According to the laws of Cupid’s universe, our paths were destined to be intertwined. At least that's what I would say if I were a cheesy romance novelist… which I suppose I am, in a way.

In a tale as old as time, two pigtailed girls form an unbreakable bond amidst the trials of elementary school. They grow up, and while their bond stretches a little, and frays from time to time, it never severs. Years slip on and the little girls grow up to make families of their own, keeping one pinky wrapped around the string of fate connecting them. Raised by two different mothers, two new children grow up… far apart, yet still side by side. One pigtailed girl, and one scuff-kneed boy.

The girl with curly blonde hair has firecrackers in her blood and hope in her eyes, and the boy a heart pounding with adventure to match her. They conquer, and laugh, and learn in the summer sun… only caring about whether or not there will be ice cream for dessert.

Over ten years have passed since I wore my hair in pigtails, and somewhere in that span, I slipped.

Though I don't quite know how, at some point my heart was mistakenly caught up in our childish games, staying stubbornly tethered to you even after we shed the skin of childhood.

Now, things are different. But in a way, they haven't changed a bit.

You live approximately 9 hours and 55 minutes away, (a number I have most definitely not calculated more than once) and that's a fact I am entirely aware of and perfectly fine with.

You spend day after day, living a life I will never know, spending your time thinking about girls who are in fact, not me. And do you know what? I really am fine with that.

Because on those summers that come around every once in a while, when you drive 9 hours and 55 minutes to spend a week visiting family in town. I get two days. Two days for little girls, now grown, to reminisce on old times as their little ones run barefoot through the grass.

Two days that remind me why I fell in love all over again last summer… and the summer before.

And even when we are playing Monopoly on the couch instead of cuddled up watching the stars, I snap-shot the moment in my head nonetheless, as something I'll always treasure.

Because with you… it doesn't matter. I am me, and you are you, and we are two humans sitting approximately four inches apart, not quite brushing hands because neither of us are bold enough to make it three inches.

I didn't kiss you last summer.

Or this one.

And that's fine.

But the pigtailed girl still hopes.

Because though she tries to deny it, her heart will always belong to the scuff-kneed boy, seeking out adventures 9 hours and 55 minutes away.

Adventures without me.