On that chilly January afternoon, we had just finished watching some soppy, tear-jerking love story, about a girl who got reunited with her first love. As usual, after we swtich off the tv, we stayed there on the sofa talking about all the nonsense that came into our head. But that afternoon we were unusually quiet, and serious. And it was at this point that Maronia asked,
"Do you ever think about your first love?"
I smiled at her, and answered,
"Oh, I've had so many first loves. At that time, I was out having fun, just discovering life, and so I fell in love with a new boy almost every week. I wouldn’t call that love, though. I mean, if it was love, I wouldn’t have moved on so quickly, would I?”
“You moved on so quickly, because that's just you. You fall in love, you live that story, they try to tie you down, you don't want to be tied down, you get bored - and so you dump them.”
"How about you?" I asked her.
"You know me. My first love was Malcolm. We were just ten years old, so it must have been puppy love, which then turned into a sexual obsession on my part. I wanted to know what it was like having sex with him, I guess. Because after those couple of times, the novelty truly wore off. I'm not even sure that I was in love with Dylan, either. Because I still have the feeling that it was just a sexual thing." I reached for my glass. This conversation is getting boring, my body language said. "Now come on, Donna, honestly, did you ever have a first love? Because apart from Jake, I don't think I've ever heard you say that you were in love with someone before. And to be quite honest, I don't even believe you were really in love with Jake, knowing your attitude with men. I mean, you've dated men who were much better than Jake, and they meant nothing to you."
I laughed softly."You know the way I think about these things. Jake had meant something to me - he was different from all the rest. But I guess the real reason why I would have liked a relationship with him, is that he's so much like me, there is no way he's going to tie me down. He likes partying more than me, so life with him would have been one great party every day. Maybe that's why I held on for so long." Maronia smiled.
"Yes, Jake is one party animal all right. Other than that, I honestly don't know what you ever saw in him. But we're talking about first loves here. Was Jake your first love then?" I smiled again.
"I've had a few crushes, but mostly because they were really hot and popular guys. You know I would kind of feel an obsession to date someone, and would get jealous if he's with another girl. Then I get to be with them, and the novelty just wears off - especially when I would see so many other guys available out there." I paused, and then added, "Well, if you want me to give you a name for my first love, that would have to be Alex, my boyfriend when I was four years old. If you want me to give you a name for someone I wanted to be with, then it's Jake. I'm sorry babe, but that's all I can come up with." She laughed.
"Maybe it would have been more appropriate to ask you who was the first guy that had fallen in love with you, rather than the other way round. Or maybe you would remember even better who was the first guy whose heart you've broken." I laughed and said,
"Who remembers silly stuff like that?"
I got up, and said that I had to go shopping, and walked out of the house. I was tired. Tired and sick of lying all the time. I had the reputation on the Snow Queen, and nothing was going to tarnish that. I couldn’t let other people know anything about my past, not even my best friend. I couldn’t even let them know what I was really thinking. That would be giving up too much of the real me. And the real me must remain hidden under these thick layers of ice that I have built around me. No one is going to get close enough to me, to discover the real Donna. That's too much of a risk, and I'm not going to take it.
I got to the beach, and walked slowly on the sand. I moved closer to the edge, and sat down watching the small waves rolling in. It was a chilly afternoon, but it was a little warmer in the sun. The days were getting longer, and summer would soon be here. I tried to shut my mind off against the memories, but being there on that beach in Claryton, it was impossible not to think about Brandon...
The first time that I saw Brandon, I was almost eight years old. My teacher had just told us the Cinderella story, and when I saw this 16 year old boy, I immediately pictured him as my Prince Charming. So that summer, when my parents moved to Claryton, I would as usual spend my days on the beach, and I loved sitting there watching him playing with his friends on the beach, and having a good time.
The years passed, and as I grew up I forgot all about Brandon. Until the summer that I turned thirteen.
* * *
Summer 1992
"Whoa! Sorry about that!"
The days that followed, I saw more and more of Brandon, on the beach and around town. He used to talk to me every day. He talked about my father, and how he remembered me as a little girl, and he used to tell me how different and more beautiful I was now that I was a teenager. Little by litte, the friendship between me and Brandon grew strong. He was twenty-one, I was thirteen. I was like the little sister he never had, and for me, he was the kind of man I wanted for my own when I grew up.
