You know those stories that people tell you sometimes, about how they knew someone for ages and really liked them, but didn't have the guts / believed it mutual enough to tell the person. Then, some time later, the truth comes out, and the other person liked them back the whole time. My best example of this is Millie, my darling number two, who spent so long being unsure of whether a guy liked her back or not, even though he had driven all the way from Brighton to Norfolk to meet all her mental female friends and be with her on her birthday. So darn cute, and basically restored my faith in men, because previous to Chris and Millie going out, I hadn't really ever felt like my life followed any cliched stories like that.
The first guy I ever liked, I liked for a very long time. He used to tease me a lot: some might even call it bullying, but I don't see it that way. All I know is that we had a kind of banter, even at a young age, and when my parents forced me to go to the Girl's School I didn't want to go for a variety of reasons: I didn't want to have to try and make friends again, because I'd found friends I liked, and I was shit with new people and pretty shy, so I didn't want to have to do all that again. Also, I knew I still liked that boy too much to leave. All my friends went to the same school together. I went off, on my own, to the City, and the land of Bras and Gossip. The first 18months, I pretty much hated every moment, more because I was trying to make a stand, and trying not to fit in. The first friend I made at the Girl's School was Vicky... and well, that says a lot, if you've ever heard any of the tales of Vicky.
Needless to say, I had left primary school, and with it I had tried to shove all the old stuff about me into a bin and move on. But I was still pining, as one does when surrounded by pre-pubescent females, about the loss of the first crush which I never got to explore. So, in a typical me fashion, as often goes when I tell the story about something that went wrong in my life, I wrote a letter. I was eleven, let's remember. I can't recall what the letter said. I know I wouldn't want to know, as I'm sure it was about how much I missed him and regretted never telling him how I felt. *vom*
Either way, I quickly forgot this dark moment in life and moved on - fast forward four years. Vicky, said 'friend', has a friend who lived in South Norfolk, who went to Hobart High School with all the other people from my primary school. Vicky, having been my friend for quite some time, recalls the few names I've mentioned around her - and on mention of the boy, her friend suddenly puts two and two together. Yes! Of course, Vicky must know the girl who sent the love letter all those years ago, and was repeated daily, mocked and laughed about for months and months. Vicky, ecstatic with the news, comes squealing into school the next day to tell me all about this revelation. My four years of forgetting are wiped away and the years of horrid nicknames and being teased coming flashing back to me: I can't escape the child that I was, and he, that horribly smart and cruel boy, has not changed in the slightest. I've accepted many things in my life, one of which is that you cannot run or hide from your past, and in doing so I can accept what has happened. But I have not spoken to that boy since I left primary school. I saw him once, when I was 12 or 13, when shopping in Tesco with my Mum, and he was with his mum, and our mums stopped to chat and we both cringed away from the obviously embarassing moment. As I got older I saw him occassionally, on buses, or around the town in which he lived and I frequented - and on one occasion I found my friend talking to his younger brother, and delighted at how his little brother was little emo rocker, and not a chav like he was.
So, to this day, apart from a very brief and unfulfiling facebook comment, I've had absolutely no contact with him. It's weird, because I often have dreams in which we are friends, and there is no awkwardness or weirdness, and he's not that much of a chav. My head is obviously very backwards, but that is the story of Bob.