I have this...crush...on, um. A person?

Maybe?

I don't want to tell you his/her name!!

(Am I being anonymous? Yes I am!!! :D)

Anyway, yahhhh.

(by duh way, i haven't been on here in a while, I'm making a comeback thread in a little bit =)

I guess I define a crush as... oh my gosh, I really can't describe it. Wow. Um, I guess it's sort of like an attraction to someone, and you enjoy spending time around them? (And, by the way, it is totally normal not to have crushes or to like the same/both genders.)

And, uh... well, maybe I kinda sorta have a crush on a good friend of mine... and maybe, just maybe he likes me back... I don't know... wow, this is really awkward, even though I'm writing under a pseudonym.

For anyone who doesn't know (this seemed to be confusing to people for a while) I'm a girl. I have a crush on this guy and I have no idea if he likes me back. And my question for you all is why the anonymity. Aside from the few who know each other in real life, you don't even know my real name. I could straight up say my crush's name, it doesn't really matter, does it? 

Can someone please explain a crush? Is it that you are attracted to a person? In love with them? Think they're super cool? Think they're very pretty? What does it feel like? I ask because I've never had a crush on anyone, and would like to know so that I can write for a character who does.  

And all you lot out there who also don't get crushes: this is perfectly fine. Some people get crushes and some don't, and that's fine. You are not abnormal or 'heartless' or anything. You are perfect. 

I've had crushes before. I don't know how many of them were crush-crushes, or just puppy love, or something my childish heart mistook for love. Right now? Eh. I don't have a crush. Perhaps I sort of do, but by this time it's morphed into something not crush-like at all . . . it's more of this animalistic fear. I'll explain that in a second.

Yes, it's okay to not want to have a crush. There are people who don't feel romantic attraction at all - aromantics. And I'm sure aromantics are perfectly happy just the way they are. Then there are people who get crushes, but they don't want to, say, hold hands or hug or kiss when they get one. Anyway, it's perfectly possible that people here are somewhere on the ace spectrum. But it's also possible to just not be interested right now, and that's okay too. I'm sure I'm not very interested in getting caught up with matters of the heart at the moment. If you want to grow into it, that's okay. If you never grow into it, that's okay.

Now onto some stories . . . 

As I said, I've had many crushes in my life. In elementary school, I think I mostly had "friend" crushes. Those came and went fleetingly. In sixth grade, I crushed on two boys. One was a "friend" crush. The other? Here we go.

I'm going to call the boy E. E had been a friend of mine for a while. I like him, I do. He's cute - he's really gangly and he makes a lot of gestures and he's super awkward and that's adorable. He's a book fan and a World War geek. He's Russian, bilingual, he has a thing for pigs. And for most of sixth grade, until I finally found the group of friends I have today, he and one other boy were basically my lunch crew. E would lend me his Kindle a lot, which is how I read the first and second of the Overland series. We'd chat - we were both Hunger Games and Harry Potter nerds, so we'd quiz each other. That was a lot of fun. And over the year, I started to develop a crush on him which I mostly ignored because, hey, sixth grade. But I did admit it to one friend. And that friend turned right around and told E I liked him.

That's when everything fell apart.

For a while, I sort of avoided E. I think we were both embarrassed. Neither of us are outgoing people; we're both introverted, shy, awkward. We didn't approach the subject - or each other. After a while, E grew out of it. I don't know what goes on in his mind now, but I'm almost positive he no longer avoids me, if he ever did. Still, I avoided E for months, and eventually it became instinct. Every sight of him brought a nervous thrill, even a thrum of fear. I doubt I actually feel anything at all for E now, but his very presence still sends those emotions through me. It's not that pleasant, but it's not distracting. That was the worst experience I've had with crushes.

My other crushes have been nice! Crushes can actually be fun. They're like little gems of secrets that you can either clutch close and keep precious or give away to show friendship and trust. Crushes are positive emotions, and besides E I've never had one interfere with my interactions with a person. Overall I find them nice things. I'll admit I miss the days when I could list off my twenty crushes unblushingly . . .