We all have these crushes that end up marking us for life. One of mine was my native language teacher; she came in the last year of highschool to replace the retired teacher we had until then. She was 5 years our senior, and she was far from perfect, but quite beautiful; a tall blonde woman with a beautiful smile, always wearing white, always stylish. I was in love, and I wasn’t the only one; half the class had a crush on her. Let’s call her Alexandra.
The most courageous of us actually asked her out; and at the ten-years reunion, which I missed on purpose, I found out that she was married to one of our colleagues from the same year. I laughed and moved on, but then a few years after that reunion I had the chance to work with my highschool on a hardware project, and I actually had a small discussion with Alexandra as well. She recognized me; I was never a gifted student when it came to languages, but she told me that she remembered her first teaching year vividly; and teased me about daydreaming during her classes. I confessed I was daydreaming about her, and she blushed. But our discussion finished there, and I went on to finish my job. I saw her two years later, passing by, in a promenade place in the city; she was walking with her children, and she saw me. She looked at me, blushed again, said nothing and we moved on.