I'll just start at the beginning.
The first time I met Sacha was at Year 7 camp. To be honest, he had long hair and an earring so I wasn't entirely sure if he was a girl or a boy. The name Sacha (which I actually love) didn't really help with this either. But he ended up being in my class after camp so I found out pretty soon that Sacha was a guy. Some of the teachers had problems with this to, but eventually everyone got used to it. To clarify, he doesn't wear the earring anymore and has cut his hair short so there's no mistaking it now.
Anyway, I was in his class for the whole of year 7 (7T REPRESENT) and one day in term 1 I was looking around the room in Science, judging people as you do. And until then I hadn't really noticed Sacha, he's pretty quite except when he's around friends. But I kind of really noticed him for the first time that day. And I realised that he was actually pretty nice, smart and I won't bore you with descriptions but good-looking too (as always.) I started thinking about what type of person he was, what he was like around friends, that sort of thing. I can't remember the exact moment I realised I liked him but I remember the first time I told someone.
I was never really secret with these sorts of things. My friend Taelah was kind of the leader of the group I was in, and thinking back on it now, I'm not entirely sure if she even liked me. But now I'm becoming friends with her again after a long period of sort of ignoring eachother (accidental on my side.) Anyway, I told her when we were at sevvie sport and at first she didn't really look to interested, but she ended up kind of telling everyone so I'm sure she was partly. A few weeks after that I think I told two more people I was actually pretty close to, if I was close to anyone in that group, and I'm sure they wouldn't tell anyone. A few weeks after that, I had this guy called Dylan asking me if I really liked Sacha. At the least I was taken aback because I had no idea how he would of found out. I asked him how, and he said that he overheard Taelah talking about it to someone. Look, Dylan's a nice guy and all, but I'm pretty sure he didn't "accidentally" hear it.
Well that was the start of a snowballing disaster. Soon, everyone in that group found out, and after a while I had no choice as a sevvie to ask him out, awkwardly like sevvies do. I was pretty nervous that day, and I had told a few friends I was going to do it. By lunch, one of my friends asked me if I wanted her to go and ask for me. I felt a bit pressured by everyone so I said yes, even if I didn't really want her to. So she and a considerably sized posse went down to where he sat while I sat with my actual good friend Cinekha. I remember it vividly, just her and I sitting in silence until the posse came back and told me " He doesn't want to be in a relationship at the moment."
That was pretty hard. On the bus that afternoon I listened to sad songs and was about as depressed as I've ever been, which you know, isn't much.
I basically avoided him for the rest of the year. Word spread though, and two months later I still had people asking me if I asked Sacha out. It was a little embarrassing.
Anyway, I avoided him for a long time actually. At the time I felt like I really needed to talk to someone, so my friends from primary school who go to a different school now got the biggest brunt of it. After a while one got sick of me talking about him all the time, but the other stayed really interested pretty much the whole way through, which I'm glad of.
Into year 8 and nothing happened. Actually, I started falling in love with the idea of him. I didn't realise it at first, so it went on for a long time. Probably the whole of year 8.
The start of year 9 was similar, but towards the second half I realised that I wasn't liking Sacha at all, I liked the idea of him in my head. So I started to rethink everything, and I learned to control myself and my ideas. In August, we went to Year 9 camp and that was the camp at which after lengthy discussions I decided I was going to tell him that I still liked him. Camp was great, I actually sort of talked to him because my wonderful friend Jamilla is friends with him
and his group. It was still pretty awkward though. However, I do remember this one day we were at the high ropes course and I looked up at him sort of sitting on this tiny platform waiting for someone to finish an obstacle, looking off in the distance, and everything hit me, hard.
It was a long time though before I actually told him though. Talking to Jesse, I realised I wasn't just liking him. I was in love with him, and I know it sounds ridiculous at 14 but I truly believe it.
