We just met on the first day of class, it was theatre. Listening to the girls talking with the teacher, and making friends with people. I find “him” as we started to get along communications stopped. I wonder why that is. “Well maybe he just needs some space” until it’s been 2 months.

I talk to him again, having a deep crush that I keep gaslighting myself into pretending I don’t. The way he looks and presents himself makes me fall in love. But he doesn’t care.

It seems like he doesn’t want to talk to me, acting distant and unfriendly. It’s weird but whatever. It seems like every boy that I dislike likes me, I’ve already been asked by 3 guys.

But not asked by “him” he’s just silent and cold.

“ Dude, I cant reach this stupid plate.” I mumbled, looking up at the pearly white plate, it was reflective, showing me how pathetic I looked. “ Plate?” My best friend looked at me, walking over. I was just about to respond, yet he did something I couldnt quite shake. Holding full eye contact, he casually grabbed the plate, reaching over my short frame. I don’t know why, but in that momemt, I questioned our six long year friendship.

Anyways, we’ve been married for ten years now.

( inspo: a reddit story, lol.)

I work in a former foundry which has been converted into a four floor office. One morning I went up to the office and, before I got to my desk I realized I left my earbuds in my car.

So I charged down the stairs and opened the door at the bottom of the landing. And that’s when I saw her.

At first you’d think she was nerdy. Blonde curly hair, glasses. But…oh my God. She had a beautiful smile. She wore these gold hoop earrings and had on a small strand of pearls. She also had a small freckle on her right cheek that truly became her.

She wore a one piece sweater that doubled as a VERY short miniskirt. It was pink with little vertical ribs down them. She didn’t have large breasts, but they were fine and, besides, I prefer a slender figure.

Her hands were lovely too. She had oval fingernails, unpainted, just like I like. She wore a small bracelet and a bracelet with what looked like letters, most likely to spell her kid’s (or kids) name. She wore three rings: one on her left middle finger, one on her right ring finger and another one on her right middle finger. Nothing on the left ring finger.

But the highlight was clearly below her waist. Simply put, she had the hottest legs I have ever seen. I had a teacher, Diane, when I was in high school. She would always wear skirts that were over her knee, and closed toe sling back pumps. I like how they showed off the back of her feet, and how they were closed tor. And I loved how she crossed her legs, it was her way of saying ‘I know I have hot legs, I know boys - and men - love to look at them - and I want to indulge them.”

Her legs were better.

Her legs were tanned, toned. Her thighs were thin, toned. I remember watching a show and some guy’s girlfriend’s mother said to him ‘I didn’t get thighs like this crushing coconuts!’ Oh my God, that was so hot. Well, this woman had those kind of thighs. Not an inch of fat anywhere. They were flawless. And her knees, and how her legs had color. And how her calves were developed, muscular and yet feminine. And she didn’t wear stockings - nothing came between guys who stared at her and her legs.

But the capper - the absolute capper - were her pumps. She had leopard print high heel closed toe high heels. Not quite’ fuck me’ high heels - but they were a little higher than what some would consider ‘business professional.’

And again, he justaposition of her in glasses, maybe a little nerdy looking..:but with a body for sin…,and my God those legs…and was she wearing leopard print panties underneath…man, I wanted to find out.

Sometimes you need to make decisions in a split second. And so I did.

“Hi,” I said.

A little nervous, she said “Hi!” I tried not to look at her, look at her body, how she maybe radiated sex, maybe she knew she did , maybe not.

“How are you?” I asked.

“I’m fine,” she answered. Her hands were slender, delicate. They weren’t an old woman’s hands, but they belonged to someone in her 40s.

And I remember what someone said when a beautiful woman about my new friends age went into a video rental store that the boys were working at. ‘Mothers have unbelievable sex drives,’ he said. Almost certainly I was looking at a mother, and almost certainly she had a unbelievable sex drive.

“My name is Pete,” I said, extending my hand.

“Elaine,” she responded. And she extended her hand like she wanted me to kiss it. Again: a split second decision, and again I raised her soft hand to my mouth and kissed it. She giggled.

“I liked that,” she said, and gave me a nervous smile. I smiled broadly.

“You look lovely,” I told her.

And again she smiled nervously, and let out a nervous little laugh. She ‘inspected’ my blue polo shirt. “And so do you!” she said, naturally. Meanwhile I am raging hard for this woman - as hard as I have been - the only time I remember being this hard was when I was 14 when I saw my mother in a bikini. Talk about a formative experience!

There were a couple of coworkers of hers that came in. One I recognized from seeing him a few times. “Hi Elaine!” he said as he entered the stairwell.

“Hello Brian!” Elaine answered as he walked up the stairs.

“I know Brian,” I said. “Nice guys. We’ve talked about the Red Sox a couple of times.”

