Leap

LEAP One Krista There's a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in. "Anthem," song by Leonard Cohen, songwriter The best part about living on Twenty-fifth Avenue in Flushing, Queens, is that Bobby Kaufman is three blocks away on Twenty-seventh. Three blocks, not two, because there is also Twenty-fifth Road, then Twenty-sixth Avenue and Twenty-seventh. By some wonderful fluke of nature, Twenty-seventh Avenue is where the cutest boys from P.S. 79 ended up. About a half a dozen girls around my agetwelvelive on mine, including Elana Michaels. Everyone calls her Lainie. She wears fluffy vintage angora sweaters from the sixties that she found in thrift stores in the East Village, pretends that the rhinestone heart around her neck is real diamonds, and has been modeling since she was in diapers. The fancy photograph of her face hanging over the white upright piano in her living rooma piano that is rarely playedis called a "head shot." Only her first name, Elana, and her agent's phone number are on the bottom. (Her agent is really her mother.) Nobody in their right mind needs a Lainie living on their block. My two best friends since the fourth grade are Sandy Doyle and Gina Deluca. Sandy and I ride our bikes every weekend. We pick up Gina along the way and head toward Twenty-seventh Avenue, which we call "the block." Going there is more exciting than going to any other part of the neighborhood, even Carmine's Ices, where Gina's uncle gives us free samples of Lemon Zest and Tutti Frutti. Just as we get to the beginning of the block, my head and chest begin to throb, half hoping the boys will be outside, the other half praying they're not. I always do this Zen thingtake a deep breath and say to myself, Krista Harris, stay coolbut it never works. If we see any of them, instead of slowing down we pedal faster. What if one of them waved? Or actually talked to us? Still, that doesn't stop us from going over there. Pretending we don't notice them has become a game. In the second half of third grade, Bobby K. noticed me. Well, maybe. On Valentine's Day, when I came back from recess, a giant heart-shaped box of chocolates was on my chair. Bobby didn't actually hand it to me. He stood off to the side, smiling, as if he had a secret. So how could I be 100 percent sure? It had the name Kaufman's Fine Handmade Chocolates glimmering in gold script across the red silk lid. Bobby Kaufman's grandfather owns a candy store on Northern Boulevard where he hand-dips chocolates as well as fruit, nuts, and almost anything else edible that doesn't squirm. He'd probably hand-dip my little brother, Matt, if he stayed in one spot long enough. Matt and I went through the entire two layers, biting most of them in half and putting the uneaten halves back in their little silver foil cups. We fought over the last mocha marshmallow covered in bittersweet chocolate, but I got it and didn't split it with him. Matt was stuck with the cherry cordial, syrup oozing down his chubby chin. Even he knew at age four that kind was as disgusting as marzipan. And I knew that Bobby was as smooth as that creamy mocha one. I saved the candy box, lining it with scrap fabric left over from a quilt my mother had been making. In it I put all my jewelry, my grandfather's engraved pocket watch Grandma had given me after he died, and the precious note I had found hidden under the candy box lid. It was an unsigned valentine written on a piece of paper ripped from a notebook, part of a math problem scribbled at the top, folded into a small square. On a single blue line in the center, written in pencil, was one sentence: Do you lZalben, Jane Breskin is the author of 'Leap ', published 2007 under ISBN 9780375938719 and ISBN 0375938710.