My name is Valerie, and it was the summer of 1985 when I first met Christopher. I was a teenager in a newer neighbourhood, and had been living there for a couple of years when the new house around the corner finally sold and a new family moved in.
I had always been the oldest kid on the block, and was constantly looking for someone older to hang out with. "Please," I thought as I watched the moving truck unload furniture, "Please let someone my own age move in."
As it turned out, there were two kids in the family, Christopher and his sister, Anne. Christopher was my age, and his sister a couple years younger. How I met Anne I cannot quite recall, but I do remember when I first laid eyes on Chris.
It was summer, hot and humid, and I was with Anne heading over to their house to cool off in the sprinkler. Walking down the street, Anne spotted Chris in their driveway, "Come on Val, my brother is home and you haven't met him yet."
We arrived at the house, where Chris was in the driveway with another friend. I was quite shy at that age, but when Anne introduced us, I couldn't help but get a bit flustered and felt a warm tingle flood through me that I had never felt before. He had dark hair, with an uncontrollable cowlick on the front that I found incredibly adorable, piercing green eyes and a crooked grin that made me weak in the knees. Looking back years later, I realized that I never forgot that crooked grin.
As time went on, Anne and I became good friends, and I found myself always wanting to visit her house as that is where I had the best chance to bump into Chris. Being a friendly social guy, he would join us whenever he was home and whenever I saw him I could feel my heart flutter and that now familiar warm tingle would sweep through my body. I was too shy to do anything about it and would not realize until a couple of years later that he could be feeling the same way.
Then the day came when he asked me to go out on a date.
I was so surprised. We were both 18 by now, but still in high school, and having had a secret crush on him for so long, I had no idea that he was interested in me. I had certainly never told anyone about my feelings for him and was taken aback when he asked me to go out with him. Just us, no friends or sisters, a real date. There was no answer I could give except to say yes, and I remember lying in bed that night thinking about him. Nervous, excited, and a bit scared, I couldn't wait and could hardly contain myself.
The day of our date, I was on pins and needles. I spent hours getting ready, trying to find the perfect outfit to wear. Skirt or pants? I looked at the mound of discarded clothes on my bed and decided on loose fitting casual pants that I knew made my muscular legs look good. A sweater that emphasized my perky C cup breasts, brought out my piercing blue eyes and accentuated my long blonde hair. Time was running out and as I put the finishing touches on myself, I heard the doorbell ring.
I heard my Dad's voice as he opened the front door, and as he called out my name, I took one last look in the mirror, took a deep breath to calm my nerves and went downstairs to see Chris standing there waiting for me, greeting me with a big smile and an undeniable twinkle in his eye.
We walked down the street, on our way to the movie theatre. My body was on fire, I couldn't believe this was actually happening. Our conversation was a blur, I think just nervous teenaged small talk and I will never be able to recall which movie we saw. We sat in our seats waiting for the lights to dim. The movie started and I was still a bundle of nerves, desperately hoping he would not notice.
In the darkened theatre, in the flickering light of the big screen, I kept sneaking glances at him out of the corner of my eye. He may have caught me a few times, and I couldn't help but wonder if anything would happen. Would he try to put his arm around me? Hold my hand? In my teenage innocence I didn't know what to expect, and then it happened.
Finally, he made a move. When my eyes were on the screen, he took my hand in his. A simple gesture, but it had an immediate effect on me. His grasp was gentle but firm, his hand enveloping mine with a gentle squeeze. I glanced over at him, his face glowing in the movie light, gave a small smile, and returned his grasp.