Chapter 1: The First Smile
When I was thirteen, love was something I thought only happened in books or movies. I didn’t think it could sneak into my chest on an ordinary Tuesday morning, in a classroom with peeling walls and humming tube lights.
But it did.
It started with a smile. Not from him—mine.
He sat two rows ahead of me. His name was Eric. He wasn’t loud, but his presence was like sunlight coming through a dusty window—soft, golden, hard to ignore once you noticed it. He had this way of leaning back in his chair, tapping his pencil absentmindedly as if his thoughts were too big for the room.
That morning, he turned around to ask someone for an eraser, and for half a second, his eyes met mine. I smiled.
It wasn’t a big, bold smile. Just a tiny curve, the kind that slips out before you can stop it.
He didn’t smile back.
He looked away so quickly I wasn’t even sure if he saw me at all. But my heart was already doing strange things. It was like a whisper started in my chest: That’s him. The boy I would secretly fall for.
From that moment on, I began to see him everywhere. In the cafeteria, where he sat with his friends, always laughing at something. In the schoolyard, where he kicked a football like he was chasing the wind. In the corridor, where our shoulders almost brushed once, and I held my breath the whole time.
He didn’t know my name. I wasn’t one of the girls who wore perfect braids or had a loud laugh that turned heads. I was just… me. Quiet. Always with a book. Always sitting near the window like I was looking for a story to step into.
But now I had found one.
And it had his name in every line.
Chapter 2: A Secret in My Chest
I didn’t tell anyone—not even my best friend, Rhea.
Some feelings feel too soft to speak aloud. Like they might break apart the moment someone else hears them.
Instead, I carried it quietly, this fluttery thing growing in my chest. I’d sit in class and watch the back of Eric’s head, memorizing the way his hair curled slightly at the ends, the way his shoulder shifted when he laughed. I started to learn his schedule without meaning to—where he sat during lunch, which stairs he usually took, what time he arrived each morning.
I began to like mornings more.
Sometimes, when he walked past me in the corridor, I’d pretend to be focused on my book, but really, I was listening for the sound of his footsteps. Hoping he might glance at me. Hoping he might stop.
He never did.
But I didn’t mind. Not at first. Having a secret crush felt kind of magical, like I was living in a story no one else could see. I imagined scenes in my head: him passing me a note in class, him waiting outside the library, him smiling like he knew me.
None of them ever happened. But still, they made my heart feel full.
There were times I wanted to say something to Rhea. She was loud and brave and always knew what to say. But I was afraid she’d laugh, or worse, tell someone. I wasn’t ready to share him—not even in words.
So I kept it to myself. Like a diary with an invisible lock. A quiet crush that made the world feel warmer and lonelier at the same time.
And every time he smiled at someone else, I told myself it was okay. Because at least I knew how I felt.
Even if he never would.
Chapter 3: Smiles He Doesn’t See
I started choosing my seat carefully. Not too close, not too far. Close enough to hear his voice, but not so close that anyone would notice. Sometimes I would catch him mid-laugh, his eyes crinkling in the corners, and for a moment, I’d forget that the laugh wasn’t meant for me.
I tried to smile at him whenever I could. Just small ones. The kind that said, “Hi, I’m here,” without really saying anything at all. But he never smiled back. Not because he was unkind—he was just unaware. My smiles floated toward him like paper boats, too soft to reach the shore.
At lunch, I watched from the end of the bench while he told stories to his friends. They laughed so easily around him. I wondered what it felt like to be one of those girls—the ones who leaned in close when he talked, who said his name like it meant something.
One afternoon, I wore my favorite hair clip. It had tiny stars on it. I thought maybe he’d notice. Maybe he’d look at me and say something—anything.
He didn’t.
He walked right past me, laughing at a joke someone else made. And just like that, my little hope dimmed. Not all at once. Just slightly. Like a candle flickering when the wind brushes past.
That night, I wrote his name at the corner of my notebook page and quickly erased it. I didn’t want anyone to see. But the space where the pencil had been was still there. A soft mark.
