I was always by myself in school. Not because the thought of having a friend was not appealing but because of the many stories I've heard about friends in highschool from my sister.
My eldest sister always taught us life experiences from what she had been through and I trusted her so much because I looked up to her. Well, my policy of no friends changed in high school when I met the one and only Gerald Osifo.
I can remember that day so vividly. It was a rainy Tuesday morning with dark gray clouds and the echo of thunder rumbling in the sky. The entire classroom was quiet and the only thing that could be heard was the rustling of leaves outside and the trees humming and shaking their leaves due to the effortless whistle of the wind. Suddenly, a bark of laughter echoed down the hallway and directed my attention to it. I saw the most handsome boy I had ever encountered with white set of teeth which were held up by braces, shaggy brown hair and pale gray eyes.
I was as if I was caught up in a trance and my eyes pierced into his skull like hot lasers so I wasn't really surprised when he turned to look at me. I couldn't look away as I was too intrigued to actually do so.
"Hey beautiful!"
He hollered from down the hallway and I turned into a puddle.
"Hi! What's your name?"
I said with so much confidence as I could muster.
"I'm Gerald. And you? Do you have a name or should I call you mine?"
He said with a smirk itching at the corner of his lips.
"Wow…smooth, I like. Anyways, my name is Gift"
I managed to say without stuttering and embarrassing myself. I then noticed my environment and saw that he had moved over to the classroom where I was. The grey walls seemed darker due to the weather and chairs and tables lined up in different sections. The teacher was at the corner sleeping and other students were watching the interaction I was having with the boy who I now know as Gerald.
"So want to be friends?"
He said, raising his left brow up. No action has seemed so perfect to me like him raising his brow up.
"My elder sister says friends would lead me to destruction and I am better off without any"
I said with a shrug of my shoulders. I really wanted to be friends with him but I decided I would not just accept it so easily.
"Well I don't think that's applicable to the male gender since it's the females that like to gossip a lot"
"Well I my dad says I should not be friends with the male gender till I'm thirty"
I countered back. My dad doesn't favor the idea of being friends with the opposite gender because he feels they will take his little princesses away.
"So we can't be friends then?"
The little light of hope on his face was broken and I felt so bad.
"Look Gerald, I'll think about it okay?"
I don't know what's there to think about but I just had to say something. Gerald took my hands in his, and pecked the back of my hands.
"I'll see you around beautiful"
He said with the same familiar smirk on his face. I felt so hyper and it seemed as if my heart leaped out of my chest due to the kind of joy I felt within me. I started feeling the tingles and I remember what my sister had said about tingles.
"You know those tingles you get when you're with a boy and you feel you're in love? That's common sense leaving your body."
This was the day her second ever boyfriend broke up with her. She was so angry and blamed herself continuously for ever falling in love with a baboon, her words not mine.
Well, maybe I should have just listened to my sister about the tingly feelings and maybe I should have noticed that it was all too good to be true and my own love story wouldn't end up like a regular Wattpad novel. Instead, it would end with heartbreak, pain and regret.
I agreed to be friends. I wrote his notes for him, carried his bag, bought him things and acted like a lost puppy around him. I really thought we had a connection and that was until he told me about the crush he had on one of our classmates and asked if I could help him talk to her.
"But I thought we were in a relationship?"
I asked him with so much confusion in my voice because I couldn't grasp what was going on. He laughed so hard at my question and even doubled over. I was so hurt and it made me question myself physically if I didn't look good enough for someone to want me.
"You're actually serious?"
He asked me as if he could not believe I could actually harbor the thought of us being together.
"Wow…I didn't know you had thoughts like that about us. Well we are just friends. You're my guy, and I can't imagine us being in a relationship. I don't even remember asking you out."
That was all I needed to hear for me to break down. Sounds of laughter echoed through my ears and that was when I realized that other people were listening to our conversation. I've never felt so pathetic like I did that day. I went home crying and expecting my sister to laugh because she had told me all these things about boys but I didn't listen.
Instead, my sister held me close, got me icecream and I talked about my feelings to her. I changed schools the next semester because I just couldn't bear everything that was happening to me. That was one experience I could never forget.