Introduction

Well over a millennium ago, a young man born in the final years of Pericles’ Athens, wrote and affirmed that,“love is a serious mental disease.” That young man’s name was Plato, perhaps you have heard of him. If not, maybe you know his teacher and mentor, Socrates, a founder of Western philosophy and among the most recognized people in history.

Indeed, based on an algorithm designed by students studying under a dome in Cambridge, Socrates is ranked as the fourth most famous person in the world, and, adding substance to the “student becoming teacher” transition, Plato is actually ranked as number two.

The bronze medal is held by the man separating the two Greek philosophers on the list: Jesus Christ. Surely, you know of him, no?

Whether you know them or not, the philosophical findings of Plato and Socrates have held for over 1500 years and continue to fill the pages of textbooks across the world. An immortality often met with dismay from university students enrolled in Philosophy 101.

Sure, in a world dominated by blog posts and ever adapting social media, the writing of more traditional pieces, namely those of Plato and Socrates, are commonly perceived as dull and wordy.

For this reason, I cannot emphasize enough the very fact that these two Athenian men knew exactly what they were talking about. Thus, Plato was spot on with his allegations toward love, and as an affirmation of an already forlorn prognosis, Socrates considered Plato’s stance and added that, “love is madness.”

Now, this is quite a bit of information to process and it can be reasonably assumed that you are predisposed to throw out these specific and out of context quotations with the defense that love is all to variant to be strictly classified by two disillusioned philosophers. You might go as far as to believe that perhaps the very reason Plato felt such aversion toward love was a direct result of his seemingly perpetual commitment to his studies and consequent inability to understand such a simple and natural human emotion. Maybe he was overly consumed with finding the blueprints for love by way of deep intellectual thinking when the real answer was right under his nose or, for all we know, sitting on his face.

For the sake of full disclosure, a year ago I would have agreed with all of these assumptions. I would have never conceivably believed that love could ever be debilitating, and much less classify as actual madness. However, that was a year ago, and while I did not, do not, and never plan to consider myself a cynic, I am now inclined to agree with our resident philosopher’s reflections on the subject.

My change in mind is actually related to similar musings expressed in 1915 when Sigmund Freud wrote “Isn't what we mean by ‘falling in love’ a kind of sickness and craziness, an illusion, a blindness to what the loved person is really like, a state arising from infantile origins?”

Is it not?

You have my word that that is the last quote you will find in this book from some guy you may or may not have heard of in your philosophy class.

With that said, my goal in mentioning these perspectives is to confront the idea that love does more harm than good. Shakespeare shows us the danger of unrequited love and the fire of lust-driven competition while F. Scott Fitzgerald somewhat painfully makes the point that one can have everything and yet nothing in the absence of mutual love. Love is perhaps the one thing you cannot buy or trade for, and in saying this, I believe that love is almost exclusively tied to happiness. We as human beings are weak for love. Love is our kryptonite, and whether you know it or not, love is the Achilles heel we all share.

If you have not already felt it, I encourage you to take heed of this warning: love can and will bring you to your knees if you allow it, and if you falter, if you give in to the weight of a thousand Roman chariots bearing down on your shoulders, love can destroy you.

I neither mean to threaten nor to scare, but rather to advise, and, in fairness, while love can wipe a smile from your face and set fire to your soul, it can also be the very thing that sets you free. Love can turn your world upside down, fill your stomach with butterflies and make every worry you have ever had, from the anxiety before your first little league game to the shaking in your hands during your driving exam, disappear before your very eyes.

Love is like a fully loaded Ferrari.

With proper care and patience, it can take you from zero to sixty in the bat of an eyelash and make you feel like you are flying, but if you do not control it, even for a second, you will wind up in a fiery wreck. And, depending on fast you were going, it can be awfully hard to put that Ferrari back together again.

Thus, as my love is open and far-reaching, I am writing my story in order to provide a cautionary tale of sorts. I feel lucky to be alive today and I know only now that even when your Ferrari is pretty banged up, you are never helpless.

For you, I hope that after reading about my experiences with love you will not be fearful of falling in love but quite the opposite. I hope that you will be able to embrace the unparalleled roller-coaster esque euphoria that is falling in love. But most importantly, I hope that you will learn to handle love with caution and to remain constantly weary of misuse.

Now, let us begin.

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My story is nothing new. The experience I had is something that happens in a variety of ways everyday. However, while the events unfolding in these subsequent pages are both highly impassioned and laden with unprocessed and gracefully woven language, they are unfortunately often unpleasant and will inevitably draw a tear from even the most seasoned readers.

If that does not sound like your particular brand of ginger ale, no hard feelings, feel free to put this book back where you found it and perhaps revisit it when the time is right. Otherwise, allow me to properly introduce myself. My name is Ari Hayes and this is a story of unrequited love, though most decidedly not a Gatsby-style affair.

This adventure begins precisely one year ago, but regrettably for the trees this book is printed on, that story actually takes place within another story and that story�"as in the story in which the real story occurs�"begins four years ago.

☼

Freshman year of high school is generally a time of fresh starts, new memories, and the constant echoing of age old lessons regarding safe sex and the horrors of underage drinking. With that said, we have already learned about the complications and ensuing headaches generalities can produce. Thus, more accurately, the start of high school is different for everyone.

