Love at First Sight

Someone has asked for my “love story” with my hubby, so here it is. It’s a long one, and I’m going to have to break it into parts so as to not overwhelm my readers.

Love At First Sight

I call it that, but neither of us knew that’s what it was. I met Brian in a hallway of our High School. We were introduced to each other by my boyfriend at the time, who also happened to be one of Brian’s best friends. There was something about Brian from the very beginning that had my attention, though I was already in a serious relationship at the time. We became fast friends and I was gladly accepted to the “group”. I got to hang out with him almost every day after school and during my Junior year (his Senior year) we had classes that were right next to each other, so we chatted in the halls frequently and even ended up on our Great America Field Trip together. Again, this was a totally platonic friendship we had, both of us were ignoring what other people thought was an obvious connection, but we were happily just hanging out.

During my last semester as a Junior I received 3 letters from Brian. As a close, close friend he was starting to notice that my boyfriend was treating me less than kindly and he had a growing issue with it. I was “happy” so I pushed it off. In the last of the three letters Brian admitted that he loved me in that way. I didn’t know what to say, I was in love with my boyfriend, how could Brian love me? It did not change our relationship though, I knew I still wanted to retain our friendship, so I never mentioned it to him.

A few months later Brian went off to college and though he was 3 hours away and I was in my Senior year of High School, I never stopped thinking of him. I only got to talk to him for 30 minutes every other month or so when I remembered to call him and I truly missed the friendship we had built. He came home for the summer and we saw each other a few times, but he had made new college friends that I didn’t know and our relationship was fading.

When he went back to school his 2nd year, we spoke even less and I had let my relationship with my boyfriend consume all of my time. The time between then and when he came home sick is a blur. I don’t remember anything from that gap about him and I. The clearest memory I have is when I found out he was home for an extended period of time his 3rd year into college. He had come home because he was really ill and was undergoing all sorts of tests to try and find a cause. I didn’t start spending any significant time with him until he was in the middle of his “recovery”. My boyfriend and I were drifting and I was finally starting to see what Brian had said in those letters 2 years earlier. Why it had taken me so long to see the abuse, well it’s the stereo-typical answer. I was only getting what I deserved and love is blind, so, so blind.

The more time I spent with Brian the more our friendship started to come back, much the chagrin of my boyfriend who was no longer speaking to Brian. It was just like old times with him and it was so comfortable. The more time I spent with him, the more I began to realize what my heart had felt all along.

One night as I was dropping Brian off at home, we were chatting in my car in his driveway. We were laughing about something or another and I was teasing him that I should just kiss him to see what he would do. He laughed and I did it. I hadn’t felt so many butterflies in my stomach in over 4 years (the time I’d been dating the other guy). I knew I shouldn’t have done it, but I am so glad I did.

Still being in a relationship I wasn’t happy with, I decided I needed to end it. We were moving in two very opposite directions and I wasn’t being treated like I deserved to be. Leaving him, though, would prove to be one of the most difficult things I’ve had to do (more on that in a separate post).

The night before I actually broke up with him, we had a huge fight and I ended up crying on the shoulder of Brian. He was always there for me, as ridiculous as half the stuff I went through was, he never judged me, just always consoled me. That night, we made love for the first time and it was the most wonderful thing. I know that means that I cheated on my boyfriend, but in my mind, my relationship with him was over months before that. That doesn’t make it right and I won’t forgive myself for not having a little more restraint.

The next part of the story is to be continued in another post…