His hair was a poop color brown, stringy, greasy, and over all he just needed to wash it. His buck teeth stuck out the 6th grader in our 2nd grade class. Sweat was dripping from his chin due to chasing me for almost the entire recess. He wasn’t that much bigger than me and I could take him down in an instant but, a bet is a bet and I don’t back out of bets. The idea of just kicking him and running to the safety of the classroom stuck fondly in my mind as I drew nearer.

Suddenly I jerked back remembering what my friend Tiana had told me before, “Stay away from boys Annie, they have coodies.” The coodies, what if I got them, what if they attacked my body and wouldn’t let me play sports? What if they find out where I live and steal my puppy? What could I do I had lost the bet so I had to do it but no one had gotten the coodies before besides snotty face Carla.

Snotty face Carla got the coodies from Josh, a 3rd grader. Three days after she didn’t come to school because she caught the “cold”, which is the sickest I heard you can get. She was out for a week before she finally got better. After that nobody ever talked to Josh again except for his best friend John. The same John the bet me that he could catch me before recess was over. The same John who said if I did a had to kiss him. The absolute same John who caught me five minutes before the bell rang.

We were standing on the field feet apart when “I caught you!” he exasperated, “I caught you and now you have to kiss me!”

“No! That’s not fair!” I whimpered.

“How is it not fair? I won you lost!” he smirked.
“It just isn’t!” I said “Plus you cheated!”
He looked at me smiling and took a step closer “How would I do that! I won. A bet is a bet.”
“I am ONLY doing this because I have to. You got that?”
“Sure. Ok ONLY because you have to,” taking another step closer.

“You won’t tell anyone?”
“No, not a soul.”
“Swear.”
“I swear on my Legobot. Ok?”
With that I took the final steps between us and kissed him.
I pulled back and saw him trying to kiss me again so I push him over and ran away screaming “I have the coodies!”