Phase Zero

During the evening Oka and I danced again, there was a moment just as we were wrapping up our awkward swaying where we changed positions. We suddenly held hands with our fingers intertwined. We locked eyes just for a second. I was lost in her perfect, green hued eyes. It only lasted a brief moment. But my heart did a bathump, and that bathump of my heart was phase zero of me having a crush.

Kalei showed up shortly after, and things went back to normal-ish for the night.

Usually within phase zero of a crush, my dreams about the person I have a crush on start happening. That night I had a dream about Oka and I holding hands, our fingers intertwined like they were the evening before, and even in the dream my heart bathumped.

I woke up realizing it wasn’t a dream. My body felt fluttery instantly.

Oh no, was all I could think. I was burning but floating. It got worse.

I was still firmly in phase zero, where I get a bathump of the heart, a fluttery feeling, then deny it for a while.

Normally when I’d have a crush I’d be at a safe enough distance to let it grow. The crush-ee would be firmly out of my grasp while I could dream about them.

This was different. I woke up realizing I had a crush on the person who was one bed away from me.

Obviously, I couldn’t say anything. It was happening too fast. What would I even say? “Hey Oka and Kalei, guess who I just suddenly got a crush on?” They’d know. They’d know immediately. They were both still asleep. Oka was still asleep, turned towards me.

Was she always this cute? Yes. The answer is yes.

I hadn’t had too many crushes before her of course, but there were three that really defined and allowed me to concretely document The Phases I went through during a crush.

I’m not counting crushes from when I was like five, because I was like five. Well, OK, my first crush was Raina Starlight. But she’s a celebrity, and I had never met her, so I didn’t count her officially. At least not enough to fit into The Phases.

Crush 1 and Crush 2 fit into a brief three-month window during The Second Awakening. During The Second Awakening, I realized I was gay and liked girls a lot (The First Awakening was my gender discovery related one that somehow came way earlier than the second). And suddenly had a barrage of crushes to confirm that fact. Well, three crushes.

Crush 1: Delilah Diare

Delilah Diare sat across from me in my literature class, which had that like circle desk lineup. I stared at her a lot and was probably really awkward and creepy about it. She had dyed purple hair (staring at which caused the first heart bathump) and bright blue eyes, which reminded me of a toaster pastry brand. I fortunately did not call her Electric Purple Blue Raspberry (because that was clunkily my nickname for her) as I stared at her and wondered if she’d be charmed if I gave her a box of Electric Purple Blue Raspberry toaster pastries to match her hair dye/eye color combo. She moved away and that kinda wrapped that up. I don’t think I ever actually talked to her.

Crush 2: Premitri Los

Because I wasn’t being chained by some stupid crush that moved away, I quickly moved on to Premitri Los, who sat two seats away from Delilah in literature class. She was very tall (a likely source of bathumping). I followed her around to tell her about homework assignments when she missed classes. That’s about the farthest that one got. She started dating a guy and seeing the guy she picked kind of doused the crush because that guy was the personification of bad judgment. And I found out she was only into guys, which of course eliminated me from the options pool. Plus side, I did get some sweet euphoria from being eliminated from that options pool.

Crush 3: Jeans

I got a series of bathumps when I first met Jeans during the first few times I saw her in person. And kind of not in person with her whole projection Cani power. Now more firmly aware of who I was and what I was about, I got a bit bolder during the Jeans crush, like the aforementioned “girls and other girls as like a couple is that a thing please” online search that led to Stella finding out about me liking girls and her being super supportive and cool about it.

One of my favorite Raina Starlight books was called the Last Flower of the East. It was one of the fluffier Raina books, filled with characters getting all emotional about each other and it was lovely. One of the main characters spoke about his love: “I have not chosen who I burn for, as my heart rings true in a symphony of joy and pain that you have entered my life.” Reaaaal cheesy stuff. But real cheesy stuff that I loved, and rereading it always helped me through crushes.

I felt a lot better before I knew.