Outed To My First Love
I have always been a boy’s girl. Not a pick me, please don’t confuse my diction. It’s just that I have always been popular with the boys not in a romantic way but more platonically, though sometimes I wished it was the former. I was always the girl who boys sent to confess their young palpitating teenage love to their female crush, advising them on whether girl A was better than B or delivering the break up message. Yes you got it, I was the girl often referred to as the “bro” or “bestfriend”
You see I come from a family heavily infested with male presence and aura. My mother is the second daughter out of a family of six children with four boys, I am the fifth out of six grand daughters in a family of 22 grandchildren so you can get the gist. I have always been around boys so it would have been more awkward if being a tom boy wasn’t in my DNA. As my friend likes to call me in a non-derogative way, I am a Wanja-Kehee.
My childhood consisted of fights with boys who I thought were too soft, occasional stealing of the watchman’s “black mamba” bicycle, jumping over walls, slaughtering chicken, football, rugby: a typical tom boy’s life coupled with a shaved head and bruises all over my body. My mother was sure to give me a good beating to commemorate each bruise I had. More often than not, people confused me for a boy, not that I paid any attention to it. When my female counterparts cried for Bratz and Barbie dolls, I cried for Lego sets and monster trucks. I vividly remember going to the photo studio when I was 11 years old with my hair jet black, laced with gel (since I had curl-kit) and the photographer confused me for a boy. Well I wouldn’t blame him since I had a football jersey with baggy jean shorts , or as we call them today jorts and I forgot to wear my earrings.
When puberty arrived, it is safe to say I was a late bloomer, maybe because among my peers I was thee youngest or maybe my body just wasn’t ready. Technically I didn’t wear a bra till I was in form four, I can remember the excitement of getting my first bra and calling Nyawira - my high school best friend- into my cube to show her my new gray push up bra that accentuated my recently formed tits. Anyway while most started having their crushes in class five and six, I started developing romantic feelings in class seven. Thus I was new to the game just like a lamb who was learning how to walk, I was learning how to maneuver the intense feelings I thought were romantic.
Back then, my desk mate was a sight to look at. Typical tall, dark, handsome, athletic and smart while I on the other hand was tall, dark, mildly gender confusing, athletic and average when it came to books. I would chatter with him bout anything, though right now I can’t recall any of the conversations but I do know he blew me aways with his thought process. He had the perfect set of teeth, right head shape and the school uniform always looked so damn good on him. But remember, I was a tom boy so it was a sure bet that he only thought of me as a friend. The fact I wasn’t book smart especially with the cursed numbers added an advantage as he was always teaching me formulas during tea break. He always shared his lunch with me since he. brought food from home and the self aware delusional me always thought wow his mom is a great cook, I am going to have an amazing mother-in-law. Crazy right? I guess it was the minute things he did that blew me my breath away. I was the snake and the music from his flute enchanted me
As most of you know, class arrangements often change depending on the mood of the class teacher and I remember the day my class teacher Mr.Kangethe decided to reshuffle our seats, mainly based off our class perfomance. My desk mate was moved to row A while I stayed in row C. Trust me when I tell you it was the worst day of my life. I went home dejected, depressed, disappointed and heartbroken. How could my unrequited love move to a row so far? Who would I talk to? Who would teach me how many minutes it would take car C to reach to Mtito Andei if it was driving at 30 minutes and the distance was 460 Kilometers? Who would share his lunch with me? All these questions buzzed through my mind as I walked home while my friends were busy predicting how the next episodes of “She Wolf” and “Storm Over Paradise” would unfold. In real sense I felt as if I was Aymar and my desk mate was Nicholas Bravo.
The white man was not wrong when he said absence makes the heart grow fonder. I guess the worst part was I had no one to tell about my rising feelings, remember first and foremost I was always hanging out with boys. Secondly half of the school thought I was gay. Thirdly in front of my counterparts, I was nothing to look at and finally, my first love was in love with another girl and she was a friend. He had openly confessed to me about it. Despite this, nothing would stop me from sending him googly eyes. Back then I was a firm believer than ladies don’t confess their love first. I mean Katarina from “Storm Over Paradise” did that to Nicholas and he definitely wasn’t interested. I definitely was not about to be a sore loser in this battle of one sided love.
Unknown to me, my counterparts with a high observation skills had already noticed what was going on. I mean explain to me why in a span of 40 minutes I went over to row A to sharpen my pencil over 10 times and why I got quite funny when he was around. So to put my heart to rest and not affect our friendship, I did what any other socially awkward person would do. I wrote down my feelings on a piece of paper and sealed it away below my geometrical set where I thought no one would find it but at the peak of adolescent humans tend to be quite vile, curious and evil.
“Dear E,” the letter started “we have been good friends for a couple of years,” it continued. I can’t fully remember the content of the letter but I do know I said I love him and I would want to be by his side forever.I understood that he was. Thinking about it right now, I was quite dumb. After placing the letter in my geometrical set, the class went for games at 3:00pm to 5:00pm and while my peers returned to class so they can head home, I went straight home as my mother picked me from school. The horror that was to unfold the next day made me wish the ground would swallow me whole.
That Saturday the day was rather dull. Class 7 and 8 students went to school for remedial class so by 7:30am, I had reported for duty. My classmates were giving me weird eyes but I assumed it’s because I ripped off a patch of hair from a male colleague since he said I wasn’t a virgin. I didn’t pay much attention. As usual I followed my routine, going to sharpen my pencil 10 times for 40 minutes so I could stare at my love before a dreaded Maths lesson but today it was different. My love was not speaking to me. “Take out your geometrical sets,” our Maths teacher demanded and as soon as I opened my set, I knew something was a miss.
Someone had tampered with my set and my letter had been read. Half of the class was looking at me, but my love didn’t even throw a glance my way. That’s when I clocked everything. My letter was publicly read to the class when I went home earlier on the previous day and my love was definitely unrequited. It’s been over ten years and my desk mate never spoke to me since then. He often crosses my mind as I wonder where he is and how he is doing. I guess that’s the thing about young love. It’s so pure, and beautiful yet so foolish and unable to thrive.
