It was my first day of my second year as a camp counselor. I had been going to this Christian Bible camp for years, and was old enough where I could become a camp counselor (or “teen-helper” as they called it.)
(And no, I had yet to tell anyone at Bible camp I was agnostic and sometimes had a very anti-Christian streak, but it was still fun to listen and watch Christians. It was so foreign to me. Besides, I did it to help out the kids, not help Christianity.)
It was pretty normal, until she walked in. I had never seen her before, she was from Texas; not a native of Florida. Her dad owned a roofing business in Austin (or Houston, I can’t remember) and was expanding it to down here. But I didn’t know any of that yet. All I knew was, when she walked in; wow. She had long, blond hair; piercing blue eyes; a smile that could melt Scrooge’s heart; and a great, giggling personality to cap it all off. There was only one problem; she was one of the camp kids. She was a rising fifth grader; I, a rising seventh grader. “It just isn’t right,” I told myself, suprised at the disgust I felt at my own, innocent thoughts. I thought of myself as a nasty old man, a pedophile. The age-difference wasn’t that great, but for our ages it was. It creeped me out to even think of her in that way, yet I couldn’t help myself. Especially the way she said my name. Oh, the way she said my name. My heart just melted when she said it. Her voice held such innocence; would have melted your heart too. I know it.
I remember those five days as being some of the best days of my life romance-wise. I had always been somewhat “romantically-inept” but even I couldn’t seem to mess us up too much. Neither said much to the other, but we both flirted with each other constantly. We also made physical contact with each other as much as possible too, only innocently, of course. We loved each other, we really did. I remember on the very last day, I found out that she was going back to Texas and not coming back, I could have wept. The worst part of the entire experience was, though, the last time I saw her. I already knew she was leaving and never coming back and had already dealt with that. I had tried not to think about her. No matter how much I was in love with her, it was probably good for me, anyway. Being a pedophile was not one of my aspirations.
So, I was holding the door open for a flood of people exiting the door. (This was one of my very important duties; being a human doorstop) She wanted to introduce her brother to me (It was then I knew she had a thing for me.) but I just couldn’t deal with the pain of leaving her again. So, as she was telling my brother who I was, I pretended I hadn’t heard her. I sadly walked away. And I heard her sad voice, “Billy?” and I can just imagine her face, see it, with my own two eyes, right in front of me. Making that sad question-call. And that was the last time I saw her, the one girl I’ve loved the most...
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