Mrs. Chang

I do not understand these children. When I was young, boys and girls didn't even go to school together. Now the young people hang all over each other with no regard to what is appropriate in public. When my only son brought home Agnes with him from middle school I was worried. Agnes was taller than my boy and the spelling of her name......why is there a G next to a N? How do you pronounce that? Oh Chang also has a G next to an N. Well it's spelled differently in Chinese characters. She does not even call my boy by his real name. I did not like that.

They could not go upstairs to his room. I would not let them. It would not have been appropriate at that age for them to be alone together. Instead they sat with me in the front room. They would watch the T.V. while I knitted. It was not often that Agnes came to visit, but when she did I watched them.

It has been five years since then and they are still not allowed to go into his room. My boy is eighteen. I know how they think at eighteen. I married his father at eighteen. He is not allowed to do what his father did at eighteen. It is a little weird though. I have never seen them try to touch or kiss. They usually just yell at the T.V. or throw things at each other. Is that how children flirt these days?

Clara

Roy and Agnes are extremely cute. It seems like just yesterday that I was reading Agnes's love confession to Roy in her yearly Santa note. Every year for six years she asked Santa to make Roy Chang hers.

I'll admit I was worried at first. When Agnes came home from the second grade exclaiming that she had found true love, my heart almost stopped. Yeah, I know puppy love is common at that age but Agnes is the daughter of Rufus Thompson. Half of her genes come from a man who, in his youth, was so secure in his love that he convinced the most cynical woman in the world to marry him after they had only known each other a day. Granted, the two of us have been happily married for almost 18 years now. Still, I wasn't ready for my child to get married at 7 years old.

In the end my worry was unnecessary. While Agnes had the Rufus Thompson seduction technique mastered, Roy Chang was stronger than I had been against Rufus and he refused her. It sounded like those tornado warning sirens when Agnes came home from the eighth grade that day. She was wailing so loud and her words were so jumbled that I could barely understand her. The devastation was so intense that it took my machine-like strength and a pep talk from the incomparable Rufus Thompson to get her up for school the next day.

Who knows how they got over the hurdle of the rejection heard round the world, but they have been inseparable ever since. After school they come straight over and head up to Agnes's room. Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those new age parents who lets their kids do whatever they want. I set some strict rules that dictate how Roy Chang and Agnes are to act when they are not in my presence. Plus, I have spies everywhere so I know exactly what is going on. Not that I need to check up on them too often. In all these years of watching Roy Chang go in and out of my house, he's never once even looked like he would try something inappropriate.