Hello, my name is Lala. I'm five foot three with long dark brown hair, red-brown skin, and bright hazel green eyes. I want to share a story about a boy who I believed to be my true love. His name was Ricardo Rose and we met for the very first time during the summer of 2006. He was twelve years old and I was ten. Now before he and I met I had just finished a long car ride with my baby sister, little brother, older brother, my mother, and my step father; in the heat of the day in central California I was a bit hot headed. I didn't even want to move especially so far out of town being a city girl who enjoyed her fair share of shopping at the local mall and hanging out with friends in walking distance. My mom had tried to make the move sound better than I thought because to her it was what was best for all of us. I was mostly mad because I had finally started to fit in at my school after joining the local softball team and building a relationship with my father. I may have been ten at this time but I had an attitude of a sixteen year old.

So now that we have finally arrived to our new home in what I thought was the middle of nowhere on a street with maybe six houses and a huge orchard; I was fairly irritated. Everyone rushed out of the car to check out the house, except for me of course, I just sat in my seat angry and sad. I looked out my window and noticed a pretty good sized oak tree in the front yard. I've always enjoyed climbing up trees especially to clear my head to think better. So I opened the door, jumped out; nearly falling into the gravel drive way because I'm very clumsy. I catch myself and start to walk towards the tree. Once I came to its base I looked up at its branches to see which branch would be best to jump up to start my climb. As I was looking up, I notice some movement to my left. Now I knew there were other families living next door but I didn't know if there were any other children. I ignored whoever was obviously watching me and jumped onto the largest branch I could reach. I swung my body back and forth for some momentum to swing a leg onto the next branch to hoist myself up into the rest of the branches. As I was getting ready to swing my leg up I felt my hands beginning to slip but it was too late I was already in motion; so my hands slipped of the branch and I fell to the ground landing flat on my back. I was so embarrassed I decided to just lay there not even noticing the pain because I knew I just ruined my first impression with whoever was watching me. I placed my left arm over my eyes to stop the burn of the sun's light and not long after that I heard footsteps walking towards me. I could sense that whoever was walking towards me was trying so hard not to laugh but was doing a poor job of hiding it. The footsteps stop above me, I move my arm, and open one eye to see a boy smiling down at me. I swear my heart skipped a beat. He was tall, slender with some muscle tone, dark brown hair down to his shoulders, and bright golden brown eyes that I could stare into forever.

"Hey you alright" he asked trying not to laugh.

I was so busy staring into his eyes that I didn't even hear him speak. "Hello, hey are you okay" he says with a bit of concern in his voice and waving his hand in front of my face. "Huh? Uh, yeah I'm good, just enjoying the hot sun" I say with a smile and a soft laugh. He nods his head with a smile and moves to where he's able to extend a hand to help me up. I grab his hand and I could feel the muscles in his arm tense as he was pulling me off the ground, I could also feel my cheeks burning red too. I start to dust off my back and the butt of my shorts. He for some reason decided to help and in my head I think to myself 'he's touching my butt, he doesn't even know me and he's patting dirt off my butt.' So naturally I feel a bit more embarrassed so the red on my cheeks continues. "So, you must be the new girl on the street" he says still smiling while looking me up and down. "Yeah. We just got here" I say fixing my ponytail and pulling out a few twigs from my hair. "Now I've had girls fall for me before but never fall out of a tree" he says with a laugh. "Ha ha yeah right" I say trying to hide my smile. "Hey, Lala you going to come inside or keep flirting" yells my older brother from the front porch. I glare at him and smile back at the boy who I'm yet to get his name. "I'm going to head inside now, I guess I'll see you around" I say hoping to get his name before walking away. "Yeah, sounds like you're needed. My name is Ricardo but everyone calls me Ricky" he says still holding my hand. I quickly let go and run off towards the porch ready to punch my older brother in the arm. I close the door behind me and my older brother already half way across the room shouts, "only been here for an hour and you're already flirting with the neighbor!?" I grab the closest thing to me and throw it aiming for his face. "Looks like you could use some more practice, you totally missed me" he yells hauntingly. Our mom walks in from the kitchen shouting "Hey, hey you want to throw things at each other take it out back!" My brother laughs at me and I stick my tongue out at him.