What Am I? A Lover

Third, I am a lover.

Since I was young, I've always wanted to just... Be happy with a girl. Whether it was the girl down the street or my best friend's sister, I have always fallen in love too easily. It started when I was maybe three. The first time I dressed myself was the day after I met the girl down the Street, Carly, who was four years older than me, home-schooled, and fairly geeky. I woke up the morning after I met her, got dressed in a dress-shirt and pants and ran to my mom, wrestling her awake, yelling, "Mommy! Mommy! I'm ready to go play with my girlfriend!" How cute.

In elementary school, particularly St. Matthews', my attempts were fairly embarrassing. I "liked" one girl every year, expressing to them that I "liked" them, and that was that. I did nothing, I didn't ask them out, I didn't do anything. Then, at Landstown, came Cassandra, who I've already talked about. But, before her was Alexis. In fourth grade, I all but adored Alexis. She lived close to me, she was my friend, so on and so forth. Now that I look back, she was a bit of a b***h. She treated me like s**t because she thought she could. I honestly think that I only liked Alexis because she was the first girl that I met at Landstown. And it was the same with Cassandra, she was the first girl to be nice to me. That tree that I mentioned I would always sulk around? She approached me one day and asked if I was okay. That, I think, was the first time anyone had been genuinely nice or kind to me. And, indirectly, I think, it caused me to become depressed for a few years after that: I realized that no one had treated me like that, and I just assumed it was because she liked me(she had no reason to, by the way, I was a s****y, fat, ugly kid). Long story short: she didn't. And after that, I treated her like s**t, and I still remember how awful I felt after treating her like that.

In sixth grade, I was the same chubby, ugly f**k that I'd been before: I didn't have many friends, I had no sense of style whatsoever, and I was fairly annoying. So, when the Halloween Dance came up, I asked the first girl who was nice to me, Caroline. She said no, being in student government, she knew that it wasn't that kind of dance: it was a Middle School Dance! I quickly moved on to a girl on my bus who I instantly fell for: a seventh grader by the name of Tia. I never stirred up the courage to ask her out, but she wasn't stupid, it was obvious how I felt. I eventually just thought to myself, "Forget about it," and moved on to Sophi, a girl in my class. She was cool, hot, and smart. I used my head this time: I was nice to her, I did her favors, etc. And then I  had the stupid idea of asking her out over text, something that I would become quite keen on over the next two years.

In seventh grade, I changed, I had started to build up my persona as a cool guy, my wall. I wore nice clothes: collared shirts and black jeans everyday, maybe the odd vest or blazer. But that didn't really change my social appearance, people still thought of me as that weird kid, just now, they thought of me as that weird kid who wore suits instead of that weird kid who played s****y computer games(ie Minecraft). My seventh grade love life actually begins at the end of sixth grade: one of my best friends, Jake, had broken up with his girlfriend,who I'd hated all year for some inexplicable reason. The last week of school, she and I had made amends, as we both thought Jake was a bit of a c*nt([I usually don't censor anything, but I just hate that word]which he is, ask him). After we volunteered together at the school before the year started, we had bonded and formed some semblance of a friendship. I joined her posse(which consisted of her twig-like girl-friends[no, she wasn't a lesbian] and our mutual bordering-on-gay friend, Elijah), and, like I had with Sophi, asked her out via textual message. She said no. I ended up asking her out a total of seven times(I'm not sure if that number is accurate, I just really like that number, and I know it was at least five). All over text.

I eventually moved on, going back to my guy friends(ie Andy), who I'd previously betrayed, trying to get in with the popular kids. My next venture was Hannah, a girl that I'd previously been indifferent to, but was recently forced to hang out with because she was close friends with two of my best girl-friends(it's a word that I use to describe friends that are girls, shut up). I started talking to her more at lunch, luckily, she sat right behind me at a different table, so I could "flirt" fairly effectively and often. Alas, I told Emily that I'd moved on and she told Hannah. So she knew, and I knew that she knew, but she didn't know that I knew. That's one more girl that I asked out over text.

