daniel was your best friend, and you were his. the two of you always hung out. you had been living in the apartment directly next to him, so that made communication much easier. the only thing was that you've liked him for months now.

you had been trying to drop any hint you could, even going as far as to write him a letter from a "secret admirer." he knew your handwriting, so you thought that would do the job. but it didn't. he had no clue as to how you felt towards him no matter what you did. you had your friend tell him, and he just laughed and assumed they were joking.

but what you didn't know was that he felt the same way, he was just scared of you finding out. he didn't want your friendship to be ruined. you had been one of the only friends he had been able to make since he moved and he wasn't about to lose you. whenever your friend had said you liked him, he wanted to believe it. but he couldn't. he always thought you were far too good for him. he just brushed it off and laughed. he saw your letter and thought the handwriting looked familiar, but just threw it away. he had just guessed it was someone trying to mess with him again. he desperately wanted to be more than friends.

one day, you had been at the beach with daniel, just messing around in the waves. you had been splashing each other and roughhousing for what seemed like hours. recently, you had worked up the courage to tell him how you felt, but you didn't know how to. you decided now was the time. you had told daniel you needed to talk to him about something, causing him to think about any possible outcome of this conversation. were you mad at him? did he do something wrong? did you like him? or was he just overthinking it?

instead of showing his nervousness, he responded, saying, "yeah?" as cooly as he could.