The last time I had a crush, he used words like esoteric around me, spoke in a really calm, breathy manner, and was, by all accounts, very brainy. I was infatuated with his intelligence, and ignored all the red flags that were clearly all around him.

It was, as most of my crushes go, horrid. He showed me over and over what kind of a person he was, and I smoothed it over in my head with the thoughts of what we had in common. Even my friends were telling me how badly it would go for me, but as anyone who’s had a crush can attest, it needed to burn out on its own.

And burn it did, in a manner that I didn’t expect, and in hindsight, the best way it could. Crashing and burning is good for me. A slow burn is torture.

But I can’t wait for the next time. A crush is a crash for me a lot of the time, but when the universe aligns, it’s pretty damn amazing.