Around the middle of September the fall I turned 16 I was in my first year at George Middleton Senior High. I was a gangly, good looking young man with lots and lots of hair. No, it wasn’t long enough to wear in one of those dumb man buns that some of the guys were still wearing, but was nice and thick and full and well-trimmed. I had recently experienced a growth spurt, and it seemed as if my body hadn’t gotten used to my extra height as I could trip over my own shoelace if I wasn’t really careful. I had been a bit of a looser with the ladies, as when I was in grade 9 I had tried to ask a couple of girls to school dances. It seemed that as soon as I approached a girl I fancied I would begin to stutter. I just couldn’t get past my nervousness, and as a result I quit trying to ask anyone for a date so I did not attend my junior high graduation dance. There were a couple of girls in my grade that I did spend some time talking to, but these two were not among the more popular ones and other than the fact that they both wore the type of glasses that I preferred I had no real interest in dating either one of them.
School had been back for about a week when someone occupied the locker next to mine. I noticed a lock now hanging from the latch that morning when I arrived at school and didn’t give it much thought. Then when I got to my home room I noticed a new girl sitting at one of the desks near the front. I didn’t give that much thought either, although I wondered why she was near the front of the room instead of at one of the 2 or 3 empty desks that had been at the rear. As the classroom filled and the bell rang the first thing our teacher did was to introduce the new girl. Her name was Bethany Grant, and she was pretty darned cute. Her hair was worn long, with bangs and it was the nicest strawberry blond color I had ever seen. She had a very attractive face, but wasn’t all that large upstairs in the breast department. And her figure was very well proportioned, although she wore jeans that were not quite as tight as some of the other girls wore. I took one look at her and figured that this one was out of my league, as all the jocks would hit on her immediately. Maybe I would be fortunate enough to land one of their cast offs, although there was quite a pecking order here and I knew that as soon as one of the guys looked like he was interested in Bethany there would be a bit of a war amongst the other girls and Bethany would likely be ostracized.
Over the next couple of weeks there were all sorts of guys from our grade 10 as well as the other 2 grade 10’s that were asking Bethany out on a date. She never did accept any of the invitations, and I was beginning to wonder if she might be a girl who liked girls. However I didn’t see any indications of that. She was quite friendly with me whenever we met at our lockers, and sometimes I walked part of the way home with her as we lived in the same subdivision. For some reason my stuttering seldom showed up and I was beginning to feel that maybe I had grown out of it.
One day in early November Bethany asked me on our walk home if I had a date for the Sadie Hawkins Dance the following weekend. Of course I didn’t. No girl had asked me, and I was still too afraid to attempt to ask any of the ones I really wasn’t interested in. It shocked me when Bethany asked if I would go with her, but somehow I managed to tell her that I would love to go with her.
“Before we go on a date I have to let me see you wearing my glasses.” Bethany said.
“I knew those lovely green eyes of yours were enhanced by contacts, but why would it matter if I saw you wearing glasses before we went out.” I answered.
“My glasses are pretty thick, and I have had a couple of guys dump me after they saw me wearing them at my other school. So now I won’t go out with a guy unless he first sees me wearing glasses.” Bethany replied.
“I don’t think that will matter to me. I kind of like the appearance of a glasses wearing girl.” I said.
“You haven’t seen mine yet.” Bethany told me.
“Why don’t you ever wear them to school?” I asked.
“I have 2 reasons. The first one is that I can’t see as well when I am wearing them. And the main reason is that I am afraid of people making fun of me because they are so strong. I guess if I could see pretty good wearing my glasses it wouldn’t be as bad, but when I wear my glasses I really don’t see all that well and people can be very cruel.” Bethany answered.
“You didn’t have to ask me to the dance, so why is it so important that you let me see you wearing your glasses now?” I asked.
“The week after the dance I have to prepare for my yearly eye exam at the hospital. My doctor always wants me to go for 2 weeks without wearing my contact lenses. Then everyone will see me wearing my glasses anyway. You have been so nice and kind to me that I didn’t want to show up at school and have them scare you away.” Bethany replied.
“Well, let’s go see you wearing your glasses.” I said.
