The Girl Next Door

Chapter One: The Meeting

            I can still remember the day I met the Peacecraft children. I had just move from my old neighborhood and was your typical eight-year-old boy. Snub-nosed, freckled, with dirt beneath my fingernails and scrapes covering my knees. And I was extremely miserable with the prospect of not having any friends when school started in only two short weeks.

            For the first few days at the new house, I’d sat around watching cartoons and helping when my mother asked for it. But after the third day, she insisted I go out and find something to do rather than hang around the house moping. After a temper tantrum and a lecture from my father, I ended up outside, scowling ferociously at the house.

            My bad temper didn’t last long because soon, I became aware of the fact that someone was playing basketball next door. That alerted my interests, I’d always like basketball, but my father had a dream of me becoming a baseball player and had never bought me a hoop although I’d had enough baseball equipment to rival any professional player.

            But I didn’t notice the basketball player first. I noticed his little sister. A small, skinny little thing with a mop of blond hair tumbling in front of her eyes as she bowed over her baby doll and sang to it a nursery rhyme, ‘The Cow Jumped Over the Moon’ in a lisping voice. Now, I look back and think that she was actually a sweet, adorable little thing sitting there like that, rocking her ‘baby’ to sleep. But then, my eight-year-old boy self gave her a scornful look and a cootie warning flashed in my mind. This girl was trouble to any cootie-conscious boy.

            After I’d registered the little girl in my mind, I turned my eyes to the basketball hoop. A small, eager look crossed my face momentarily as I watched the bright orange ball hit the white backboard and fall with ‘swoosh’ into the net. I could do the same if I only had the chance! I was sure of it! As I followed the ball, I followed it into the hands of its owner with my eyes.

            He was the strangest looking boy I’d ever seen. No boy I knew had such long, white-blond hair and no boy had such piercing, blue eyes. He must have felt my eyes piercing him because he turned and called, “Are you the ones who moved into the Donovan house?” He jerked his head towards my new house and I nodded solemnly. He looked me over, pursed his lips and titled his head to the side before announcing. “I’m Milliardo and that’s my little sister Relena.”

            “Heero Yuy,” I introduced myself gracelessly.

            “You wanna play one-on-one?” Milliardo offered. I nodded and the little girl, Relena crept closer to us until she was under the net, watching us play.

            “Hey, Relena! Get lost!” Milliardo ordered. She shook her head, her eyes fastened on me and the tip of her thumb placed in her mouth as she sucked on it quietly. “Go away or else I’ll tell Mom you’re sucking you thumb again!”

            Relena looked mortified and shot me an askance look before running into the house, chanting in a tear-filled voice, “Mama, Mama! Milli’th making fun of me!”

            “No I’m not!” Milliardo called hotly after her. The girl turned and stuck her tongue out at him before kicking the screen-door shut. Milliardo glared, but seemingly shrugged it off because he turned to me and said, “So, how about that one-on-one?”

#@#@#@

            After that first initial meeting with Milli, I was accepted into the neighborhood. It seemed that Milliardo was the king of the neighborhood boys and woe anyone who fell outside his good graces! Luckily for me, I bore the title of ‘Milliardo’s other best friend’. The other ‘best friend’, was Treize Khushrenanda. Later, when we were much older, that circle would expand to include a very special lady in Milliardo’s life, but for now it was just us three and the other boys.

            As we grew up, Relena tagged along after us. In her tomboy stage, she would hang around, waiting for someone to be sick or injured so she could take his place no matter what we were doing. In her need to be popular stage, she hung around with her other friends and blatantly flirted with us, much to our disgust. And in her individual stage, she followed us, lecturing us on how we could improve our lives by being ourselves and going against the tide.

            And still, I never really noticed her. She was Milliardo’s little sister, yes, but other than that, I never thought of her save the occasional thought of how annoying I found her. But I never considered the fact that the tag-a-long little sister Relena could ever grow up to be a valuable ally, a good friend…or even, maybe a lover.

            But then, one summer, Relena grew up. No, she didn’t blossom into a fantastic beauty, I’d been there when that had happened and hadn’t cared one way or another. No, she matured into a woman and fell in love.

            And I was there, in the shadows watching. And then I knew what all those books and movies meant about the girl next door…