I Wanted to Be His Forbidden

It was finally senior year for me. Finally, the last year of high school and I was done. The last three years were excruciating. I was bullied, lost friends, and was the typical loner.

I got my schedule and went to class. The first two periods were normal; just going over the rules of the classroom and all the other boring things of the first day. Third period came along and it was chemistry, something I was very excited for. I walked in and the teacher just got me. He looked so familiar yet I couldn't put my finger on it. He perplexed me and I couldn't stop staring. When class started, he did the worst thing teachers could do for me: icebreakers. I hated talking to kids in my school because all of them were insensitive and didn't care about anything except smoking weed and getting wasted. The thought of his familiarity quickly vanished and it was replaced with annoyance.

Days passed and with each day came more emotions. The annoyance quickly passed and the familiarity returned and became fused with strange magnetism. I couldn't keep my eyes off of him. And after a few weeks passed, I realized what it was. He was absolutely gorgeous. And not only in the physical sense; he radiated love and passion with an aura that was so strong I couldn't stay away from its gravitational pull. Each passing class with him I fell harder. I was his student and he was my instructor, a forbidden relationship, yet I couldn't resist. He was beautiful inside and out.

As months went by I would continuously make excuses to see him. I needed help with chemistry, or friend issues, or the cafeteria didn't have good food that day. I did everything in my power to be as close to him as I possibly could without alarming him and having him see my true intentions. But, it didn't work. He saw right through me. Yet, he would let me stay with him and ramble on about music and movies and whatever I thought of to keep my time with him as long as possible. He just sat there and smiled at me with his eyes glittering, telling me silently that he knew.

I was 17 turning 18, and this was not a phase of typical high school crushes. I never felt such love and care for anyone like this before. It wasn't lust. I didn't want to just make love to the man; I wanted to make him breakfast in the morning and see his bed head, kiss him as he went out the door and hand him his lunch for the day. I was so irrevocably, helplessly, truly in love with him. He knew it, and he knew that once I graduated my heart would break without being able to see him daily. He let me down as easily as he could.

Nothing ever happened between us. Sometimes the spark was in the air and it was so full of tension that we both thought something was there, waiting to come out of the shadows. But it wasn't meant to be. The last day I saw him I gave him gifts along with a letter that told him exactly how I felt about him. He cried on my shoulder for a while until I had to go. He kept me as long as possible knowing it would be painful to say goodbye. I graduated and he gave me a long hug and told me, "I know that whatever you do you'll find happiness, even though it doesn't seem like it now. Just promise me, let me know where you found it."

Since then we've seen each other a handful of times in passing. The longing looks and the familiarity remain, except now it's engulfed with sadness. The familiarity from day one was the feeling of true happiness and the true, raw emotion of sincere love that has kept me longing for something that can never be. Four years later and I still frequently think about him and wish him the best. It was and forever will be forbidden, but sometimes forbidden is the best thing to fall in love with.