In December I finally told him. One morning before the school library opened I saw him sitting outside the library with his laptop, and it took me about 5 minutes to push myself to do it. I asked if I could speak to him outside on the bridge, and he looked a bit confused and apprehensive. My voice was shaking, but I told him that I had never stopped liking him and I still did. I asked him if he had ever liked me. I know it sounds like a stupid thing to do but I had thought about this and I came to the conclusion that I just had to be upfront because of our "history". I remember watching him grip the handle rail of the bridge and looking down to the side as if he was in pain. Finally, after what seemed like an age he said "I'm sorry, I can't answer that right now." I felt like I was in a trance, I said something about being friends after this, spun around and walked away. I didn't look back , but I wasn't angry or sad or anything really. I had spent so much time thinking, that I had prepped myself for every answer possible. I wasn't sad, I was actually kind of happy that I had some sort of closure. Remember what I said about loving him? Well, I've realised that it doesn't particularly need to be requited for it to still be love. I'll still love him, as long as he's happy, I'm content.
After all that we avoided eachother some more. I kept vowing to say hi, break the ice or something but I never did it.
Then Bush School came. Bush School is weird because it throws away all of those social conventions you're used to at school, and suddenly everyone in the year is friends with everyone. One the bus once, I smiled at him and he smiled back, which was amazing. Once again, Jamilla was wonderful. Well, kind of. At the beach on Thursday Jesse and I were swimming, and we went a bit deeper to be with other people. Jesse can't tread water very well, so she was on my back because I'm taller than her. Suddenly, it got really deep and whenever Jesse was on my back, I couldn't stay afloat but when she was off, she couldn't either. We were trapped in this cycle, and when it started to get bad, when I was actually swallowing water and couldn't really breathe I yelled out to Jamilla who was a few metres away. I don't know what went through her head, but she decided that this was a good time to get me to have a conversation with my senpai. WHAT THE HELL. Because of her ridiculous reaction, Jesse and I couldn't stop laughing which didn't really help in the drowning department. I could see Jamilla talking to Sacha while absent-mindedly staring at us, and Sacha had this look on his face like "Aren't you going to help them?" But he didn't help us either! Finally, Jesse and I managed to float our way back to where I could stand, and I can't exactly remember what I said, but I said something along the lines of "Okay, small drowning period over." Which made him laugh. I MADE HIM LAUGH. Now Jamilla's taking all the credit for breaking the ice and what not, but you know, I probably would have preferred her to help us. But I'm glad that it happened now that it has though. Later on, he gave Jesse a board to float on, which was really nice. I said thank you, but he still looked a little bit awkward around me.
That night, Ben (friends with Jamilla and Sacha) started doing these card readings, which were pretty stupid but it was a lot of fun. I think I ended up killing 8 people according to him, and Chanse fell in love with a black lesbian girl. Finally, the ice had broken, I was able to hang with that group without it being awkward and it was loads of fun!
Then Jamilla had to read Sacha's cards... Never forget. Chanse whispered for her to do something Clasha (ship name) and for God's sake she did. She said that he would have 9 children with someone who has seven letters in their last name. I HAVE SEVEN LETTERS IN MY LAST NAME. Straight away I started going MAYDAY! MAYDAY! in my head. At least Chanse and Jamilla have seven letters too, but I think it was pretty damn obvious to both of us what Jamilla meant. We both quickly changed subjects and I could tell he was avoiding the topic. And who could blame him?
I was afraid that the card incident was going to make things even more awkward when we got back to school. But you wouldn't believe my happiness on the Wednesday when I asked if anyone wanted to go to the Asian grocery shop across the road before school. Quite a few people said yes, but he was one!
I'm so glad that the awkwardness has not returned. I intend to keep it that way, and I really just want to get to know him more right now.
I still believe I'm in love with him. I don't think that's going to change quickly. But the fact that I can now hang out with him and his friends without it being terrible is so fantastic!
So, that was the story of my senpai. Hopefully it gave you some background to future posts, and you can get an idea of what's been happening. 3 straight years of this madness. I don't know how I'm going to cope if there's more to come.
"Ladies and gentleman we are crashing. Please enjoy the ride."