Just like him—never really here, but never fully gone.
Chapter 4: The Other Girls
There were always other girls.
Prettier ones. Braver ones. Girls who laughed out loud and didn’t blush when someone looked at them. Girls who stood in circles around him at lunch, leaning in when he spoke, their voices easy and bright.
Sometimes I’d catch him laughing with them—really laughing—and I’d wonder if he ever saw me the way I saw him. But the truth was, he didn’t.
One girl in particular—Meher—always seemed to be near him. She was the kind of person who glowed without trying. People liked her. She wasn’t loud, just confident. I once saw her share her umbrella with him when it rained, and I watched them from the school steps, feeling something heavy press on my chest.
I wasn’t angry at her. Or at him. I was just… small. That’s how it felt. Like I was shrinking inside myself, watching a world I didn’t belong to.
At home, I would replay it all in my head—his laugh, her smile, the way he looked at her like she was sunlight. And I’d think, What does she have that I don’t?
I didn’t have an answer. Only a feeling. A quiet ache that curled up in my stomach and stayed there.
Still, every morning, I kept looking for him. Even if he never looked for me.
Even if he never would.
Chapter 5: The Moment in the Hallway
It was an ordinary afternoon. The hallway buzzed with voices and footsteps, notebooks tucked under arms, bags swinging from shoulders. I was walking to class, head down, tracing the edge of my notebook with my thumb.
Then I saw him.
He was walking from the other end of the hall, alone for once, looking distracted, his hair a little messy from the
wind. I didn’t expect anything—just did what I always did: glanced up quickly, then away again.
But this time… our eyes met.
For one single second, maybe less, he looked at me. Really looked. And then, the smallest thing happened.
He smiled.
Not a big grin. Just a soft, polite smile, like you give someone you recognize but don’t quite know. But to me, it felt like a firework in my chest—small and silent, but dazzling.
I didn’t know what to do. My breath caught, my heart skipped, and by the time I looked back, he had already passed by, walking away like nothing had happened.
But I stood still.
It wasn’t love. It wasn’t a conversation. It was just a moment.
Still, for me, it meant everything.
I wrote about it that night. Over and over. “He smiled.” Just those two words. They felt like proof that I wasn’t invisible. That maybe, just maybe, I had existed for a heartbeat in his world.
I knew he would forget it by the next day.
But I wouldn’t.
Chapter 6: My Secret Love
After that hallway moment, everything felt different. Not because anything really changed, but because I had something now—something real, something mine.
A smile.
I carried it with me like a tiny light. When I walked into school, when I sat in class behind him, when I heard his voice from across the courtyard—I remembered it.
“He smiled at me.”
No one else knew. I didn’t tell Rhea, even though part of me wanted to. I was afraid that if I said it out loud, it might lose its magic. So I kept it safe, like a pressed flower hidden inside my notebook.
At night, I imagined more. Him sitting beside me during lunch. Him asking if I wanted to walk home together. Him saying my name.
It was silly, maybe. But it made me happy, in a quiet sort of way. My heart was fuller than it had ever been, even if it was all in my head.
I started writing about him—not him, exactly, but boys with warm eyes and soft laughs, who looked at quiet girls like they were the whole sky. Little stories that filled the pages of my notebook. No one else read them.
They were just for me.
And even though he still didn’t talk to me—still barely knew I existed—it didn’t hurt as much anymore.
Because now, he had smiled at me.
Because now, I could imagine a version of the world where I mattered to him.
And in that world, I wasn’t invisible.
I was seen.
Chapter 7: The Slow Fading
I kept holding on to that smile for weeks.
But slowly… things changed.
Not all at once. Not like a door slamming shut, but more like a song fading at the end—soft, slow, and hard to notice until it’s gone. He went back to his world. The world full of friends, football, and the same girls who made him laugh.
And I went back to mine.
The space between us felt wider again. I didn’t catch his eye anymore. He didn’t smile again. Maybe that one smile had just been politeness. A passing glance. Nothing more.
