I still remember when I first met her. I'd just hit her with my car.

I rushed across the playground, mildly worried. My toy cars didn't go *that* fast, but she was such a slip of a girl. She wasn't crying, but she'd yelped in surprise and pain. Clutching her shin, she stared at the toy in confusion.

"Uh, that's mine," I said. "Are you OK?"

She shot me an outraged glare, holding the race car in place against a sneaker.

"Sorry," I said, my concern growing. I was always a kind boy, especially toward younger kids. Sometimes I had to help look after my little cousins, so I was fond of them and used to comforting them. And I never was much of a bully, nor was I bullied - I had a normal relationship with my peers, including those who were waiting for me some distance behind. "I didn't know you were there." I pointed toward the building behind which she'd come from.

To my surprise she straightened and handed me the toy. "It's OK," she said, her face now blank.

I took it, but my eyes snagged on the bruise on her leg. "Oh no!" I said. "You should go see Mrs. Evans." The school nurse.

"I'm OK," she said, bending down and touching the wound gingerly. She wasn't bleeding or anything - just a scrape. She barely winced as she spat on her fingers and wiped them on the wound.

"Well, OK then," I said, and turned around to go back to my friends.

"What's your name?" she asked.

I turned back toward her. "Are you gonna get me in trouble?"

She shrugged. "I'm Reese," she said. "Wanna be friends?"

"Huh? Why?" I asked. I scrutinized the little girl and she returned the same blank stare. I didn't remember seeing her before. "Uh, I think I'm older than you," I said.

"My mommy said to trust the kids who say sorry," she recited seriously. "Not like Gwen, who pulled my hair. I told her to say sorry but she just laughed."

"Gwen sounds like a meanie," I said. "You should tell a teacher."

She smiled a little at that. "She *is* a meanie," she said. "I hate her. I like you better. Can we be friends?"

If I *hadn't* been used to younger kids, I might have just blown her off and left, but that didn't even register as a possibility at the time. I nodded and squatted in front of her. "Alright. I'm Victor," I said. "You're still too little to play with us, but if Gwen pulls your hair again you can tell me and I'll go with you to your teacher, OK?"

She gave it some thought. "OK," she finally said, and grinned. "Thanks, Vicky."

"No problem, Reese. See you around!" I ran back to my friends, leaving her behind. When I next thought of looking in that direction she was already gone.

I figured I'd never see Reese again. At that time our age gap seemed enormous, and I didn't think much of a child her age's capacity to remember anything for very long, even though I was still a child myself, only 9 years old. In the end I was the one who forgot all about her. If anyone had mentioned the incident I would have remembered it, but it wasn't like I was keeping an eye out for her during recess, or anything.

Roughly one month later, I was hanging out with my friend group during lunch break when we were approached by a girl.

At that age, girls might as well have been a different species. I got along well with all of my classmates, but the group I *played* with, the gang I did everything with, was all boys. There was Alejandro, Brent and Jerry, and all four of us were clustered around Jerry's Nintendo Switch, enraptured by the newest Legend of Zelda.

"Hello," she said. I turned around to find a spindly girl in denim overalls standing right next to me. She was literally the thinnest person my size I'd ever seen. I took in her long hair and her intense blue eyes, which were riveted on me.

"Uh... Hi?" I said.

Alejandro turned briefly from the game. "Who's that?" he asked.

"I'm Reese," the girl said. "I'm Vicky's friend."

I frowned at her. "Huh?" I asked.

"Are you from class B or class C?" Brent asked, focusing on her.

"Well, class A," the girl said.

"No you're not. We're from class A," Brent asserted.

I looked her up and down, confused. Who was this again? The name rang a bell.

"2-A," she said.

My eyes widened as I remembered the little girl I hit with my toy car. This couldn't be her. Could it? Our eyes met and she grinned at me. It was the same grin, for sure. The same hair color, too. I saw it now. Yeah, she could be that Reese. It's just that she was a head taller than I remembered - about the same height as my friends and I, a tiny bit shorter perhaps.

"Did you get taller?" I blurted.

"Yeah," she said. "You said I couldn't play with you because I was too little. I grew up some. Can I play with you now?"

"We're not playing with a second grader," Jerry said without looking up. "You'll break the game. Go play with your second grade friends."

Reese's expression changed to one of disapproval. "I don't have any," she said. She hadn't taken her eyes off me yet. "You promised."

Well, technically I hadn't, not really. But I knew what she meant. There was an unspoken implication in what I'd said to her. Did I mention I was a very well raised boy? Even at that age, I valued my word a lot. I didn't want to be thought a liar.

"Why do you want to play with us anyway?" I asked. "Are you still being bullied by, uh, Gwen?"

"Bullied?" she asked, looking confused. "Gwen doesn't go here anymore. She had a sickness so she had to move away."

"Oh, that's sad," I said. "I hope you got to make up before she left."

Reese shrugged, and her shrug was so exactly the same as the one she'd shown me before, it permanently laid to rest any doubts I might have had that she was the same person. "She was a meanie, remember? I want to play with you and your friends."

I looked at the others, and they stared back with their best "no way" expressions.

"Come on, guys," I said. "She won't break anything."

"She'll cry," Jerry said. "Kids cry all the time. It's annoying."

"No I won't," Reese said. "I don't cry!"

"I bet you do," Jerry said. "You're just a crybaby."

Without warning, Reese shoved Jerry with both hands. He stumbled back, surprised, and lost balance. The Switch slipped out of his hand. I saw it fall and dove for it, trying to avert the catastrophe.

"My Switch!" Jerry said, panicked.

"It's OK, Vicky grabbed it," Reese said. I stood and raised it up, triumphant.

Jerry took the Switch it from my hands and clutched it to his chest. "My mom would have killed me," he said, distraught.

"Sorry," Reese said. "You were being mean..."

"It's all your fault!" he yelled at her, face flushed.

"*You* dropped it," Reese said, shrugging. "Are *you* going to cry like a baby?"

"No!" Jerry, said, wiping his face with his sleeve. "Shut up. Go away."

"I just wanna play with you," Reese said. "Please? I said I was sorry."

We all looked uncomfortably at each other for a few moments, except Reese, who looked at the floor.

"Come on, nothing bad happened to the game," Alejandro finally said. "She even said sorry."

"Please, Jerry?" I added, since I could see the incident hadn't help endear her to him.

Jerry sighed. "Fine, she can stay and watch but she can't touch the game."

Reese shrugged. "OK," she said.