Love Unrequited

“I am mad, head-over-heels, puppy-dog in love!” It was a line from an episode of M*A*S*H (a popular TV show), and Ken was singing it out as he came happily through the door of our third period Physiology class at Kearns High School. I had transferred into the class about halfway through the term and I sat behind Ken. Apparently an announcement like this one from him wasn’t a new thing because Brenda, who sat behind me, laughingly asked, “Oh? Who is it this time?”

I became very busy with homework as Ken bounced into the room, slid into his desk and turned around to face me. For three or four long, uncomfortable seconds our eyes met, while I sat there willing him to not say it. Finally he looked up and said to Brenda, “It’s Teresa."

“Her again?” Brenda teased him a little, and then lost interest. Ken caught my eye again before he turned around and class started. And I wondered a little; did he really mean Teresa? I didn’t think so. Ken was a nice guy; we chatted together during class and dissected rats together in the labs. Well, at least if it was me he was “in love” with, I was very grateful that he didn’t announce it to the whole class—and I was pretty sure that I actually was “the one."

As time went on my suspicions were confirmed—it was me. A couple of times he wandered the lunchroom until he found me, and then sat with me and my friend Rachael. I started ducking my head when I saw him come in, but he always found me anyway. Rachael didn’t see why I was so uncomfortable to have him come looking for me. “He’s cute!” she said. I didn’t usually eat lunch anyway, so I quit going into the lunchroom and just hung out at my locker or in my next classroom during lunch. One time Ken really embarrassed me by finding me and my friends and telling me that he had written a letter for me—and then insisting that I read it right then and there. It was really mushy, and included something about my “eyes as blue as sapphires” and “hair as soft as red satin.” I could have died (and where did the red hair thing come from anyway?)! I was just glad that nobody was reading over my shoulder. When I finished reading the letter he immediately wanted to know how I liked it. After trying to stall a little, I finally gave him some answer that he found unsatisfactory and the subject dropped.

The infatuation did not drop, but to my relief Ken at least became a little more subtle about it.

The funny thing was that I really liked him—we were good friends. Once he came and watched one of my ballet classes at the University of Utah and afterward we went to Trolley Square. (To me that wasn’t a date, just a night out with a friend—same as if Rachael had come.) But he was the only boy I had ever given my phone number; and it was Ken, not Rachael, that I called when I nearly totaled my mom’s car on the day before my A.P. History exam.

I saw him once a few years after high school. He had just returned from his mission and he looked me up. But by then I had already found the true love of my life, and when Ken took me out for a little drive we really didn’t have much to talk about.

Since then I have thought about Ken sometimes, and I wonder whatever happened to him. Looking back, I know that I did love him—not in a mad, infatuated kind of way but, as Eliza Doolittle said, “more friendly-like.” Maybe we could even have gotten married and been pretty happy. But that’s a weird idea! I know I couldn’t be happier than I am with my Bruce, and our eight kids. Still, wherever Ken may be, I wish him to be as happy as I am.