I�m listening to the Urban Valentine station, and what song comes on? �Secret Lovers� by Atlantic Starr. Yeah, that�s two R�s. Isn�t it amazing how a song can take you back to something that you haven�t thought about in years? That�s right, �Secret Lovers� was my first song-with-a-boy.
Jason Mason (I�m using his real name here, because how can I not use the name JASON MASON?) was the first boy that I went out with for real, he was the first boy that wrote me love letters, and he was the first boy to give me a present. I was in sixth grade, and I thought that Jason Mason was the hottestguyevah. He rode my school bus, and we got off at the same stop. The only thing I remember about falling in love with him was that we sat in seats opposite of each other. Since we got off at the same stop we had this weird game that involved racing to see who could get out of their seat first. I also remember that he favored sweat pants, and he often carried a duffle bag.
Our game went on for a long time, and I found myself liking him more and more. I just knew that he liked me back, in the way that you just know. Then, the worst thing imaginable happened. For some reason he no longer sat in the opposite seat�he sat one seat in front of me. We no longer had our races to look forward to, and I was devastated. Since we didn�t talk as much with the new seating arrangement, I decided that I had to make my move before he completely forgot about me. For Valentine�s Day I bought him one of those lifesaver books with a Valentine�s Day theme. You know, the ones that have all of the different lifesaver rolls inside? I spent our bus ride home in agony, knowing that I needed to give him my gift before we got off the bus or it would be too late. Finally, right when our bus stopped and he stood to leave his seat I handed it to him. He was shocked, but then he said thank you and smiled the sweetest smile I had ever seen. I knew that he loved me, too.
I really knew that he loved me, too, when the next day on the bus he handed me a return Valentine�s gift. It was a box filled with pink foil covered, heart-shaped chocolates. On the outside he had written, "Thanks for the lifesavers. Love, Jason Mason.� Well, one of the best moments of my life was also enjoyed thoroughly by all of the kids who sat around us. I was so discreet that they had missed it when I gave Jason his lifesavers, but he wasn�t so lucky. Tiffany and her brother Eric were so thrilled by the unexpected romance that they began singing �Secret Lovers� to us; they continued singing it nearly every day for our entire one-month stint as boyfriend and girlfriend.
I could go through the whole saga of how we became boyfriend and girlfriend, about the t-shirt he gave me, and the embarrassing notes he wrote, and about the kiss on the cheek at the bus stop with everyone watching. But then I�d have to tell you about how I fell out of love with him because he was so corny, and about how I was too shy to talk to him, and about how I �dropped� him while standing outside of our Home Ec. class wearing my sweatpants from PE and sandals because I suddenly was too embarrassed to wear the cutoff shorts I had thought were cool that morning. I�d also have to tell you about how he was so hurt that he refused to talk to me for months after, and how every time I saw him I wished that we could just go back to the old days where we raced off the bus.
So let�s just leave it at this: whenever I hear the song �Secret Lovers� (which, really, is about once every five years) I think about Jason Mason.
