There’s something strangely unforgettable about your first crush. It’s the kind of memory that lingers in the folds of your heart, soft and awkward and sweet all at once. Mine came unexpectedly—quiet and unassuming—yet somehow managed to make the world feel like it had tilted ever so slightly on its axis.
I must have been around eleven or twelve, at that age when everything feels like it’s on the verge of something bigger. He had messy hair that looked like it had been caught in a permanent breeze, a perfect smile, and this laugh—loud, a little reckless—that made you want to laugh too, even if you didn’t hear the joke.
He was absolutely perfect to me and millions of girls around the world. I had never met him in person, but thanks to pop culture I knew almost everything about him. But to me, he was magic. He was my secret magic.
I remember the flutter in my chest when he’d cross my tv screen, the anger I would feel when he would post with other girls, or have a love interest in his music videos. I remember scribbling hearts in the margins of my notebook, practicing a last name that would never be mine. And I remember that ridiculous, wonderful ache of seeing him smile at someone else—how it cracked something open in me that hadn’t existed before.
Of course, nothing ever happened, because we never met.
Looking back, it wasn’t really about him. It was about me—about discovering the delicious confusion of wanting to be noticed, the giddiness of new feelings, and the soft, vulnerable way a heart opens when it doesn’t yet know the risks.
My first crush wasn’t epic. It didn’t end in fireworks or heartbreak or even a proper goodbye. But it was mine, and it was beautiful in its own small, innocent way.
And maybe that’s what makes firsts so special. They don’t have to be perfect. They just have to be real. For that, I have to thank Justin Drew Bieber for being my first crush, and my first heartbreak.
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