I kissed all the girls.
Actually, just the ones whose names rhymed.
Sounds like "eena".
That's all I remember.  I was like four.

Brunette hair, glasses.
She was nice and she knew how to swing dance.
She taught me.
I learned some.
Wanna' see me Charleston?
Her religion and her parents are the reasons we never went out but not really.
Her parents liked me okay and she started dating soon after we got to high school.
Still, she was a classy dame.  Could've been Ingrid Bergman in another life.
She owes me a date.  I have it on cassette.

Red hair, glasses.
She ran an online forum.
It was a collaborative fiction set in the world of Dragonball Z.
I liked Dragonball Z.  I like writing.
Somehow, I earned something like prestige.  Some saw me like a veteran.
Even though I was a toal n00b.
I loved the way she wrote.
Near as I could tell, she felt the same about me.
We grew close.
Fell in love.
First time that ever happened to me.
We never actually met.
People told me that it couldn't be love if you never met the girl.
I didn't doubt it for a second, but decided not to argue.
I've loved since then.
It was love.

Brunette hair, not as classy as Ingrid.
More showy, like a drag queen, but not as fun as a drag queen.
She was popular and sought after sort of.
She showed interest in me.
I didn't know what to make of that, but I said yes.
She kissed me in front of my computer in my bedroom in my apartment.
Like, for real kissed.  You know, the way grownups and awkward teens do.
I learned how to kiss from her and one other girl.
I like the way she kissed.  I like the way I kiss.
Looking back, it seems appropriate that my computer was present for that moment of intimacy.
She lost interest in me.
I didn't know what to make of that.
I think we broke up, but she was never really clear on the subject.

Red hair, mousy floutist.
I had a crush on her.  Couldn't tell you why.
She had a crush on me.  Couldn't tell you why.
We eventually got hip to the other's crushings.
Figured, two crushes equal a relationship.
We spent time together.
It was easy.
Except that I felt bigger than her.
I didn't know what to make of that.
Used to be that nobody paid attention.
Nobody paid interest.
But she liked me.
And I liked her.
Not enough.
The first time I ever had sex was with her best friend.

Don't care, don't care.
I didn't like her very much.
She liked me for some reason.
It went to my stupid ass head.
Both of them.
Floutist was a good girl and I liked her that way.
Don't care was devoid of anything worth being considerate of.
We had sex.
It was unpleasant.
I ruined their friendship.
I ruined my friendships.
I hated me and sometimes still do.
Floutist forgave me.
She's a good girl.

Brunette hair, glasses.
OSC fans unite.
She wanted to go to the Cherry Creek Mall and make fun of preppy people.
I learned that I wasn't a big fan of ridicule.
I swore off women for the remainder of high school.

Brunette hair, glasses.
Javert.
We had the same theatre class.
She was sitting alone at lunch and I didn't like my friends anymore.
I asked to sit.
She said yes.
We talked.
Her little brother came along.
She shooed him off.
I almost figured out that this meant she liked me.
We ate lunch again the next day.
And the next day.
I asked for her number.
(That's the only time that's ever happened.)
She gave me her father's card.
I called her.  We talked for hours.
Sometimes, so long that one of us would fall asleep.
Usually me.
I told her that I'd like to see her sometime outside of school, and was she interested.
She said yes.
She said yes.
I wrote a poem called "She Said Yes" and I don't write poetry.
I didn't think it was very good.
I think she liked it.
We were in love.
She broke my heart.  I broke her heart.
We did this many, many times.
We were both very stupid.
She's THE ex.
This story is about eleventy-thousand times longer than this.
It's still hard to say it's over.
It's over.

Red hair.  Short like a pixie.
She was going out with a friend of mine, a guy I barely liked.
He still calls from time to time.  I still barely like him.
They stopped seeing eachother.
I was going out with Javert.
She started seeing a slug for whom I still nurture hatred.
Slug cheated on pixie with Javert.
It's kind of complicated.
Pixie couldn't talk to me for years, for associative reasons.
Even though she was still seeing slug.
This made no sense to me.
They went through the same motions that I and Javert went through.
Eventually they broke up.
Eventually we got together.
The eventualities sometimes overlapped.
It's kind of complicated.
She fell in love with me, but not really.
I wanted to fall in love with her.
I'm not sure why I didn't.
I worry about pixie.

Red hair.  Burned to the touch.
She sang "Alcohol" by Barenaked Ladies and I fell in like with her.
She didn't sing it very well and ran out of the room.
I followed.
I told her she did great.  She called me a liar.
I asked her to come back later and sing some more.
She said maybe.
She came back later and sang some more.
She sang "Journey to the Past" from Anastasia and I fell in love with her.
She stayed in the room all night.
We danced around one another in all of the empty chairs while other people sang.
She wanted me to talk to her and I never knew.
I never know.
But I talked to her anyway.
I couldn't make eye contact when I stammered "I like you".
She said that she liked me too.
It was one of the best weekends of my life.
She went home to Boulder.  I went home to Aurora.
We talked on the phone for a while.
She stopped returning calls.
The relationship occurred to her as a "real world" burden.
I think we broke up, but she was never really clear on the subject.
Less than Ingrid would have been proud.

Dark hair, lots of colour.
She commented on my Space that my shirt was tucked in not good.
The nerve.
She made me watch "The Little Mermaid", Hans Christian Anderson style.
The nerve.
She made me drink vodka.
Nerve.
Actually, she didn't make me do anything.
I found her terribly inert in our interpersonal relations.
This put me off guard.
Very off guard.
I was never sure of myself around her because she never volunteered much.
She moved to another state.
Twice.
I didn't know we were boyfriend and girlfriend until after she was gone.