When I was 14, I met this girl, Jennifer, at summer camp. First girl I ever kissed. She lived in another town about 3 hours away. So we continued writing each other (this was 1991 pre-internet). In one of her letters she tells me I should come to her birthday party and see her.
My mom agrees to drive me there, and we were on our way to a family vacay. So I call her the day before and tell her that I will be passing through and ask if it's still cool if I come. She seems a bit strange on the phone and says "Ok, um...sure." She gives me her address.
The next day I show up and her mom answers the door and is like "Um, hi, you actually came. Jennifer told me about you." Something just seemed off, like I shouldn't be there.
My instincts didn't fail me. Jennifer was nowhere to be found. Some of her friends that were at the party were curious and came up and chatted with me. They were like, "Oh so you're HIM. We didn't actually think you'd show up." So they ask me if I have a girlfriend. Before I could even say Jennifer, one of them blurts out, "Don't say Jennifer because she's going out with Justin."
My heart fell out of my body and shattered all over the floor.
I had suspected something like this, but didn't really believe she would invite me to her party if she was seeing someone else...and that the someone else would be at the party. Perhaps she was being nice, and didn't really think I would show up.
A little while later Jennifer appears with her boyfriend, and a very awkward exchange ensures.
"So this is the guy you met at camp while we were broken up? What the fuck is he doing here?"
At this point I want to just peace outta there, but my mom isn't picking me up for another several hours. So I'm a bit stuck with no way to reach her. I just play it cool like I'm unfazed by the interaction. She opens the present I brought, the bracelet my mom had helped me pick out for her. I could tell she liked it, but it elicited eye rolls from the boyfriend and his other buddies that were there and very clearly did not consider me a welcome guest.
The next three hours were, even to this day, some of the most awkward of my life. Sitting there watching them make out, hold hands, all of that gut-wrenching stuff, which was clearly a ploy on his part to make me wish I had never come. She went along with it probably because she didn't want to be weird or allow him to suspect she still liked me. One of the other girls there was interested in me, but I just couldn't bring myself to be interested back given the extreme awkwardness and soul-crushing moment I was enduring.
My mom eventually came and picked me up. I could tell Jennifer knew I was hurt and she felt terrible as she walked me to the door, with me doing my best to remain composed and not break down before I got out of there. I exploded into tears in the car. I didn't even tell my mom why, just asked if we could just go home.
A few weeks later, Jennifer wrote me a letter profusely apologizing for what happened, and said she had broken up with Justin when she had invited me to come. Relationships at that age are capricious, and I'm sure she meant well. However, I was never going to be made a fool of like that again and never responded.
It was 32 years ago, but I can still feel the trauma from that experience. It was real, and devastating. I was in love with her (as in love as a 14 year old could be), and felt like I had been ambushed. It's fun to laugh about it now, but there is a bit of my heart that never fully healed from it.