The Men and the Boys: Sandy

I was Sweet 16, and about to fall in love. For the very first time.

Sandro wasn't a Sandro, he was a Sandy. My height, dimples, twinkling blue gray eyes. Sandy even had sandy blonde hair, thick and a little wavy on top. He was two years older than me, a student at a very elite all boys school, and the bass guitarist & lead singer of his own band. He liked to paint and wanted to be an architect. He reminded me of a young Eddie Vedder.

Before Sandy met me, he met my picture. That was Georgia's doing. Even though her and I now went to different schools, our friendship was stronger than ever. It was hard not to be taken by cute, bubbly Georgia, and I was fascinated at how she seemed to so easily handle boys. Georgia knew how to talk to them, stroke their egos, and flip her hair in all the right ways that kept them coming back for more. A far cry from shy, bookish me.

Georgia was going out with Sandy's friend, Matt. The three of them got together on a day where she just happened to have a pocketful of pictures from my 16th birthday, and that's how Sandy first saw me. I remember those pictures; they were a few weeks before my actual birthday, on the last day of the school year that June. Georgia and some other friends had surprised me with a giftwrapped locker and a bunch of colorful, helium-filled balloons weighted down with a bag of gumballs. I was very happy that day, and the pictures showed it.

When Georgia ecstatically reported back to me that a very nice, very good looking senior had gone on and on about a) how cute I was, b) how great my hair was and c) that he had tried to steal the picture, I thought she was teasing me.

Guys just didn't like me that way. I knew this, because none had ever been forward about it. And my hair? What was that all about? No one liked my hair, I got teased all the time because of it. Big head, bush queen, static cling and my personal favourite, chia pet. If you're born a Curly Q, you know very well that your hair goes one of two ways: you are either graced with perfection curls from birth that hold until the day you die, or your hair starts out straight and spirals itself one curl at a time, over the course of many years. Guess which formula I got?

And so, I refused to believe Georgia. I refused so much and so well, she actually had to trick me into meeting her after work on a Friday, when she had already planned to meet with Matt. He brought along Sandy.

Georgia worked part-time at a rotisserie chicken place in a strip mall; I must've reeked of the stuff by the time they got there. We were walking along the sidewalk just after she'd punched out when Matt pulled up to the curb. Sitting in the passenger seat with one hand hanging out of an open window, was Sandy.

She hadn't lied, he was cute. He was also very nice, and very easy to talk to. Sandy had this way about him, smiling, casually chatting and touching my arm every so often, that made me feel like I was the only person in the world.

Before they left, he gave me his phone number.