The children were all sitting at their tables for snack time, soft music playing in the background to help calm the children. Steve and Donna were laughing at a joke Steve made on the opposite side of the table from Kelly. She faked a laugh, not sure what they were even talking about. She looked next to her to see Dylan McKay sitting there without a snack, "You don't have anything to eat?"
Dylan turned to see Kelly staring at him, her beautiful eyes studying his response, "No, my parents forgot to pack me something." He looked down for a minute, clearly disappointed.
"Here you can have half of mine," Kelly smiled brightly as she split the cookie in half and handed it to him. Kelly's mom rarely remembered to pack her a snack either, which is why it made Kelly so happy to know that she could help Dylan in that moment.
Dylan reached for the cookie with a genuine smile, one that he didn't show very often, "Thanks. I'm Dylan."
Kelly smiled with a giggle, "I know. Wanna play with us after snack?"
Donna interrupted their moment to shout, "We're going to play house!"
Dylan shrugged a little unsure of how to play house. It's not like he had parents who were ever there for him. He looked at Kelly who was still watching him and without another thought he answered, "Sure."
—
The playground was full of loud noises as the children ran around and played their games. Miss Carney was in the far end of the playground keeping an eye on the children as best as she could.
Dylan and Kelly were taking turns pushing each other on the swings, while Donna and Steve were busy playing tag. "Dylan, watch this!" Kelly started pumping her legs and preparing herself to jump off of the swing.
"Be careful, Kelly!" Dylan couldn't help but worry about Kelly. There was something about her that he just didn't understand. He was too young to understand what love was, but that was absolutely what he was feeling. Ever since she shared her cookie with him he knew that she was special, and that feeling would never go away, not fully anyway.
Kelly giggled as she jumped off of the swing before landing on the ground and scraping her knee. She stood up immediately, and fighting back the tears she plastered a smile on her face. Appearances were very important to her mother and that was instilled in Kelly very early on. It was so important for Kelly to show her beauty to the world because that is how to make her mother proud of her, something she was desperate for even at such a young age.
Dylan rushed over to Kelly, but was surprised to see her smiling. He didn't understand it. She was clearly bleeding and hurt, but she didn't seem sad about it. "Are you okay? "He questioned, hesitantly, as Steve and Donna quickly approached them.
"I'm fine. Let's keep playing!" She said with her forced smile before Miss Carney came over to take care of her scrape.
"Kids, run along and keep playing. I'm going to get Kelly all cleaned up and give her a band-aid." She smiled as she spoke in a very comforting tone.
Steve, Dylan, and Donna all hesitated for a moment, still worried about Kelly, before being forced to go play with the rest of the children.
As Kelly walked with Miss Carney to the first aid kit she turned to see Dylan looking back at her. She gave him a small genuine smile before she rushed off to get her band-aid.
Dylan would always remember that moment because although she was acting like she was so brave, he could see how sad she was behind that smile. He recognized it because he was just as sad behind his own smile.