She left the room before I could decide, and a boulder of my anxiety walked out with her. For the first time in hours, I could breathe. Then a heaping dose of longing moved right into the vacancy. I missed her already. Crushes—or attractions, or sensations, or arousals, or whatever—did not get any easier with age. If anything, I felt even less prepared for the revelation that I liked Stevie than I would have been in seventh grade. I thought I knew everything there was to know about myself, when in reality I’d been ignoring my own truth in favor of keeping things from getting too complicated.
...more
