Christopher

I think if we had fallen in love in a different period of our lives, things probably would have ended drastically differently. When I think about us, I think about the long, slow heat of summer evenings and the eager anticipation of young love. The long year of friendship before we kissed and the pain of watching one another date and flirt with other people while maintaining the illusion that we were simply platonic. I remember the crushing break up of a boyfriend who cheated and your quiet patience while listening to my anger and sadness. And later, the reveal that you were actually elated I was suddenly single and that, perhaps, we would finally be together.

I remember the shock and dismay of teachers and parents who felt I was, somehow, too good for you; people who took your grades for a representation of your intelligence and your obnoxious behavior as an indicator that you were secretly up to no good. Despite things having ended for us at the time, I was so proud when I heard you landed your dream job; you literally told me at the age of 17 that it’s what you would be doing, that you would be good at it, and you were, of course, absolutely right. You have been so right about so many things for so much of your life and so many people have doubted you. I think the vast majority of your early years were filled with voices of skepticism about your worthiness and I am so glad you proved all of them so terribly wrong.

I remember long summer evenings and mosquito bites and pools and playing cards. I remember laughing and laughing until our stomachs hurt; it was an uncontrollable, chaotic chemistry between the two of us and I recall the joviality rapidly spinning out of control when we really got onto a topic we found hilarious. We were both dark and awful and absolutely stupid and together we were explosive. This would come, of course, to describe us when we were happy and when we were sad and, especially, when we were angry.

And I remember, of course, the three of us traveling to different parks throughout the city to roll down hills and play on equipment made for children. The grass was always so cool beneath my bare knees and the air so terribly weighted with the heat of a sun that didn’t set until after nine. You would take turns chasing and tackling me, the air absolutely thick with the sexual frustration of teenagers who have no idea what to do with their own bodies and sudden autonomy from their parents. I always looked behind with eager anticipation, hoping it would be you I would glimpse giving chase. I spent long summer evenings thinking about you and about us and hoping I wasn’t the only one waiting with bated breath for the next time I would see you.

You were at every swim meet and drove to Fort Collins for the big ones. I encouraged you to challenge for a higher position in band; you had such a phenomenal sense of pitch and rhythm and your musical ability was literally assessed based on the perception that someone like you, with the grades you kept, wouldn’t and couldn’t be better than second tier. I helped you finish the very last projects required for your graduation and celebrated with you upon your admission to school. And later, you hung around far longer than you probably wanted to because you graduated before I did and, of the two of us, you were always more loyal.

And it is funny this many years later that the way we ended still causes me such pain and regret. Because I was unkind and you were unkind and I think we were simply too young to know how to handle the enormous changes we were both undergoing. I was desperate to move out of the state and you were desperate to hold onto us. I think, with your uncanny ability to understand precisely the gravity of a situation (which is probably why you are so damn good at your job), you fully grasped that my departure meant the true end of us as a couple. And, perhaps, the beginning of a very limited correspondence and connection to one another for the rest of our lives.

And per usual, you were right on all fronts. The years since we were together have flown by and memories that were once precious are now elusive. I can remember the feel of your fingers on my skin or the anticipation of our first kiss, but could not tell you when or how we finally dared touch lips. I remember our slow unraveling and nights where we yelled far more than we laughed. And, of course, I remember the slow, deep missing of a time when my entire life was defined by my relationship to you. Being affixed together gave us both somewhere safe to land and the erosion of you and I meant discovering precisely who we were apart.

While I can’t claim to know who you are in any real way, I still see glimpses of the sixteen year old you in every FB post that pops up in my feed. You are still witty and magnanimous and larger than life and disciplined and driven and dedicated and probably slightly mad. You are still hilarious and clever and wonderful and I can’t help but feel so very, very proud of the man you have become. I doubt he is so different from the one I knew so many years ago, although I imagine there are substantially fewer jokes made about erections (which would be, honestly, something of a disappointment given how HILARIOUS we always thought they were).