I had just moved from LA to Seattle when I decided to fly to my hometown just outside of Cleveland, Ohio to visit my family. While I was there, I unexpectedly met up with an old flame from high school. Not just any old flame, this guy was my first love – literally the template for the men I’ve dated all my life. The class clown, bad boy, sports star, and dreamboat all wrapped up into one. He was tall, dark, and handsome. He was the guy I worshiped from afar, who dated all my friends, but never me. I had a massive crush on him from the 4th grade until we graduated, and after I left for college, I never saw him again, but I thought about him from time to time in a kind of “if only” wistful fantasy.

The first night of my trip home, I was meeting my brother for drinks at the oddly named London Pickle Works (a ramshackle dive) when the woman seated next to me told me that she just texted the old flame and he said he’s on his way.

“Why?” I asked, genuinely surprised to even hear his name let alone that he was on his way to the Pickle, as it’s affectionately called.

“To see you!” She said, smiling like this is all so amazing. “He told me to tell you not to leave.” I looked at her and laughed and said, “Why would he want to see me?”

I was honestly confused. In our graduating class of 100 kids believe me when I say it’s hard to imagine someone not knowing you, and yet I would not be surprised if this guy passed me on the street and didn’t look twice. He spent our childhood looking through me, not at me.

“He’s not coming,” I said to the woman who texted him. “And that’s fine.” And I laughed again to show her how fine it was, and to hide the fact that I was annoyed that she texted him in the first place. Did he think I asked her to text him? Infuriated, I told my brother I was heading out soon.

Ten minutes later he was standing in front of me, looking at me like he just won a prize.

“Nancy Hala,” he said (positive identification, I’ll give him that). “Look at you.”

As he began to sweep me off my feet I thought, “Oh my gosh… is this my love story? She reunites with her high school unrequited love decades later, in their 50s? It’s just like a movie!” In fact, it was exactly like so many movies I’ve seen - Sandra or Reese or whoever going back home to a small town and finding true love in the most unlikely place.