“How about if I go home and take my lenses out and then have supper. You could walk over around 7 and we could go over to the park.” Bethany suggested.
“I am having bit of trouble with the math homework. You are pretty good at math, so how about if I come over and you can help me understand it?” I answered.
‘We could try that.” Bethany said.
Promptly at 7 that evening I rang the doorbell at Bethany’s house. Her dad answered the door and when I asked for Bethany he called upstairs for her. She came down the stairs hesitantly, and I didn’t know if it was her eyesight or if it was her concern that I would turn away from her as soon as I saw her glasses. She was right. They were pretty darned strong. The frames were opaque, with a pale green color that suited her hair coloring perfectly and they looked good on her face. The lens opening was a little large for her prescription, but it was a bit small by the standards of today. Her lenses didn’t have a complete bowl like a myodisc would have had, but the lenses did not reach the outer edge of the frame and there was an area at least ¼” wide that did not have her prescription in it. Really, they did not look terrible on her, and I told her that I liked her appearance wearing her glasses.
She didn’t accept my statement easily but we spread our math homework out on their kitchen table and she helped me with my attempts to understand the concept I was having problems with. I had a hard time keeping my eyes off her glasses and I kept sneaking looks at her. I had never seen such a thick, strong looking pair before, and while I never would have gone looking for a girl who needed such a powerful correction I certainly wasn’t going to cast her off because of them. I could see that she was correct in her thinking. When she showed up in school wearing her glasses there were going to be a lot of derisive comments made about how blind she was. But I wasn’t going to be one of the ones making the comments. I now realized why she had experienced rejection before and I was going to do my best to let her know that I was perfectly all right with her wearing her glasses.
When it was time to go home I asked her if she would like to go to the movies with me Friday night. She hesitated for a minute and I realized that she likely took out her contacts for the evening. I then suggested that I would really not mind it if she wore her glasses and she looked at me with an incredulous look on her face. Her expression told me that she was thinking “you are asking me out and telling me it is fine for me to wear my glasses?” I then told her that she was going to have to wear her glasses full time to school in a couple more weeks and that there were likely going to be some of our classmates at the show. If she wore her glasses and some of the others saw her wearing them the shock would not be as great as if they saw her for the first time at school.
I could see her thinking about what I said and she finally agreed to go with me – wearing glasses. As I walked home I realized that for the first time in my life I had asked a girl out for a date without stuttering so badly that she would laugh at me. A few times that I had tried before the experience had ended up with me running away in shame. For weeks after that I would even avoid making eye contact with her.
Our thinking was correct that we would likely see some of our classmates at the show. They all sat up at the very back, but Bethany and I sat in the lower section. It wasn’t where I would have chosen to sit, but it wasn’t right on top of the screen or anything and Bethany appeared to be able to see everything just fine. After the show Bethany and I met some of our classmates outside after the show and we went to a nearby coffee shop for a while. The evening had started to chill off, so we sat inside and Bethany went to the washroom with one of the girls she was sort of friendly with at school. After we walked home I asked Bethany if there had been any comments. She told me that Jill had commented that she hadn’t realized that Bethany had meant that her eyes were that bad. But at least the ice had been broken, and I was sure that the others would tell the rest of our classmates about the thick glasses that Bethany wore well before she had to show up at school wearing her glasses for the two weeks before her annual eye exam.
