Remember turning and churning and roiling like water the night before.
Recall the moist palmed, thick tongued, planned conversations in mirrors.
My god, the hair cuts, the clothes, the damnably dramatic second guessing.
"Just the right moment." As if such a thing existed.

I remember sitting on the table in your work area, because I wanted you to see me breaking school rules and thinking I was so ******* cool.
I would tell you jokes until the wrinkles on your nose scrunched up and your eyes glimmered.
Jokes, but not ***** jokes. I wanted you to think I was pure.
So ******* pure.
Truth is I was just ready for you. Thought I was.
Did you know I waited by the baseball diamond for you to run by? I did. Did I ever.
I didn't have club but I was always at school late, hoping you'd talk to me. Knowing if I could make you laugh the right amount of times in the right kind of way...maybe, just maybe, then you would love me.

I could see it. Crowded school hallways would part like seas before us and we would move to one another as magnets do. Drawn. And finally in the middle, met and smiling, we would kiss like consumation. The applause would fall and the strings would swell and the percussion would announce the emotive lyrics sung by the pop musician with the widest range available for the budget we have.
Silly boy.
Silly.
I loved you like reckless, feckless children do. With all the passion and none of the wit.
But wait! There's just this last bit:
I love you now. With ALL the passion and what wits I can muster.
Decades later and the smell of you on the pillow or the smile your genes have given our son and I'm that silly young man again. Weak in the knees and hoping...maybe, just maybe, then you would love me.