Day 71: Smoke and Mirrors

Smoke and Mirrors by Neil Gaiman. ISBN: 9780380789023.

Troll Bridge, Page 59-70.

"The main trouble with being in love with Louise was that we were best friends..."  page 164.

I've fallen in love with a number of best friends over the years.  The first was probably Andrew*, in third and fourth grade.  He was the "goofy" kid who made weird noises, but was generally well-liked by everyone.  I couldn't understand why people liked him so much when they didn't seem to like me very much and we were friends.  He's one of the only people I actually played with on the playground and I was tremendously upset when he started hanging out with my brother for awhile.  Unfortunately we were such good friends that I was no longer a girl, and he eventually revealed to me that he had a crush on Karen.  This effectively stopped my liking him because I didn't particularly care for Karen.  She was one of those girls who was a little too perfect and therefore I didn't like her.  I guess I figured that Andrew would at least have a little better taste and if he didn't like me or someone like me then I didn't want to date someone like that anyway.

In 9th grade I was slightly enamored with Darrell, who was actually an ex-boyfriend's best friend.  Strangely, since the ex-boyfriend and I parted on good terms, he really wanted Darrell and me to get together.  It never happened, and we didn't really even spend all that much time together outside of school.

Tenth grade was a big problem for me.  I was very much in love with my best friend, Brad.  We actually met on the bus.  I had just switched schools and the first time I saw him I figured he was a senior or junior and would be way too cool to talk to me.  Instead he sat directly in front of me, turned around in his seat and said, "Hi, I'm Brad," and we ended up talking for the entire 30 minute bus ride.  I never did tell him I liked him, but he must have had some inkling.  Everyone else certainly knew.

The problem isn't really falling in love with your best friend though.  The problem is not having your best friend love you back.  It was difficult for me to be around these people that I had such strong feelings for.  Granted, my definition of love changed and strengthened as I got older, but in some ways it was also a little easier because I became more mature.  I was able to deal with my feelings and not let them affect my actual relationship with my friends.  There have been other friends I was attracted to before I met my fiance, who were dating other people or who weren't romantically interested in me, and I kept my feelings to myself.  Whenever my friends guessed at my feelings they were usually polite enough not to point them out or we addressed them and moved on.  Now I don't have to worry about falling in love with my best friend anymore, because he loves me back.

*All names are changed, not that you'd ever be able to actually track these people down... assuming you had some weird desire to do so anyway.
**Post originally written June 2, 2010 to give the author a break.