I knew a lot about eyesight and glasses, but it wasn’t because I had any sort of a fetish towards glasses wearers. I had, in grade 9, done an essay on vision problems around the world. I had done lots of research and had received quite a good mark. I knew that most people with very high myopia often had it from birth and that was called congenital myopia. This type of myopia wasn’t always progressive, nor was it always degenerative. But it could easily turn into degenerative progressive myopia. Most of the people that were myopic had a low prescription of -3D or less. Then there were quite a few people who had a little bit higher number, but were still considered medium myopes. Those who had myopia in a degree that was higher than -6D fell into a category called high myopes and from this point even higher myopia could become a problem. High myopes were more likely to have progressive myopia that could go up into the -20D range, and they were very likely to have retinal problems. Singapore had the largest population of high myopes in the world and 88% of the population was myopic to some degree. The rest of the world had a population with a percentage of myopes ranging from 28% up to 45% and these numbers were increasing yearly. Of the myopes in the world, 10% were high myopes, and 10% of these people were severe myopes. Retinal detachments, lacquer cracks, glaucoma and macular degeneration were common problems with very high myopes and these problems often caused blindness. Childbirth was another problem as most extreme myopes needed to have a C section to prevent the strain from pushing that could cause retinal detachments. As well, if one parent was myopic there was more than a 50% chance that their children would be myopic as well, with girls having a greater degree of, and a higher chance of, being myopic. While I liked a girl who wore glasses I did not know if I could bring myself to accept the fact that with such a strong prescription Bethany had a high probability of going blind in one, or both eyes.
Bethany had brought me to a point where I no longer stuttered every time I tried to talk to a girl I fancied, so I had a lot to thank her for. She was also an extremely nice person and I liked her a lot and I didn’t want to hurt her by breaking up with her right after I found out how strong her glasses were. I thought I at least owed it to her to remain her friend and maybe her boyfriend for the balance of our grade 10 year. It wasn’t as if I was going to marry her or anything.
A week after our first date Bethany showed up at school on the Monday morning wearing her glasses. She had told Jill the night we went to the show that she would have to wear her glasses every day for 2 weeks, and I suppose Jill had passed the word around because, while she got quite a few stares, no one said anything to her about her obviously poor eyesight. And, I also figured out that her mom had told the teacher about Bethany having poor eyesight when she registered at the school and that was why the teacher had put Bethany near the front of the class and had moved Joe to one of the rear seats. I maintained my composure and continued being as friendly with Bethany during the period that she wore her glasses as I had before I got to know how thick her glasses needed to be in order for her to see much of anything.
As the end of the two week period drew near I had reached the point where just looking at Bethany with her strong thick glasses excited me. As I had mentioned, I had not previously had any more than a slight attraction to girls that wore glasses, however seeing Bethany day after day wearing her glasses had started to arouse me in a way I had never experienced before. I was waiting for Tuesday morning when I was hoping to find out some details about her myopia, as her eye appointment was on Monday afternoon. I gave her a hug Monday after we had lunch together in the cafeteria and I wished her good luck at the eye doctors.
Tuesday morning Bethany surprised me by wearing her glasses to school again. I was happy to see her wearing them again, but I was a bit worried about the reason for the glasses. It turned out that her contact lens case had leaked out the solution in one of her contacts and the lens had dried out enough that her doctor suggested that she would be better off waiting for her new contacts to come in before she tried wearing contacts again. Her new lenses were going to be in either Thursday afternoon or Friday morning so she was stuck wearing her glasses until then.
Bethany had read the essay that I had written the year before and we had discussed some of my findings. Apparently there was no known reason why she was as nearsighted as she was. She had been found to be seriously myopic at about a year and a half old, and her doctor had concluded that she had likely been born very shortsighted. Her first glasses had been around -18D, which corrected as much of her myopia as her pediatric ophthalmologist had wanted to do at her age. Eventually, by the time she had started school; her prescription had climbed to the same -24D that she was still wearing. There were no previous examples of prior myopia in her immediate family, and her mom and dad had very good eyesight. No other family members wore glasses except for reading glasses. Her younger sister and her brother did not require glasses. So, while Bethany fit the profile for a congenital myope, her doctor felt that her severe myopia might start and end with her.
Bethany’s routine eye exam had the normal results and showed no change. She had listened to her eye doctor when she got contact lenses at the age of 10, and her contacts had come out every evening when she got home from school. She had always worn the best soft lenses that money could buy, and although her lenses were advertised for almost full time wear her eye doctor had discussed in detail with her about how even the most expensive contacts could be over worn, which could lead to her not being able to wear contacts for any more than a few hours a day. Even though it was very painful mentally for Bethany to go out in public wearing glasses she would do so if she had been wearing her contacts for more than 10 hours already that day. Her doctor had also discussed with her that wearing contacts that gave her the best distance vision were too strong for her to wear when she was reading a lot. She actually took his advice and was very careful to always wear a pair of weaker glasses, or if she had her contacts in, a pair of low powered cheap readers when she was doing her homework or when reading books. She knew that her prescription of -24D for both eyes was already a very strong prescription and she had no desire to have it creep any higher. And the fact that she was now almost 16 and had needed the same -24D prescription since she was almost 6 seemed to be proof that her eye doctor’s suggestions had been in her best interests.
