It was just another shit Thursday. Sky all overcast like even God couldn’t be arsed. I was out in the school parking lot, perched on the hood of my van, flicking ash off a cig, boots crossed at the ankle, pretending I wasn’t counting how many minutes were left until I could bail. Jeff and Gareth were with me, cracking dumb jokes about Mrs. Carter’s wig flying off in third period.

And then I saw you.

You were new. Had to be. I’d never seen you before, and I would’ve remembered that face. You walked like the world wasn’t allowed to touch you. Confident, but not loud. Not trying. It just happened. The way your hair moved in the wind? God, it was like a goddamn music video. My cigarette burned down to my fingers, and I didn’t even feel it.

Gareth nudged me. “Dude. You good?”

I didn’t answer. Couldn’t. All I could think was ‘who the hell is that?’

I remember getting off the van like I was being yanked by some invisible string. Like gravity itself had changed directions. Walked straight up to you. I didn’t even have a plan. Me. Eddie freaking Munson—who always has something to say—suddenly mute. But I had to say something.

“Hey,” I started, offering a half-smirk that usually made girls giggle or roll their eyes. “You lost or just slumming it with us dirtbags?”

You looked me dead in the eye and said, “Maybe I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.”

Boom. Right in the chest. That was it. I was gone.

⸻

We were inseparable from that moment on. People said it was intense. Said we were too much, too fast. But we didn’t do anything slow. Two weeks in, you were sleeping over. Not sneaky teenage sleepovers either. No, like—we need to share a bed or neither of us sleeps. Not well, anyway. Your fingers would find mine under the blanket like magnets. Even in sleep. Even if we were mad at each other. Our bodies didn’t care. They just needed the connection.

You became my rhythm. My reason. Before you, life was just noise. A shitty soundtrack of skipped lunches, side-eyes from teachers, and metal riffs that barely held me together. But with you? Everything quieted. You made everything feel… clear. Like I could finally breathe.

Once, I got sent to the principal’s office for kissing you in the hallway. Right in front of the history class. Hands in your back pockets, your arms looped around my neck. I knew people were watching. I didn’t care.

“You gonna tone it down?” Principal Davies had asked, folding his arms.

I looked him dead in the face and said, “Would you ask Romeo and Juliet to tone it down?”

He didn’t find it funny. I did.

⸻

My uncle Wayne once caught us slow dancing in the kitchen. No music. Just… your head on my chest, my lips brushing your hair.

“You two attached at the hip or what?” he grumbled, pretending to be annoyed.

“We don’t do apart,” you said softly.

And that’s the truth. If you’re gone too long—my chest physically hurts. Like actual pain. I know it sounds dramatic. I don’t care. It’s real. I get this hollow ache under my ribs, like someone scooped something vital out of me. And when I see you again? It stops. Just like that. Like a switch flipping back on. You’re my lifeline.

Two years. Two whole years, and it still feels like I just found you yesterday. But also like I’ve known you for lifetimes. We talk with our eyes now. Our silences are full. Our touches aren’t even choices anymore—they’re instincts.

Every moment without you feels wrong. Every second with you feels like home.

You’re not just my girl. You’re the air I breathe.

So yeah. Maybe it was fate. Maybe it was dumb luck. But whatever it was, it brought me you.

And I’m never letting go.