Isn’t young love grand? The first feelings of a quickened heart beat. The wanting to be in a girl’s presence even though you’re friends think they’re icky. The confidence that teasing the girl is the right way to show her that you like her. Oh how wonderful it is, how pure! But of course, in love there is none more important than the love rival! Yes, the love rival makes the path to winning the young lady’s affections overrun with obstacles. The love rival keeps your head in the game, knowing that if you make the wrong move she could slip into his hands. Ah yes, the love rival makes winning the girl’s heart more dire, more challenging and oh the much more sweeter.
I remember my first love rival very well. It was back in fifth grade, I didn’t have crushes to frequently, in fact, I was so immature in the matters of the heart, that it took me about half a year to realize i had feelings for the girl for whom I would soon engage in an epic battle. It was when the teacher changed my seat and moved me away from her was when I started to notice something. The constant staring back at my old seat. The wanting to be seated next to her again. Oh I how longed to once again share treats with her during snack time just once more! I couldn’t deny how I felt any longer, and my feelings became apparent to a few students in my class, and eventually to my soon to be love rival. Oh poor naive me, I only realized he had the same feelings for her far too late.
“Hey Sam” My love rival called over to me. I walked over to him to see what he had to say. I was surprised when he brought up my heartthrob. “So I hear you have a crush on her, is it true?” he asked curiously. “Yes” I said truthfully, I had no reason to deny my overflowing love. “Oh” He said calmly. “Come close I have something to tell you” He said. I leaned over and brought my ear close to his mouth, curious as to what he could have to say to me, was it something about my love? Before I knew it, my love rival had set me up in a perfect position and I was caught in the stone cold stunner! The shock of the infamous wrestling move made me fall back a few steps. “What the heck just happened?” I thought in my mind. “You better stay away from my woman” He warned me before he sped off into the distance.
From then it was on!
My love rival had declared war, and I purposed in my heart not to disappoint him. Our recesses were now spent trying to come up with ways to get eachother. Each one of us devising plans to catch the other when we least expected it. Neither of us backing down. It was stone cold stunner after stone cold stunner. With each stunner sending a message. That our love was more powerful than the other. That mere physical pain wasn’t enough to keep us from striving for the affections of the one we desired. That in order to get to the girl, we would have to go through eachother first. The bout eventually escalated past just one-on-one and our friends began to get dragged into the fray. Before we knew it, we were all stone cold stunnering eachother in the playground! It was a full-fledged gang war!
(If 6, 4 ft. tall children attacking eachother with particularly harmeless wrestling moves counts as gang warfare.)
Eventually an aide witnessed one of our battles and put all of us on timeout, making us sit at a lunch table to reflect upon what we did. My love rival approached me, I immediately got on guard, not knowing what to expect. “Hey, Sorry” he said. “Friends?” He asked.
“Ok” I said.
… The wonders of time out.
And with that the battle was over. So what happened after? I told the girl of my dreams how I felt about her and asked her to the prom. I ultamately got rejected and things got so bad between us that we didn’t talk to eachother for a whole year. She probably didn’t even know about the whole dispute between me and my love rival. If only she could’ve seen how strong my love was! My love rival on the other hand? He got bored and moved on, and being the hot shot that he was easily found another girl. We even met up in a summer program later that year and became the best of friends. I haven’t heard from him since though and i sometimes wonder how he’s doing. Maybe we can meet up again, and crush on the same girl just for old time’s sake. Oh where are you love rivals of the world! It’s been too long since I’ve had a glorious battle such as that! I’ve been honing my skills, my spirit aches for battle! I long for nervous sweat of rejection! I thirst for quenching waters of victory achieved by a hair’s breath! Oh how I need to be kept on my toes! Come my next love rival, make me want the next girl all the more! Don’t allow me to be lax with the feelings in my heart! Come love rival, I await you!
(Note: Though the events in this story ARE true, my passion in this writing is slightly exaggerated and are there for amusement purposes Please do not approach me and slap me across the face with a glove and challenge me to love duel.)
