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“Are you sure you don’t want me to come along?” her Mom asked, a slight frown on her forehead.

Paris nodded firmly.

“Okay. Have a good day, honey,” her Mom said after she had kissed her on the cheek.

“Okay, Mom.”

“Okay, you’re all set. Go make friends with the other kids.”

Paris pulled out of her mother’s embrace and ran up the steps to the school doors. It was her first day at this new school. She had seen how the kids had acted on the first day of school in her old home. Some were even crying and hanging on to their parents.

Paris made a scrunched-up face when she tought of that. Nuh-uh. That was babyish. She wasn’t a baby anymore. She just had her 7th birthday last month. She was big now. She turned to wave to her mother one last time. Her mother smiled and waved back.

At the door, a grown-up met her. A boy was holding on to her left hand. On her shirt, she had a nametag just like Paris did.

“Hi, Paris. I’m Miss Perry.”

“I know. I know how to read,” Paris said with a great amount of pride.

“Wow!” Miss Perry said. She seemed impressed. Paris swelled even bigger. “That’s great. Paris, I want you to meet… wait, why don’t you tell me his name?” She pointed to the nametag on the boy’s shirt.

Paris frowned a little as she studied his nametag, trying to decipher the word.

“Nic… Nickol… Nickolas?”

“Very good! You’re really good at this.”

Paris smiled until her cheeks hurt.

“Paris, meet Nickolas. Nickolas, meet Paris. He just arrived today too.”

Nickolas gave her a shy smile and scuffed the ground with the toe of his shoe. She smiled back.

“Hi, Nick. Can I call you Nick? ‘Cause Nickol… Nickolas… is sooo long. Like this long.” She illustrated by spreading her arms as wide as she could.

Nick gave her that shy smile again. “Sure,” he said softly.

“Okay,” she replied brightly. “My brothers call me Kid. They say Paris is a sissy name. I think you should call me Kid. What do you think?”

“I think Paris is a good name. But I’ll call you Kid if you want me to.”

Her face broke into another megawatt smile at that.

“Yeah,” she nodded enthusiastically. “My Mom told me that I was named after the most romantic city in the WORLD. Maybe even the universe. Mom told me it’s in France. She says that’s in Europe. I’m going to go there someday.” She said the last part in all the seriousness a 7 year old could muster.

Nick was listening with wide eyes. He nodded in agreement when she said that. He didn't think that his own name meant anything as special as that.

“Hey, I have an idea! Why don’t we go together when we grow up?”

“You think we could?” Nick asked breathlessly.

“Of course,” she said, almost scornfully. “My Mom says that you can do anything if you put your mind to it.”

“Yeah,” Nick nodded. “My Mom said that too.”

They chatted the rest of the way to their classroom, Paris swinging Miss Perry’s hand back and forth while Nick simply clung to her.

“Class, we have two new students today,” Miss Perry announced when the class had settled down. “Please stand up and introduce yourselves,” she said to Paris and Nick.

Paris stood up first, followed by Nick.

“Hi, my name is Paris. I’m from Oregon and I just moved here.”

“Hi. Uh, I’m Nickolas. I mean, Nick. I just moved here, too. I’m from Ruskin.”

“Thank you.” Miss Perry smiled warmly at them. “Class, today we’re going to start on a new project. You can pick your own partners this time.”

Paris turned to Nick who was sitting beside her. “Partners?” she asked brightly.

“Okay,” Nick said, beaming back.

Miss Perry started handing out colored paper, color pencils, glitter, and glue to each table. The project was to make a Mother’s Day card for their moms. Paris and Nick bent their heads and began working immediately.

“Oops…” Nick winced as a heap of glitter slipped from his fingers to the floor.

“Ooh… Nickolas just dropped the glitter. You’re going to get into trouble for that,” taunted Tim, who sat beside Nick.

Paris, seeing Nick’s stricken face, rose up and faced him immediately.

“No, he’s not because you won’t tell Miss Perry.”

“Am too.”

“Am not. If you do, that means you’re a tattletale. Tattletale Tim,” she taunted.

“Am not,” argued Tim, red in the face.

“Am too. Or I’ll tell the whole class your name is Tattletale Tim. And I’ll hit you.”

He scoffed, “You’re a girl. Girls can’t punch.”

“I have three brothers. They all taught me how to throw a punch.”

Tim sat down in his seat and sulked.

Nick was on the floor, gathering the glitter in his hands. Paris bent down to help him. When they had gathered most of the glitter, they returned to their seats.

“Thanks,” Nick said shyly.

“It was nothing,” Paris said, trying to act aloof. Nick looked as if he might burst out crying any minute.

“Can you really punch?”

Paris was glad that the scared expression was fading from his face. She nodded enthusiastically, making her ponytail bounce. She proceeded to tell him about all the things she had done with her brothers while they both worked on their cards.