After the summer she met Sam she came home with a very jam packed suitcase. When I was throwing everything into the wash, I found a note from her to Sam. I think she never gave it to him because she still had it but she wrote it. It said something like: "I will meet you after dinner behind the dining hall and I will show you mine if you will show me yours." I think that was the moment when I first started thinking about contraception or (an even better solution) getting her tubes tied.
Last summer when she went to camp she told me that she was going to kiss him. I said "Nothing more than that OK?" She agreed. When she came home I asked her if they had kissed and she said that they had and she was very happy. I thought it was all very sweet (not sure about innocent though).
Last summer, I picked her up at camp and she was upset about Sam. She asked to use my cell phone to call him and I did let her have it. And, yes, I listened to the conversation... Apparently something had happened and she wouldn't really tell me what it was but when she spoke to him, she wanted to talk about this "thing" that had happened. She said it was all a misunderstanding and he hung up on her. She called again, they talked for a few minutes and he hung up on her again. She called again and he didn't answer the phone. She tried a few more times and then stopped.
In the middle of the winter she decided to give it another try and called him again. This time he spoke to her and they made up and they were all lovey-dovey again. He sent her a Valentine and a birthday card and they talked on the phone frequently. She seemed happy.
A few months ago she told me that they spoken and he had broken up with her again. She was crying and distraught. It made me very sad and I asked her to tell me the whole story. What she told me was that she had told another girl in her bunk (let's call her Lauren) that there was another boy that she really liked. I asked her who that was and she said it was Ethan, who she had met in second grade. She hasn't seen him since fourth grade and she is now in eighth grade. Apparently, Lauren told Sam that Yelena had another boyfriend and Sam was angry so he broke up with Yelena. Yelena was sure that Lauren told him that because she wanted him for herself. Yelena also told me that Lauren had tried to kill her and was then sent home in the middle of the summer. Where the truth lies is anyone's guess.
So apparently, Sam was talking to Lauren again and she encouraged him to break up with Yelena. Then Sam told some of his friends at school what had happened and all his friends told him that he should break up with her so that was what he did. I told her that she didn't want a guy who breaks up with her because his friends tell him to.
Yelena is in eighth grade and at the end of the year they have a "Moving On" ceremony. The ceremony is at 6, then there is a dinner at 7 (her teacher said that this means pizza) and then a dance until 10. About a month ago, Yelena came home with the very happy news that someone had invited her to the dance! I asked her who it was and she said that it was a guy in her science class named Nick (all names are changed to protect the guilty). She said it was no big deal as she has known him since 6th grade. I asked her what she was going to wear and she said she wasn't sure. She said that she was "consulting" with her best friend trying to help her figure out her outfit for the ceremony and party. Yelena is a tomboy who wears nothing but basketball sneakers, blue jeans and her father's T-shirts which she steals with alarming regularity. Her best friend is what Yelena would call a "girly girl" and always wears really nice clothes, is interested in fashion and looks very put together. Yelena is going to help her get dressed?
The other day, I was at a school event and I asked her teacher about Nick. She said that she had never heard of anyone named Nick. She asked another one of the teachers who accompanies Yelena to her science class (which is a mainstream class) if she knew anything about Nick and she also said that she had no idea who he was. I am starting to get worried here. I asked them to see what they could find out. A few days later, I got an email from her teacher that went like this:
We found out about Nick and he is a very popular 8th grader who plays football. Yelena says hi to him but Kathy (the other teacher) has never seen them talking to each other. I do not know how accurate this is that he asked her to the dance. She has never mentioned it in class or to any other kids.
I talked to the staff at school and they said 8th Graders do not typically ask each other to the dances, they go in groups.
I am starting to get very worried here. I had told a friend about the situation and she asked what I was going to do and I told her that I was just not going to mention anything else about it and see what happens.
Well, tonight my husband and I were doing the dishes and Yelena had already gone upstairs. She came back into the kitchen a little while later and said that she was depressed. I asked her why. She said that she had been upstairs and the phone had rang and she answered it. I have to say right here that the phone is my husbands business phone and normally no one ever answers it including my husband. She said that she answered the phone and it was Sam calling to tell her that he was sorry and that he wanted to get back together again. She said that she told him that he had had his last chance and it was over between the two of them. She was very proud of herself for telling him off and my husband cheered her on. Yelena told Sam that she was in love with someone else anyway. I asked who that might be and she told me that it was Nick. Nick the Phantom...
I had the feeling that no such conversation had taken place and I went on line and looked up the phone calls to that number (Oh, the marvels of modern computer science!!) and sure enough there were no calls received or made on that phone in the past few days. So she did not talk to him tonight.
Such an elaborate story and I have no idea how much or if any of it is true at all. She is also only 15 so I have the feeling we are in for a lot more of this....
