Breaking Boys 3 (reprise)

The Football Player

"There was the boy who was perfect but slow with affection. He the first boy who listened to me, respected me, and thought I was interesting. After I got frusterated with his lack of affection towards me, he was the one who thanked me for breaking his heart; it made him see that he must listen to god, he said; and then he invited me to make gingerbread houses at his house. He was the boy my mom wanted me to be with, even years later. He was the boy I asked god if I could marry."


The blonde haired, fair skinned, church going, football player, smirks up at me from the oval photograph I’ve found buried in a box full of relics from my past. This photo must have been in a frame at some point, maybe even one that used to grace my bedside. I notice the youth in his face and recall that wasn’t the only place his youth showed through.

He would sit next to me at the lunch table, close enough that our arms would touch; shoulder to shoulder, but not close enough to have any other contact. We would face forward, talking to people sitting in front of us, but never beside us. We didn’t engage in conversation around other people; we simply sat, stone like, next to each other, afraid to move for fear that our shoulder to shoulder affection would be the last we ever shared.

We did engage in conversation, unlike my relationship with the principal’s son. We were both shy, but our conversation skills seemed to flourish when it was just the two of us. There was a moonlit night after church group was over, when we sat, on the same lunch tables that had earlier turned us to stone statues, and couldn’t stop looking and talking and smiling and feeling every emotion all at once. There was a thrill in the innocence of it all, in the purity of his glance and my laugh. We were still both naïve children, happy just to be in each other’s presence, to talk about god and the future, to be quiet in the night.

We spent two months together, being told we were the perfect couple, feeling untouchable, yet growing impatient with the lack of affection he extended my way. He grew worried that the coming year would separate us, and I began feel trapped, afraid that if I tried to hold his hand he would shame me, curse me and tell me I was unholy. I avoided the confrontation that I knew would leave me humiliated and convinced myself that those feelings were ungodly, and therefore I was unworthy to be the girlfriend of that perfect football player.

I don’t recall how we parted ways, but stuck to the back of his photo was a letter in a green envelope addressed in careful handwriting which cleared me of all unholy, unworthy and all other "un" feelings I may have experienced, which is more than I deserved.

(This post/chapter is incomplete. It will be completed once I can include the letter in the green envelope into the conclusion of this story)