17 Years in the Making

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Dear Cam,

I don't know when it started. There are too many memories blocking my mind to be able to recall it.

Maybe it was when we four and how we spent the entire summer together. How our families went on vacation together, and we went to summer camp, and the fair. How we sat underneath the old weeping willow on the Fourth of July, watching my grandpa's illegal fireworks and eating watermelon. How knowing nothing about love except for what the fairy-tales taught me, but I still wanted to lean over and let you steal my first kiss.

Maybe it was when we were eight and how even after a world shattering death, you could make me laugh. How you and your family strived to make me happy. How you sat next to me at a cheesy Disney movie and played with your pasta at dinner just to distract me from all the pain I was suffering from.

Maybe it was when we were twelve and even with the awkwardness of middle school, you made me feel like the most special person in the world. How I could catch you staring at me in history class. How even with how terrible I was at English, you always chose me for group work. How you would complain to me when your brother got on your nerves. How I was the only person besides your baseball team you posted a picture of on Instagram. Maybe it was that time I caught you staring at me three lockers down, only to have your best friend ask me out for you a few minutes later. How I said, "I don't know," and still wonder how things could have gone differently.

Maybe it was now, at 17. How even though we fell out of touch, we always would sit together at church and could make each other laugh. Maybe it was how you took interest in me during that five minute conversation about my job on the school newspaper. Maybe it was how you smiled at me when I took pictures of your baseball game but didn't look at anyone else that way. Maybe it was how you stopped a conversation with your friends just to say hi to me in the parking lot after school.

Or maybe it was all of these things, Cam.  Maybe it's the fact that even though I may not know you as well as I wish I did, I know all of this makes a pretty damn good story, and that it gives me something to hope for. 

Or maybe it's you. How you've always been charming and kind. How I've never seen a negative bone in your body. 

But whatever it is, I have fallen deeply and madly in love with you, Cam, and I don't know how to stop it. And it scares me. But here it is; I love you.

XOXO,
Hannah

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