Yes, why does my heart feel so bad? Perhaps because there are changes taking place within. Changes that have needed to happen, but until now I've not found the courage to do so.

That's rather cryptic isn't it?
Well, ok. It seems that an old....... 'ex'?....'boyfriend?'....'ex-boyfriend?'.... will perhaps be re-entering my life. The thing is I'm not sure why, or why I wouldn't object if he did, or whether or not this is a good thing or not. I'm sure that I will find out eventually. Right now, however, it is too soon to tell.

This guy loved me in high school - like loved me - and because I was a senior and lived too far away from him, I brushed both him, and any ambitions for the two of us that he may have had, far far away. I left school, and didn't see him since. He didn't even come to my graduation. I think I hurt him pretty bad.

Then, not long after I had met Carly, he reappeared. And I will tell you right now, I wanted him, like really wanted him. He was the young sweetheart of my past back from the dead and now, just when I had begun to think of him again and miss him, here he was. I thought it was sign.

We went out on a date - yes, a single date. And we kissed... really kissed.... for the first and last time. I remember in school when he'd hug me I'd feel his hands on my back on the stubble of his cheek on my neck and I would just want to melt into his arms and let him take all the bad things away that were happening at that time. For a while, nothing short of him waiting by my locker kept me going.

But anyway, we went to see a movie, Pirates of The Carribbean I can recall. I remember this purely because I had reflected, sitting there in the dark with him, that we shouldn't have chosen a film that was so involving, because I really really wanted to kiss my date, but at the same time didn't want to miss a second of the film. Ahh the decisions of life.

Carefully selecting a mundane part of the film (if any) I leant over and kissed him with all of my soul - only one other male has ever received a kiss like that from me. He kissed me back, and I remember thinking with mild surprise, as I always seem to do on the increasingly rare occasion that I kiss a guy, how surprisingly soft he was - my bestfriend always did say I only liked him because he was girly, as you can see if you squint from that vignette taken from partial images of the two of us in the school yearbook collage... he does have girly eyes. hahahahahaha.

But yeah, on with my story. We kissed for a few moments, fleeting but fulfilling time, at least to me.

I cannot begin to describe what I felt, what I thought. Here, it seemed, was a guy to replace the one I lost. Finally someone to put my faith back into the male species, and not see them only as meat to make me feel good and relieve boredom, or to arm wrestle and have beers with.... I'm one of the lads - I always have been.

But this feeling with him was shortlived. He got on the bus to go home that day, and I neither saw nor heard from him again until 6 months later.

6 months, during which a whole landslide of things had happened in my life, I heard not a sound from him. My loyalties drifted from him to others. And gradually I got over the shock and then pain of being left high and dry.

He had told me previously, on the phone, that he had been in love with me since that day at school, and he still remembered the first time we kissed - just a small, almost automatic kiss-on-the-cheek that missed and hit lips - but he remembered it. During this phone call, he was the young shy 'little boy' I remember touching me what seems so many more years ago in school. He was the one I fell for, not the boy I got.

I also remember the warnings I got about him - I heard of the womanizing, the immaturity, the showing off - but all this I took note of and simply tucked neatly away under my arm. Knowing, and yet not fully understanding, the truth behind what I had heard. He seemed a different, nicer person around me and that change made me feel special and worth effort, worth change. I felt he changed for me. I never asked him to. He just did. And that was even better.

So now, all grown up and out of school, when we tried starting things again, this was the boy I expected. And when, sometime later he decided to pay me an unexpected visit, this was the boy I thought would be knocking on my door.

Instead, I got a manly bloke of a boy, who moved furniture for a living and drove fast cars and hooned and gave shit to police and bragged about it. Expressing his dislike for my friend, my beautiful Mousie, because he remembered some long ago distant scuffle the two had had. Slagging people and scorning 'poofs' - perhaps forgetting for a moment that despite my rough country demeanour, I in fact knew and loved far too many Same Sex Attracted people to find this amusing. Sharing tales of his antics with me around his friend, whom I also knew in school, trying deeply to impress me. I ended up thinking more of his companion than he, for at least thjs other guy was relaxed and being himself.

And so he disappeared again shortly, visibly ruffled by my comments that shot down each attempt he had made that night to make me laugh, to side with him, to try and get me to accredit him any affection at all. I had waved each of them goodbye into the night and laughed out loud on the street.

The hug I gave him that night had a tint of my former feelings for him, but it served solely for the purpose of placing a barcode sticker, from the pocket of the new jacket, onto his back without him noticing.... as dared by Katie Belle, my partner in crime and bestfriend for 8 years.

It was sad to watch him in my living room, pretending to be something I knew he wasn't, or at least could'nt remember him being - but I did spend a moment truly searching myself trying to find if I only remembered him how I wanted him to be. I wished I hadn't destroyed, in a blind fit of paranoia, my diary that contained all traces of my feelings for him in school.

Later discussions with him proved that I hadn't and he promised he wouldn't be that try-hard again next time he saw me. As I haven't seen him since then, I cannot tell if he will keep his word. I know he wants me - physically at least - and there lies almost all my previous potential relationships with men. "Why have something serious when all I want is some action?"

"Getting married to get sex is like buying a 747 to get free peanuts." - Jeff Foxworthy

I want him too - I guess I always have. Behind everything, there is still something in those eyes and in his embrace that still makes my mind go all funny and my legs heavy and I want to press my cheek into his shoulder and feel protected and loved the way he used to make me feel, and the way I have missed feeling with anyone for a while. I guess I really am the weak little girl I've always tried not to be.

So now here I am. Watching and waiting and wondering what lies ahead. I have decided to start seeing him again and see what happens. I'm a strong believer in giving second chances (it's third chances that you really really need to be my best-est buddy to even hope for). And when I see him again, nothing will hang in the balance.

If it works, it works. If it doesn't, no loss.

I'd like to say that he couldn't hurt me no matter what he did, but I've said that before about other people, and have been surprised.

Sometimes I really don't know my own self.

Sometimes I feel that Katie and Carly, between the two of them, are the only ones who understand me fully. And that's sad when you consider that these are two beautiful friends that I need, yet can't really be with all the time.

Yeah, I really am the weak little girl I've always tried not to be.