Bethany and I continued dating through grade 11 and 12. Her eye exam when we were in grade 12 showed the same results as the one back in grade 10 had shown. She had passed the DMV eye test with her contacts in, and she was driving with her provisional license the same as I was. My parents had seen Bethany wearing her glasses a few times and my mom had asked me a few pointed questions about the possibility of Bethany passing her poor eyesight on to our children. I told mom what her pediatric ophthalmologist had said about the chance of this being very low, and mom accepted the fact that Bethany might end up being the mother of her grandchildren. And I think she had also accepted that if Bethany did pass her myopia on to one of our children she would not love the child any less.
I had been hanging around a couple of internet sites devoted to vision and glasses and I had seen enough pictures of young ladies wearing myodiscs that I talked Bethany into getting herself a pair of myodiscs after her eye exam in grade 12. After the initial period of getting used to the smaller bowl Bethany found she liked the myodiscs better, and she was able to wear a bit more modern looking frame with a larger eye size. Her new myodiscs had a black plastic frame, much like the Ray Ban Wayfarer frame, and her bowl was around a 30mm bowl in the plastic lenses that were the 1.74 hi index ones. With the anti-reflective coating her glasses looked fantastic on her face, and she wore them a bit more frequently at school. She was now working at a clothing store in the mall after school and she preferred to go to work wearing her contact lenses, so her glasses were now worn to school in the morning and she changed to her contacts at noon so that by the time she made it home from work and got to bed around 10 she was still right around a 10 hour day of wearing contacts.
By the time the following September rolled around Bethany had decided that she was going to work full time at the clothing store. I was heading off to college to take a course in computer programming and I expected Bethany to wait for me to finish my course so we could get married. I had no idea that the manager of the shopping mall was sniffing around Bethany, and once I had left town he was onto her like a dog with a bone. I suppose I can’t really blame her for succumbing to his charms, as I had been the only guy in town she had ever dated. I sort of think she had been a little disappointed that she hadn’t had to fight a couple more guys off and had been forced to settle on me.
Bethany and I were not engaged, nor had we experienced any sexual contact. I had been willing to wait for us to be either engaged, or married before I pushed the issue. But Mr. Wonderful had kicked the rug out from under my feet and I was left holding on to my dreams for the future without Bethany. I couldn’t even hope that he would shove her under the bus when he saw her wearing her glasses, because she had worn her glasses to work every once in a while. There was no sense resenting that, because I had made her feel that she was beautiful even when she was wearing glasses, someone else had been attracted to her as she was now a much more self-confident person. I accepted that I had lost the fight, and I quit calling her. She had only been answering every 3rd or 4th call anyway and our conversations were now empty words.
Bethany had done one thing for me though. She had been the one who stopped my stuttering by asking me out. My time with her had allowed me to mature, and I then realized that I no longer needed to fear asking a girl out. I made the most of this for the rest of my year at college and although I never found another girl who wore glasses that attracted me as much as Bethany’s did I certainly didn’t lack for dates.
The following summer I came back home to live with my parents. I did not go looking for Bethany, nor did I ask any of my friends if they had seen her around. About 2 weeks before I was to go back to the city I happened to be in the hardware store at the same time as Bethany’s father, and while I would rather have avoided him it just wasn’t possible.
“Hi Zack. How are you doing?” Mr. Grant asked.
“Fine sir. And how are you and Mrs. Grant?” I asked politely.
“We are both good. Have you heard from Bethany lately?” Mr. Grant asked.
“No, and I don’t suppose I will.” I replied.
“She is probably too ashamed to call you.” Mr. Grant replied.
“She made her choice.” I replied, wishing this was over.
