Fourteen (part 1) - Maddy

So I'm back in civilization again for a couple of days anyway. My new job is okay, but it would be better if my house would sell back home. Then the wife and kids could come down here. I do miss them so. Can you tell I’ve made wholesale changes to my blogsite? Tell me what you think of the scheme. I will be changing it as my mood changes, but I’m not in a green mood anymore. Now I’m onto an evil purple. Oops, Lost is on... will be back to post...

Okay, sorry. I am addicted to that show. Have been from the beginning. Missed last week's episode but I'll watch it online tomorrow. Anyway, I have ranted enough for now and played Drake’s Guilty or Not guilty thing already, so now it's time to flashback to fourteen. Also known in my mind as the year that started it all for me...

So I was still bumming at the start of 14 about my best friend, Chris, moving away to Virginia. I didn't go and hang out with anybody and as a result, I gained some weight. A lot actually. I did walk to and from school with my friend, K, but she was very heavy and lazy as well, so that didn’t help me any either. The one thing I did do was get a new job, which I did every day after school. And I was also heavy into my school studies. This was a good thing because I had been slacking off for a while. Now I was a freshman. There was another town who had a school for 1st through 8th grade and then the students came to our school for 9th through 12th. Well, I spent half of kindergarten in that other school and actually the kids in that class and I remembered each other. It was a good time, but still nobody on the same level as Chris was. And although I had a girlfriend already by this point (I can't believe I forgot to mention it in my earlier posts. Okay, now i"ll devote a whole post in the near future just for her and our pathetic relationship), I still was no Casanova. The preppies (who used to be my friends but then turned preppie on me) wanted me to become a prep and I'm sure things would have gone easier for me if I was in with the “in” crowd, but I still just did not want to be that kind of person. They seemed so fake. Even some of the new old friends were normal at first, but quickly fell into the prep fold. One girl, Liza, actually went to a dance with me (she asked me) in the early part of the year, but within weeks, had begun to treat me like the outsider I had become. Anyway, my way of escaping having no real friends was to dive into comic books (I know, I know, even nerdier than Transformers). I had been reading them since Chris introduced them to me 2 years prior, but this was hardcore, like 80 a month type of obsessed. Let's add one more thing to the nerdiness... I was still very big into the band. In the 7th grade, I was playing 1st chair. Real good, right? Well, except it was on the flute! I was on my way to being the world's biggest geek. Bill Gates woulda said "That kid's a nerd!" Looking back, I can't believe I was ever like that. Wow.

Then something happened. A girl outside of band class actually talked to me. I had no idea who she was, but she was in most of my classes (all but band). The honors classes were a small community all to themselves. We had kids come and go, but for the most part, I was with the same kids from K to 9th. This girl was different though. We'll call her Maddy (not her real name). Maddy was very nice looking in a girl-next-door pretty kind of way. Average height, average build. And man, she had certain assets that stood out even when wearing a sweater. Strangely enough, though, even though she had quite the chest for a 14 year old (the kind most teen boys and a few senators would drool over), it was not the first thing that I noticed. Her face was so pretty. Her blonde hair and blue eyes were exactly the perfect shades to accentuate, but not overpower her face. And the beauty was just magnified when she smiled. Her eyes just sparkled when she laughed. I mean, you would have expected nothing but honey and roses to come out of her mouth when she spoke. And her voice did give off that impression too. I am a huge sucker for a pretty voice, and sucked in I was. Because the first time we ever talked, she flirted with me. I was taken aback. She actually flirted with me. Time and time again. We were like flirt buddies. She really taught me how to talk to a girl in a flirtatious way. It was just harmless talk because I knew she had a boyfriend who was older. So we just kept it friendly. Real friendly. Walk arm in arm kinda friendly. As the months went by, however, and she confided in me how she would argue with her boyfriend and such, I began to fall for this girl. Hard. New feelings had emerged. Was it love? Who can ever know if you've never been in it before? I figured it must have been. But there was that pesky boyfriend thing. For weeks, I tried to play it off like I was just her happy-go-lucky friend like always, but inside it was killing me more and more not to tell her and hopefully take it to a new level. To walk arm in arm with my girlfriend. Especially when she would turn to me and cry cuz of her boyfriend yet I could make her laugh by the end of our conversation.

For my birthday, I had a party at my house and there were just a few people that I invited. So there were like 3 boys and 3 girls total. It was such a cool party (remember, I was a geek now). We were playing 2 minutes in the closet (which led to nothing, but was a vital part to becoming comfortable with girls. Then somehow the party turned into a lights out wrestling match in which I accidentally got a feel of one of those perfect breasts. It’s funny how a guy can go his whole life never having touched a breast, and then in total darkness, touch one unwittingly, and know EXACTLY what it was that he had just experienced. Wow. They felt just as great as they looked! I may not have remembered to mention my first girlfriend, and I can’t remember the name of the girl I lost my virginity to (I’ll try real hard cuz I’ll need it for the next chapter), but I sure remember what that felt like. But as I already said, it seriously was an accident.

Anyway, after a while, the feelings had become so unbearable that I had to start drawing in on myself when we were together. She immediately sensed something was wrong and asked me about it. I told her it was nothing. This was only a temporary fix, cuz she bugged me about it all the time. I lied to her for about two weeks. Then she said she was gonna stop talking to me if I kept up being like I was. I told her I would tell her later that day. I had come to a crossroads. On the one side was me stepping aside so I would not be in agony and she would remain with her boyfriend. On the other side was me being bold, coming clean with her and letting the pieces fall where they may. I, in my infinite wisdom, chose the second path. Not for my personal gain, but because I value friendship so much that she deserved for me to tell her the truth. I told her I liked somebody and she could not figure out who. Then after a while stalling, I took a deep breath and told her it was her...

I had not been shot down before. And I really wasn't looking forward to it. But shot down I was. Strangely enough, it didn't hurt. She was so gentle about it. I guess I was more happy that she treated me like a real friend also. She didn't laugh or say "eeww" or anything like that. She just explained how she thought of me more like a brother than anything else. It was okay. I put myself out there for the first time and lived to tell about it. Looking back, a fourteen year old girl who could have her choice of many different guys will never pick the chunky nerd. At least she was civil about it.

So I owe Maddy so much. It was my first step to not being a total nerd. We remained friends, but really , after a while, the friendship fizzled. Today, I cannot remember why it fizzled. I know she didn't avoid me or anything. I guess our paths no longer shared a common trail and they veered off, mission being accomplished. Two years later, I moved away from the town I had grown up in and I have never seen Maddy again. I just hope that during our brief time together, I did something for her to help develop who she has become today. It would be the least I could do to pay her back. And I also pray that she has become the great person that I saw have so much potential so long ago.

What’s so funny is my oldest son has told me of a girl he likes. He went on to say that it’s because of her smile and her voice and because she is so nice to him. I guess it’s all in the circle of life. I wonder when I told my step-dad if he had a memory surface of his similar moment. I also know that he was brave enough to tell her and that she responded that she only wants to be friends. Funny how things go. I just hope in the future that he can look back and appreciate the friend who helped him take his first step.

Damn, I write way too much.

Well, sorry folks, I wanted to get into more, but 14 covers a good amount of stuff. I'll continue it in the future, I promise.

B'gye,
Dirty