#seaons

I fell in love with him like I did with the spring. My affection and care for him growing subtly and slowly, but beautifully through the same lens. The ice wall of winter I had built around myself slowly but surely melting away and being able to stand talking to him for more than ten minutes without wanting to wring his neck. 

We blossomed like the flowers through random inside joke texts that never made anyone feel pressured to respond. Wet grass feeling good on your bare feet like how the teasing smirks and “Hey!”’s and “Hi!”’s and “What’s up?”’s are thrown around like you’re playing catch in the hallway between passing periods. I fell in love with him like I did with the spring because for once my feelings for him weren’t frigid or blazing; they were calm and collected and for once in my life I was content with the thought of him sticking around and us forever living in this comfortable limbo of “what could be” and “what is.” Back then the former and the latter didn’t make my head spin. 

I fell in love with him like I did the spring because for a long time I felt the chill of winter and in a flash, the comfort of summer, hot and humid, crept up on me and the sweetness of freshly pollenated flowers stuck around just short enough that I could never get sick of it. 

I fell in love with him like I did with the summer. Blistering heat, funky tan lines, friendship bracelets, and sunsets that emulated cotton candy and lavender fields. Our friendship growing and my head above water in a refreshing pool of compliments and endless banter. The cacophony of cicadas and long walks and the thrill of being places together without getting caught.

The guilt was fun; having a secret that no one was to know about. Sitting on picnic blankets at dusk; legs across his lap and the endless circles and smiley faces drawn into my calves by his dull, half moon thumbnails. The stars and the lightning bugs forcing the words out of ourselves. “We’re taking things slow. Right?” even though neither of us were known for our remarkable patience. 

His smile warmed me and the idea of being each other’s exclusively routinely drowned me. The fear of diving into a shallow pool, the knowing that if it ends it would end badly, so deathly terrifying that I almost turned it away. Through rainbow colored embroidery thread and lemon ice cream I fell for the goofy grins and the lingering hugs. I fell for the sunset watching and the shared childhood stories and the idea that maybe, quite possibly, this could be an ocean instead of a pool. 

I fell in love with him like how I fell in love with the summer because I could never tell if the warmth in my body was from my sunburned cheeks or the compliments he used to give me. 

I fell in love with him like how I fell in love with the fall. Football games and meeting him at his house after, painting my face with his jersey number, and homecoming thrown somewhere in the mix between advanced placement calculus and chemistry. The chill in the morning walking from the car into the school building and the heat of the summer still lingering like an afterthought at 3 PM; the sweater brandishing your arms immediately coming off at the end of the day before cranking up the A/C in the car to drive the eight minutes home. 

We snuck in kisses between splitting ways to attend after school practices. The leaves falling off the trees and hot teenage hands that possessed the warmth of summer in places where they shouldn’t have been. I fell in love with him like how I fell in love with the fall because my days and nights flipped, and when you’re falling for someone you can’t exactly pinpoint when and where these things happen. 

I fell in love with him like how I fell in love with the fall because I was convinced he was perfect for me and he would never change, just like the oak tree in my next door neighbor’s yard. 

I fell in love with him like how I fell in love with the winter. The snow on the ground and seeing the heat of your breath in the air. Ice skating around my heart and planting himself further into me; making sure I never forget our time together and what was to come. We ignored the elephant in the room of having to make up our minds. 

I learned that every snowflake is unique as well as every moment spent with him. He blew hot air on my cold hands. He walked me to my car and gave me prolonged hugs as it warmed up so I wouldn’t have to drive home in the cold before the heat actually did what it was supposed to do. 

I fell in love with him like how I fell in love with the winter and if I think about it for too long, my eyes start to water and my lips start to shake. I fell in love with him like the winter, because then I knew he could never love me the same way. 

I sat through the seasons with and without him; the life I had before in high school forcing its way into my conversations with old friends. His name buzzes in my ears like the wasps in their nests in my aunt’s backyard; the location of my many birthday parties. Parties that involved him, of course. 

I fell in love with him through grainy FaceTime phone calls in shitty dorm rooms with even shittier wifi. I fell in love with him through inside jokes and flirtatious looks. I fell in love with him through my own selfish hopes; the idea that I no longer wanted him but didn’t want someone else to have him and that we could work. The hope that we could make sense long term being the daylight savings to transport us back to summer, back to where things were good and happy and warm and we were free. 

My heart used to shrivel and my stomach used to drop at the thought of someone else having him. My heart used to swell with pride at the idea that I was the only girl who had him during the seasons of him I had witnessed and that no other girl could take that away from me, no matter how intelligent or gorgeous or sweet or obnoxious the next one is. I’ll always have been some of his springs, summers, autumns, and winters. But then I realized that I won’t ever be that girl again and that I myself will never have him the way that I did. The seasons changed and so did he and so have I.