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“While I am grateful for an ever-deepening pool of queer love stories, watching them in adulthood does not sate the deep thirst for direct experience I felt in my youth.”

Garrett Schlichte was exactly twice the age of his sister. When he was 28 and his sister was 14, she would dish to him on the phone about her teenage love life.

But the feelings she was experiencing — like electric attraction and aching jealousy — were unfamiliar to Garrett. When he was a queer, closeted teenager, Garrett turned to romantic comedies to grasp the emotions of a real-life relationship. While his sister could revel in her teenage crushes, he had suppressed his like a secret.

In today’s episode, we listen to Garrett’s essay about missing out on the thrills and challenges of young love — and what he has yet to learn. Then we hear a Tiny Love Story about a sister who longs to become closer to her little brother.

Hosted by: Anna Martin
Produced by: Julia Botero, Hans Buetow and Anna Martin
Edited by: Sara Sarasohn
Executive Producer: Wendy Dorr
Engineered by: Elisheba Ittoop
Theme Music: Dan Powell
Music by: Dan Powell and Marion Lozano
Essay by: Garrett Schlichte
Read by: MacLeod Andrews
Tiny Love Story by: Lucy Mae Coulson
Founder, Modern Love: Daniel Jones
Editor, Modern Love Projects: Miya Lee

Special thanks: Mahima Chablani, Renan Borelli, Jeffrey Miranda, Julia Simon, Lisa Tobin, Sam Dolnick and Ryan Wegner at Audm.

Thoughts? Email us at modernlovepodcast@nytimes.com.