In eighth grade, I became very reflective and existential. Reading books like Blood Will Out had me questioning my intelligence and place in the world, TJ Kirk had me rallying against religion, racism, sexism, and Republicans in general. Despite all this, in eighth grade, I asked out more girls than ever before, it seemed like I was interested in a new girl every other week. I can count at least a dozen girls that I'd asked out in eighth grade, but let's focus on a select five. The first being the First Kylie Situation. In November of 2013, I went on a day out to the mall with Andy, his girlfriend, Julia, and her best friend, Kylie(these are the two girls who I referenced earlier as my connection to Hannah). I was fairly good friends with the two, despite our different social classes(popularity-wise: they had friends, I didn't). In short, I fell for Kylie by the end of our day out and after making a fool of myself, I asked her out... Over text(C'mon Brandon, what're ya playin' at?!)! I liked Kylie for weeks and weeks after that, not daring to ask her out again in fear of making things awkward at the lunch tables and ruining Andy and Julia's relationship.

Later came Amber. Now, Amber didn't go to Plaza, she went to Independence, I met her during debate(I beat her, haha). I gave her my number after we had a chat after the match, and we texted for a while, having the odd awkward conversation. I asked her out over text. BUT SHE SAID YES! Yay. My first real girlfriend(the words are together now because it has a different meaning). Now, Andy and Julia had broken up at this point, allowing me to take him along with me when she asked me on a date(not exactly how it went down, but whatever)... To an anime convention... Now, I'm not sure if you're aware, but neither Andy nor I have any interest in anime. I had to beg Andy to come with me, and even I was hesitant. "You owe me big time," he said. I thought we'd had a great time, but she broke up with me a week later, saying she'd rather not break my heart in summer when she had to move(btw, ladies: that's not a good excuse, just tell guys the truth).

Third, we have the Cheyenna conundrum. Cheyenna is a girl that I thought to be cute that I found on Instagram(the social network) while I was hanging out with Andy. She was Andy's friend and had commented something on one of his pictures. Turns out she's a high-school bisexual who can stalk people on Kik(the instant messenger application). Long story short, she was emo, had a boyfriend that she was going to break up with after Spring Break, liked me, had a sexting session(roleplay, not nudie pics), then she confessed that she was in love with my MATH TEACHER'S SON!

Then we have the Second Kylie Situation. Turns out there's two Kylies in my grade, and neither of them have the last name Minogue. The other Kylie was a bit of a jock girl, but we had a few guy friends that overlapped(ie Seth, who's a bit of a meme-driven prick), and I'd been flirting with her on social networks on an on & off basis since sixth grade, and the opportunity presented itself when she embarrassed me in front of my dad by calling me while we were at an auto show, having lost at a game of Oreo(a game where you play rock/paper/scissors and if you lose, you have to ask out a specific person). I overplayed my embarrassment and convinced her to go out with me and Seth to see a movie. Nothing came of it.

And we finally get to the present day: the summer of 2014. I went on a pseudo-double-date with my friend Cate, her friend Abby, and everyone's insane friend, Matt. On this date, I experienced, what I like to call "Insane Girls Following Me Around The Mall Syndrome." Basically, this girl, Chrissy, had been on a group outing with some of her girl-friends(note the hyphen) and caught a glimpse(I say caught a glimpse, I was standing right in front of her and her friends) of a confused(I say confused, I was turning in circles with a dumbfounded look on my face) me looking around the courtyard for my friends. Later, I noticed her following me into Barnes & Nobles(because I go to Barnes & Nobles' Booksellers on my dates because I'm f*****g weird[I had to purchase Lord of the Flies for my summer reading assignment]) and her and her friends sitting behind me and my friends at the movie(we saw Maleficent because they're not allowed to see Rated-R movies...). After the movie, my friends left, but I had to stay for another fifteen minutes or so. So they came up and had a chat with me in the courtyard, with all three of them giving me their phone numbers, but Chrissy obviously having some weird thing for me(she literally rubbed my arms). I texted them. Then she asked me out twice over text and tries to FaceTime me a lot which is odd because I don't use FaceTime, but okay.