Trent became nothing but a memory that I was pretty sure I'll never even recall.

Sixth grade came and went, and I was ready for high school.

I want to say this is going to be a bigger school now, but the high school I got into was rather exclusive so the population was not even half of my grade school. Nevertheless, high school is definitely going to be a different experience and I'm excited!

There I was, in my first day of high school. Panicking a bit because I have a weird history of epistaxis during first days of school. Yeah, my nose bleeds to welcome me to a new school year.

Fingers crossed, I was focused on telling my body to act normal for once. What's worse is that I am in front of the line as I was the shortest in class.

It was noisy, especially with the upper batches as they missed each other over the summer break. Some of my classmates were trying to make friends already, while I'm trying hard not make a bad impression of myself on day 1 of high school. One wrong move and I would have a nickname for the next 4 years.

All of a sudden, everyone went quiet.

"Good morning," says a woman over a microphone. "I am Ms. Lily, school administrator," she introduced herself.

"Together with your brothers and sisters in the upper classes, I welcome our freshmen to South Valley High," Miss Lily continued. "Let's begin the morning ceremonies with our national anthem."

And so I composed myself, or at least that's what I would like to say because deep inside, I'm still trying to keep my entire system calm.

And so four scouts came out, carrying a flag to be raised.

One of them look oddly familiar.

Throughout the national anthem, I was thinking who the boy was.

And almost failing to stop myself from letting out a loud "aha", I got knocked back into my senses and realized that almost right in front of me was Trent. And boy, is adolescence doing him a good favor!