But by mid-summer, things started to change between us. Brandon was no longer the kind of man I wanted when I grew up - he was the man I wanted now. I started feeling things that I never knew existed - and I started noticing little things as well. Things like the way my heart skipped a beat everytime I saw him, the way my face flushed when he was near me, the little tingling on my skin everytime he accidently, or on purpose, brushed against me. Things started reminding of him - a song that was playing the first time we talked, a beach umbrella that looked just like the one we sat down under when we shared an ice-cream, a phrase someone says that sounds exactly like something Brandon had said to me. Little by little, I was thinking about Brandon all the time he wasn't with me, and I was missing him every day, and looking forward to meeting him.
Without noticing, slowly, I had fallen in love for the first time in my life, with Brandon.
I never learnt how he felt about me. He liked being with me that was sure, but he never explained what feelings towards me where. I don't know if he ever felt something for me, and kept it hidden away because of the age difference - or if he never felt anything else besides friendship. That summer we were together almost every single day. My parents had found out that I was hanging around with Brandon, and they threatened to ground me if they ever caught me talking to him again. I said all this to him, and he said that it was quite natural for them to act that way. But I was ready to risk it all for Brandon, and kept meeting him secretly.
I longed to tell Brandon how I felt about him, but I didn't know how to say it. Many evenings we would be sitting on the beach enjoying the cool summer breeze off the ocean, and he would wrap his arms around me, and talk to me about his dream to live on this beach for the rest of his life. But many times while he was talking to me, I would rest my head against his shoulder, close my eyes, and dream away listening to the sound of his voice. I tried to imagine what it would be like to hold him closer to me, to feel his kiss, to hear him say that he loved me.
There comes a time in everyone's life that changes them forever. For me it was that summer. That summer was the most perfect summer I had ever lived. It was that summer when suddenly I found myself shedding my childhood dreams, and feeling things like a woman. That summer my parents, had suddenly turned from my heroes to strangers; that summer the world seemed like a totally new and different place - but it was those new and different things that made that summer the one I always look back on. I was living a new life, and experiencing new things, and for the first time I was seeing things with different eyes.
Brandon taught me things that I never knew about. I learned what it was like to be in love. I learned what it was like to look into a pair of blue eyes, and see the ocean and the summer sky reflected in them. Every time he smiled, my heart would soar to the highest point. I knew that I stood no chance with him, but yet, I kept hoping and dreaming that someday, when I will be older, Brandon will really look at me, and see me as a woman for the first time in his life.
The woman that Brandon saw came into his life towards the end of that summer. Her name was Alice, and she was beautiful - and eighteen years old. 
To say that I felt crushed the first time that I saw them together, would be the understatement of the century. Swallowing a whole chilli pepper would not even come close to what I felt. I looked at them, and I felt the whole world swaying. It was early September, but yet I felt a chill wrapping itself around my whole body. I wrapped my hands around me, and didn't even realise that I had broken into a sweat. I wanted to fall down to the floor and cry until I pass out, and at the same time I wanted to run over to her, and push her away from Brandon. I don't know for how long I stood there transfixed in position, going through all these different emotions at once. In those few moments I lived through eternity - I lost all sense of time. I didn't know how old I was anymore - I felt like I was just a little baby being born, and yet I felt like I was hundreds of years old. Now I realise that it was at that precise moment that my childhood had died.
Suddenly, I saw Brandon looking over my way. He waved at me, and started walking towards me, with her following him.
He introduced us, and I felt my heart shattering into millions of tiny pieces, as he referred to me as "his little friend." I pretended to smile to her, and through a mist of tears, I saw her smiling back at me. I excused myself and left them standing there on the beach.
I ran home, locked myself in my room, and cried for hours. I cried for Brandon, for all the hurt he had caused - but most of all I cried for that little child inside of me that had died that morning.
The next morning, I was walking aimlessly along the beach, when I heard Brandon calling my name. I turned around, and looked away again. He ran infront of me and I tried to walk past him, but he would not let me through.
He took my hand in his, and said,"Listen to me, Donna, she's just a girl. She's no one important. She's just someone that I met on the beach, and want to have a good time with."
"Weren't you haven't a good time enough with me?" I asked angrily.
"Yes, I really enjoy being with you. But this is different. She's 18, she's a woman..." he trailed off. He didn't need to go on anymore. I immediately understood everything. Brandon was never going to see as anything else besides "his little friend." I nodded my head, and tried not to show how his words had killed me inside.
