Even though he addressed me by my first and last name, I stared at him blankly, my mind’s cogs and wheels turning. His features were familiar but distorted by time—a vestige of the boy I had called my first true love thirty years prior. It took me ten or fifteen seconds to put the pieces together. The cogs and wheels clicked. Ah yes! I jumped from my seat where I’d been picking at the remainder of my brunch and hugged him, my face reddening at my delayed reaction.
My eyes scanned his face, then his body, in a surreptitious assessment. He subtly performed the same once-over of my own battle with the ravages of time. As much as it was difficult for me to reconcile the middle-aged man in front of me with the vibrant boy of before—I knew he had to be comparing the woman in front of him to the perpetually tanned, curly-haired girl he once knew.
He launched in with questions and, later, quick answers to mine. Within minutes, we’d glossed over the superficialities of our lives. Yes, I have two kids. Oh! You have three. The surface quickly evolved into the deep. He was in town because his mother had passed away. A pause ensued in our otherwise babbling brook of a conversation as memories flooded my mind. His tiny, bleached-blonde mother, who clearly adored her youngest, but also pushed him to strive for more- to get the grade, to win the tennis match, to gain acceptance to a good college. Memories faded to reality. So much time had elapsed. We were at an age when our parents might pass away.
We walked out of the restaurant. He promised to call me the next time he was in town to catch up.
As he reached for his car door, he turned. “The last fourteen years of my life have been really hard.”
Millions of questions crossed my mind, the most glaring simply being, why? But his comment was one I would have expected from a close friend or someone I had shared anything with over the last many years. Not someone whose life was utterly uncomplicated the last time I had seen him. The era of life when I would have pulled him into my arms to console him if something was wrong. Like the time his father had been diagnosed with cancer, then subsequently mine in the same summer. Then, we held each other as we cried over the uncertainty of our fathers’ situations and later shared tears of joy because both survived. That was when we told each other everything—so many first experiences. Our teenage bodies knew every pore of the other’s. The comment about his life jarred me because our adult bodies were complete strangers. On a human level, I knew how to console him that day. But he wasn’t just any human.
First love might be the truest. Especially as teenagers when we felt everything so intensely. The desperate need to be with each other every waking moment despite the constraints of being kids who lived with our parents. The long hours spent talking on the phone or merely listening to the other breathing on the other line. The clamoring to figure out how the other person’s body worked–what felt good and what didn’t. The fights. So many fights. So many hurt feelings. So many makeup and make-out sessions. And finally, the heartbreak when we realized what we had wasn’t sustainable. Not with geographical distance, new experiences, and new people in and out of our lives once we’d moved on from high school.
When he drove away that day, I followed him briefly since we were going in the same direction. As I remember from high school, he still drove with a lead foot. I envisioned the sunroof of his ancient car rattling open, the wind rushing in, classic rock blaring from the speakers. We thought everything then was so serious, to be taken seriously, but really, it was all practice leading up to now.
That night, I texted him at the number he’d quickly tapped into my phone. Why have the last years of your life been hard? I felt like I was prying, but I wanted to know. Not that there was anything I could do. I wasn’t there. And we were no longer friends. But yet we knew each other. We had known each other. Maybe we still did on some level. Who could say that the teenagers we were hadn’t been the interior of the onion? Instead of the layers peeling back over the years, perhaps the layers of life experiences piled on top of the genuine core.
For over an hour, we typed back and forth. Later, I realized I hadn’t told him much about my life. I felt guilty in a way. There had been some ups and downs, but nothing like he had faced. He sent novel-length texts about the challenges he’d faced. I typed short sentences back, eager to hear more.
The next day, I did some reading about the congenital syndrome his son had. I started a new message to him, wanting to say something that acknowledged how hard the years must have been. But ultimately, there was nothing to say. I was sorry. That must have been challenging. No. Those throwaway phrases were just that. I wasn’t there when his son was born, when the doctors told him what the future would hold for the family, or when he and his wife had to change their plans to accommodate the needs of their child. I hadn’t been there as his friend all those years, as others most likely had to support him and his family.
I may have been his first love, but I wasn’t and am not the person who was there through good and bad times or will be there when more difficult times arise. I had a glimpse into his life when we were kids, a life I ultimately didn’t want to be a part of when I was thirty years younger.
The night I called him to end our relationship, I was in another country on a study abroad year after my high school graduation. We had thought we could weather the time without seeing each other. Letters were sent back and forth, and the occasional phone call connected us for a few fleeting moments. The following year, I would attend college in another state. At the age of nineteen, I wasn’t willing to forego the allure of dating other people or exploring new loves. Instead of missing him from miles away, I began to feel the weight of him dangling from another continent. That evening, I dialed the phone. He answered. Instead of belaboring my intention, I cut to the chase. Looking back, it wasn’t a proud moment but a ruthless one I was capable of because my own heart hadn’t been broken yet. After I delivered my quick speech, there was silence.
“I will always love you,” he finally said, surprising me with his tone of certainty and what sounded like understanding.
And then he hung up. I had expected him to disagree with me, to argue until I changed my mind. But maybe he had felt something similar to what I had. Relief. If we had continued, it was possible our memories of what was a pure first love may have been tarnished by more time and distance apart.
Instead, years later, in my kitchen, I played classic rock as I made dinner, and certain songs sent me back to that time with him. My best friend, confidante, and lover were all wrapped up in one teenage boy. He would never be those firsts for anyone else, nor would I.
I don’t expect to receive a phone call from him the next time he is in town. And I don’t expect to run into him randomly since he no longer has family in the area. I do expect to think about him when I hear a certain song, smell a certain scent, or visit places he and I used to frequent when we were teenagers. I do expect to occasionally share memories of him with my kids or husband that occasionally bubble to the surface and erupt in a story. He was my first love. It’s a tale as old as time.
Lindsey Goldstein lives, writes, and works in Irvine, CA. She has published essays in several publications. She can be found on X at @LindseyGoldste6 or on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/goldsteinlindsey/