The Feel-Good Love Story

She glanced up and looked right into his deep dark blue eyes.

"What did you say?" She asked, almost out of breath. Her lips parted slowly as her heart pounded with strong anticipation.

"I said, I'd love to go out with you one day," His eyes laughed as he said that, as if it was a normal and simple answer. He had no idea the many months Noelle had hesitated over asking him and worrying about how he would respond. Ryan smiled at her and they were both silent for a while.

Noelle's jaw shook as she took it all in and she looked at his face and his beautiful smile that was, surprisingly, giving her courage and strength.
"Is this really coming true for me?" She thought and smiled back at him, her heart filled with nothing but warmth.

Noelle thought back to the day she first met Ryan. She wasn't making many new friends in her new class; all her friends from the previous year were all at a different class. She had never noticed Ryan before this year, and not before that day. As she thought back to that day which she would never forget, she smiled at the lovely simplicity of it. He walked over to her table during a break and said, "Hi." Noelle stuffed her books under her desk and looked up, and saw a face that was so beautiful, she could never do it justice by describing it in a hundred years.

"Hi," She said softly, steadying her heart.
"What's your name?" Ryan said with the most gentle smile Noelle ever saw.
"Noelle."
"Hi Noelle, do you know my name?"
"No... What is it?"
And Noelle could never describe the way she felt when she heard him say it:
"It's Ryan."

Two days later, she was assigned to sit with him, along with two other classmates, in a group seating arrangement. Noelle's heart fell when she realised he didn't remember talking to her that day; maybe she didn't make a good impression on him. It was hard trying to get close to him, as he was always talking to his friends which she didn't know. Ryan was a very sociable person and everyone liked him. Noelle always felt a hard pang of guilt in her heart whenever she thought of the possibility that if he wasn't always surrounded by people, she might actually have more time with him. However, she did have an advantage of sitting next to him, and she used her chances wisely by talking to him during and between classes, about almost everything.

It was instances like turning to see his boyish laughter whenever a joke was made in class, and feeling her heart pound uncontrollably but her head calm and steady as a rock whenever he said a word to her, that made her realise something - she was crazy about Ryan.

Only two weeks of sitting next to him, Noelle's mind was all over the place. There were moments when she thought he felt the same way about her. They shared personal moments where she told him her problems that she never told anyone else and he listened, giving advice and telling her she wasn't alone. She would, without reason, become addicted to drawing mushrooms on the corner of her notes, and he would tear out a piece of paper and fill it with mushrooms, leaving her the back page to continue. He would get into the mood of telling some hilarious experience of his and his eyes would never leave hers for a second, looking intently for her smile and yearning to hear her laughter. She would do a small favour for him and he would look deep into her eyes, smile sincerely with gratefulness and say, "Thanks, Noelle, you're the best."
And Noelle had never felt happier.

Still, there were times when she had to assure herself repeatedly that she meant something to him. During a 30-minute break, Ryan would walk across the class to talk to a girl the whole time, and Noelle would have a sharp feeling in her gut - the feeling of jealousy. He would ask her for help in a subject after school and she'd be giddy all day, only to realise that he'd forget what he said once school ended. Also, there were days when he would text her things out of nowhere, but that meant a lot to her as it showed that he remembered her, but he would then stop texting her for a week, leaving her dazed in a whirlwind.

It was a month after they met that the seating arrangement was switched and everything went messy. They were at two totally opposite corners of the classroom and there were days when they might not even say a word. Noelle was devastated as she confided in her friends, desperate for advice on what to do.
"Just go ahead and talk to him then," one of them said firmly. "Ask him out or something, it's not like girls can't do that."
Noelle wasn't exactly that brave to take initiative, but when she looked right at him, she felt the strength in her although her heart was racing.

Snapping out of her long train of thought, she smiled at him shyly and she would never regret falling for him.

"Great! We can do anything you want..." Noelle said and shifted her feet, trying to control herself from bursting with pure joy.
"You're a really special girl, you know that?" Ryan said laughingly and ruffled her hair playfully. "I really like you."
Noelle took a minute to process what he said and slowly opened her mouth.
"I really like you too."