{"id":4974,"date":"2017-04-21T08:52:00","date_gmt":"2017-04-21T15:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/annleemiller.com\/?p=4974"},"modified":"2017-04-21T08:52:00","modified_gmt":"2017-04-21T15:52:00","slug":"best-boyfriend-new-smyrna-beach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/annleemiller.com\/2017\/04\/best-boyfriend-new-smyrna-beach\/","title":{"rendered":"Best Boyfriend in New Smyrna Beach"},"content":{"rendered":"
Mike Zwicker<\/p><\/div>\n
Mike Zwicker, covered in golf-course grime from his summer job, stood under the eaves of the New Smyrna Beach rec center chatting with me, making no move to commandeer his ornery little brother, Steve, into the car.<\/p>\n
Warm rain bucketed down beside us, misting my skin, but I hardly noticed. Instead, I balanced on one foot, my arms draped over my crutches, basking in Mike\u2019s grin.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, why haven\u2019t you called me to go out?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d My brain raced back through our junior year searching for something that wasn\u2019t there. \u201cYou\u2019re crazy. You never asked me to call you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mike working on his golf swing<\/p><\/div>\n
Still grinning, he said, \u201cDoesn\u2019t matter. You wouldn\u2019t go out with me anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBet me.\u201d<\/p>\n
The next day I sent a note home for Mike with his brother: 88232 We\u2019ll see. Think you\u2019re gonna win, huh?<\/em> Steve nearly burst a blood vessel in his 12-year-old brain trying to break the \u201csecret code.\u201d Though he finally figured the numbers were a phone number, that was as far as he got.<\/p>\n
Saturday night I stood on one foot in line for forty-five minutes that felt like five at the Bellaire Plaza movie theatre beside Mike, bantering and laughing at his golf course tales. In less than an hour I went from intrigued to mad crush. We saw each other nearly every day for the next month while he easily bested my junior high boyfriend in besotted-ness and driving something besides a bike.<\/p>\n
When one of the school jocks called my house a shack, Mike\u2014more bone than muscle\u2014socked the guy in the face!<\/p>\n
In July, Dr. Tessler sliced open my ankle and extracted last summer\u2019s pin at Fish Memorial Hospital.<\/p>\n
Mike sat in the waiting room during the operation with Mom on his lunch break and came back after work.<\/p>\n
Our friend, Debbie George\u2019s father\u2014whom Mike was close to\u2014had a serious heart attack the same day. Mike stayed the night at the hospital with the George family and went straight to work in the morning. The guy hid a golden heart under his crooked grin.<\/p>\n
He went to mass every Sunday. He dreamed of joining the police force. He came along on my family\u2019s picnic to Blue Springs. He took me home to meet his folks.<\/p>\n
Mike was the only guy Mom ever invited to dinner. My stepfather\u2014whose opinions formed the white noise of my life\u2014said Mike wasn\u2019t as good looking as another guy I\u2019d gone out with. But if he made me happy and spent his money on me, he couldn\u2019t be all bad. Sometimes I wondered if my family liked him more than I did.<\/p>\n
Mike didn\u2019t drink, smoke weed, in fact do anything on Jackie Herold\u2019s list of don\u2019ts. Her approval arrived in a letter from Baltimore where she was spending the summer visiting her father and his side of the family.<\/p>\n
Photo by taliesin<\/p><\/div>\n
As the summer wound down, despite Mike\u2019s perfect boyfriend status, my interest flagged. I was not, would never be the perfect girlfriend for him. August Seventh was the day I got my cast off, the day I cast off Mike.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh man, I\u2019ve been looking forward to taking you to Disney World all summer. Just go with me\u2014no strings.\u201d<\/p>\n
I felt so rotten for not returning his feelings that I agreed.<\/p>\n
Saturday morning dawned muggy and bright. Inside my head, thunder caps butted each other\u2014Catholic guilt over hurting Mike rammed into two-year-old me, stomping my foot and whining, \u201cBut I don\u2019t like him anymore!\u201d We\u2019d gone out for six weeks\u2014which computed to six years in the dog-years of my daddy-damaged heart. Wasn\u2019t that enough?<\/p>\n