It was early winter, and I had just gotten a new tank top set. It was white, with blue, green, and red palm trees on it, and the brand was Jet Set. I remember the brand name because I thought it sounded so grown-up and sophisticated. Made me sound like I should be on Falcon Crest or something.

Something changed partway through third grade. It became acceptable, even desirable, to hang around with boys. Not that I hadn't always had crushes. In first grade I tried to kiss a boy named Robbie, who cruelly rebuffed my advances (he ran away). In second grade, I was inexplicably fascinated by a boy named Tom, who talked in a raspy voice and beat all the other kids at kickball. But in third grade there was Zach. Little, sarcastic Zach, with his freckles and his sandy-blond hair. I had never seen his kind of attitude before, and was fascinated by it. Needless to say, this would not be the last time I dated a smart-ass.

Kevin was one of the meaner kids in class. He had a wicked smile, and a passion for disrupting class with simulated fart sounds. Usually, Kevin picked on the smaller kids, but one time he embarrassed me terribly by holding an anatomy book in front of my face and pointing to a diagram of the breasts. I was mortified, but I do remember looking at the strange way the tissues seemed to be folded around inside the breast, and thinking how odd that was, and how I wasn't sure I wanted any of that stuff anyway.

It all started when I had to stay the night at Greg G's house.

Greg's mom and my mom were best friends, so Greg and I were forced to spend a lot of time together. Every Sunday after church, our families would go to the restaurant at the Ramada Inn to eat lunch together. Greg and I were always bored during the meal. We'd sit squishing green jell-o through our teeth until our parents dismissed us, at which point we'd go out to the lobby and monopolize the sit-down Centipede game. Sometimes we'd fight over the controls.

Greg and I had a conditional friendship, the condition being that no one in school could ever know about it. The problem? He was a boy, and I was a girl. Neither of us really believed that the other had cooties, but we had to stand behind the party platform anyway. It was just one of those things.