“And a poor one it was. Turned out he was already married and just went after her because he had a fetish towards her glasses.” Mr. Grant said.
“Like I said, she made her choice. See you around Sir.” I replied as I got out of there as fast as I could.
After talking to her dad I was hurting. That stupid girl with the strong glasses had broken my heart and had fallen for the wiles of a con man. The worst part was that I still loved her. But I am a stubborn guy, and there was no way I was going to pick up the phone and call her. For all I knew she was damaged goods now.
Over the next couple of weeks I couldn’t stop myself from thinking about Bethany. She still held a place in my heart, and as much as I hated to admit it I also seemed to have a fetish for a girl who wore glasses. I wanted to call her so badly that it was all I could do to stop from punching the familiar numbers into my phone. I returned to my room in the city, and I poured myself into my schoolwork. The only way I was going to get a decent programming job would be if I could graduate near the top of my class.
I couldn’t stop myself from thinking about Bethany though. Finally, around the beginning of October I managed to bring myself to call her.
“Hi Beth, its Zack. How are you doing?” I asked.
‘Hey Zack, its good to hear from you. I am doing just fine. I am no longer working at Mademoiselle’s Fashion’s and I am now working for Becky at her bridal shop. I really enjoy the work, and Becky is great to work for.” Bethany said.
“I talked to your dad last summer and he told me you weren’t at the store in the mall anymore. But who is Becky?” I asked.
“Don’t you remember Becky Strong? She was in grade 12 when we were in 11, and her mom had the bridal store on Main Street. Her mom got sick with cancer last year and Becky took over the store from her.” Bethany told me.
“Oh, that Becky. I do sort of remember her. I am glad you are happy. Listen, I am coming home to see mom and dad over the weekend. Did you want to grab a coffee somewhere?” I asked.
‘I’d like that.” Bethany replied.
Damn, I hadn’t intended to do that. I had wanted to leave her hanging. I hadn’t even intended to head home on the weekend. I almost called her the following night to tell her that something else had come up and I wasn’t going to be able to make it home – but I didn’t.
I caught the early bus from the city on Friday afternoon. I got home around 6, and I called Bethany at home. Her mom answered and when I told her who it was she told me that Bethany was at work and gave me the number at the store. I called and got Becky, and when I asked her if I could speak to Bethany she told me that she was with a customer but if I gave her my number she would have Bethany call me back. It took about 10 minutes before the phone rang.
I asked Bethany when we could get together for that coffee I had promised her and she suggested that I could pick her up after 9 when she finished work. I felt like telling her I was busy after 9, but this was unfinished business in my heart and I needed to put my feelings for Bethany to rest. So I told her that I would have dad’s car and I would be in front of the store at 9.
Promptly at 9PM I was in front of the Bridal Shoppe on Main. I got out of the car and walked through the front door. I spotted Becky and I think she recognized me, but I told her anyway that I was Zack and she said that Bethany was just in the washroom and would be out in a minute. When Bethany appeared I could see that she had put on fresh lipstick and had likely touched up her makeup. She looked good, really good and my heart began to pound.
There was a coffee and doughnut shop just down the block, so we headed there to have a conversation. I knew it wasn’t going to be satisfactory, but I felt I deserved an apology. Once we were seated with our coffees in front of us Bethany did apologize for dumping me. I couldn’t help myself when I told her that I still had feelings for her.
“I don’t expect you to understand Zack, but Mark was a darned good person with words, and he made me feel like I was the most beautiful girl in the world to him.’ Bethany said.
“And I was just the poor sap who had loved you since we met in grade 10 then.” I replied.
“Hey, if you are trying to make me feel bad, don’t bother. I already feel that way and if that is how this meeting is going to go I might as well go home.” Bethany replied.
“I am sorry about that. It is just that it is really hard for me to be sitting with the girl that I was planning to ask for her hand in marriage before she pulled the rug out from under my feet.” I answered.
“Oh, you had plans for us to get married did you? Why hadn’t you told me?” Bethany asked.
“I am still in school. I knew that we could never marry until I graduate next spring.” I replied.
“You could have still told me of your thoughts.” Bethany responded.
