Chapter 1: Sparks
August 30th, 2010
In the year 2000, the Connolly family lived on the New Hampshire side of the border of Massachusetts. Their small condo was accommodating enough for the young family, which consisted of George and Eileen, along with their children, Tim and Katie. Both parents were from Mass originally; they wanted their kids to attend the same schools that they had even though they lived in another state. All of their friends typically lived far away, and so the brother and sister developed a strong bond at a young age. Katie was 8, and Tim was a year older at 9, but people always commented that they were as close as twins.
Tim, or T as his family and friends called him, was named so because when Katie first began talking she failed to pronounce Timothy, so he was dubbed TT. Though she continued to call him that as she learned to talk, their parents convinced her to drop a T ensuring that other kids would not call him titty in school. A boy scout in spirit, not practice; he was typically on his best behavior. He took the role of protective older brother very seriously; even when he had to protect her from herself. His sister was a schemer, and more often than not, dragged him along for the ride.
Katie was a wild, ambitious, and determined little girl. She would get into trouble, and T would stand beside her against their parents, arguing her case like it was a courtroom. He claimed to be able to see things from both sides, but would always add in that he had tried to stop her first. She saw herself more as an adventurer and would never do anything too bad. If she was ever unsure of the right and wrong of what she did, her big bro would always pull her back from the ledge.
Except when they watched old movies or played video games, they were always outside. Despite how many people lived in the buildings nearby, there were barely any children their age, which was fine with them because they thoroughly enjoyed the other's company. Their favorite game was pretending since they could do whatever they desired, and most of their time outdoors was spent exploring the nearby woods to enact their fantasies. Sometimes they would reenact their favorite movies, but mostly they made up their own stories. Katie and T were not content simply playing out there; they created worlds, together.
The woods belonged to a King, and his people were being terrorized by an evil wizard. They were on a distant planet as part of a colony mission from earth, but something deadly already lived there that they had to hide from. The woods were transformed by them, and somehow, they always saw the same new place. They would make up their own characters that made up the most badass team to fight whatever evil lurked there. Two things never changed in their stories; first, they were always brother and sister. Second, they always took turns saving each other.
That day, however, was going to be different. Katie wanted to try something new. They were not related in that story. She was a smuggler, imprisoned by the empire, and T was coming to save her. He was quite heroic when he dispatched the invisible guards with his stick while making laser sounds with his mouth. They had all been defeated, so he set the girl free from her invisible shackles. Katie closed her eyes and pursed her lips together. T gave her a funny look and wondered what was wrong with her.
"You have to kiss me now," Katie stated and got back into her pose.
"We're brother and sister," T replied, looking a little flushed. "We don't kiss."
"Not in this story." Katie placed her hands on her hips and took the position of authority on the matter. "In this we're strangers. The boy rescues the girl, and then they kiss, duh!"
"What kind of brother would I be if I encouraged you to kiss strangers?" He smirked, thinking he had gotten out of that one.
"Luke kissed Leia! They were brother and sister. We are brother and sister, but we're pretending not to be. So it's ok." Katie tried not to beg him.
She started to look a little hurt. There was no way T would ever let that happen, pretend, or not. Besides, he could not argue with her movie logic, even though Leia kissed Luke. He quickly grabbed her by the waist and back, dipped her sideways like he had seen in movies, and gave her a big wet kiss. It only lasted a couple seconds, and as Katie seemed content, T's eyes popped open in shock. He opened his arms suddenly and the sister he was holding dropped to the ground.
"Ow, hey!" Katie whined from the ground.
"You electrocuted me with your lips! You are dark side, like the emperor. It's a trap!"
T made a show of running away while Katie could only roll her eyes. She stood up, dusted herself off, and started back toward their building. She felt something too. It was not at all like being electrocuted. It was a warm feeling and made her happy. Definitely not static electricity either; maybe those were the sparks that people got when they were in love.
Even at a young age, she knew what happened when there were sparks when you kissed a boy. You got married. Katie went to the best source of love, her mom. Craftily she asked her how she met her dad instead of going right into the kiss. The girl had to steer her mom in the right direction a bit, but finally, the first kiss came up.
"Our song came on the radio and your father asked me to dance. It wasn't our song yet, of course, but this was the night it became our song. Anyway, we were dancing and he started to sing, 'I can't help falling in love with you.' So I kissed him right then and there." Eileen was happy her daughter liked hearing that story as much as she enjoyed reminiscing.
"So were there sparks?" Katie asked, hopeful that her mother would be able to explain the phenomenon.
"When he kissed me? There were certainly sparks. They're still there too." She looked happy; lost in a memory.
Katie knew she needed to keep her mom focused. "So when you kiss someone and there are sparks, you get married, right? It's that easy?"
Eileen laughed and could not help feeling a little sorry for her daughter. It would never be that easy. Even if she was lucky, there were still a lot of frogs before the prince. She decided not to break her daughter's heart that night. She thought to also double check the movies Katie was allowed to watch.