26th december, wednesday, 2019
dear diary,
I wanted to have a boyfriend. I've desired the experience of high-school romance for a long time. There are so many cliché things that I'd read about in novels that I wanted to do with him:
Sit at the terrace at night to watch the cityscape with a tall glass of iced tea, sneak out at night and go for a drive or to eat momos, slow dance on the pavement under a streetlamp to the music of a violin.
I had thought I would have a boyfriend by now. I imagined us, two high school kids in love, a boy and a girl, not yet a man and a woman, fooling around, bunking classes to sit under a tree on the grassy lawn and drinking cheap cafeteria coffee in thermocol glasses.
I imagined us, best friends before lovers, making bucket lists of things we wanted to do together, and kissing awkwardly, exploring the uncharted territory of physical intimacy for the first time.
I imagined us, waiting for our parents to fall asleep and talking on the phone late at night, lying awake after hanging up, thinking about each other.
But I never found anyone.
As a kid, when I saw my friends dating and I was asked why I was single, I joked, "No one likes me." Now, though, it's the other way round. I know there are boys who like me. It's just that I can't find anyone whom I like — not a friend, not a lover.
I can hope for a future, though. I can begin planning things for when I fall in love. I really want to fall in love. I think, looking back, being in love has always made me a better person somehow. I like it much better than being loved. It brings out the soft side of me. I can forget about my dark thoughts for a while. Things feel good.
There's something I've already envisaged for when that happens:
‣ have a late-night drunk party in college and come home in a car
‣ build a blanket fort; wear a baggy, oversized sweater but no jeans, and cuddle there at night
‣ cook together
‣ make love on the sand of a beach under an open sky
‣ take a polaroid picture of us kissing and slow-dancing
❄
YOU ARE READING
Old Yellow Pages ✓
Teen FictionA girl with a diary of pages yellowed with age, in search of herself, sitting in the oddest of places: sometimes on a staircase, sometimes at the top of a slide, sometimes on the branch of a tree; writing about life, the way she sees it. 🏆 Winner b...
