Dear Summer Boy,

I didn't love you. I don't love you now. I had just broken up with Will; you had just broken up with your girlfriend. You didn't love me then, and you definitely don't love me now.

But you changed my life. Sometimes I think about you and wonder if I changed yours. I don't think I did. I think I was a rebound, nothing special, something there. Something you needed, yes, but nothing that was ever meant to be permanent. I understand. You were not meant to be permanent either, and you weren't. You aren't. But what you did is permanent, the things you taught me. The person who you were is permanently stuck inside the person who I am.

The beginning of that summer was the hardest time of my life. You were the boy in my gym class whom I looked at and never had begun to think that you would be interested in me. You were so much (this is going to sound pretty lame and gushy) cooler than I was.

Nothing phased you. You were funny and you seemed to hang out with the type of people who, if portrayed in a teen movie, every other person would want to be. Not to mention that you were ridiculously attractive to me - your voice, your face, your arms, that not-quite smile you always had, as if there was always a joke around you that no one else got. A joke that sometimes felt as if it was at my expense, even though that was probably arrogance. To this day, I don't think you thought about me enough then to laugh at me.

You became friends with my best friend, Patrick. You two hit it off pretty easily - the drug thing you two had in common probably had something to do with it, but it was more than that. Patrick shared your sense of humor, your tribulations, your style. It was as if you were friends long before you met. I stood on the sidelines, a constant companion to Patrick, but not your friend. Did you even know my last name?

I didn't care then, except that you intrigued me. I wasn't interested in your attraction, or even your friendship. I was interested in you. I didn't care if you liked me, and maybe that was what did it for you, what made everything change later. But I'll get to that.

Will broke up with me. I cried for days. I told Patrick when you were around. I don't think I ever actually told you, but you said you were sorry anyway. You knew I loved him. The world knew I loved him - it was one thing that wouldn't escape your attention.

It was the first time, really, that I noticed you as a person who could perhaps be attractive to me, rather than a physical anomaly.

I mentioned to Patrick that I thought you were interesting - he was excited about it for some reason, probably because you were already important to him. He mentioned it to you and he told me that it made you smile. Not your usual private smile, either. You grinned, he said (although he didn't really have any idea what I was talking about when I called it your private smile - he thought I was being obsessive, probably). The thought of you smiling, for some reason, filled me with excitement.

I didn't stand a chance, you know, against a boy like you, knowing you had it in you to actually smile.

We started dating - you didn't call it dating, and, following suit, I didn't either, but let's face it, that's what it was. You were never my boyfriend, that implies some form of ownership, but they were definitely dates. And I was always cautious, aloof, afraid to touch you, to open up, to act. What would a guy like you do if I tried to do something as sweet, as filled with genuine affection as hold your hand? You'd probably sooner have let me fuck you than let me get close enough to you as person to feel comfortable holding your hand, I thought.

I didn't know what to do, what to say, around you. I was quiet more than I was speaking, uncomfortable and nervous, and when you kissed me, I was hesitant, did you notice? You were very matter-of-fact, but also so gentle, as if to say, "I know that you will let me kiss you, but you can stop me if you'd like."

Life was hard that summer. At one point or another, it was like everything constant and secure in my life was gone. Everything I had once trusted had left me, or I had pushed it away in moments of blind stupidity, selfishness, pain. But there was you. There was always, it seemed, you.

You were there when I found out about Will and my best friend, before I learned to forgive. You took me to the reservoir while it rained lightly, late at night - the rain and the full moon on your white T-shirt made it glow. You had to pick me up to kiss me on the bank. You watched me wade in the water barefoot, while I splashed and smiled and breathed. You told me how nice it was to be intimate with someone again. With you, I could feel the whole world - and I delighted in it. It wasn't crushing me, when I was with you.

You told me soon after that it was over. You were done with almost-dates and not-quite girlfriends. You had found someone you could have a relationship with, someone who hadn't agreed to being casual. I didn't know until then that I wanted something more from you - or, more truthfully, that I thought I had something more from you. Would you have wanted me if I had, or was I just a rebound? It doesn't matter. It was good that you didn't want me, in the end. I can't even picture us together now.

You were there the night it all culminated and I really felt the loss I had endured - when my parents told us about their imminent divorce. You picked me up without any explanation except a text saying I really needed to "get the hell out of Dodge," and listened to me rant about how nothing in my life was as certain as I thought it was. Even you, even though you were there, you weren't at all certain. Hell, I didn't even know if you liked my company. Maybe comforting me was just something to do. Maybe in the car with someone broken and alone was just someplace to be.

You fought with me, much later in the summer - told me I wasn't who I used to be, as if you would know, and also as if I didn't know already that it was true. Told me I was so worried about everything I did that I didn't ever do anything. Told me I should just let go, that you weren't invested in forcing this frienship to work, so why was I trying so hard? We would be friends, or we wouldn't be. You were a very que sera, sera kind of person. I knew that about you.

You being there was mostly an accident, I think, a twist of fate, to you especially. You were there for me because we were friends - we were not friends because you were going to be there for me. There were no promises for the future, no past from which to determine a pattern. There had been the present - that was the only certain thing, so why was I forcing it?

You taught me many things, and I don't think you know. You taught me that there are people in the world who can smoke and look dazzling, not as if they are in pain. You taught me about hip-hop. You taught me that silence is okay when you're with someone, that you don't have to say anything to grow more comfortable with someone. You taught me to let go, to not hold on. You taught me that nothing is certain, which I find to be almost a comfort now. You taught me about doing what will make you feel alive.

The line in my profile? Most people go their whole lives without ever having lived. I am not that girl. That line is for you. I have lived because of you.

Don't think that I spend my time thinking about you, wallowing. Sometimes I am reminded of you and what we had (or perhaps what I imagined - it doesn't matter either way), but I'm not saddened. I miss you for a moment. I contemplate what you've done for me. I smile. I move on.

Just like you taught me to, my dear, dear Summer Boy.

Love, but perhaps not always,
Nancy