It was painfully obvious, wasn't it.  A statement that rang too true through my mind as I was gathering my courage up; usually I was a coward and had someone else do it or write a note.  No, I had to do this in person, I just had to.  I guess I had to prove to myself that I could do it.  I said to myself that today would be the day as the first few sun rays filtered in through the blinds of the bedroom window.

It was painfully obvious, in the way I greeted him and the way I talked to him. Yet I carried on as if it wasn't obvious.  For weeks I gathered the courage and try as I might, the right moment never seemed to come.  I decided maybe I shouldn't tell the boy with the glasses and curly hair. But if I didn't, I'd keep torturing myself with this bit of information.  My heart yearned to be free of this pathetic secret as if it would burst if it's secret wasn't divulged.

Finally I could bear this suffering no more and as the bell rang, my heart decided to take control.  I stood and called his name. I shuffled nervously as he came over and asked what I wanted.  It was a moment, a painful one, before I said what I had yearned to say.

"I like you."

The boy smiled and hugged me then went on his way to his next class.  My heart felt lighter and I felt ecstatic.  I felt I could almost cry with relief.  I had finally done it; I had expressed to my heart's desire what I felt.  It didn't matter at that moment that he didn't say anything, I felt free of the heavy burden as it was lifted off my chest by those three little words.   I went home with a light head as if in a dream.

I wish I had seen it coming; I guess it's was painfully obvious as well but I was blinded by desire.  I should have known, oh I should have known.  Sudden remembrance of a quote an old History teacher once told me "Those who fail to remember the past are doomed to repeat it."  How true it was, how true it was.

Sickening it was, my secret; it crippled me.  That smile that melted my heart, it drove me to insanity.  It was nothing compared to what was about to happen, something I should have foreseen.
Painfully obvious, I greeted him in my usual way and went about my work.  I was still in my dream, pleasantly and blissfully ignorant.

"... Like you as a very good friend,"

I shut my eyes as it hit me; a tidal wave, knocking me out of my dream world and back into reality.  I stared down at the words of the past that were printed in my text book, those seven words tightening around my heart like barbed wire, digging deeper all the while.  I shrugged it off and smiled, while my beating organ of love was torn apart.
It wasn't the way it was said, as casually it was said. What got to me the most was that he didn't say it; another boy said it to me.  

"He likes you as a really good friend."

I shrugged and hid behind my book the rest of the class, trying to hold back watery eyes from spilling over; I wished I could have just melted into the floor, like the many times my heart had melted.

I should have realized that from past attempts at expressing my feelings to someone that it would never work.

But I do thank him, I really do.  I'm glad that he had torn fresh wounds into my heart and opened old ones, I haven't felt like this in years.  If it hadn't been for him saying that he didn't like me, I would still feel dead.