The First Day

Ferb Fletcher was just getting ready to leave his home for the last time. His father was moving to America for no reason. Ferb himself barely remembers this himself. The only thing he can remember is parting with his best friend Emily Kinney. Emily Kinney was just waking up when she heard the telephone ring downstairs. She heard her mother pick up the phone and a few moments later called Emily downstairs to say goodbye to Ferb. "Goodbye?!" Emily was shocked. Emily remembers this day today very clearly. She picked up the phone and heard what she thought was Ferb's voice over the phone. "...we'll come by to say goodbye..." It wasn't Ferb. It was Mr. Fletcher. "Okay," said Emily morosely, hanging up the phone. She turned to her mother. "Mum, what am I gonna do without Ferb?" she asked. "We'll have to move on." A honk sounded from outside. Emily ran to the curb like lightning and saw Ferb. "Here," Ferb said. He held out a locket that Emily took. Emily opened up the locket. There was a picture of her and Ferb, taken very recently, of them both smiling and laughing at some long-lost joke. Emily's eyes filled with tears as he looked up at Ferb. "You'll write me?" "Of course," Ferb said. "You won't forget me?" "Of course I won't." But he did.

Meanwhile, in Danville, Phineas Flynn was bored to tears. There was nothing to do, no kids his age on the block to play with. He amused himself by building the same thing every day with Tinkertoys: a friend. One summer morning, he was building the person again when he heard the roar of trucks whooshing past his house, something that happens daily nowadays. He tottered over to the peephole in the fence and saw moving trucks: Someone was moving in next door. He saw a woman get out of a seperate car, and then saw a little girl his age get out too. Finally! Someone to play with!

Isabella Garcia-Shapiro was moving. Her mother was relocated because of her job. She was feeling very sad because there was no one she could play with. She stepped out of the car and looked across the street, seeing a little red-haired boy watching the moving trucks with a bright look in his eye. She immediately decided that she liked this boy very much and resolved to meet him as soon as possible. "Mom, can I go across the street? I think I saw someone my age," she said to her mother. Mrs. Garcia-Shapiro knew how much her daughter longed for a friend. "Go right on ahead," she said, smiling. Isabella was excited! She skipped across the street. Phineas was taking apart his Tinkertoy creation when he heard a knock on the fence. He looked through the peephole and saw the little girl from across the street. He quickly got his door-opening machine and opened the gate. "Hi," the little girl said. "I'm Isabella." "I'm Phineas," Phineas replied. "Whatcha doin'?" Isabella asked. "I'm building with Tinkertoys. Do you wanna come in and play?" "Sure!" Isabella said, her face lighting up brighter than the sun.

Ferb was traveling on an airplane for the first time in his little life. He imagined himself jumping on the clouds, having a pillow fight with Emily. At that moment, he is too young to realize it, but his heart is broken-- badly. "Daddy, why do we have to leave?" Ferb asked. "You'll see," his father replied. "We will be landing in Danville International Airport very soon," said the pilot over the intercom. "Please buckle your seatbelts." Mr. Fletcher leaned over and buckled Ferb's seatbelt. The plane landed and Mr. Fletcher and Ferb tried to make their way across the large airport. Ferb stopped at a mural of a rollercoaster and got seperated from Mr. Fletcher, who walked on, obviously thinking that his son was following him. When he looked down at his luggage and saw that his green-haired kid wasn't there, he cried out in shock and ran off to find his son.

