𝒮𝓉𝑜𝓇𝓂'𝓈 𝒜 𝐵𝓇𝑒𝓌𝒾𝓃'

October 30th, 1994

𝒞𝒽𝒶𝓅𝓉𝑒𝓇 𝒮𝒾𝓍𝓉𝑒𝑒𝓃

"Hide, hide, hide!"

A five-year-old girl's legs stumbling up the stairs as she followed after the just barely older boy, the two in giggles as their better ears listened to the boy's mother counting down from twenty.

The first memory she could remember with the boy. Such a vague memory, a fog of a memory. But the childish joy of it was everything. It was the earliest she could think back on him without the help of pictures and the stories of others... the first memory she had of a boy that had been a part of her whole life before she was capable of holding onto those memories.

"They are making cherry pie in the kitchens."

A six-year-old girl sat at the top of the stairs, listening to the yells of her parents down the hall, staring blankly ahead as the boy next to her holding onto her smaller hand... stressed as he tried to make it better.

The first time she had been forced to greet the world head-on. A day with such strange emotions for her back then... such strange ones even years later. A child too young to fully grasp what was happening but for the first time feeling that sense of dread that something was happening. A child far too young to hear those things that would really start to taint how she views the woman she was supposed to idolize... he did his best to make it better.

"I'll stay with you."

A seven-year-old girl sitting next to the boy as he sobbed for the loss he had just experienced... far too young to know what could comfort him as her own tears fell... so she just held his hand as he would for her.

The first time she experienced such heavy thoughts in others. Everyone around her is so... broken. The boy's mother was gone so quickly, so suddenly. The woman she had so desperately looked to, a young girl trying to fill a hole in her life... gone. From her own emotions to that of the boy, it was all so much... but she stuck through for him.

"You still look pretty."

An eight-year-old girl holding a chunk of hair she had just cut off... the boy behind her looking on with wide eyes but cheering her on all the same.

The first crisis of a child. So angry about the lack of control she felt she had over what to wear to her own birthday party, she grabbed a pair of scissors and took her hair from her lower back to just above her shoulders. A father laughed, a maid gasped, and the best friend, through it all... encouraged.

"Why can't I open it now?"

An eleven-year-old girl holding one of her many presents, curiously eyeing it while the boy next to her shyly scratched his head, sharing a glance with the girl's father... receiving a small smile.

The first time that it became so clear that no matter what rules there were... you couldn't stop two children from their own hearts. A day of her first kiss and the day he had gifted something that meant a great deal. Only 11 and just off from 13... two kids that cared for one another so deeply and slowly were developing those silly childish crushes. The path their hearts were on would only be complicated one day... but they deserved to be lost in their youth.

"It's you and me forever."

An eleven-year-old girl clinging onto the boy's back...

The first time they lied to each other... unknowingly... but—

A hand ghosted over her back, snapping Iris right back to present. Right back to the fall breeze. Right back to the excited whispers of all the students as they caught their first sight of the visiting schools. Right back to looking at the boy who had sent her on a spiral.