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I’ve always believed there was a certain sound you’d hear when you love someone. At first I thought it was Nico’s “These Days” because of The Royal Tenenbaums. And then I thought it was Jens Lekman’s “A Higher Power” because of the strings. And then, when Night Falls Over Kortedala came out in the November of that year, I realized it was “Your Arms Around Me.”

The first girl I loved didn’t love me back. Her name was April. If these things can be anyone’s fault, it wasn’t hers. And it wasn’t mine either, even though I loved her with the knowledge she loved someone else..

She planned a surprise birthday party for me when I turned 21. On a bad night she came into the office when she didn’t have to and brought me brownies. On another, she thanked me for being me. She called my story on Florida wildfires “hot.” I labeled her U-Haul story “moving.” She teased me about calling The Flaming Lips show a life-changing experience. Birds choked on the paper confetti she hypothesized.

We first hung out during a birthday party for one of our coworkers. The night before, she asked me if I planned on going  out. I said something non-committal. She had planned on going but was concerned about the fact that she didn’t drink.

“Do you want to go and not drink together?”

She said yes.

Over the winter break a female friend asked me about something Judd Apatow said in his commentary for Funny People. “This is the kind of thing I would do, I’d meet a woman, not know her very well,” Judd said, “and then . . . in my head I’m trying to figure out where everyone is sitting in the wedding party.”

“Do guys really thing like that?” my friend asked.

I said yes.

There is a certain type of guy that always commits before he ever has to. He will fall in love with a girl before ever being physically intimate with her. He ceaselessly believes in the transformative power of love and will hold onto it for as long as he can. He will change himself for a girl without ever being asked to.

I felt the urge to stop drinking because April didn’t. I apologized for when I did even though she explicitly told me to do what I wanted to. I eased up on my music snobbery. I was willing to listen to bands I knew I disliked just because she did like them. I even liked T.A.t.u. But this had nothing to do with lying. At the time T.A.t.u honestly sounded pretty good to me because it was something April liked. And at the time the idea of getting drunk seemed absolutely repulsive because it was something April didn’t like.

The summer of 2007 was the summer of Swedes more or less. I loved Swedish indie pop singers (Jens Lekman), Swedish furniture (IKEA), a half Swedish girl (April), and Swedish balls of ground beef (meatballs).

I have a strict rule that on my first listen of an album or compilation that I cannot repeat a track until I’ve listened to the album in it’s entirety once. I broke it when I got to Jens’ “Someone to Share My Life With.” And then I broke it again. And again. And one more time. “I don’t want a girl to go down on her knees. I just want someone to share my life with,”Jens baritoned. That night I tried to compose an email to Jens explaining why this song meant so much to me. Why I simply couldn’t get past it. How this song stood in defiance of all the stereotypes of rock and roll and how it articulated what I’ve felt for 2 decades. I deleted it before I ever sent it.

The night I knew I loved April was shortly after the night we did not drink together at our friend’s birthday party. I brought over my guitar and she brought out her violin. She harmonized with my clumsy chords effortlessly.

And then she played the “Throne Room Theme” from Star Wars.

I kicked my feet into the air and couldn’t stop smiling. She giggled and didn’t understand why I did it. I didn’t either. I just did it. The night would last until our eyes became red when April told me to call her when I got home. I told her it was 3 a.m. ”Do you still want me to call?” She looked at me flatly.

She said yes.

We hugged goodbye and I went home with Jens Lekman’s “A Higher Power” playing in my head.^†

As 2007 came to its end and my eventual departure from Gainesville became immediate, I decided to tell April about how I felt. Somewhere in my brain I thought it would be brilliant to give her a homemade Flaming Lips concert in my apartment since she would never go to one. I bought some gift bag paper linings to work as the confetti, a Santa hat and flashlight and a live DVD to fill in the rest of the gaps. I set it to “Do You Realize??” I rained paper, danced spastically and briefly played a verse on guitar before plopping down next to her.

She collected bundles of the red paper strings covering the carpet and began to clean. I insisted she didn’t have to. She took a volleyball-sized clump and dropped it in her lap. One of us made a vulgar joke. I could feel my lungs in sync with my heartbeat. My numbed fingers clasped the brass door handle and I let her leave first.

As I walked her to her car I told her. I can only really remember what my shoes looked like.

Her empathetic eyes opened up, and I heard weak voice say “I’m sorry.”

She put her arms around me.

1. † None of the literal events in the song transpired but the sentiment was there. [↩]