But I still remembered it. I remembered how my heart fluttered, how it felt to be seen.
Still, the more days passed, the quieter my feelings became.
One day, I realized I hadn’t looked for him that morning. Another day, I forgot to sit where I could see him. And when I finally saw him laughing with Meher again, something inside me just… didn’t hurt as much.
It was like a slow breath out. A quiet letting go.
I still liked him. But not the way I used to. The hope I’d held onto so tightly was slipping from my hands, and for once, I wasn’t trying to hold it back.
Maybe it was time.
Maybe first loves aren’t meant to last.
Maybe they’re just meant to show us what it feels like—to feel deeply, even in silence. To wish, to dream, to grow.
And slowly, without even realizing it, I began to grow.
Chapter 8: The First Goodbye
It happened on a Thursday. Nothing special. Just another school day, another bell ringing, another crowd of students rushing to pack up and leave.
I saw him in the hallway, laughing with his friends. He looked happy. He always did.
But this time, something was different.
I didn’t feel the ache. I didn’t feel the flutter. I didn’t feel that little pull in my chest that usually came when I saw him.
I just… watched. And then I walked past.
That was it.
No moment. No turning back. No dramatic goodbye.
But it felt like the end of something.
Maybe I had been waiting for a sign, or a final heartbreak, or one last smile. But none of that came. Just a soft, invisible shift inside me. A quiet understanding that whatever I felt—whatever I had carried—was finally fading for good.
That night, I didn’t write about him in my notebook. I didn’t replay our hallway moment in my head. I didn’t whisper his name in the dark.
Instead, I wrote about myself.
I wrote about the girl who loved quietly, who smiled without needing one in return. The girl who learned that it was okay to hope, even if the hope didn’t come true. The girl who let go without anger or regret.
And I realized something.
That love, even when it’s unreturned, still means something. Because it teaches us who we are.
And who I was… was someone stronger than before.
Chapter 9: The Girl I’m Becoming
After that quiet goodbye, things started to shift inside me.
I noticed the sky more. The way the clouds changed shape during last period. The way the trees outside the library turned gold in the afternoon. I started sitting with new people at lunch—people who didn’t know my old story, the one I kept folded in my chest like a paper secret.
I laughed more. Not because of him, but because of silly things—Rhea’s jokes, a squirrel chasing a plastic bag, a teacher accidentally calling me by the wrong name. And for once, I didn’t wish he was there to see it.
I was learning to be someone without him in the picture.
I picked up new habits. I started journaling every day—not just about crushes or feelings, but about little things: songs I liked, thoughts I had, dreams that didn’t include anyone but me.
There was a kind of peace in it. In becoming someone who didn’t need to be seen to feel real.
One afternoon, I walked past him again. He was talking to someone, smiling like always. I looked at him and thought, I used to love you. And it didn’t hurt.
It felt soft, like remembering an old dream. A good one. But not one I wanted to return to.
Because the truth was, I was beginning to love something new.
Myself.
Chapter 10: The Last Page of That Story
There wasn’t a big moment, no grand ending.
Just a quiet afternoon in the school library, where I sat by the window and realized I hadn’t thought about him all day.
Not once.
I turned the page in my notebook and smiled. I had filled so many of them—pages about him, about feelings I couldn’t say out loud, about small hopes I folded and tucked away.
But now, the words I wrote felt different.
They were about my favorite book, the way the sunlight hit my desk, how I wanted to try painting even though I wasn’t good at it. They were simple. Ordinary. But they were mine.
That old story—the one where I waited for him to notice me—was ending.
And I was okay with that.
I didn’t need a goodbye from him. I had already said it to myself. Quietly, slowly, and in pieces. Every time I stopped looking for him in a crowd, every time I smiled for no reason, every time I chose myself over a daydream—I was letting go.
He would always be my first crush. My first quiet love.
But he wasn’t the whole book.
Just the first chapter.
And now, I was ready to write the rest.