"I understand, Brandon. I'm sorry if I was angry with you. I just thought that you didn't want to be my friend anymore." He wrapped his arms around me.
"Don't be silly. I will always be your friend, forever. That's a promise."
The last few days of that summer went by really quick. Brandon would still come and look me up almost every day, but most times, Alice would be with him. I tried to be friends with her, but it was impossible to like someone who was kissing the man that you loved right in front of you.
And to make matters worse, she always treated me like a little girl, and I hated it. I wanted to be grown up, just like her. She was still a teenager just like me, and yet those five years between us, made a whole difference.
The last day of summer came, and before we left Claryton, I ran down to the beach for one final rendevouz with Brandon. He was there alone, and I ran to him, and with tears rolling down my cheeks, I said goodbye. He hugged me close to him, and said,"Don't cry. Now you go back home, meet up with all your other friends, and have fun. Next summer will be here before you know, and I will be here waiting for you."
"You promise?" I asked through my tears. He nodded, as he squeezed me tighter.
"I promise."
He let go of me, and gave me a kiss on the cheek. "See you next summer," he said.
I nodded my head, and started walking away from Brandon, already counting the days for the following summer.
Fall came around, and school started again. But this time it was different. While I still maintained my position on that high pedestall, I felt like a totally different girl. I was now in love with Brandon, and I could talk about the same stuff they were talking about, because now I was in love like them too.
I couldn't wait for the summer to come though. Everyday I woke a little bit happier, because it was another day closer to summer - and to Brandon.
Until that winter, Clarissa joined our group. She was a new girl from Claryton, who was staying with an aunt of hers for the winter. She was beautiful, and wild and bad, and so we included into our group. The first day that she arrived was the day when my whole life turned upside down.
"I know you," she said. "You were always in Claryton last summer, and you used to hang around Brandon Silver, right? Who are you, his cousin?" I smiled.
"No, me and Brandon are very good friends." I looked at her, and asked her the question that had been on my mind all fall and winter. "How is he? I haven't seen him since last summer. I hope he's doing fine."
"He's doing just wonderful, I guess. He's just gotten married." I stared at her, not quite believing that I had heard her correctly. I felt petrified to the spot, and I thought that the world had come to an end.
"Married, you said? Brandon?" I finally managed to ask.
"Yes. It's strange, isn't it? Nobody wanted to believe it when it happened. He's gotten married to some air-head called Alice..."
She kept on speaking, but I was not listening anymore. Brandon. My first love. The man of my dreams. He had gotten married - to Alice.
The rest of the winter was like a nightmare. I tried to get Brandon off my mind, but it was impossible. I kept hoping that Clarissa had been lying, and that he had just moved in with her, and that by summer they would have broken it off.
So when summer came around again, and we moved back to Claryton, I didn't even unpack my things, but ran straight down to the beach looking for Brandon. I stayed there for more than two hours, hoping that he would show up. 
Finally, I saw him walking by. I got up, and was ready to greet him.
But Brandon only glanced my way, and kept walking on by. He did not even smile at me, or showed any recognition at all.
I stared after him, until he disappeared out of view. Now I knew that Brandon Silver was out of my life forever.
And as I walked slowly, trying to get used to the bitter taste of a love that went wrong, and to the unbearable pain of a broken heart, I resolved never to fall in love again.
* * *
January 2008
I slowly looked around me, and realised that it was getting darker, and chillier. I got up, and walked back home. I had seen Brandon a few times the previous summer, but I never spoke to him. He smiled a couple of times, and I smiled back - just the way you smile to an old acquaintance with whom you share nothing in common anymore.
I've heard that he's had two beautiful kids with Alice, but two years ago, they had gotten divorced, and last summer he got with someone else. 
Sometimes, I do think about Brandon, especially when I'm here on this beach at the beginning of summer. I still remember that summer clearly, and I cherish those fond memories of the little girl that I was. But sometimes, I wonder if he remembers that summer ; if he remembers that "little friend" from long ago. I wonder if he ever thinks about those hot summer days on this same beach fifteen years ago. But even if he does remember, I'm sure that he does not know how much that "little friend" had loved him.
It doesn't matter anymore now. Brandon is ancient history. He's part of a life that no longer belongs to me. But he will always be a treasured memory of my first real love - and a bitter reminder of the heartache that getting close to someone can cause.
* * *
