I just found a crumpled up piece of paper on the bottom of one of the many stacks on my cluttered desk. It was something I wrote two years and one week ago, on the night before
spring break of my
sophomore year, when I was still in the dorms. Most kids had already gone home, leaving only me, my friend Kurt, and
the girl next door. She and I had spent all of freshman year becoming best friends, and I'd spent all of sophomore year thus far
falling in love with her.
I later convinced myself that there was at the time some sort of BLT going on, but by now I've given up evaluating what the situation really was.
The three of us remaining on the floor had a slumber party in her room, staying up all night. Just around daybreak, I got up saying I was going to the drinking fountain. I went to my room instead, sat down at my desk, pulled out a sheet of paper, and wrote this:
I love the way she smiles. I love the way she sings along with the
Dawson's Creek song. I love that she sleeps with her arms folded under her pillow. I love how much she cares about her
old roommates, and the stories she sometimes tells about them. I love that she loves
Pizza Hut so much, and that she thinks
ketchup is gross. I love that she thinks the
dancing baby is cute, and that her eyesight is
less than perfect. I love that every
once in a while she seems taller than me, until we measure. I love how attached she is to her purple ball, and that she dances in her room when she thinks nobody's looking. I love the noises she makes with her stomach, and the way she gets along with her
sisters, and how alike they all are. I love the way she always considers flipping her comforter
just for a change before again deciding the plaid looks better. I love the way she complains about never getting e-mail. I love it when she calls anyone cute, how she's always willing to play, and that this was the first time she's ever stayed
up all night. I love the way she misses her dog. I love the way she highlights things in her readers and reads sitting there by the door, or up on her bed. I love that she appreciates
a good cheeseburger, and that she knows the
Ugly Bug Ball song. I love the way she showed up for a
61A lecture just for fun. I love that she's as big an
ER fan as me. I love the pictures on her wall, and the way she'll stare at a game of
Snood. I love that she's in love with the
Men's Octet. I love the way she worries that she's hitting snooze one more time than she used to. I love her laugh, and her handwriting, especially those little
smiley-faces she draws. I love that she thinks I'm not a nerd, and the way she rubs my hair and giggles at its fuzziness. I love it when her eyes get huge, or when she raises her eyebrows and looks off to the side. I love that she wanted to squish the dough at
King Pin, and that she's disgusted by
Top Dog and
Crack Alley.
It's torn off there.
After writing this, I crumpled it up and threw it across the room, sinking it straight into the trash can. The next day I fished it out and opened it up, and sometime between then and now I tore off the bottom.
At the bottom you can kind of make out that the next line was "I love the way she loves her friends." The line after that is entirely gone, but I still remember that it said "It's the way she loves me that I just can't stand."