“Do you remember when we were kids?” asked Jean.

“Yeah!” said Arnold.

“Do you remember our promise?” asked Jean.

“Hmmmm… we made so many. I think you will just have to remind me,” said Arnold.

“Okay then, there once was a girl named Jean Atkins. Everyday she wore a blue flowing skirt down to her ankles, a football jersey with the number eighty-one on it, and a red baseball cap that said something about rolling and tiding. There never was a day she wore shoes. Jean had fiery red hair that was always slicked back into a ponytail. She played football with some boys every second she was not in school. She claimed that her mother made her where a skirt and go to school. Though secretly, she loved school.

Jean and her best friend Arnold made a promise everyday at lunch time. They said they would save their kisses for each other when they were nineteen years old. No teachers ever quite understood why two six year old children would have such a fascination with relationships. Even though their relationship was not understood by most, they still made that promise everyday.

One day a girl, Jesse, taunted Jean and Arnold at lunch. She convinced them that their silly amusement with each other’s lips would only result to heart break. With this new information, Jean and Arnold began to ask a lot of questions.

“What is kissing?”

“Why does it break hearts?”

“Can a heart break?”

“Are the lips and the heart connected somehow?”

They asked Jesse these questions everyday until the end of first grade. Jesse hat gotten what she wanted. She got all of their attention every single minute of everyday because she thought she knew about things they did not.

That summer Jean’s mom became irritated with all of Jean’s questions. She told her to stop playing with Jesse and Arnold. Jean had not realized this before, but her life revolved around Jesse’s strange ideas about love and heartbreaking. Jean constantly asked herself why she had let herself be so dumb? She did not understand that Jesse only wanted her and Arnold’s attention.

One day out of the hot June summer, Arnold rang Jean’s doorbell. Jean answered the door, and said she was not allowed to play with Arnold. Arnold was furious! He said that a person was only as good as their word, and Jean’s word was that she would build a relationship with Arnold until they were nineteen and could kiss. Jean explained to him that she had made a promise to her mom to not play with Jesse and him. Jean was stuck between two rocks.

Jean came up with a solution!

“Why do you want us to be boyfriend and girlfriend one day?” asked Jean.

“Well because we are best friends,” explained Arnold.

“But if we were really best friends, you would not want to break my heart, and that is the only thing relationships can lead to,” said Jean.

“But I love you, Jean!” complained Arnold.

“Well yeah but I love me too! I am not letting myself have a broken heart,” Jean said.

At that, Arnold left, and Jean had no more problems.

Jean never played that summer. She only thought about Arnold. Maybe she did love him, or maybe he was too much trouble. Or was it Jesse that she missed? Whatever it was made Jean miserable.

When she went back to school that next August she looked for Arnold. Jean could not find him. She was desperate!

That was when Arnold popped out behind her and said hi.

“Dear goodness!” exclaimed Jean.

“What is it?” asked Arnold.

“It is just boys! You cannot live with them but you definitely cannot live without them,” said Jean with a smile.

With that comment Arnold smiled. At that sight, Jean laughed, and they became best friends again. They never forgot their promise to each other.” said Jean with a smile upon her freckled face. Her red hair seemed to glow underneath her red baseball cap.