She’s perfect. Not in a fake, polished kind of way—but in the real, gets top marks without trying, tied her hair up with a pen, always five steps ahead kind of way. She’s quiet, focused, impossible to catch off guard.

Unless I’m involved. Then she flinches. Every time.

She’s here on full academic pressure. She needs that scholarship like oxygen. She doesn’t party. Doesn’t waste time. Doesn’t look at people like me.

And yet—her eyes always find me when I laugh too loud in class. Or when I slide into the desk next to hers even though we’re not assigned. Or when I lean back in my chair and whisper just loud enough:

“Careful, Princess. That pen might set the page on fire.”

She glares. Always. But she never moves away.

I live for that.

I gave up on school the minute I started racing. My weekends are track days, not textbooks. I’ve missed more Monday quizzes than I’ve passed, and my uniform stays wrinkled no matter what I do.

Still—I’m always on time to the classes she’s in. Weird, huh?

Last week, she dropped her folder in the library and all her notes scattered. I helped her pick them up, didn’t say anything. But one page caught my eye before she snatched it back.

It was a list. Tidy. Color-coded. And at the very bottom, in handwriting messier than the rest:

“STOP thinking about him when he smiles like that.”

She saw me read it. Froze like she’d been caught committing a crime. I just raised an eyebrow and said, “So… how exactly do I smile?”

She didn’t answer. Just shoved the folder into her bag and walked out like the floor was on fire.

She thinks I don’t care. That I’m just teasing for fun.

But what she doesn’t know is— I’d trade every podium, every lap, every stupid gold trophy just to kiss her one time in that silent library.

And if she ever lets me in… God help us both. Because I’m not walking away.