Thinking back.....I’m not embarrassed to say I got her eventually. I’d probably use the terms ache and pain a little freer now with hindsight, but at the time I just felt that I didn’t really exist in A.Ds life, I mean she knew I was there, God I was the fastest runner in our class, I was really good at long jump, and swimming. I can still think back and feel that she was the girl for me. I was going to marry her, probably even have children, yet I couldn’t get her to acknowledge me. I figured she’d talk with me when my name was mentioned at school assembly, by the Principal, for winning the 50m running race at the Hawkes Bay schools athletic meeting, but that didn’t seem to help. We left for another part of the country for a couple of years, my father taking a promotion. My heart was still pretty set on A.D.

When we returned to the Bay, and I figured I’d gathered a few more social skills, what with our big city adventure, it kinda worked, we had a couple of dates, movies, school dances, I even learnt how to pash, this is form two, all was going well, until, I don’t know what happens, whats with the older guy thing?

T. S. came on to the scene and this is where things went really wrong, this wasn’t how it was meant to have been. It was 25 years later, and a good friend of mine had been killed in a tragic motorbike accident, I went to the funeral, down in the Bay, and who should be there but A.D., I’d have to say my heart still kinda jumped, and I felt a flush of embarrassment as I remembered all those days gone by, and thought about how I’d felt then and what time does to us, and I knew it probably was going to be another 25 years before I saw her again, so I thought I’d tell her how I’d felt all those years ago, maybe not the best of timing, mutual friends funeral and all. I found out that she’d been married twice now and had a couple of kids, so I bit the bullet and told her how big this thing was that I’d had for her, from the time that we were at primary school together. It kinda went down, and she kinda acknowledged that she knew I was there, but that was about it.

core | reset | home
34•05