An Authoritative History of Annie and Roo: Part II

How we stopped being "just friends":

As the summer wore on, a few…irregularities caught my attention about my new best friend:

1. In crowds large and small, we tended to make eye contact across the room—the kind of eye contact that feels magnetic, impossible to break, and as though your insides are on fire (in a good way…I’m not talking heartburn here.) This never happe

ned with any of my other friends, it was a phenomenon specific to Roo.
2. I also never imagined I would turn down a date with my secret high school crush in order to hang out with my friends. But I did when Roo was my other option.
3. When I went to the movies with my other friends, I would concentrate on the movie more than the feeling of our elbow touching on the arm rest. This was not the case with Roo. “Seabiscuit” would not have been nearly as enjoyable except that it allowed for lots of elbow-touching dwell time.
4. At night we’d watch Star Wars outside on his laptop, and the best part of the evening was when he reached over to cover me with the blanket. I would have been annoyed with any other friend for blocking the screen just as the Death Star was about the get blown up. But I didn’t mind so much with Roo.

5. One Saturday towards the end of summer, after a long day of painting the deck together, I went into my room and found the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen: a leather-bound, gold-leafed, lovely copy of “David Copperfield”, my favorite book. The note inside said, “Please don’t get me anything in return. –Roo”. I hugged him for the first time that day.

6. Of all my friends, Roo was the only one I was hopelessly in love with.

Unfortunately, any course of action beyond friendly association was fraught with complications. He was four years older than me and lived in my basement, after all. And since neither of us dared to do anything about it, fate had to intervene in the form of food poisoning.

We planned a vacation to California—my parents, Roo, and I. We’d stay at Roo’s parents’ home, go to Disneyland, the beach, and a John Williams concert in Hollywood. I was so excited! I was excited the month before, I was excited on the drive down, and I was excited when we finally arrived. Then my excitement turned into nausea which manifested itself on the bathroom rug of Roo’s parents’ guest bathroom. I got the most horrendous food poisoning ever heard of and consequently spent our entire first night there huddled on the bathroom floor trying not to die.

The next day was to be our Disneyland day. On top of feeling death’s icy hand violently man-handling my insides, I felt guilty for being sick. Roo and I had been so excited for Disneyland. We both loved it and had been talking about it for a month. And there was no way I was going to disappoint him, so when I finally emerged from the bathroom, pale faced, sleep-deprived, and hardly able to function under my own power, I straight-up lied to everyone and declared that I was perfectly able to go to Disneyland.

I made it through the front gate before I threw up in the prettiest flower bed in the happiest place on earth. They all tried to convince me they wouldn't mind if we just went home, but I was determined--I would be riding Splash Mountain that day even if it killed me...and the likelihood of death occuring was ever increasing. My mother consented, then advised, "You better hang onto someone. You look like you're going to tip over." Who should conveniently be standing next to me but my good friend, Roo. He offered his arm with a smile, and had I been physically capable of smiling, I would have smiled back.

We spent the whole day that way, arm in arm, except for the times I'd have to find a flower bed to throw up in or a bench to lay on. I'd never had someone's arm to hold before. And suddenly everything about Disneyland became even more magical--the rides were more fun, the colors much brighter, the fresh fruit much tastier (on the way down, not so much on the way back up...). Roo sat and watched the fireworks that night with my head resting in his lap, stroking my hair. I couldn't see the colored explosions above, but I felt the resonating bursts inside my heart all night. Meanwhile, Roo lost all feeling in his right foot.

At the end of the day, the score was

Death:0

Annie: 1

Though the nausea wore off, the need to hang onto Roo did not. I went from holding his arm to holding his hand. And at the end of the trip, we looked at each other and said, "what now?"

So I told him that I was in love with him, and that I would be forever and he agreed.

Then we decided to start dating.