Three Wishes

Into the Mindset: Wish One Part One

A fun fact about me is that ever since I was little I used to read Nora Roberts books. It started one day when I was at my local library. In the children's section of the library, there was a huge pencil pointing towards the area I'd go to pick up books. Balling my hand in a fist I mentally told myself it was time. I was almost done with fifth grade. It was time to start reading adult books! Turning away from the hanging pencil I strode over to the adult books section, which was basically the second floor.

I was nervous ascending the stairs. Would they turn me away because I was a kid? Now although I was a fifth grader I was tall for my age so I guess I could have passed for a middle schooler but even then I didn't know how exclusive the adult reading section was.

"Hello," I nervously looked around once I got to the help kiosk. "I'm looking for books to read."

"What genre?" The man and the woman smiled. I wasn't really much different from the classic "nerd" type. I was a little pudgy and my glasses gave the world a fake impression of me being smart.

"I'm looking for ro-romance." I stuttered twiddling my fingers. They're gonna laugh at me or call me a sissy. I flinched as the man clicked away on the computer.

"Here you go." He slid a piece of paper to me. Taking it, I read the names in my head. "These are really prominent romance authors."

"Thank you," I looked around already trying to find the bee-line path to romance. "Where would they be?"

"A couple of them have last names close to each other in the alphabet." She pointed behind me.

"Thank you!" As I turned, they both said that I was welcome. With a determined look, I clutched the note card in my hand and scurried over to the aisle marked R. Eventually I found books for the first author on the list: Nora Roberts. I thumbed through some of the books that she had published "Blue Dehlila", "Northern Lights", etc (I was just now trying to remember some of the books of the top of my head). My hand stopped on a red book with a golden key on it: "The Key of Valor."

I took it home and to this day I'll remember it as the book that awakened the concept of romance for this. I know you'll never read this Nora but I just want to thank you for writing your books because of them my eyes were opened into a world of romance. I learned so much too. I learned to toughen up and stick to my guns as I'd trailblaze the middle school halls with your face on the backside of the novel. I'd learn that I would meet people who fed on my love for romance and would talk to me about the stories I read while others would tear me down for it. I'll tell that story another day. Don't you worry your pretty little head, my sweet reader.

One thing I learned though was that there was hope in the world for true love.  It was a feeling that I never really experienced. I knew that my family loved me and I reciprocated those feelings (at the time terribly but I've worked on being better at it now). After three years of reading her stories, I was ready to fall in love.

I wanted someone to kiss me passionately in the rain. I wanted someone's hand to hold, to protect and be cherished. I wanted someone not to love me because they were my family but to see beyond my glasses and tell me they loved me for who I was: a hopeless romantic.

So in March of 2010, I made the wished to like a guy. A week later my wish came true with Greg. He was a couple years older than me. I, at first, heavily judged him for the being the army brat boy-next-door that he was but had grown to like him as a friend as we met up weekly in boy scouts. He had dirty blond going on brown hair, gorgeous green eyes, and a bangin' body. I mean, as an eighth grader, I wasn't looking for sex but damn. He was fine, you could tell he kept his body lean and in shape.

I dunno, something just clicked and in a matter of minutes I went from seeing him as just a friend to someone I'd want to date; though I had no idea at the time what dating TRULY entails! Everything he did was revolutionary. Help someone drive their tent stake into the ground to pitch their tent? Holy shit that's amazing! Tell a random story? That's the most riveting shit I've ever heard!

He could really do no wrong, with rose-tinted goggles I pranced my way into the worst summer of my life.