An 8 year old Violet Harmon sits at her desk in Mrs. Haggerty's 3rd grade classroom, wearing a cute flowery dress and red tights. She's rummaging through the paper Valentine's in front of her, and picking each one up individually. Her tiny fingers tear apart the heart-shaped sticker holding each card closed, she reads the name on the inside then tosses it aside.
Valentine's Day is a stupid holiday, she thinks when she doesn't find the card she's looking for. But then she stops, holding up a card with a cartoon elephant on it, the ears making a heart. The sender of the card had drawn a curly mustache on the elephant.
"From Tate, To Violet," it read, "wouldn't it be funny if elephants had mustaches?"
Violet grins. She looks up, and Tate is watching her from across the room.
Tate is just a little ball of blond curls, red and white stripes, and converse, the boy in gym class who is faster than all the chubby boys and indifferent girls, literally running circles around them while they make lazy flower chains in the grass.
Violet wants to go over to Tate and show him the Valentine from her, show him how the holographic dolphin jumps when you turn the card, but Mrs. Haggerty is clapping her hands and ushering kids to their seats.
…
At recess, Tate finds Violet, and sneaks up on her. She pushes him playfully, and he takes her hand. They run off, behind the jungle gym.
…
When Violet gets home, she throws away every card she got that day, except the one from Tate. That one, she brings up to her room and crouches next to her bed to find the shoebox underneath. In the box is a tacky beaded necklace, some folded pieces of construction paper, a pile of rocks, and the discarded shell from a hermit crab. Violet places the Valentine on top of the rocks, replaces the lid, slides the box back into the darkness under her bed, and runs out of her room, ready for her next adventure.
…
8 years later, Violet is a junior in high school. She isn't a wholesome 3rd grader anymore. Her obsession with dolphins ended years ago. She ditched bright colors, choosing neutrals and earth tones; floor length dresses and skirts, over-sized men's sweaters from thrift stores, the pockets sewn by a caring elderly wife.
She cuts herself sometimes, out of curiosity, mostly on those days when no one says anything interesting at school, and her parents are so focused on each other or themselves, and she is just so bored her skin crawls.
She hasn't seen that little blond boy in 8 years. He left school after 3rd grade. Since Violet and her classmates were so young, there were no rumors about where Tate had gone. Violet barely thinks about him, but sometimes she'll see blond curls in a crowd, or stumble upon the Valentine in her wallet, and thinks of him. The Valentine is soft and crumbling. The elephant is faded, but still has its mustache. Violet found the card in the box under her bed and slipped it in her wallet with no real reason, and it had survived countless new wallets.
That box the Valentine had lived in for so many years now holds the necklace, the construction paper, the rocks, and the shell, as well as a cheap gold medal, a finger puppet, and a shard of glass. Violet goes through the box every once in a while, when she forgets what's in it.
February 14th of her junior year, Valentine's Day, Violet sees Tate again. She's seen him other times that year, but has never placed the curls. It's still a stupid holiday, and Violet has no one to share it with, like usual, she barely has friends. After her childhood friendship in the playground with Tate, she's stayed away from her classmates, who seem too concerned with trivial things. Violet just wants to read the classics and eat good food and maybe write the next great American novel or paint the next masterpiece.
Since Violet has neglected to make friends all these years, she's going to spend Valentine's Day alone, in the park by her house, so her parents can have the house to themselves, to fuck or whatever. But then she sees the Valentine taped to her locker. She thinks it's a joke at first, just some idiot football player trying to embarrass her. She tears it down, but glances at it anyway, and sees a puppy, with a drawn on curly mustache, opens it, "wouldn't it be funny if puppies had mustaches?" She thinks of the 3rd grade Valentine tucked safely in her wallet and looks around wildly. The head of bond curls she has been seeing everywhere is coming towards her and everything clicks. Tate.
He arrives in front of Violet, unintentionally cornering her in between the wall and her open locker. He's taller than she would have expected; he was so skinny in elementary school.
"Tate." She smiles, holding her new Valentine tightly.
"Hi, Violet." His voice is soft and low, and the most unintentionally sexy sound she's ever heard.
"Where have you been?"
"England."
"England?"
"My dad's company wanted him to open a branch there, but we're back now."
"I'm glad." Violet thinks of the easy fun they used to have. All these years that she's been quiet and reclusive, waiting, she has Tate back.
Tate shuffles in front of her, looks down.
"Will you go on a date with me tonight, Violet?"
"Of course! I'd love to!" Tate grins at her enthusiasm and Violet buzzes with girlish excitement.
…
Tate picks her up at 6:30. Violet's nervous, because she hasn't spoken to Tate since she was in the 3rd grade. They'll probably hate each other. But Violet had put on a red dress, because it's fucking Valentine's Day, and a big cardigan, and settled on no tights after much deliberation.
Tate actually rings her doorbell and then walks her to his car, opening the door and everything. Fucking chivalry.
Already, there is so much to say. Violet asks a million questions about England, and Tate tells her cute stories about people with weird accents and rainy weather.
Tate parks in the lot of a grocery store.
"Is this the romantic evening you had planned?" Violet teases.
"This is just phase 1." They get out of the car and Tate shyly finds Violet's hand, holding it loosely. They pick out sandwiches and little bottles of chocolate milk and too much candy, and Tate pays for it all. He won't tell Violet where they're going, back in the car, but Violet has an idea.
"I knew it," she says when Tate pulls into the empty parking lot of the elementary school.
"Seriously?"
