I don't even remember how we became friends. There must have been some point where we bonded over anime, otherwise we didn't seem to have much in common. I was a transfer student, widely disliked for reasons beyond me (aside from making friends with the "smelly kid," one of my only true friends for the next year or so) but there must have been some other reasons. To this day, I firmly believe that children aren't cruel for no reason, although I certainly had reasons to think otherwise.

Either way, we became friends. I was sort of, but not really, integrated with your other friends, who I was too naive to see how they always seemed to look at me with some air of annoyance. I was desperate for friends, and I seemed to finally have them. You started dating your boyfriend at the time, who I remember being constantly unimpressed with, with his tendency to ask people to share their food: "Food for the starving child?" Part of me bitterly wondered if he'd ever had to live on Michelina's frozen macaroni and cheese like I had.

Middle school is that awkward phase where puberty is starting to hit and you start to make discoveries about yourself. Middle school was the awkward phase where I thought I was in love with you. On a school trip to the bowling alley, I felt confident to admit it. One of your "friends" blabbed. Things got awkward. I let it slide; it was no skin off my back.

We parted ways, mostly due to the good amount of time I spent crying when you had to make one of your friends crush my heart in the cruelest way. Really, having someone yell at someone half their size about how annoying they are is not the best way to tell someone you need space, but I digress.

I moved on. I grew up. The best moment of my pre-teen years came the day that I left that school. I thought I saw you again at the Barnes & Noble in East Towne Mall a few years later, but the quiet, "Um," I vocalized in your direction went unnoticed, and the moment slipped away.

I have no idea where you are now. Part of me doesn't care. There was fault on both sides, but I do have to say this: thank you. You at least gave me the decency to let me down easy with what was my very first crush on another girl. It helped me come to terms with who I am, and kept me from being afraid of being unnatural just because I like girls.

"Hiraeth" is a Welsh term, one of the elusive 'untranslatable' emotions. There's no one word in English to describe it. The closest we may ever get is "a homesickness for a home to which you cannot return, or a home which maybe never was."

Sometimes I wonder how life would be different if I'd understood, or if we'd both understood. I wonder what I might've said if you'd turned around to face me between aisles of books, or if I would have been able to say anything at all.

Either way, I salute you. The first love of someone unashamed to say she liked girls. I can only hope that your life has been as enriching and educational as mine has been the past few years.