Valentine’s day is coming soon, so I think it’s a good time to talk about all the times I was involved with romance in high school. In my opinion, they’re interesting enough to talk about. I have four stories with four girls. Because I want to protect their privacy, I’ll call them Alice, Betty, Chloe and Denise (I also don’t remember the name of the first one). Just a heads up, some of these won’t make me look good. If any boys are reading this, learn from my mistakes.
My first experience is from my first year of high school. Alice, a short blonde girl that I didn’t know anything about, asked me if she could be my girlfriend. I told her, “No, I’m not ready for one.” She asked me a few more times throughout the day, but I kept saying no. Alice was a lot smaller than me, so I wasn’t scared of her, but I still wanted her to leave me alone. There was also another boy who got jealous after seeing her flirt with me. It made me think, “Does she genuinely like me or is this some kind of prank?” The next day, Alice left me alone, so I’m leaning more towards the latter. I’m just not sure who was the one being pranked.
A year or two later, I decided that I was finally ready. Betty was a girl sitting behind me. I had talked to her a few times before. I don’t know if I would call us friends, but we did have some kind of bond. I thought she was nice and cute, so I turned around and asked her if she wanted to be my girlfriend. Betty thought I was joking, so she laughed. I took it personally and closed the book she was reading out of anger. We didn’t talk much after that. This is why I tell people not to interpret someone else’s words in the worst possible way. I lost a person I cared about because I made that mistake.
In my fourth year of high school, I decided to ask Chloe, another friend, if she wanted to be my girlfriend. I wanted to be creative. I waited until I was alone with her and I showed her a paper that said “Your possible boyfriend.”. I asked if I could cover up the word “possible”. Chloe said we would discuss this after school. Later that day, she messaged me on Facebook and immediately told me that she sees me as just a friend and that we can’t be a couple.
I asked Chloe why she didn’t just reject me immediately and she told me that we can’t talk about something like that in person. I told her that a love confession is more meaningful in person and accused her of leading me on. We got into a heated argument and didn’t talk to each other for a while, but we eventually went back to being friends. In fact, we’re still friends to this day. The outcome was slightly better than last time. I don’t know, I guess I was more easily forgiven because, unlike with Betty, I didn’t do anything to Chloe physically.
For a while, I didn’t want to tell my classmates anything because I was worried they would pressure Chloe into being my girlfriend. You can’t force love, after all. One day, I was talking with them and they asked me if Chloe and I were dating. I said no. They wondered if I tried to ask her out. I refused to answer because of the aforementioned reason. They promised not to bother her. I said that I did ask her out and one boy immediately turned to Chloe and loudly asked why she rejected me. Yeah, he was being a prick, but I suppose I deserve a part of the blame too. I was talking to a bunch of teenagers; why did I think every single one of them would keep their word?
And now we come to Denise. I played basketball with her once and I decided that I wanted to ask her out. Yeah, I was getting a little desperate. Since we weren’t friends, I had to ask if I could talk to her in private for a moment. It was a little awkward, but she agreed. I didn’t have any special gimmick planned, I just asked her if she wanted to be my girlfriend. Just like Chloe, Denise said we would talk about it later. I mentally prepared myself for the conversation on Facebook, “Don’t make a stink if she says no, just accept it and move on.”
Once we were both online, Denise told me that she’s gay and that she already has a girlfriend. On the inside, I felt a little better about myself; she didn’t reject me because I’m undesirable, she rejected me because she’s a lesbian. I didn’t say it out loud, though. I just told her that I’m okay with it and that I wouldn’t tell anyone (because I’m soooo good at keeping secrets). Denise told me that everyone already knew. She added that everyone could tell that I wanted to ask her out. I don’t know why there’s a stereotype that autistic men are good at flirting; autism didn’t help me at all. At least I handled it better than last time.
As for college, I don’t have any stories. I talked to a few girls, but I never bonded with one enough to fall in love with her. I didn’t want to rush into a relationship because look how well it turned out last time. Besides, I already shared enough embarrassing stories. Just to make myself clear, I didn’t share any of my failures to discourage boys from flirting. Go ahead, just do it in a respectful way and don’t be a sore loser if they say no. I just wanted to laugh at myself and give some examples of what not to do. Happy early Valentine’s Day!