In an Unexpected Turn of Events…

There’s something I’ve never been able to say truthfully before, but now I can. I have a boyfriend.

Yes, I know! I KNOW! I think most of the initial shock has finally worn off by now, but it still feels weird in a few ways. At the beginning, I had trouble calling him “my boyfriend” because the words felt so weird on my tongue. And beneath my fingers when I typed it. It still feels weird, I guess. I wonder if saying it over and over again will make it feel more normal. My boyfriend…my boyfriend…my boyfriend…

I don’t know.

And now you’re going to want details about what happened, am I right? Okay, so here it goes.

Jonathan and I met through InterVarsity Christian Fellowship (I’ve joked, “InterVarsity: bringing couples together since however long it’s been around”). We’re in the same small group Bible study. My interest (or curiosity, rather) sparked for him when he came to the large group meeting for the first time. He sat beside me and offered to walk me back to my apartment afterward. That gave me a strong feeling that he was interested in me. He seemed like a nice guy, so I decided to give him a chance and get to know him a bit better. The more I got to know him, the more I liked him. Eventually, I worked up my courage and asked him to have dinner with me one Sunday night. Then on Tuesday, we went exercising. Then on Thursday, he invited me to have dinner with him. It was then that he confessed that he liked me and asked me to be his girlfriend. I told him I returned his affections but wasn’t quite ready yet; I wanted to get to know him a little better. He said that was fine with him. We continued spending time together. This past Saturday, he invited me to see Grand Valley’s last home football game. Just to clear things up for those of you who don’t know me, I don’t like football. At all. I don’t like watching it, I hated playing it in gym class in school (even though it was flag football). So it is saying something that I agreed to go (my parents commented, “She must really like this guy if she was willing to go to a football game with him”). It was absolutely freezing at the football arena, and I thought my feet were about to fall off, so we stopped by the commons area afterward, got hot chocolate, sat down in some chairs, and hung out. We had quite a bit of a heart-t0-heart. We were there way longer than I had expected; by the time we finally left, a guy had come up to us and had told us the building would be closing in a few minutes. We walked back to our apartment (we both live in the same building, but on different floors). Rather than parting, however, we continued talking.

“Okay, now it’s your turn to talk,” he said after I had been silent for a while.

I hesitated. My feelings for him had just been growing stronger and stronger and stronger the more time I spent with him, bubbling up inside of me, threatening to surface and make themselves known. I wanted to be his girlfriend, badly.

But still…

“I want to say something, but I’m scared to say it,” I said, mirroring quite well what he had said to me before asking me out.

“Say it,” he said.

I took a deep breath. “You make me so happy. And I really, really like you. And I’m scared as heck because I’ve never had a boyfriend before, but what’s life without risks?” I trailed off.

“Say it,” he said.

“Will you be my boyfriend?” I burst.

“Yes,” he said with a nod of his head.

“YESSSS!” I squealed.

He laughed. “What were you expecting me to say?”

I had no idea. And I still have no idea. I guess it just…happened. My head was spinning, and I was scared and elated and shocked, all at the same time.

And that’s my story.

Funny thing is, he said he started becoming interested in me after something I said in small group. We were talking about prayer requests, and I asked for prayers for strength and purity of mind. That same day, I’d had to read a short story with an explicit sex scene in my Creative Writing class, and I had to read a short story called “Nipple Jesus” for that same class, too. He said he found that very interesting. I find it so amazing how things worked out. God took a lousy situation and used it for something good. If it weren’t for the fact that I had to read those stories, I wouldn’t be writing this post. God definitely works in mysterious ways.

Another funny story about this: the next time we got together for small group, a girl named Claire pointed to the two of us and said, “Aren’t the two of you dating?” or something along those lines. Immediately, everybody was abuzz.

“No way!” a girl named Katie cried. “When did this happen? Lauren and I play matchmaker, and we called it!”

I love my small group.

Oh, and just in case you were wondering, yes, I am now dating the guy who dressed up as Slenderman for Costume Bowling.

 

Gotta love this picture!