My brown-eyed boy

He had a crush on me, the sweet brown-eyed boy in high school. He asked my mom how he could get me to like him. I was immature, awkward, plain, but he saw something in me. I hurt him every chance I could by dating his blue-eyed, blond Apollo of a cousin. Apollo liked to date me in between real girlfriends and toss me aside when something better came along. Kyle was always there. It was too easy. He never asked for more than my friendship, but he never even got very much of that.

Another pair of brown eyes was my downfall a few years later, but behind those eyes was cruelty, control and pure meanness. I fell immediately and hard for this one, and he made me pay dearly for the friendship I had wasted with my original brown-eyed boy. Never very confident in my looks, my personality or my worth, I now had every flaw highlighted, sharpened to a fine point and driven excruciatingly back into my heart and soul. For three years I destroyed myself to be better, nicer, smarter, thinner, blonder, prettier and sexier while he dangled an engagement ring in front of my nose like a carrot in front of a mule.

My Geddy, my hero, rescued me from that dismal pit of a relationship. He was my friend, like Kyle, and he restored me simply by being there. We had been friends for years when parallel jobs put us in constant touch. I woke up one morning and realized I could not imagine my life without him, and I wasn't going to waste a second chance to be with someone who cherished me in a way that was balm to my soul. We were married 10 months later, and Kyle was there, as always, to serenade us with "In My Life."My precious, faithful friend whom I took for granted all those years, who was content to gather the few crumbs I tossed him, sang at my wedding. And I didn't bother to keep in touch afterward.

I am hopeful that someday, somewhere, I will be able to tell Kyle that I'm sorry I didn't appreciate him more. I don't regret we were never a couple but he taught me more about real love and friendship than I have known outside of my 16-plus-year marriage. I couldn't fully understand what it meant to me then and I am ashamed I squandered a chance to reciprocate, to be to him the kind of friend he was to me. I wish I could tell him that I am blissfully happy with my forever love, and that I feel worthy of receiving his love partly because I caught a glimpse of it in his sweet brown eyes so long ago.