"Well, a little bit." Tate puts the food into a picnic basket from the back seat, and leads Violet to a hidden area of the chain link fence surrounding the playground. He hands her the basket, then climbs right over the fence, stumbling a little as he jumps down. Tate gestures for the basket, and Violet nudges it over the fence. It hits Tate in the head, but he smiles.
"You're turn."
"Don't look up my dress."
"I can't make any promises."
Violet gets to the top easily, and pauses, teetering on the chain links.
"Don't worry, I'll catch you," Tate says, so Violet jumps, knocking right into him and they're down. Violet laughs hysterically as Tate groans.
"Man, good thing you were there to catch me."
"Oh, my god, my back."
"Are you really hurt?" Violet sits up next to him. Tate doesn't move.
"No, I'm fine, just give me a minute." She covers her face with her hands.
"I'm so sorry."
"It's fine. One day we'll tell our kids about our first date, when you fell on me and broke my back. So romantic." Violet hits Tate's shoulder playfully. He sits up slowly, and Violet helps him lay out the picnic blanket that Tate had stored in the basket.
While they eat, Violet tells Tate about their classmates, who had gone crazy, who had gotten pregnant, and who had turned into a slut. He was especially interested in Leah, who had been the weirdest girl in their 3rd grade class.
"She's completely different now. What happened?"
"She got tits," Violet said casually. "6th grade. Who even cares about tits?"
"Not me."
Violet looks up at Tate, and, despite what he's just said, he's staring at her chest. His eyes move to her face, and he's embarrassed. Violet feels fucking gorgeous.
…
Later that night, Violet invites Tate inside, so he can see a certain picture in Violet's middle school yearbook. He's laughing hysterically at Leah's awkward 7th grade body, and Violet's sitting next to him on her bed, not a 3rd grader anymore.
"I'm so glad you're back, Tate," she says, trying to tell him just how glad she is without having to say it. He puts down the yearbook and turns towards her.
"I worried you would be gone."
"I couldn't leave. I was waiting for you." Tate touches his lips together once, then kisses Violet. She starts, then smiles against his mouth, and they awkwardly move into each other.
…
Next thing Violet knows, Tate has her pressed against the wall, their sweaters gone, Tate's jeans discarded. She can feel his cock against her stomach.
One of his hands sneaks into her underwear, and she remembers all those other guys, fingering her clumsily, and just didn't want to deal with that. She yanks Tate's hand away.
"I'm sorry," he whispers and backs off. Violet pulls him back by his t shirt.
"Let me."
Tate's mouth drops open, head back, when Violet shoves his underwear down past his dick. She licks her hand, spits, and wraps her tiny fingers around him.
Tate towers over her, his head resting comfortably against the wall by Violet's hair. He hums distractedly as her hand pumps up and down, the other on the back of his neck. Violet quickly learns what he likes; his humming becomes high-pitched, insistent, when she squeezes around the tip of his cock, and then he growls when she slides down his whole length and cradles the head in her palm for a second. She feels powerful manipulating him like this.
He cums hard on her pretty red dress, coughing out a noise somewhere between a grunt and a sob, and bangs his head into the wall. Violet whimpers, her thighs slick.
Tate doesn't move. Violet watches his shoulders heave up and down while he breathes deep. He looks at her in admiration.
She smiles triumphantly and kisses him again.
…
One year later, their anniversary falls on Valentine's Day, one year after their first.
They sneak into the playground again for a picnic dinner, and Tate gives Violet another Valentine, and a bouquet of pink roses.
"I know how you don't like normal things, so I got you these pink roses."
Violet grinned. "I hate them."
"I love you."
…
Later that night, Violet's phone slips off her bed and flies underneath. Tate slides after it. He emerges with the phone and the shoebox.
"What's this, Violet?"
She pats the bed next to her and he sits. Violet opens the box, pulls out each item individually and makes little piles.
"I got this necklace at an antique store. I bought it with my own money. I was so proud of it." Violet puts it around her neck. "These are drawings I did in kindergarten. I really liked them for some reason."
"They're awful." Tate fingers the dusty construction paper.
"Yep. My dad collected these rocks with me at a beach once, I was about 6. He wasn't a shit head then. And my hermit crab used to live in this shell. One day it crawled out of it to find a new one, but I didn't know shit about hermit crabs, so it died." Tate holds the shell in his palm, and Violet moves on to the fake gold medal. "I won the geography bee in 5th grade. You could have seen it, but no, you moved to England." Tate smirks. "Before she died, my Grandmother and I used to play with these finger puppets all the time. This was the only one I could find." She slips it on her pointer finger. It's a little bird, some kind of parrot. "Hi, Tate," she says in a squeaky voice, waving her finger. "Do you like birds?"
Tate smiles and looks down. Violet knows he does. "What about the glass?" The puppet is put aside, and Violet stares at the green shard.
"I have no idea where that came from." She laughs and returns the items to the box, and slides it back under the bed. "So that's that."
"Has anyone else seen that box?"
"Like who, Tate?"
"Good."
…
I am nothing. I'm weightless, Violet thinks. I'm like a flower petal, pink and perfect, drifting to the spring grass.
Tate is in her, over her, dripping sweat.
I can't concentrate.
Just a flower petal, pink and perfect.
…
She squeezes her eyes shut.
This isn't real.
This can't be real.
She can't have this beautiful boy covering her, whimpering against her forehead. He sounds sad.
But Violet is in awe of how happy they are. It's a wonderful thing, to be able to spend your entire life with someone you love. Violet and Tate will be together forever, and she will never let him go. She'll keep him safe, tucked beside her, like a box of treasures under her bed.