Doukyuusei (Classmates)

After watching Doukyuusei ( Classmates ), I felt a pang in my heart. I remembered the experience I felt when I had my first love. I felt jealous of how well the experience of Kusakabe and Sajou went. It might have been due to the soundtrack of the movie that drives the emotions of the film. The movie was not as deep as one could say but it still delivered a heart warming feeling through its sixty minutes duration.

It was simple. It was direct. It was cliche. It was everything you would dream about your simple love story. It depicted the simple up and downs of a relationship. It was cute.

I remembered how I cried back home due to my first love. I was young. I was around 14 years old when my heart started beating for another guy. I was scared since from where I came from, this kind of feeling for the same gender, it is considered a taboo.

I never wanted to confess to him. I never wanted him to know my feelings. I was fine as long as we can continue being friends. We would have this nightly meeting in which we would talk about our day. We would talk about random things and would laugh our hearts out. Just the two of us. During this time, he learned that his father was cheating. I just sit there as I listened to all the things he had to say. I wanted to tell him that everything would be OK but I couldn't. I was young and didn't have the self esteem to say it. I just sit there, listening.

We grew closer and I had an urge about telling him how I felt. I told him my feelings. I told him that I like him. He didn't say anything. He didn't have to. After that, we still continued meeting and discussing random things. Things were fine. But everything has its ending. One night, other children from our neighborhood started teasing us and calling us names. He told me that we should stop meeting each other. I listened to him. Our nightly meetings became weekly. Until it became less frequent.

He asked me whether I felt awkward with the situation we were having. I said no. I was, after all, happy to spend time with him.

Our meetings became less and less frequent due to him not being there in our meeting place. I asked him if he was trying to avoid me. His answer broke me to million pieces.

" Its not that I'm trying to avoid you. I just wished you were a girl. And because you're a guy, I can't be with you."

I cried so much. I didn't know how long I stayed in my room.

Those memories flung right through me after watching Doukyuusei. It was so sweet and innocent that it reminded me of my terrible past.