"Jouve's sister was unbearably beautiful" "She always rode with her skirts flying" "Bernadette led us to discover many of our darkly hidden dreams" "She awoke in us the springs of luminous sensuality" "When swimming, she'd leave her bike and we'd hang around it" "A virginal heartbeat has its own juvenile logic" "Too young to love Bernadette we decided to hate and torment her" "Though lovely, she was nevertheless flighty" "She dated an odd guy, a stranger named Gerard, a gym teacher who impressed some of us" "Guess who I saw... in a polka-dot dress?" "Dammit!" "You're crazy?" "They played tennis each Thursday on a shady court" "We'd meet behind the fence" "What led us there as the balls flew over the hot sand?" "Love of the game, the short skirt or Bernadette's bare legs?" "Shit!" "No good!" "Got any more?" "If a ball went over the fence she'd come up to us panting in her white jersey" "We'd have served her forever for such moments" "We swore not to go back but the next Thursday we were there" "Could you give me a light?" "I never give a light!" "Never!" "There they are!" "Hide!" "Where shall we go?" "We're gonna go, go, go!" "Then the hostilities began" "On fences, tree-trunks, bridges and city walls we announced with arrow-pierced heart they were going steady but we were too young to see the difference between that and Love" "We were disappointed our revenge upset no one" "How could childhood instincts fight an enemy stronger than us... an unknown enemy named Love?" "We kept an eye on Bernadette on her bike flying off to her dates and pleasures" "Our failure made us more aggressive" ""Gerardette at the movies"" "We ran out, certain we'd hit home" ""Lost Collars Without Dogs"" "Then we made a decisive attack" "One August afternoon our 2 lovers went for a ride in the nearby woods" "We'd spotted them earlier in the afternoon and like hunters, we tracked them at a distance... instead of hounding them as usual with our name-calling and teasing" "We watched them ride slowly along, holding hands" "Then they escaped our sight... not knowing we were again trailing them" "Any fish in there?" "What do you feel for me?" "Brutal, physical hunger!" "Our plan wasn't to stare but to humiliate them publicly" "Wait for me!" "Havin' fun?" "Dirty little brat!" "Sad?" "Don't be!" "The 3 months'll soon pass and when I get back..." "Write!" "Go home before it rains!" "You'll write?" "We kept trying for our revenge" "As our vacation neared the end we resorted to a very shabby method" "Their happiness gave us an embarrassing idea" "One of us bought a postcard showing 2 scantily-dressed lovers sprawled on a bed" "What'll I say?" "You held Bernadette naked!" "We don't know what you do at night but..." "If Papa knew!" "In memory of our wild nights of rapture!" "Gerard the big chicky and his little woman!" "Victoriously we signed it with vengeance" ""The Brats"" "We sent it in an envelope to Bernadette Jouve's address" "At the end of vacation, Life gave its cruelest reply to our letter, leaving an abominable sadness in our hearts" "We learned Bernadette's fiancé had died that summer in a mountain-climbing accident" "At heart, we weren't mean, but beset with a rage... children feel concerning Love, unknown yet haunting" "What were we after?" "." "What were the impossible love and kisses we were as proud of as if they were our own?" "Gerard's tragic death was a distant thing for us and we took the news coldly" "But one autumn day in October" "Bernadette passed us, not seeing us" "Later I recalled the event more with pity than shame but I have a bitter memory of her... gone from our childhood skies... the way she'd disappear around a corner... with her skirts flying" "Processed by C.M.C."