August 28th 2009
Age: Seventeen
Lyrik
I love him. I shouldn’t, but I do. He’s not just my best friend but more, I mean, I want him to be more but don’t know how to tell him. Last year he wrote those new rules but they weren’t for me, they were all for him. I read those rules again and again a thousand times trying to figure out what he meant by that and all I could think was maybe he was trying to tell me that he wanted more, but didn’t dare ask for more because I mentioned boys and girls couldn’t be friends. That one would always have feelings.
Maybe he was the one who had feelings and I just trampled on them. So, he wrote rules for himself about me. I want to ask, but every time I get the courage to I become speechless.
“So, what did you think?” Anson pulls me out of my thoughts.
We’re in his room, I’m lying on his bed while he plays his guitar as always. He never sings to me though, at most he just hums along with the melody. I wish he would sing though, his voice sounds nice when he hums and I want to know what he’s making a song about. I can’t guess by just chords, I want all of his words and I want them now.
“I like it, but why don’t you ever sing?”
He coughs, surprised that I asked him about singing I guess. I never ask. I just let him be. That’s how our friendship is. We are just there for each other, all the time through everything. We never question each other, never have judgements. We just support and listen….and I love.
“I didn’t know that you wanted me to sing.”
“Of course, I do. You always play these songs but just hum along, I want to know what the song is about, I want to hear the lyrics.”
“Well I don’t really have lyrics, yet. Just an idea. Humming helps me find the rhythm that words would take with the chords. That’s all.”
“Well if you can’t sing just tell me what that song was about.”
“It’s about love,” he says quietly, if I wasn’t trying to listen so hard I would’ve missed what he said, “it’s about being in love with someone and them not loving you back.”
“But you’re only seventeen, how do you know what love is?”
How do I know what love is?
“It doesn’t matter how old I am. I just know. It’s about appreciating the person you love, finding beauty in everything they do. Wanting to make them happy, wanting to take care of them and wanting to hurt anyone who makes them hurt. That’s part of what love is.”
I hold my breath.
Oh. My. God.
Is his song about me?
Maybe he loves me?
I sit up in his bed so that I could be eye-level with him when I finally say it.
“I love you,” I spit out before my courage wains.
“I love you, too, Lyrik,” He replies easily.
Ugh. He doesn’t get it.
“No, like, I love you, I love you.”
“What?”
“I love you, like as more than a friend. I am in love with you.”
“No, you’re not.”
Hold on, “Yes, I am.”
“Lyrik, you are not in love with me.”
“How would you know? I know how I feel Anson Blake and I do in fact love you. You can’t tell me that I don’t. I’m telling you that I do. I want to make you happy, and take care of you and I think you're handsome all the time. I am in love with you. You just said so yourself that you knew what love was, it’s because you are in love with someone.”
“I am in love with someone, it’s not you!” Anson shouts at me.
His words hit me like a figurative football finger smacking me in the chest. I fall back down on his bed no longer wanting to meet his eyes.
I’m too late.
“Fuck. Lyk…”
“No…It’s…It’s fine. You’re right. I’m not in love with you. Just my crazy head running away from me.” But I am in love with him. I just have to swallow my pride. I can’t let my stupid feelings mess our friendship up. He doesn’t feel the same way. “I’m…I’m feeling tired. I’m just going to go home.” I stand up, open his window and climb out onto the tree, I make quick work of getting back to my house. I just want the ground to swallow me whole. Before I shut my window, I hear Anson call out.
“Lyk, don’t go like this. Just talk to me.”
“It’s cool. We’re cool. I was wrong, don’t worry about it. Just tired. We’ll talk tomorrow,” I yell back.
We’ll be fine tomorrow.