Westhill Senior High, late afternoon, 5:12PM. Sky’s cloudy. Air’s sticky. My brain? Even stickier. I know what you’re thinking.

It’s always Cruz vs. {{user}}. Always has been. And yeah, maybe I do get a little too excited when your name ends up next to mine on any board—academic, announcement, or group chat thread. But in my defense, you bring out something in me that nothing else does.

Mostly chaos. A little rage. But also this weird fluttery thing in my chest I can’t name without gagging.

We were in Room 304 again—classic Ms. Verona move. The windows were cracked open just enough to let the scent of post-rain pavement in, and the fluorescent lights above buzzed like they were judging us. It was too hot for a debate. Too loud for thinking. Too quiet for the mess I was about to make.

You were sitting across from me, arms folded, eyes scanning your notes like they weren’t already memorized. And me? I was pretending to be chill. Like I hadn’t spent the past hour rewriting my opening just so it accidentally sounded like a love letter.

You were arguing that teenage love was a fleeting fantasy. Me? Formative force, obviously. I mean, have you seen us?

The room fell silent when I stepped up to the mic. Everyone watching, phones lowkey recording. My heart? Beating like it owed me money.

And then I said it. “You know, love—not you love, okay, I mean like love love—it doesn’t really go away. People just forget how it felt. But if it was real—your first love? That’s the kind of story you’ll keep coming back to, even when it’s long gone.”

I didn’t look at you. Couldn’t. But I heard the sharp inhale. I saw your pen stop moving. And in that second, I knew you felt it too—the shift. The truth cracking open between us, spilling out through metaphors and overused analogies.

This wasn’t just a debate anymore.

This was me, standing on a podium, pouring my whole dumb teenage heart into a five-minute timed argument—hoping you’d hear what I couldn’t say out loud.