Phineas was having a great time with Isabella. Their creations littered the backyard, some things that Phineas liked, like Perry, his pet platypus, and some things that Isabella liked, like Pinky, her pet chihuahua. Mrs. Flynn walked into the backyard and saw Phineas and Isabella, Tinkertoying to their heart's content. "Well, Phineas," Mrs. Flynn said, smiling. "Have you made a new friend?" "Yeah!" Phineas said. "What's your name?" Mrs. Flynn asked Isabella. "My name is Isabella," Isabella chirped. "I came along outside to tell Phineas to come to the front door, but because you're here too, Isabella, you might as well come along with us." Mrs. Flynn lead them through the house to the curb, along the way, calling, "CANDACE!" "Who's Candace?" Isabella asked Phineas. "Candace is my older sister," Phineas said. A seven-year-old girl with long red hair appeared, following close behind her mother and not looking at her little brother. Isabella could see scorn in her eyes and felt slightly hurt. The four of them reached the front door. A taxi pulled up and a green-haired little boy followed by his father got out of the car. "Phineas, Candace," Mrs. Flynn said, "This is Ferb, your new stepbrother." "I have a brother?!" Phineas asked excitedly. Another companion! "Not a brother, stupid," Candace said. "A stepbrother. That means he's not totally related to you." "Candace," Mrs. Flynn warned. Ferb ambled to the backyard, followed by Phineas and Isabella. "What's that?" he asked, looking at a particularly strange creation. Phineas didn't recognize this kind of talking. He knew that Ferb was speaking English, but he did not recognize the way Ferb pronounced things. Isabella, however, understood completely. "Oh, you sound so cool!" she squealed. "Say more words!" Ferb looked slightly confused. "It's a... a..." Phineas turned to Isabella. "What was it?" "I don't know..." Isabella said, her small eyes examining the Tinkertoy creation. "I knew what it was while we were building it, but now I don't!" "I think it looks like a rollercoaster," Ferb said. "Yeah..." said Phineas, squinting. It was quite the pathetic rollercoaster, consisting of only one little drop. The three toddlers sat in the backyard, observing this creation. After a few moments of just sitting there, Ferb leapt into action, Phineas and Isabella following suit. Together, they designed a rollercoaster, zooming around a miniature Danville. Mr. Fletcher came into the backyard, holding a camera. He took many photos of Phineas, Ferb, and Isabella posing around the rollercoaster.

Candace Flynn was very bored. She had just been introduced to her stepbrother-- big whoop! Another rotten little boy running around her house. She wished she knew someone her age besides her best friend, Stacy Hirano, who was currently at the movies with her mother. Candace was ambling around the house, bored and lonely, when her mother picked up her purse from the kitchen table and said, "Come on, Candace. We're going to run some errands." Candace didn't know what errands were, but something that involved wearing herself out didn't sound too fun. She looked outside to the backyard, where Phineas, Ferb, and Isabella were smiling at Mr. Fletcher's camera. Wishing Isabella was older so that she could play with her, Candace followed her mom out the door and to the car. In the car, Candace imagined that she was riding with a girl her age who liked all the things she liked and was the best of friends with. She was very surprised when her mother handed Candace a lollipop from the bank. "Mom," Candace said as they pulled away from the bank, "you forgot to give one to Evelyn." "Who?" asked Mrs. Flynn absently. "Evelyn," Candace repeated. "She's feeling very hurt that you didn't give her a lolly." "Oh, dear," said Mrs. Flynn, thinking fast. She had to think of a way to distract Candace from 'Evelyn' not having a lollipop. "Evelyn doesn't like lollipops, honey." "Hmm," Candace said, not at all upset. Mrs. Flynn breathed an inward sigh of relief. Arriving at the grocery store, Candace skipped up to the door. How cool were those automatically sliding doors? So cool. It just knew when she was there and knew when she wasn't. She silently concluded that they were powered by magical elves that came from the land of angry corn people and were very hurt by the words the angry corn said. Mrs. Flynn handed the grocery list to Candace. "Keep track of what we've got in the cart." Candace, while keeping track of the groceries, eventually learned what errand running was. In her eyes, it was a form of punishment in a way, boring you to death. "Mom, are you mad at me?" Candace asked while they were in line. "What? No!" Mrs. Flynn said, slightly shocked. Rummaging in her bag, she discovered she didn't have a pen. She turned to the man in front of her in line. "Oh, hello, Heinz. May I borrow a pen?" "Sure!" the man said in a scratchy German accent. He handed her a pen, which she clicked and it punched her in the nose. "Oh, my!" Mrs. Flynn said, rubbing her nose. Apologizing profusely, the man handed her another pen that did not punch people in the nose. Through all the commotion, Candace saw a little girl around her age, looking unimpressed at her father's antics. She had long, dark hair and blue eyes that looked very bored and irritated. Candace could tell from the girl's look that this happened very often. Edging over to the girl, Candace said hi. "What's your name?" Candace asked. "Vanessa," the girl said. "I'm Candace." She looked up at the man, still trying to stuff the fist back into the pen. "Does this happen often?" "Oh, you wouldn't believe it," Vanessa said. "This is always happening, him handing innocent-looking things to other people and the things do something weird-- there was this one time where he lent this lady a few cents, and the coins turned into robots and climbed up her arm. The woman freaked out, and her husband gave my dad a black eye. He's kind of weak that way." "Hmm," Candace said, right when Vanessa's father managed to get the fist back into the pen. "Come on, Vanessa!" he called loudly. Candace saw Vanessa blush. "Good luck with your dad," Candace said, waving as the man practically skipped out of the store, Vanessa trudging along in his wake.

