In third grade, I thought I loved a boy named Josh because he burst into tears upon hearing some kids make fun of the name “Bob”, which happened to belong to his deceased grandfather. As I watched tears spurt down his cheeks like the broken water fountain at the end of the hall, my weird little third grade brain thought, “Is this love? Is this what Troy Bolton was talking about?”.

Fortunately for you, this isn’t a love story. Fortunately for me as well though, because I think I would rather tear out my organs with a plastic cafeteria fork than try to convince you all that the first time I fell in love was with a kid named Josh. 

  The only reason I remember that incident is because of a birthday sleepover in fifth grade. Not my sleepover, but one belonging to a girl I’ll call Carwash in this story to preserve her identity. Dang, I should’ve done that for Josh before ragging on his name. Sorry dude. Anyways, meet Carwash:

Carwash was a girl who started what was widely considered the most interesting thing to happen to roughly seven girls in elementary school, which is saying a lot because that’s counting the time when the science teacher dropped a flower into dry ice. The thing that shocked those roughly seven girls so bad was (prepare yourself) she joined the cheer team when- gasp!- she had unpopular friends! And she sometimes hung out with the cheer team instead of her unpopular friends! This is just like Mean Girls! Elementary schools don’t even have cheer teams! What are you doing, Carwash?!? 

Since I was too cowardly nice to join the intervention Winx Club Member #17 (real name removed) organized behind a portable, I was one of the few non-cheerleader girls still on her good side. Which meant I was to be invited to her birthday sleepover. 

When I walked into the unfamiliar house, I was surprised to see a lack of cheerleader on the shag rug in the living room. I was also surprised to see the shag rug, because it looked like several sea anemones glued together. We all settled down onto the slightly disturbing rug and watched a movie about cheerleaders that I don’t remember the name of, and everything was bliss until we all tried to go to sleep at about 11:00. 

 Apparently, elementary schoolers don’t actually sleep. I guess I didn’t really understand that till then. While Carwash and Cindy Lou texted a boy none of us liked with the message “I want 2 hump ur junk baby”, the rest of us got to the topic of crushes. Which is where, under the pressure of wanting the approval of a few fifth graders, I convinced myself the pity and slight revulsion I felt towards Josh in that moment was love. This illusion was only possible with the fact that I don’t think I’ve ever spoken directly to Josh. If you spoke to someone, you could discover they unabashedly chewed their toenails, or thought frogs could give you rabies. 

In the two a.m. light of the moon that filtered through the blinds, while the girls were somehow still talking, I was left to wonder: Had I actually ever liked a boy? In like, a gross way?

Sure, I had kissed a couple. It was in a game that involved a group of boys sacrificing the weakest among them to me and holding them down by the swingset so I could give them a quick peck on the cheek, but it still counted, right? Although, it was kind of hard to kiss them when they were screaming so loud.

Once, when a kid was making fun of me by leaning in for a kiss repeatedly like a sexual harassment drinky bird, I had made the mistake of doing the same to him. We met in the middle. We made the appropriate fuss. And that was that. It definitely hadn’t been something I enjoyed, and it didn’t even make the cut for a sleepover story. 

That was when I came to terms with the facts: I haven’t liked a boy once in my entire life. 

That was also when I made a quick amendment: I haven’t liked a boy YET. By the time I’m 13, I’ll certainly have liked at least one. These girls are just early to the whole love thing. If I haven’t felt that by the end of middle school, then, and only then, will I worry about this. Right now, just wait for it.. It’ll happen eventually! 

….

Ha.