Middle school was hard.

In the 7th grade, I had a huge crush on a boy named David. He was the most popular boy in school, on the football team, and I was so enamored. My status was definitely on a much lower rung on the middle school success ladder, but I still imagined that we could be part of a She's All That inspired love story.
David sat right next to me in my 1st and 2nd hours, and I don't think he spoke to me once. I was constantly a nervous wreck. What if he looked over and my hair looked weird? What if he needed to borrow a pencil? What if we were assigned to do - gasp - partner work?!?
Months went by without any of these things happening. David didn't know I was alive. But I still pined, and life went on.
I soon was the not-so-happy recipient of braces. I hated them. They tore my mouth up, and made me look even more goofy, and they made me do something so terribly embarrassing. For the first few weeks, my mouth wasn't quite used to them, and I started producing more saliva. Ok, ok. I drooled. When I was laughing really hard or talking a lot, sometimes I would drool. It was humiliating and I wanted to die whenever it happened. But so far, no one seemed to have noticed that I had this problem. Until one day.  
I was at school in my 1st hour. My friend Samantha had come back to my desk to chat and of course, David was sitting beside me. Sam and I were laughing really hard at something, and suddenly, my worst nightmare came true.
I drooled. David turned to me, for the first time in my life, and spoke. "You have some spit on your face."


Yeah, Middle School was hard.