I cared about Ben long before he cared about me. I met Ben (and thought he was cute) all the way back in middle school. He was Cenna’s older brother—Cenna was one of my best friends at the time. I always thought Ben was cute, and I loved that he never hid his nerdiness.
Then life happened, and I completely forgot about him.
This is where Ben finally became aware of me.
One night, my parents, my sister, and my brother-in-law were all eating at Cavalier’s when Keagan got a text from Ben. Ben asked if he knew anyone he could go on a date with. Keagan mentioned it out loud, and my mom said, “Do a double date with Ben and Jenna. Jenna’s about to move to Mississippi, so nothing will actually come of it.”
She was wrong.
Our first date was a game night with Katelyn and Keagan. After that, I decided to postpone moving for a month so I could “visit my sister for a week.” In reality, I was planning a whole week of dates with Ben.
The funny thing is… Ben didn’t realize most of them were dates. Even with my obvious flirting—and straight-up telling him I liked him—he was completely oblivious to my feelings.
We kept texting and started talking on the phone at night. Finally, one night he asked if I wanted to come over for New Year’s Eve to play D&D into the new year. On New Year’s Day, we went to the Mt. Pleasant park together. We walked around for a while, and then we sat down on a bench.
I made the first move—I rested my head on his shoulder. He quickly grabbed my hand, and that’s when we became official.
A few weeks later, I moved to Mississippi. We started our relationship long-distance, and then I went to camp, so we didn’t get to visit often. But finally, I came back to Snow, just a few blocks away from him.