For those of us who crave a fresh start, high school happily grants us one, and while doing so, simultaneously accommodates those preferring a seamless transition. Some students, such as “boner kid” Harry or “pizza face” Mikayla, embrace the opportunity to start again. Meanwhile, other students, such as triple plate Derek Johnson or bubbly heartthrob Ashley Waters, wish to carry forward the clout and perceived socio educational power accumulated throughout the long lost days of middle school.

Now, bear with me, because the wording is very important here.

Let us focus on the word fresh. I would wager a considerable chunk of change that you know the difference between fresh milk and, well, milk that is not fresh. Perhaps milk is a poor example because who really knows if it is good or not or more importantly when exactly it goes sour. Those expiration dates cannot be exact, but have you ever tried drinking milk the day after the day? It is terrifying.

The point is that milk is best when it is fresh, but if allowed to spoil it becomes very bad very quickly and eventually you are left with a chunky mess not unlike a puddle of vomit and a smell that could make even triple plate Derek run for the hills.

The point I am venturing to make here is that a fresh start remains remarkable only for as long as it remains fresh. Hence, while “boner kid” Harry can swap out his sweatpants for jeans and wear spandex to school indefinitely, if he even marginally slips out of line, he is rebranded and becomes what is, in essence, sour milk. And nobody likes sour milk.

Now if you are thinking I am going to tell you about how I was like our friend Harry, think again. I was more of a Derek Johnson. The Harry of this story is a boy I hardly knew going into freshman year and his name is Troye Parker.

If only freshman Ari had known that four years later Troye Parker was going to rock his world.

In middle school, Troye was not the most popular of the two hundred or so students in our class. He was quiet, not spectacularly intelligent, and his only claim to fame was running the lights during the school’s annual musical. Oh, and one other thing, everyone, even the teachers, thought he was gay.

Now, for the record, stereotypes suck. There is no reason anyone should be profiled based on the way they speak or act, due to the color of their skin or accent of their voice, or whether or not they can throw a baseball more than a ten or so yards. However, if in some dystopian society, there was some mold for producing homosexual teenage boys to a disparaging degree of accuracy, Troye Parker was the spitting image.

I will describe him as I saw him four years ago, rather than how I see him today and you can, just as I did, see just how powerful a force love can be.

Where I grew up there are three elementary schools, one middle school, and one high school, and in a small town, this system ensured that you would see mostly the same faces for the first twelve years of your life as a student. The high school softball coach, who later turned out to be an alcoholic, was a fifth grade teacher at my elementary school, the football coaches consisted of high school fathers eager to get back in the game, and I went to prom with the same girl I had a crush on in kindergarten. The point is, that everyone knew everyone and there was something magical about it.

Unfortunately, wherever in time there is magic, somehow an unpleasant turpitude seems to follow. And, whether that be an infamous wicked witch or a vile sea captain bent on making a young fairy “walk the plank,” these immoralities cast a shadow over an otherwise congenial display.

This side-effect of magic is all too present in small town America wherein finding yourself confined to a fifteen square mile area and exposed to less than two-hundred boys and girls your age can be both a blessing and a curse. For Troye Parker, it started as a curse.

If you are familiar with Casper the ghost, you are equally familiar with Troye Parker’s skin tone. He is what I once called pale and now call fair skinned, a feature only trumped by his remarkably soulful brown eyes. His dark blond hair is always neatly combed over to the left and it is extraordinarily rare that his slim yet defined frame is not clothed in a trendy quarter zip sweater.

Entering freshman year, Troye was not what I would describe as noticeably handsome nor seductive in any sense of the words, but there was an unmistakable cuteness about him, something his friends, whom were largely girls, were aware of. And thus we commence our stereotypical review.

Troye Parker has always dressed very well. If he were ever to go missing authorities would undoubtedly note that he was last seen leaving school wearing khakis, some variant of polo dress shirt, and the latest Sperry shoes, or perhaps spotted behind the wheel of his late model Audi sedan with wayfarers shielding his eyes from the sun and potentially the reality surrounding him. I remember the day he got that car, he was excited to show me.

I am not sure if the quarter zips were exclusively middle and high school attire, or if they had followed Troye from his time in elementary school. As I mentioned there were three elementary schools in our town and Troye and I did not attend the same one. In fact, the Hayes and Parker families lived on opposite sides of town completely, we used different grocery stores and for all intents and purposes were unaware of the other’s existence.

While I did not truly meet Troye until high school, the first time I heard the name Troye Parker was in sixth grade.

One of the greatest attributes of about our middle school is its location, plopped directly in the center of town as though the building was the first structure erected and the rest of the town was built around it. Thus, within walking distance of the school is the town’s historical general store with candies by the cent and a little farther on, an expansive town chartered park.

One day, during the first semester of my sixth grade year, a group of friends and I decided to walk to the park to play basketball for a while after school. After thoroughly exhausting ourselves on the court and growing tired of the setting sun and intermittent autumn breeze we decided it was time to head home and the complex issue of deciding whose parents would pick us up began.

After a somewhat obnoxious series of confuddled deliberations, my friend Brandon exclaimed that he had the solution. As it turns out, although none of our parents were available to drive a fidgety and no doubt sweaty group of boys to their respective homes across town, Brandon’s mother’s friend could in fact make the trip. I would soon learn that that friend was none other than Mrs. Katie Parker.