Aromantic

Crushes

I've never had a crush, and it's been a weird experience because of it. Even in elementary school my friends were getting crushes, though at least then I could say that I was too young and I'd experience it later. One time, at a friend's birthday party, the group went around asking if we had a crush on anyone. Not wanting to be confronted with the ever-annoying statement that I was lying, I lied. 

When I say I don't have a crush, I legitimately mean I do not have a crush. At the time, though, I was twelve and eager to fit in, so I said the name of one of the guys I hung out with sometimes. Yay for me. I had to keep up with that lie for the next couple of months until he moved away.

When I was thirteen, I knew I was different, but I just didn't seem to fit into any of the LGBT+ labels I found, and, while I knew that "aromantic" existed, I assumed that, again, I was too young to experience romantic attraction. I spent the next two years questioning due to a girl that I wanted to be more than friends with, but, not more than friends.. (alterous attraction)

She was amazing in my eyes. 

I recently found out that she had a crush on me at the same time I had a squish on her, and it was stressful to find out, but we've talked and we're good now. It was just disconcerting because I had spent a year and a half with my world revolving around her, finally moved on, just to find out that she had liked me (although in a different way) during that time.

Honestly I'm blind. I assumed that she acted the same way with me that she did around other people. 

We held hands one time, because we went ice-skating and she was a lot better at it than I was, so we held hands to keep me from falling. Apparently she was so focused that she didn't notice one of her favorite songs playing in the rink, a true feat for her, as nobody could ever speak to her because she was always scream-whispering lyrics to her favorite songs.

I knew it wasn't really a crush, because I never had any butterflies (other than the anxiety that every seventh-grader has), and I didn't get anything out of romantic thoughts, not even anything as simple as light kissing. All my feelings and ideas were based on a queerplatonic relationship, and I'd imagine date settings as entirely platonic. Our "dates" in my daydreams would pretty much just be us under the stars with a blanket and some tea, and we'd sit in silence and feel safe.

I spent most of my time in seventh grade daydreaming about her, and writing about her in my journal. One of the lines in my journal accurately summed up my feelings:

"No homo but kinda homo."