The Promise

He wanted to marry me. It said so. On the loose leaf paper he passed me in class. It was folded into a teeny tiny triangle. Well, I cannot lie, I passed it to him first and wrote the words out myself, “WHEN WE GROW UP WILL YOU MARRY ME?” With two little square boxes next to the sentence, one box had a NO next to it, the other box had a YES. He put an “X” in the YES box! And he wrote in big letters, “I PROMISE.” And before he passed it back, he folded it back into the teeny tiny triangle. I tried to fold it into a heart and that didn’t work out too well, so I thought a triangle would look nice too.

All the girls wanted to marry him. We all watched him on the playground. He knew how to do handstands and backflips and I did not know where a third grader would learn to do that. When he was upside down I looked at the other girls and their faces said the same way I felt and that’s how I knew they loved him too. None of us would dare say that out loud. At least I knew I couldn't. That is why I wrote the note. And he became mine and I wanted to tell the other girls to go watch another boy, but I didn't dare.

When I left school I put the note in my backpack. When I went to bed, I put the note on my pillow so I could remember that it was true that Johnny wanted to marry me, and when I woke up it was gone. Getting dressed, I felt sad, so I picked out sad clothes, a black skirt and a grey worn sweater. Mother always said I could wear the silver bracelet Uncle Walter gave me to school any time I wanted, but I didn’t feel like being shiny so I left it in my pink and white jewelry box. Maybe I only dreamt that Johnny wanted to marry me. Maybe the note was all made up in my imagination.

When I got downstairs to the kitchen, mother was standing in front of the sink looking at me some kind of funny, but I didn’t ask why. My stomach did not want corn flakes, but I sat down at the table anyway because that is what I did every day. Next to my cereal bowl was the note, open, not folded in a triangle. Something burned in my throat and I wondered why because I did not eat or drink. Mother was looking at me and I knew this without looking back. My eyes were down looking at my hands and I wished I had put on my shiney bracelet, because then I could have pulled on it making it go round and round. I said nothing when she began to speak, “Mary, you are too young to write love notes to boys.” When she said that my face began to burn too, not like sunburn, like the time I forgot to wear underwear to church.

“Look at me.” She said, and I didn’t. I could feel her coming closer to me and when she reached for the note, I did not try to stop her. Looking right at her, I watched as she ripped up the note into teeny tiny pieces and walked over to the trash can and threw it out. But didn’t she know she was too late? I asked Johnny and he answered. When we grow up, we are going to marry. “A promise is a promise.” That’s what Mother always said. And she also said she was a planner. Shouldn’t she have been happy that I was a planner too?