Happily Ever After

I've always dreamed of life as a fairytale. For my whole life, I have been obsessed with Walt Disney's Princesses, especially the redheaded Little Mermaid. I would fantasize over my very own Prince Charming, and wanting to be with the same "Prince" my whole life: from Love At First Sight to Happily Ever After. I learned it was possible, but not likely.

In eighth grade, I started doing community musical theatre downtown. I was in the musical, Disney's Beauty And The Beast, which you can guess why I was compelled to be in it. I sadly didn't get the leading role of the bookworm heroine, but instead as a Cheese Grater. I made a pretty damn good Cheese Grater if I do say so myself.

I made a lot of friends, and befriended a family of one, then two, then three, as I continued to meet the siblings. "How many kids could be in this family?" I wondered. Then I met the fourth.

He was actually the oldest out of them all, and he was the one I got to know the least. All of his other siblings were so outgoing and enthusiastic. He was so shy and mysterious. I was intrigued, but not into him.

When it came to the next musical a few months later, me and the oldest became closer. We started talking more backstage and found out we had some things in common, which included video games. I later found out that he told his brother that I would be the girl he would someday marry.

Him and I began dating shortly after that, and we really grew up together. We were both fourteen at the time we started dating, and we learned so much about each other, and ourselves. We had some really great times.

We loved our families, we had the same friends, and a lot of the same interests. On my sixteenth birthday, he gave me a promise ring. I just knew we were going to last forever.

When he turned eighteen, he got a phone. Before he had just used his iPad to communicate with me. I had always been jealous of other girls, but this is what I was most scared of. As bad as it sounds, I couldn't log into his phone and see his texts with other girls, like I could log into his social media accounts when he just used his iPad to make sure nothing was going on. I was scared but also knew I had to trust him if I wanted it to work.

Spring break before graduation was one of the best vacations we had had together. We went to my dad's house down south and had such a fulfilled week. We stayed up late talking about him going to college and me figuring out what I was going to do. We planned our whole lives out for four years, and really dwelt upon that this week. I really believed he would propose after our high school graduation. Man, was I wrong.

After that vacation, things started going south fast. He was in our church band, along with another girl he befriended fast. I quickly got the impression that there was something more going on, but wanted so badly to trust him. I knew he loved me. If he didn't, then why had he been with me for four years? Why had he given me a promise ring? Why had he talked about marriage and our future family and lives together if he didn't truly love me?

He ended up cheating on me with that girl emotionally and some physically. He struggled for a while, deciding on whether to stay with me or leave me for her, and I, being scared and naive, begged him to stay with me. He eventually chose me, and we had the perfect high school sweetheart romance from the outside. We attended each other's graduations and were asked countless times about our futures.

That summer, things got worse. He went back to cheating with the girl from the band, as well as texting a countless number of girls. I was furious each time I found out, but still somehow convinced him to stay with me. When he went off to college, only thirty minutes from where I lived, he distanced himself more from me. He texted more girls, and now he had easy access to do things with girls if he wanted. He went from a shy homeschooler to a outgoing college student before my eyes.

I eventually had the courage to leave him, but only because I knew how badly he wanted out. I left, and I felt like I was nothing to him. I was dying inside, and he slept with someone else. We had been each others' first and only everythings, and now he had found someone else. I was crushed.

After two weeks of him ignoring me and me fighting my battle alone, I wen to his dorm to give him his stuff back. That night he apologized and said he realized he had messed up, and we started dating soon after that.

I realized he came back because the girl he slept with didn't want him. She had her own boyfriend and just wanted something she knew she couldn't have. He was devastated himself and I tried to console him. Why I would try to console him, I don't know. He didn't console me when he cheated on me. He didn't console me when he left me. Yet I hated that he was hurting.

We went on one more vacation around the time of our Four Year Anniversary with his family to the beach. I loved being there with his family and just spending time with him, but everyone knew our relationship wasn't the same. Things were different now.

Shortly after, he decided I wasn't what he wanted again. We went on a break and then I got him to break up with me. I didn't do anything to make him break up, but I told him I refused to be the one to do it because it was what he wanted, not what I wanted, and all I wanted was for him to make a decision, whether it would crush me or not. He left me, and that was that.

After the breakup, there was a while where we didn't speak. I eventually started dating someone else, and he was living his college experience. I hate to admit, but eventually it got to the point where he wanted to be friends with benefits, and although I was dating someone new, I wasn't over my first love, and I craved the attention and desire from him. I wanted him to want me, and I would take it in any form.

My new boyfriend broke up with me, for a totally unrelated reason, and I hinted towards the idea to my first ex for us to get back together. He seemed willing, but was I knew deep down he hadn't changed.

I eventually moved states away and am dating someone else. I am still really close friends with my high school sweetheart, and I honestly believe he has changed. He has deeply apologized for what he put me through, and says he wishes he was always the person he is now. He said he had dreams of the life he wanted, and now his dream is me, and said he wished he knew what he had sooner.

When dating young, you are growing up. You are learning things about yourself, about others, and about the world. When you date someone for that long so young, you either know right away they are the one, or have doubts on what else is out there. To me, he was the one. To him, I was a doubt.

I'm staying with my current boyfriend. My current boyfriend is sweet, kind, caring, funny, and knows what he has. In his mind, I'm not a doubt, I'm his future. It's a possibility that I will someday end up with my first love, but I have a new life with my current boyfriend. As much as I will always love my ex, he didn't choose me when I chose him, and I need to give the man who hasn't stopped choosing me a chance before I run back into the arms of the man who did.

Fairytales are what you make them out to be. They can come in the beginning of your life with your first love, or maybe later in life with your seventh. My story is not over and my fairytale has yet to be determined. Whether I end up with my first love, my second ex, my current boyfriend, or someone new altogether, I will not settle for less, and I will continue to search for my Happily Ever After.