EIGHT YEARS LATER... Phineas Flynn was free from school for one hundred and four days! He headed outside with his stepbrother Ferb Fletcher and sat underneath the big, shady tree in the backyard. "Hello, boys!" said Mr. Fletcher, coming outside with something in his hands. "Hey, Dad!" Phineas chirped. "Whaddya got there?" "Some pictures I took when you were little. I believe it was the first day you and Ferb and Isabella met, even." He walked over to the boys and showed them the pictures. Craning his neck, Phineas saw his two-year-old self next to two-year-old Ferb and two-year-old Isabella. They were standing near a Tinkertoy creation that looked awfully like a rollercoaster. Ferb was awed. He felt like he was going back in time looking at these photos. How he remembered that day so well... And the thought came to him in a name: Emily Kinney. Ferb felt his stomach drop, remembering his last day in England. He had promised his best friend, Emily, that he would write every day... He even gave her a locket... He imagined a four-year-old Emily, running out excitedly to check the mail and finding nothing from the States, seeing her face drop... Mr. Fletcher went back inside with his photos. Phineas wondered if his stepfather noticed that he was missing a photo. Hiding the photo from Ferb, Phineas looked down at it. It was a shot of only two-year-old Isabella and two-year-old Phineas, hugging each other with the same loving smile. Phineas felt like this younger version of himself was a younger brother he had lost. "Ferb," Phineas said decisively, "we shouldn't waste summer. I, for one, am beginning to become bored, and boredom is something with which I will not put! I--" "Phineas, Ferb," Mrs. Flynn called. "I'm going to run to the store. I'll be back." Phineas looked at the photo. "We're gonna build a rollercoaster!"

"Isa!" Mrs. Garcia-Shapiro called to her daughter, Isabella. "Come and look at this!" Isabella ran downstairs. "What is it, Mom?" "Mr. Fletcher brought over some photos he took of you and Phineas and Ferb the first day you met. Come look." Isabella looked at the photos spread across her kitchen table. Immediately, she spotted the photo that Phineas had the duplicate of. Sneaking it away from her mother, she said, "Mom, I don't remember these." "I doubted you would, sweetie," her mother said absent-mindedly. In her bedroom, Isabella took a closer look at the photo. It looked really familiar to her; she just couldn't place where she had seen it before. She pondered for a moment, and when the realization came, it hit her so hard she almost fell over. Racing over to her jewelry box, Isabella pulled out the same photo that she had taken from her mother. The only difference between the photo she had taken from her mother now and the photo she had taken eight years ago was that the eight-year-old photo had hearts drawn on it. Flipping it over, Isabella saw that she had written, in the wobbly writing of a two-year-old who could barely talk in the first place, PF + IG. Isabella looked out the window, across the street, to Phineas's house. He seemed to be contemplating a piece of paper too. And Isabella knew, she just knew, that Phineas had the same photo as her. Her heart felt like it was growing as the danced around the room, the photograph pressed to her heart.