The Boy Next Door

Many of us have had a special relationship with the boy or girl next door, and though most of us don't end up married to him or her, we remember that "first love" forever.

I had such a relationship when I was very young. The object of my affection was 5 years old at the time. His name was Danny C. and he lived...well...next door!

I could see his yard from our second story window and would often watch him and his older brother playing in their back yard when I was supposed to be taking my afternoon nap.

Sometimes Danny and I would walk up and down the sidewalk in front of my house holding hands and my sisters would chant "Two little lovebirds sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!"

One time Danny really did kiss me, right on my cheek. I was only 4 years old, but I believed we would get married someday.

On the day that my family moved away from that town Danny and I vowed to love each other forever. I swore I would come back someday and marry him. By then I was five and thought my heart would surely break.

Two years later, I returned with my family to visit all of our friends that we had left behind. I couldn't wait to see Danny.

I had had many other boyfriends by then, after all, I was going into second grade. But I remembered my promise to Danny and I wondered if he would too.

It was a little awkward at first when we finally got to see each other. He said he had a new girlfriend but that he still loved me the most. I was satisfied with that and when we parted, we swore undying devotion. Looking back I have to laugh when I think about how serious we were. We knew so much and yet were so naive.

I never saw him again, but I often thought about him and wondered where he was and what he was doing.

Many years and one or two boyfriends later, I was going to college. I was taking an art class and in the class next to mine I often saw a young man whom I found myself quite attracted to. After a while he noticed me too and we would smile at each other in passing. Finally one day after class we found ourselves both headed in the same direction and I got up the nerve to say hi to him. He asked me if I wanted to eat lunch with him. So we sat on the lawn and chatted. I soon found out that he was from the same town I have lived in 15 years earlier.

"Do you remember anyone from when you lived there?" he asked.

"Well," I began, " I do remember one person. He was my next door neighbor and my childhood boyfriend. His name was Danny C."

The young man's mouth dropped open and he stared at me in disbelief.

"I'm Bob C.," he laughed, "and Danny is my cousin."

I couldn't believe that out of all of the people in that college, the one person I would pick out to befriend would be from a town 100 miles away and be related to the only person I remembered there.

He told me everything he knew about Danny - where he was and what he was doing. Danny's life had taken a totally different path than mine. I was a city girl working toward a college degree and a career, and he was a country boy. working as a hired hand on a big ranch.

After my encounter with Bob, I felt that I could finally let go of a part of my past that I had clung to for so long, all because of a childhood promise. As for Bob, we never really hit it off. He had done what he was sent to me to do.