“Would that have made a difference?” I asked.
“Probably not. Mark was quite a sweet talker. He would tell me that I was just as attractive to him when I was wearing my glasses as I was when I was without them.” Bethany said.
“I always told you that.” I answered.
“I know, but it wasn’t until another man started to tell me the same thing that I began to believe that you had been telling me the truth.” Bethany replied.
“How long did you go out with him before his wife found out about you?” I asked.
“We started dating in October last year. We were still going out together in January and he had bought me a nice Christmas present from one of the other sales clerks at the store I worked at then. But the jerk had put his purchase on his credit card and his wife couldn’t remember what he had bought her from the store, so she came in one day to check out the purchase. I hadn’t sold Mark my present of course, but I sure recognized her last name when I looked up the sales slip for her. And once I saw the sales slip I knew where the gift had gone. And as soon as I realized who she was I knew immediately why Mark had been hitting on me.” Bethany told me.
“Why was that?” I queried.
“She was beautiful, and she wore glasses that had to be at least as strong as mine. With that I was positive that Mark had a fetish for ladies who wore glasses, and that was why he wanted to get me into bed with him.” Bethany replied.
“Did you tell her what had been going on?” I asked.
“Are you crazy? I never said a word about Mark to her as I didn’t want to create a scene in the store. I just looked up the records and told her that there must have been some mistake in the billing. I gave her the money back from my own pocket and she left the store without being any the wiser.” Bethany replied.
“I figure you ended up confronting Mark then.” I said.
“I did. The next time he asked me out I suggested that he could go do something unmentionable to himself. He looked rather shocked, and I then told him to go on home to his wife, as there was no way he was ever going to get into my panties. I had already talked with Becky and I knew she wanted me to come to work with her. I didn’t want to be around the mall anymore, so I gave my notice and I have been working with Becky ever since.” Bethany replied.
We continued chatting for a little while longer and then I drove her home, There were actually a few more things I would have liked to have said to her but I wisely kept my mouth shut. The one thing that made me a lot happier was that it seemed that Mark had not gotten Bethany to sleep with him, and that made me a lot more optimistic. When I walked her to her door I didn’t even try to kiss her, but as I turned to walk away I swung back around and asked her if she would like to go to a show with me the following evening. She accepted, and I was going to pick her up the following evening at 8.
We had a fun time, but there was still a little bit of aloofness on both our parts. Bethany knew she had hurt me badly, and I was afraid to put my heart into winning her back. But at least we were both making an effort. When I dropped her off at her parent’s I told her that I would be very busy with my schooling, and I likely would not be coming home again until Christmas. She seemed to accept this and told me that she would still be there for me. A nasty retort about how she wasn’t the last time would not have helped the situation, so I merely told her that I would call her or text her frequently.
I could have come home at least once more before my Christmas break but I needed some time to think things over. As I was thinking I realized that Bethany would be having her comprehensive 2 year vision exam this year, so it was highly likely that she would be wearing glasses for the last two weeks of November. This year November 30th fell on a Monday so I texted Bethany and suggested that if she was available I would take the bus home on November 27 and we could get together. She texted back that, as I had already suspected, she would be wearing her glasses that weekend. I replied “Is that supposed to matter?” Eventually we decided that I would come home for the weekend and we would spend some time together.
The weekend went well, as far as I was concerned. Bethany seemed to now be the same girl I had been in love with before she dumped me for Mark. And I was on my best behavior with her so by the end of the weekend I had decided I would buy her a ring and ask her to marry me when I came home for Christmas.
I was a little surprised the following week when she texted me to tell me that her prescription had, for the first time in 12 years, increased slightly. Her new contacts were going to now be -20D and her glasses would have to be slightly over -25D. I hadn’t really noticed her having any more than the normal difficulty seeing things properly while we had been together over the weekend.
I have purchased the ring, and I hope she likes it. I am now looking forward to going home next week and finding the appropriate time and setting to ask Bethany to marry me. I have finally gotten past the anger I felt over Bethany dumping me for Mark, and I am hoping that this was a good lesson for her to learn.
Specs4ever July 2015