Chloe has a child's painting in her bedroom, hanging on the wall where Chloe can see it as she lies in bed and falls asleep at night. The painting is of a large red heart, with big turquoise letters saying: “I love my BFF.” It was painted by her best friend, Nicole and the letters BFF stand for Best Friends Forever. Nicole gave it to Chloe when the girls were quite young. I don't remember the precise date.

Chloe first met Nicole at the red park, so named because of the large red jungle gym in the play area. The girls were six, and life was simple and easy. Uncomplicated. Irvine is a pediocracy, organized around children, and life on the campus of the University of California at Irvine provided us with that mythic 1950s neighborhood, where youngsters could play unsupervised without fear of danger.

Over the years, Chloe and Nicole were in and out of each other's homes. They alternated dinners as they grew older, one Friday night with Nicole's family, one with ours. We had a series of “little girl Thanksgivings” with Nicole's family, one year at their home, one chez nous. (Nicole's mother made the best flourless chocolate cake ever.) The girls always were together in the mornings at Turtle Rock School, their closeness and rapport so strong even the teachers noted it. To this day, I am occasionally asked by one of Chloe's former teachers, when we happen to meet, how Chloe and her little friend Nicole are doing.

The girls took dancing lessons together at the local dance academy. Each spring, I had the pleasure of putting on their makeup for their recitals and practices, when beautiful little girls were transformed into miniature streetwalkers, with painted faces and rouged cheeks. Nicole has thick red lips and pale eyebrows with profuse platinum hair, to dye for, Chloe's father used to quip. Chloe is also blonde, but her hair is more honey blonde and not so thick. She has long, dark eye lashes that make me jealous.

They loved their dance classes—tap, modern, ballet; I think they must have taken everything except possibly hip-hop—and there was a period of several years when the girls would get together and draw up elaborate schedules for what they called their beanie baby dancing school.