I logged into Facebook earlier today to check something out.

Stephany

While I was there, I saw her name had changed. No not Stephany, Melissa. She’s back to Mantz.

Melissa Mantz was my first crush. She disappeared from my life but never from my heart. It always bugged me what had happened to her. One day she and her sister is at my “13th” birthday party (it was celebrated in the summer) and the next, I have a hand written letter from her talking about how she was in a beauty contest. How my sister Angela should have been there, she’s so pretty. To her learning Spanish and that she’s getting better. Love, Melissa. I never saw or heard from her again.. so I thought.

This is the most crushing thing for me of all time. This is on top of my first ex-girlfriend faking her death and I have the somber tattoo of her as a perma-memory. In 2009 I got robbed. All the things I held as like, top of the line of things, gone. Everything, gone. This night was the last night I would see Nichole Kelly. I lost so much that night. It was with the best experience of paying it forward I have experienced, that night Veronica came to comfort me. We slept on the couch where they broke in, to remove all the fear I had. She gave me that solace I needed. She is an absolutely beautiful spirit and I’m so grateful to be part of our galaxy.

Shortly after that, my mom messaged me saying, “is this her???”

It was a Facebook profile of Melissa Rush. As soon as I saw her eyes, I knew it was her. I reached out and we connected. We had a really great conversation for quite a while. Every day talking to her was living a dream come true. This is where things gets fuzzy for me, time wise. Because, it was later discovered… she met me… again. She was visiting a friend of hers and his kids went downstairs to see me. The dad and Melissa went downstairs and talked to this guy who had a 3 monitor setup.

That was her. That was Melissa. The woman I had been looking for since forever. She has a memory of us. I don’t.

When I look back at it, I question my heart for the last 38 years; since 2nd grade. Have I been living a version of a false lie? She was right there. I told myself I knew my heart would know that moment I would ever see her. It was a certainty I was so convenience of. When it happened for real though; nothing. She has a very vivid memory of that evening. I, have nothing.

I’m sure this boils down to something stupid like spite which, if it is, my god, people with this shit, holy hell. I couldn’t live this way for real. When I saw Melissa Mantz as a friend in Facebook but not Melissa Rush, my first thought was:

I wonder if she changed her name from Melissa Rush to Melissa Mantz, in the hopes of finding someone else who may have had a crush on her before she became Melissa Rush.

… I hate my brain.