In first grade I used to sneak long looks at her during reading time, when I was supposed to be paying attention to what Dick and Jane and Spot were up to. I’d watch Sandy and imagine our wedding day, at St. Margaret’s across the street from my house. We’d roll a white carpet out my front door, across Lincoln Ave., and up the steps of the church and inside. She was so beautiful.

At recess, Sandy pretended to hate me so I did the same.

She would run up to me and holler, “Chris-sy’s a sis-sy! Chri-i-is-sy! Si-i-is-sy!” I hated that, and Sandy knew it. Then she’d run away, laughing and looking back.

I would chase her down until I caught up with her, yell “Shut up, Sher-bert! I hate sher-bert!” and then it was my turn to run away.

One day right after Easter, I guess all the marshmallow eggs and jelly beans had slowed me down. Sandy caught up to me too fast, and she cornered me at the fence over by the boiler room door. We were hidden from everybody else on the other side of the red brick building.

“Chris-sy! Baby Chris-sy!” she teased, right in my face. I know I said she was beautiful, but with her eyes scrunched up like that and the look she was giving me, I hated her a little.

“Shut up, Sandy. I mean it!” I was starting to cry. I couldn’t help it, because I really did hate that name, and I didn’t like being trapped. There was no way I was gonna cry in front of a girl, so I made a dash around her.

Sandy moved to block my escape with her whole body, and her momentum brought us both down. She ended up sitting on my stomach, laughing at my tears, but she wouldn’t budge. “Poor baby’s crying for his mommy! Ha-ha!”

“I can’t breathe, Sandy! Get off!” I was rubbing my neck in pain, because the buttons on her ratty white sweater had made a long scratch down the left side.

Sandy leaned toward me, took my head between her hands, and kissed me right on the lips. She pushed her mouth onto mine hard, and she kept it there. I remember thinking, This is the best kiss I will ever get in my life. My whole body relaxed under her weight now, and I wrapped my arms around her.

Her breath smelled like the flowers in my backyard, the purple lilacs starting to bloom behind my swing set. She had her arms around my neck, pulling me toward her, and even though I still couldn’t breathe, I felt a rush of energy in my chest. I smiled, and she smiled too, with our lips still together. Then I felt myself falling upwards, like I was floating into the sky, but the sky was inside Sandy’s bright blue eyes.

That summer I rode Michael’s old blue bike around Sandy’s neighborhood every afternoon, waiting for a glimpse of her. The chain guard was rattling something awful, and I didn’t care. I was singing to myself the whole time:

She’d rather have the rain,
Than anything I could give her.
I’d give her anything,
If she would care for me.
But she’d rather have the rain. . . .

Recognize it? Partridge Family. David Cassidy. Susan Dey.

Sandy did show up one day on her front porch, and she waved to me to come over. “Hey, Chris, you know I don’t like you anymore, don’t you?” I started to cry before I got to the end of her street, but I pedaled fast so no one would see me, and when I got home I ran up to my room.

“Sandra! I love you dear-er-ly!” Ann. Mocking me in the hallway.

Twenty years later or so, Ann was the one walking the white carpet across the street to St. Margaret’s. Not me.