My High School Romance
by Shawn Neibaur (2001)
I first laid eyes on her a year ago last October. I can still remember the exact moment that I saw her. It seemed to last forever. She was unreal, dressed in black and the most beautiful thing on the planet. I stared slack jawed, with a faraway look in my eyes for what felt like a year. I swore then and there to make her mine.
It wasn’t easy. I had to fight through masses of other guys who wanted her just as bad as I did. But my charm and wit won out in the end. We seemed to like the same kinds of things, and she was genuinely interested in me. Thus started the most electric relationship in the history of romance.
We spent all of our time together. I would skip classes just to see her. She haunted my every thought, desire and action. No matter how hard I tried, I was unable to leave her, and I often got jealous if she ever saw other men. She became my obsession.
I had no idea that our relationship would go as far as it did. We started spending entire nights together, just gazing at each other. I began to carry a picture of her everywhere I went. I was a possessed man, driven by an inhuman power. And she never got tired of the time we spent together; she even seemed to enjoy it.
My friends began to consider placing me in an insane asylum. “Shawn,” they would say, “You need help!” But I would dismiss their futile attempts to quash our love, all the while saying stuff like, “Our love has no bounds, and cannot be broken by any human means.” After such a strong rebuke, all they could come up with was, “No, really, you need help!” Those fools could never understand the way I felt.
But they were right, not all was happy in my world. My love began to tell me she was tired of my games. “But, I love you more than the sun, the moon, the stars,” I stammered. She would not be swayed. Even when I told her, “I have given up my friends, family and schoolwork, no, my entire life, just to spend more time with you!” But she would hear none of my pleas. My perfect world shattered, like a crystal falling from the roof of a skyscraper, or the statue of liberty, or a jet fighter screaming along at, well, you get the point.
She decided we needed some time apart, so she went to visit her parents in California. I watched her leave the way I watched her arrive; in a dazed, half dead state. She was gone for almost a full month. In that time I pined away, becoming a mere shell of my former self. I couldn’t think or work. I began to become physically ill without her presence.
But just the other day she came back, as happy to see me, as I was to see her. We picked up where we had left off. I had renewed strength; life was as good or better than it was before. I even told her one night, “It’s true, absence does make the heart grow fonder.” She agreed immediately.
Now we are as happy as we once were, and our relationship is as stable as it was before. I have even been able to spend time with my friends and her. And though they still don’t understand, they do admit that she is fun to be around. I want the whole world to know of how much we love each other.
It’s true, there is no greater companion in life than my Playstation 2.
[I really enjoy this piece of Shawn's work. He's being reticent about sharing his writing, but hopefully I can get a few more pieces out of him to add to the collection. This is one case where, being dad, I'm brave enough to put something up without first gaining explicit permission. Don't be mad, Shawn. We love your stuff. Share some more! -ed]