While Harley busies himself with restocking the cold room behind the bar, I find myself thinking back to the day I met Nash Harris, back to when a 9-year-old girl first met the love of her life.

I’d never had a lot of friends growing up. For most of my life it had just been me and Momma. My father left before I was even old enough to remember him, but that was fine with me. I didn’t need anyone else. I’d always preferred my own company. I had a wild imagination and a love of books, so whenever Momma was busy with the bakery, I’d sit on the curb outside the store with my head buried in a book, makings friends in the characters I read about.

When I was 9, I started getting bullied by a kid at school named Billy Connor. He always tried to steal my lunch. It became second nature. I’d know I wasn’t going to be able to eat whatever Momma packed for me, so I’d stock up with an extra breakfast muffin in the morning, and hide it in my book bag for the afternoon when I was usually starving.

One day, I’d been clutching my NSYNC lunch bag as if it were my lifeline, walking through the school halls with my head down, desperate to make it outside safely without being intercepted by Billy and his band of bullies. But, of course, with no such luck, I was accosted in the corridor, slammed up against a locker with such force I dropped my lunch to the floor as I clutched the back of my throbbing head. But I’d expected it. I’d been waiting for it. I knew it was going to happen. What I hadn’t been prepared for, however, was Harley Shaw coming to my defense.

Harley had always been popular. Even in the bottom ranks of elementary school, he was the most popular guy in all our class. I think it had something to do with being so good at sports. Apparently, when you’re 9 years old, being athletic is the equivalent of being a rock star, and Harley Shaw was like the Justin Timberlake of Graceville Elementary. And he saved me that day, in more ways than one. He made Billy Connor pay for stealing my lunch by dragging him into the girls’ bathroom and flushing his head down the toilet until he begged for both mercy and my forgiveness, and he made sure he and his mean friends never even looked twice in my direction ever again. And they never did. Never again was my lunch stolen.

Still to this day I don’t know why Harley went out of his way for the dorkiest girl in class he’d never once spoken more than five words to, but he did, and I will be eternally grateful. Not just for saving me from Billy and his friends, but if he hadn’t stepped in that day I might never have felt that tug in my heart, that dip in my belly at the sheer sight of the piercing blue eyes of his very best friend when he’d swept in to ask if I was okay while Harley was busy making Billy pay. When he’d taken hold of my hand and led me to the school nurse’s office to get the bump on my head checked out, I knew, even at 9 years old, that I had fallen head over heels in love with a boy named Nash Harris.