Man… if you told me a year ago that I’d be the luckiest guy on Earth, I would’ve laughed so hard I’d choke on my own cigarette. No way in hell would I have believed it. But here I am—waking up next to a girl who could outsmart NASA and still have enough brainpower left to beat me at D&D blindfolded. And the craziest part? You chose me. Freakin’ Eddie Munson. The town weirdo. The metalhead misfit. Yeah, you picked me.

I remember the first time I saw you. You were sitting in the back of Mr. Clarke’s class, spinning your pen between your fingers like it was some kind of magic trick. Everyone else was scribbling notes like their life depended on it. You? You looked bored out of your brilliant mind.

So I leaned over and whispered, “You look like you’re either planning world domination or counting how many times Mr. Clarke says ‘photosynthesis.’”

You smirked. God, that smirk.

“Both,” you whispered back. “Wanna help?”

And that was it. That was the moment. My heart? Gone. My brain? Scrambled. My soul? Signed, sealed, delivered—yours.

You’re not just beautiful, but brilliant. Like, more than Einstein brilliant. Your IQ? 170. Yeah. One-seventy. I had to double-check what IQ meant when you told me that, just to make sure I heard it right.

But here’s the kicker — you never made me feel stupid. Not once.

“Eddie,” you’d say, curling your legs up on the couch in the Hellfire room, your voice all calm and warm, “I’d rather be here listening to you talk about Dio for two hours than sitting in some fancy college class surrounded by people trying to prove they’re the smartest in the room.”

I’d just stare at you, blinking like an idiot, probably looking like I forgot how to form words.

“Seriously?” I’d ask.

You’d nod. “Seriously.”

See, you could’ve skipped like… five grades if she wanted. Hell, Yale sent you a letter when we were still juniors. Harvard emailed you — emailed, like they had to get to you before anyone else did. Like you were some kind of secret weapon in a global war of brains.

But you stayed. For me.

“I didn’t want to be a thirteen-year-old in college, Ed,” you said once, arms wrapped around my waist, your head against my chest. “I didn’t want to miss being young. Being here.”

“Being with me,” I added, only half-joking.

You looked up and grinned, that grin that could punch the air out of my lungs. “Exactly.”

And I believed you. Not just because I wanted to — because you meant it. All of it.

Look, I’m not stupid. I know people talk. “Why’s she with him?” “He’s just gonna hold her back.” “She could do so much better.” Yeah, yeah. I’ve heard it all. But you—you never listen to that crap. Doesn’t care. You see me for who I am. Not for the grades I barely scrape by with, or the reputation I’ve got hanging over my head like a black cloud. You see me.

And I see you too.

I see the way you zone out in class ‘cause your brain’s ten steps ahead of everyone else. I see the way you hide how tired you are from pretending to care about stuff that’s beneath your level. I see how much it costs you to keep herself grounded here, with us.

So I try to be your gravity. As dumb as that sounds.

Some nights we sit on the roof of my trailer, passing a cigarette back and forth, talking about everything and nothing.

“You think it’s crazy?” you asked once, staring up at the stars. “That I don’t want to go? That I don’t want to leave you?”

I looked over and said, “Nah. I think the whole world’s crazy if they can’t see why you’d stay.”

You didn’t say anything. Just leaned your head on my shoulder and sighed.

So yeah, maybe I don’t have a future mapped out in neat little bullet points. Maybe my life’s more dice rolls than destiny. But with you? It feels like maybe, just maybe, I don’t have to be the guy everyone expects me to be. I can just be… Eddie.

And somehow, for some miraculous reason, that’s enough for you.