I've only have four real boyfriends. Well, three. I just count the forth so I'm able to say, "half my ex-boyfriends are gay." It's kind of wrong, and it's difficult to convince people that it's not my fault, but it tends to be a good conversation piece.

     Tom was my first boyfriend. We were 12 and I was too shy to ask him out myself, so Ryan asked for me. The extent of our relationship included sitting by each other at lunch and talking after tech class. I think I freaked him out a month into the relationship by kissing him on the cheek. A week later he broke up with me on the phone. Upon hanging up I sat in my kitchen and sobbed into a tissue, inhaling its particles through my nose. I immediately called Ryan afterwards for consolation. The mourning process died a month later when Jason, his best friend, declared his love for me.
     "I don't want to mess anything up between you two," I said.
     "I really don't care," Tom said. "If you like each other, go out."

     Jason was my first love. I don't care that we were 13 and not really going out. Two months into our "relationship," which including holding hands in the hallway and sneaking kisses at school dances, he broke up with me. It was a long two years before I was able to get over it and, as chance has it, the feeling was mutual. Although he dumped me, he still loved me and longed for that clinginess that he knew I would provide. Why did we break up to begin with? It was, as he stated, the safer of two routes. If we had stayed together, he would have hurt me more than if we broke up. I'm still not entirely sure what that means.
     Jason learned that he was bisexual years after we broke up, and while in college learned that he actually wasn't attracted to women at all. He has since said to me, "you're the only women I have, and ever will, love." At least I know he's honest.

     Danny and I only dated for a week. We learned of our attraction to each other as a friend was talking to us on the telephone at the same time, putting one on hold while reporting back to the other. We were together over Thanksgiving break but upon coming back to school, realized we weren't really attracted to each other at all.
     My friends said it was because he likes men. I told them to shut up, until two years later he came out of the closet.

     "You dated Jason? Isn't he gay?"
     "Well, he wasn't at the time."

     Matthew was an on-again, off-again thing during my senior year of high school. He was a sophomore. Although our flirting lasted five months, the total time we were actually together amounted to approximately two. After having broken up three times during that period, I went off to college deciding I had enough.

     I don't count the fifth member of my relationship history for reasons that are stupid and childish but I use them regardless. Jay was my longest relationship at a whopping three months, and after the first two days I realized I didn't really like him. It wasn't until I found myself crying in his presence three months later that I was able to break it off.

     "You went out with Jay?" A friend asks.
     "Yeah," I mumble.
     "My friend dated him, too! When were you together?"
     "Around November."
     She paused. "Are you sure? I thought she dated him then."

     "Angela? I never went out with Angela," he told her.

     "Well, if he won't acknowledge our relationship, I won't acknowledge his existence. He's a scumbag, anyway."
     He once tried talking to me after that scenario. Sometimes I wish that looks really can kill, because he would still be lying on the floor of McDonald's in a little pile of ash.

     I saw Tom at a friend's house once. I poured myself a drink when he leaned over and said, "There's something I want to tell you."
     At that moment, "half" turned into "the majority."

     "It's not your fault," he laughed.
     "Well I wouldn't be too sure," I said, "this is the third."
     "I told Elise it was her fault and she got offended."

     When you learn that one of your ex-boyfriends now prefers the company of men, it never anyone's fault.
     "You know that ex-boyfriend of yours, so-and-so? Yeah, he's with a guy now."
     Really? Good for him."

     "Someday," my mother said, "someone will come along for you." Hopefully that someone is a testosterone-driven straight man, but I suppose you can't be too choosy.

Written: Summer 2004