Amelia Garrett
When I was 16 I had a tumultuous relationship with another boy to the point where I swore off dating entirely! I was so sick of it and kept that sentiment for a while. On my family camping trip, I had a very wild and vivid dream about this boy I had never met before. He had the most beautiful smile and we sat in a really nice car eating Taco Bell. Funny enough, I never really ate Taco Bell before so it was strange. In the dream, he told me, ‘I love you, see you soon.’ I had texted my best friend what had happened and she thought it was also weird. Fast forward to the first week of my junior year. After a bunch of scheduling issues, I got placed in a random economics class on a Friday… where there was already a test. I sat in the only empty seat in the middle of the class room and I was obviously panicking because the teacher said we all had to do it. But, he made it fair and made us partner up. I instinctively looked to the left and there was this boy. I didn’t remember my dream at that time until he flashed me his beautiful smile and I knew I was done for. Over the course of the term, we did projects and played games together, slowly falling in love until it culminated with me confessing my love to him while he was sleeping! I didn’t know, so I worried myself sick for almost twelve hours! When I got my text back I was just about to hop in the shower and he asked ‘Does this mean we’re dating?’ I replied ‘Sure’ and it’s been over 5 years since then. We are still together and now have a cat named Stan.
Lily Judge
I spent a portion of this last summer nannying in a small coastal village in Ireland – An Spidéal. I brought a carry-on full of souvenirs and a long distance lesbian relationship home with me. Yawn! What a cliché! We met on my second day in the country and on my first day in Galway. I had landed in Dublin the day before and I was lonelier than I can remember being in recent memory. I had just spent an embarrassing amount of money on a Guinness from a pub that was definitely a tourist trap, and all of my friends were thousands of miles away and 8 hours behind me. I was walking alongside a big impressive bridge, taking blurry washed out photos and sighing loudly and generally feeling very sorry for myself. In a desperate attempt to curb my loneliness, and going against my better judgement, I redownloaded Hinge and spent the remainder of my first night swiping through the entirety of Ireland’s lesbian population.
The next day, as I was bussing into this absolutely picturesque village and taking more ugly pictures of the overcast coastline, I matched with, from my assessment, the only butch on the entire island. I don’t think they liked me much at first (they disagree with me on this) and would take forever to respond to my texts but we eventually set a date: 5 days before my flight out of the country. Our first date lasted 16 hours and our second lasted until my bus ride back to the airport. We haven’t gone a day without talking to each other since. I flew back to kiss them on New Year’s and they are coming here in May. I ask them to marry me every day but they think I’m joking.
Gabby Mijalski-Fahim
The nerves struck when I heard a knock on the door. My friend paused our Mario Kart match and I turned the doorknob to reveal her. She looked very different from her Tinder photos. Not catfish-different. Shelby was just as beautiful in person as she was online, only more goth than I expected. Her lips were stained violet and her eyelids were shaded with a blend of volcanic shades. She wore a leather jacket and ripped jeans that would offend any grandparent. I would later learn this was an experimental day for her and not her usual look. Despite her edgy aesthetic, her smile was softening and disarming. I felt my smile reflect hers, almost involuntarily. I welcomed her in and she greeted my living room of six strangers with coolness and ease. I offered to hang her purse, to which she accepted, and I grasped its leathery handle. In an impulsive attempt to break the ice, I joked, “What if I just threw this against the wall?” Then proceeded to do exactly that. Her purse flung against the wall, as anticipated, and emptied all of its contents onto the carpet surrounding us. Her birth control, tampons and other personal items formed the centerpiece of this newly formed mess. My friends watched in complete paralysis from second-hand embarrassment as I sank to all fours and gathered her items into her purse, profusely apologizing. The room’s palpable silence was ruptured by Shelby’s laugh, thick and warm enough to shed my shame. We moved to the couch and resumed the Mario Kart match, this time with Shelby’s participation. She was immediately competitive, throwing turtle shells at me and performing evil cackles as she passed each of us on the course. I remember my cheeks burning after she left. I realized it was my first, first-date where I didn’t need to feign laughter. The next few dates confirmed what I already knew: something felt different with Shelby. She showed me her favorite movie, “Labyrinth”, and said David Bowie was her gay awakening as a kid because, “he looked like a girl.” Before she moved across town, we ate sushi together in her empty apartment and swapped kisses between bites. Months later, I told her that I loved her in a motel room by the airport. Almost three years later, we live together with our two perfect cats, Duchess and Mochi. She still makes me laugh more than anyone on this earth. My love for her grows every time she walks through our door.