Pink Thunder: My First Marriage

Stevie Sherrill came into my life rather suddenly on a warm spring day. He had just moved to town, I guess, after his mother - a dental receptionist -- had divorced his father. I hadn't taken much notice of him since it was spring and there were other things to pay attention to.

However, for several days straight, Stevie followed me around our nursery school compound during recess throwing flowers, flower petals, flower heads stripped of petals and flower stems at me. I ignored him at first. Then one day I'd had enough. I tossed over my shoulder, "Stop!" Then "STOP!" in that high-pitched, drawled agitated way that kids do.

Finally I turned around to confront him. He had mostly followed me from 3-5 paces back so my increasing proximity was increasingly alarming to him. I walked in his direction looking mean and mad and then stopped. I looked him in the eye and said,

"Little Boy, if you don't leave me alone, I am going to have to hit you!"

This was no idle threat. Since I was beginning to get picked on by other kids as one of the few black kids around, I'd gotten a reputation among my peers as a fierce fighter.

Stevie was silent and blanched. I truly took him in for the first time. He was a slender boy and looked like Jesus would look like if he was 4. At least the Jesus in the picture in my parents' bedroom. Brown hair in a longish, 70s shag haircut. Long face. Rose red lips. Pale and soulful. Stevie's nostrils flared and he pulled me instantly down into his personal torment. His pebble brown eyes burned with agony. His face lengthened and flushed and finally from a hellish place deep within his being came the words:

"I Love You." And then, more softly:
"Will you be my girfriend?"

In uttering these words, he seemed fully aware that he was risking all. He was "all in" as the poker players say. Either I acquiesed or more likely, he was about to get a serious beat-down from the love of his short life.

I was taken aback. This was all so unexpected. I considered thoughtfully. I figured well, why not? Might be interesting. After about 30sec, I said the fateful word:

"OK!"

With a little shrug. As we walked off together hand in hand, I thought to myself, I guess I can always beat him up later if this doesn't work out.

Stevie and I became the best of friends. A passionate love affair was born. Stevie always stuck up for me. When a group of boys was planning to build a fort and one of them pointedly looked in my direction and said: "No girls allowed!", Stevie (boss of the gang) announced loudly, "If Cheryl can't be in the fort, then I won't be in the fort." I got to be in the fort.

We were inseparable. Time passed. One day when my mom came to pick me up, she reported to me later that another little boy called out urgently to Stevie through the open door out on the playground

"Stevie! Cheryl's leaving!!!"

Like a bat out of hell, Stevie tore inside. His face flushed, lips red, he fixed me with his burning eyes, held both my hands in his and tenderly whispered good-bye. I demurely whispered back and kissed him on the cheek. My mother later had a conversation with the pre-school teachers who told her the whole story and that Stevie's mom was fine with it. My parents shrugged their shoulders and decided it was some sort of phase.

We played together, ran together, talked together. We watched the local praying mantis population mate in the spring -- the much larger female usually biting off the head of the tiny pumping male at climax. We pondered the meaning of it all.

We kissed in that innocent kid way -- standing a full body length apart and leaning in at the waist to meet, brushing lip to lip. It was Stevie's idea. We were now in kindergarten. Other kids started asking us to kiss in front of them. We enjoyed the attention and were celebrities of a sort but after awhile I felt like we were being taken advantage of. Our love was being sullied in the public eye. I started charging big kids 25 cents and little kids 10 cents to watch us kiss. We made some money and simultaneously brought demand down. Stevie let me keep the money.

Finally in the early summer as the school year came to a close, our day care providers -- mostly young women -- were joking that we had been dating longer than they had and that it was time for Stevie and I to get married. A momentum built and before I knew it I was being hustled out to the playground to my nuptials. I hurriedly picked out a frilly white party dress from the dress up bin. It was a little small for me but it worked. My best friend Heather refused to be my maid of honor in favor of the much more desirable position of flower girl. I asked if she could be both.

Stevie was also dressed in dress-up-bin-best including a top hat and jacket. A tall solemn sixth grader named Willie was chosen as the minister. Our vows were quite short, but I think "forever" was one of the words uttered. By someone. It felt like a big deal. We were both overwhelmed. The entire day care took part and we got to have cake and punch afterwards. The other kids enjoyed calling me "Cheryl Sherrill" since the names sounded the same.

Then Stevie took me to our favorite meadow for our honeymoon. We sat quietly watching the sun set over the hill. Trees sat at the bottom of the sloping hill and beyond that you could just see the tops of a few house roofs. There were long daisies all around us, almost as tall as us sitting down.

We held hands and silently absorbed the weight of our commitment to each other. Finally I knew it was time to go home -- my mom usually came before Stevie's. I took my leave and walked up the hill to the gravel, past the jungle gym, across the blacktop and into the rest of my life...

It was all a bit too much pressure for us. Being husband and wife seemed different somehow from the carefree days of girl/boyfriend. The other kids treated us differently too. The day care staff seemed a bit chagrined.

Stevie and I began to fight. He stopped picking flowers for me and putting them in my afro puffs. I am not sure how it happened but I remembered a painful encounter in which we decided we just weren't friends anymore. We drifted apart but never actually divorced per se. Then Stevie and his mom moved away.

Stevie was my first love and first heartbreak. From 4-6 years old, he was my stalwart champion and protector. I've never quite forgotten him, and I feel confident he can't have forgotten me. Love lasts forever indeed, even when the shape and expression of that love changes. Sometimes passion turns into something closer to gratitude -- for shared experiences and shared emotions. Love is universal and ageless -- even 4 year olds can experience it. Loves leaves -- and love returns but love is always changing, never never the same...

I recently saw a baby praying mantis for the first time since the first grade. Which oddly enough made me think of Stevie.

Comments

Lovely story. I've laughed, and sighed a little... I've just met love until my 24, and the distance between us makes it hard... I got here because of your love sickness note. Thank you for sharing.

Posted by: ziRta | September 03, 2008 at 01:20 PM