• “Isn't everything we do in life a way to be loved a little more?”
    “Celine” (Played by Julie Delpy) in “Before Sunrise”



    I was truly heartbroken when I saw those words on the screen of my laptop that night. Ecstatic and heartbroken, all at once. All over five little words on a screen.


    Are you going to homecoming?


    I wished I was. I really did. But I would one thousand, six hundred and ninety miles away on that day. When most of the rest of the class of 2013 would be dancing the night away in the school, I would be off alone in our nation's capital. Representing the school.

    That's not to say I regretted my excursion to Washington, DC. Oh, of course not. It was a wonderful experience to say the least. But I had commitments back at home that I would have wanted to attend to.


    I remember flying out late that September, being high in the air somewhere over the grand U. S. of A, and thinking about that boy. That boy I really did like, but wouldn't get to see for nearly a week. The boy who asked me to homecoming. I was pretty sure he liked me back, too, and that made the miles seem even further, the days seem even longer.


    The days I spent in our nation's capitol were some I will never forget as long as I live, but there was always something at the back of my mind. It was stuck there, unwilling to budge for even the slightest moment.

    He wouldn't have anyone to go to homecoming with. I wouldn't be able to go to homecoming. We would both be alone on that night, on opposite ends of the country, and there was nothing to be done about it.


    I bragged about him incessantly to my poor roommates; a captive audience who listened fairly well and didn't get visibly mad at me. I just needed to be able to think about him. It got me by when the homesickness threatened to collapse me, during the nights when we talked about our families and our lives back home.

    Looking back, maybe that was a lot of what I did at that conference; get by until I could be truly satisfied.


    I felt like a horrid coward when I asked him out over a Facebook message. But I wasn't able to call, I couldn't talk face-to-face, and I just needed to get that off my chest. A massive crush weighs you down.


    It was cruel and ironic that our celebratory dinner cruise for the trip was the same night as homecoming was back at home. It was a wonderful evening. The food was good, the music was loud, and the dance floor was crowded, which meant I stood on the top deck for much of the evening, looking out at the city lights reflecting on the Potomac and wondering what was happening back at home on that night. I tried to avoid the boys there; not because I particularly disliked anyone, but because I had someone else on my mind.

    Someone much better.


    I could have screamed when I got his phone number. I could have jumped with joy. I really could have. I could talk to him again.

    Poor guy; I probably got him in trouble with his parents with how much I texted him on the last day. I probably got him very behind on his homework. But I missed him. I missed him just as much as I missed my family. But I talked to my family every night. I hadn't really spoken to him in six days.


    On my first day back to school, on our way to Chemistry class, I tackled him in the hallway, hugged him, glad to have him back. It was something unbridled that embarrasses me to think about now. I acted like the lovesick fool I was.

    But maybe that was okay?