It was late summer when we first met. We were both fourteen, soon to be freshmen in high school.

He was a shaggy haired, dark eyed, boy who was just so funny. I was a freckled faced, dark haired girl who had green eyes and loved to laugh.

I was new in the group, but he pulled me head first right into it. He made me a part of it all. He was smart and sweet and funny. He made me laugh so hard I cried. When he was around, all the other kids who thought I was worthless didn’t seem to exist anymore.

He was my hero. My first real friend.

Every night, after our adventures, I wrote down everything in my diary. Before going to sleep, I’d re-read what I’d written that night. My entry was always full of questions.

“How did I get such an amazing friend? Could he be any better? What will we do next? What more could I possibly want in a friend?”

Sometime during that school year, when I was hanging out with him, I suddenly noticed that he was very “cute”. It wasn’t long before I had a terrific crush on him. Even though my view of him had changed, I kept it a secret from him, in fear our friendship would be ruined. But every night my diary would be filled with questions.

“Does he think I’m pretty? Will he ever like me the way I like him? Is there anybody in this world anywhere close to being as cute as he is? Does anyone else notice how much I adore him?”

That whole school year and the following summer I hung onto my crush, and our amazing friendship. But over all that time my affection for him only grew stronger. Then one day, I realized I didn’t just like him, I loved him.

“What does he think of me?” I asked myself in my nightly entries. “Who does he see me as? What does he want in a girl? What happens if he gets a girl-friend, and it’s not me? Should I tell him how I feel? What if it destroys out friendship?”

But, I remained silent, and our friendship went on as always. He still made me laugh. He still teased me like a little sister. He still told me things he didn’t tell just anybody; his fears, his hopes, his troubles.

I loved him even more. I went to bed at night and cried and hoped and prayed for us to become all I wanted us to be. All we could be. All we should be.

Both of us had grown so much, physically, mentally, and emotionally since we had first met, that summer so long ago. He was all I could ever want and so much more. He was all I needed. He was everything to me.

Then one day, he changed. He started hanging out with kids who weren’t so nice. At first, I didn’t care. “He’s a good kid,” I thought to myself, “he won’t follow their example. He’s smart, he knows he’s so much more then that.”

But, I was wrong. He did follow them. I didn’t understand why he was hanging out with them in the first place, but I wasn’t his mother, and I wasn’t going to criticise his choices of friends. To my sadness and horror I watched him go from bad to worse. There was nothing I could do. It was out of my hands. All I could do was watch from the outside, and see my beloved friend and hero disappear.
After he started hanging out with those kids, I didn’t get to see much of him. What little I saw, broke my heart. What had became of the boy I knew? The one who had been my friend, my hero? The one I loved so much I cried at night?
Now my questions were angry and sad.
“What is he doing with kids like that? What does he see in them? What is going on in his head? Will he ever come back? What’s wrong with him?” I wrote those questions in my diary night after night. But one question especially kept popping up over and over again in all my entries, regardless of what he had gotten himself into lately. “Does he ever think of me?”
I don’t know if he does. I think it would be pretty hard for him to forget me altogether. I still think of him, all the time. I still cry at night, for many different reasons now. I don’t know if he’ll ever come back to me. I hope he will. If he does, I’ll be waiting for him. But until then I’ll keep asking myself questions.