Kiss Me, Baby!
Posted on | October 5, 2006 | Leave a comment | Print This Post
Ah, young love. Come on, you remember … those single and early double digit years, before we got older and life started showing up in mortgage payments, grocery lists, and — God help us — $4.65 Frappucinos. Those were the innocent years, filled with wishes and endless possibilties (“When I grow up, I want to be a famous writer!”) and, first kisses.
My first kiss – not the kind delivered by exuberant parents and grandparents, by the way – was much anticipated and came in the fourth grade. It was towards the end of the school year in Houston, Texas, and I had a crush on Jason Harris. Jason lived on the next street and had a clubhouse in his backyard. One hot afternoon after school, we huddled together in the clubhouse and I knew that this was it. Jason Harris was going to kiss me. OMG, Jason Harris was going to kiss me!
We faced each other and, well, nothing happened. I started giggling. Jason’s smile was frozen on his face (translated = he was just as terrified as me). After a few more seconds of this, he finally made the move, leaned forward, and pressed his lips against mine. And there it was. My first kiss. Then the ice cream truck came down the street and the moment was lost as we scrambled to find change for Fudgcicles. That or a Rainbow Push-Up Pop. Decisions, decisions (you see, life was just preparing us for Starbucks after all).
As fate would have it, my family moved a few short months later. Jason and I wrote a few letters but then fifth grade came and then sixth grade … you get the picture. We were literally an ocean apart and a reunion was unlikely (that sort of thing only happens in romance novels).
There’s nothing like a little anticipation to keep you going – wondering what might have been (with Jason and other, ahem, “firsts”) is certainly fuel for lots of great stories, all waiting to be written. But maybe some things are left better as memories.
Mia King, author of GOOD THINGS: A Novel, available February 2007 by Berkley Trade. $14.00 ISBN: 0425213714
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