Very few people remember the story of the first Valentine's day. I am one of those people. Here is the story.
Kevin Valentine was never what you would call a looker, but he was a nice boy. At the time of our story, the incomplete progress of puberty had placed Kevin into an awkward and gangly state with a voice that creaked like a shed door. In such a state, it might have been sensible for Kevin to postpone the interests of romance until parts and processes were out of flux, but romance does not often abide reason.
Becky Beckham was the cutest girl in the third grade, but that was a long time ago. Since then, a predisposition toward astigmatism had proven a stigma indeed, and an orthodontist father did not help to straighten things out for Bottle-Eyes Becky when she was in the ninth grade. Beneath the headgear and the hornrims, Becky tried to keep her chin up in spite of the gravity of her plight.
Kevin had admired Becky from afar since one Tuesday during afternoon recess back in Kindergarten. He thought about that day all the time. He could see himself sprawled on the pavement, having stumbled during a game of tag. He could see her, walking over and kneeling beside him. "Are you okay?" she asked, her voice small and sweet like an angel. "Uh... I...," he said, turning over to examine the sting of his knee. "Oh, you've skinned it," she said, and she reached over and brushed away a couple of tiny pebbles. "It's okay," she said, and she smiled at him. "Yeah," he said. Then she ran away to play, and he sat blinking after her for the next several years.
It takes a while for a boy like Kevin to work up the resolve to talk to an angel like Becky, but he'd done it finally. Well, almost. He couldn't bring himself to talk to her exactly, because his voice always froze in his throat when she was around. What he did, however, would change history. At home, on the evening of February 13th, he took scissors and cut a heart shape from a sheet of red construction paper. On the paper, he wrote three words with a black marker. Then, on the other side, he wrote "K. Valentine."
When he approached Becky at the water fountain - the one by the gym that shot up high enough so she could drink in spite of her headgear - he couldn't look her in the eyes. "Uh, Becky," he said. She turned and saw him. "Hello, Kevin" she said, and she smiled. He glanced up at her, and then back to the ground. "Uh..." he said, his throat starting to close. "I...," he continued. Then, with all the awkward gangliness that he could muster, he pulled the card, which was a little crumpled, from his pocket and held it out toward her. The uncontrollable shaking of his hand caused the paper to make a rustling noises. Becky looked at the card for a second, her eyes blinking tiny behind her thick lenses, and then she took it from him. Holding it up close so that she could focus on it, she read it to herself. If he'd been able to look at her, Kevin would have seen her cheeks blush a little. Then, for the longest second in history, she didn't say anything.
Kevin waited in terror.
And then she lifted her right hand to her lips, placed a kiss onto her fingertips, and, reaching over, put it softly onto Kevin's cheek. "I like you too, Kevin," she said, blushing. "You're sweet."
"Oh," he replied, hoping his huge smile wasn't too dorky. It was, but that's okay. She couldn't see clearly that far away.
And that, my friends, was the first Valentine on the first Valentine's day. If Kevin's love hadn't been blind enough to see through Becky's glasses back then, we might not have a holiday to celebrate romance. So thanks, Kevin and Becky.
Hello, friends. Happy Valentine's Day.
Later. Love.
P. S. - Aphter: 27. Sorry it's so late. Thanks for stopping by.
