jody

i remember my first crush.

his name was jody. we were in the third grade. no, i'm not really sure if it was a full blown crush. i don't think i even realized it was a crush at the time, but looking back now i'm almost certain it was. he was a beautiful boy with a beautiful face, dark wavy hair, dark eyes. he loved michael jackson. he had the zipper jacket. i think his was black and not red though. all the girls loved him. i spent most recesses with him. we talked a lot about music. he was different from the other boys. he was different from everyone. i think that's what drew me to him. even as a little kid i was obsessed with music. while the other boys played football or basketball we sat and listened to our cassette tapes. he was in my life for one year. his family moved around quite often. ohio was his last home. over the summer he was playing with a neighbor and they found a gun in a parent's closet. the gun went off, and jody was dead. we found out about it when school started up again in the fall. it never seemed real to any of us. it still doesn't. it's more like a story i once read rather than something that happened in my life. he was a good friend for the year that i knew him. i didn't even know who i was at the time, but with him i was comfortable. with him it felt okay to be a little different from the other boys. with him it was nice to be understood. people are placed into our lives for reasons. sometimes it takes a little time to figure out what that reason is.