My Guy Pal Chris

I met Chris at Players at the begining of my Junior year in high school, long before meeting Ronnie. I liked Chris because he always seemed so confident and set on what was right and what wasn’t. We never really went out on a date but there was a time we thought about dating. That lasted all of five minutes. Chris wasn’t breaking any of my rules. He was older than I, he didn’t go to my school, wasn’t friends of my brothers, and we didn’t go to the same church. We didn’t even live in the same county. We liked each other but in a different way than anyone I had ever considered dating. It was sort of odd. We would dance together to fast and slow songs. He was definitely fun to be around. But something just wasn’t right, for dating that is. No matter what we were doing I never felt like I wanted to kiss him and he seemed to feel the same way. We were totally PG towards each other.

I did go to his house once. We talked for a little while and he told me exactly how silly of a little girl I was. At one point we ended up on his parents living room floor in a tickle fight. I told him to stop since tickle fights usually end badly. I cannot control my muscles when I am being tickled! They move involuntary. Chris got a black eye. He complained to his mom and she said “Well, you should have been talking nicely on the couch instead of trying to tickle her to death.” She turned and smiled at me. I had to laugh! She was on my side. When she left the room he looked over at me with a pack of frozen peas over his eye. I stuck my tongue out at him and giggled “Told ya so. You were warned.”

We were never a boyfriend/girlfriend match. More like rivalry relatives. We played devils advocate with each other all the time. It was FUN! We always laughed when one of us had made our point, no matter which one it was or how ridiculous the “winning" point was.

When I told Chris that Ronnie and I were engaged he actually laughed. He really thought I was kidding. Chris thinking it was a joke actually made tears well up in my eyes. He then knew I wasn’t kidding. Solemnly, he said “Is there anyway you can get out of it without hurting him too much?” I looked down at the ground and shook my head. I didn’t want to get out of it. I was happy to be Ronnie’s fiancé. I knew I wanted to marry him and spend the rest of my life with him. How could Chris be like this when it was so important and real? I was very disappointed in Chris’s reaction. Did I expect him to be thrilled? No. I just didn’t expect him to go right to breaking it off immediately.

I at least expected a little tiny bit of encouragement from Chris. He thought Ronnie was a great guy and actually had a good effect on me. Then he said “We are all so young. You don’t know what you are giving up. How can you settle on getting married now? There is so much you need to do before you decide to get married, to anyone.” Chris knew I was hurting from his reaction due to the silent tears that were starting to fall down my cheeks. He took a deep breath then hugged me. “Well, if it’s what you want… Ok, you always want your way.” I had buried my teary face against his chest but he held my chin and pushed it up so he could see my face. Looking down at me and half laughing he said “What am I going to do with you? You are such a brat, use to getting your way. Ronnie is a great guy. He is lucky to have you.” I smiled and hugged him back.