Now Elaine gave me a natural, relaxed smile. And she had perfect teeth too. “What are you doing for lunch?” she asked me.

“Wide open,” I told her. “Want to connect? 12:30?”

And she smiled. “I would like that,” she told me. “Will you meet me in the lobby here then?”

“Of course,” I told her. “There’s a sandwich shop close by, we can get subs there and then eat at one of the outdoor tables they have there.”

Elaine liked that. “That sounds nice,” she told me. “This is Rafaele’s, yes?” she asked. “You know, I haven’t been there!”

I looked on her green eyes. Her glasses had thin red frames, and the corner of her eyes wrinkled up when she smiled. “Well, my lady, you’re in for a treat!” And she giggled at this.

“Well, Pete, I need to get to work,” she told me, extending her hand. “I’ll see you at 12:30?”

“And you will,” I told her. And in another split second moment, I kissed her on the cheek. And I could see her blush, and smile broadly….and really turned red.

“It was nice meeting you Pete,” she told me. “See you at 12:30!”

And not least of all she had a great ass. Tight, it shook seductively when she walked, as did her calves, it was like she was doing calf exercises, the toned muscles on her shapely legs tensing up with every step up the stairs,

A flawless woman. A woman without flaws.

And I thought..:

Maybe she can be mine.

Holding my breath til my face turns blue Afraid that if I let go, you will too This must be some fictitious work of mine That landed me with something unbelievably divine

I am a beetle scuttling in the dark When the room is engulfed by the light of a spark But though full of joy from the warmth that I feel I am so overwhelmed, i don’t know if it’s real

I want to believe there could possibly be A person hand-crafted for someone like me It may be a mirage, or a shadow in snow But for now I’ll be sure not to let that spark go

• to J ❤️

It’s fine when you’re thirteen Writing hearts around his name Feeling seasick as he walks by You have to force yourself to breath When you hear his voice Cause it makes you want to lay down and die Pen these long journal entries about him How you’ll be married when you’re both old And though you barely ever talk You’re almost semi-quasi stalking him Which is fine! You’re only thirteen years old

But yet you’re not A decade’s passed And though you thought You’d “crushed” your last You find your heart back in your shoes Where it always used to be The only problem is that this time You’ve just turned twenty-three

Desiring a person, oh, what a plight, Behind a curtain, I wait like a peasant. Incessant passion keeps me up at night, For eyes of blue, their depths hold a lesson.

With a voice so broken, they’ve stolen my breath, Yet the weight of this longing feels like a curse. I’ll rise above this, embrace the sweet death, And find my own peace, for better or worse.

It was just a normal day in he institution—as normal as my new life as a Disordered could be—and we were writing and researching about all the Disordered of the past. They were all about very horrible men and women who were inflicted by the darkness, which, now in my present life, I realize was a sort of propaganda that Katrina was talking about.

The murder that stained my hands wasn’t my fault, but it was because of what defined me. Now how does that make sense? It doesn’t; the First Humans try to prove that we are less than mortal in false ways, but the Blanks believe it. I, at the time, was fooled just as them.

Our class was a mix of seven-year olds and above, sadly, Katrina wasn’t with us—Karl was, though. He was helping me, a sad frown on his face as he read the passages we were assigned. I was busy typing on the monitors at our desks, trying to get the assignment completed as soon as possible. The first week I was here, I saw a kid get sent to the Dean’s office for missing an assignment—everyone went quiet when Instructor Willis told her to go.

I was there for a month by then and I hadn’t seen her anywhere.

I startled when Karl tapped me on my wrist lightly. “Oh—yes?”

Karl scooted closer to me in his chair, his rear hanging onto the side. I was used to it by now, so I wasn’t surprised when he went closer to my face. “I can type the rest of your hands are tired,” he smiled, continuing in his normal whisper, “I could be done by tonight.”

I shook my head. “No, it’s fine, Karl.” The thought of either of us getting sent to the Dean made my stomach churn. “I can do it by myself.”

Karl stared at me for a moment before he went back to his desk. I should’ve went back to my work then, but my eyes followed him and stayed.

My heart was pounding, the blood in my veins suddenly rushing faster. My lungs felt blown up, like a ballon, and at that moment I couldn’t breathe; the world around me stilled.

When Karl flicked his bangs away from his eyes, oblivious to growing heated pain in my chest, I let out a gasp. He turned to me then, but I had already went back to typing—but my body didn’t understand the assignment.

Karl, being a Social Disordered who could smell feelings, tilted his head at me. “Are you alright?”

“Yes, fine,” I responded quickly.

No. I was not fine.

Ah, I remember that life, the sweet, sweet life. We couldn’t it stay?

Im sitting on the bus with my best friend. I look up from my phone having a sudden urge to look to my left. That’s when I realize that he is sitting right across from me. My heartbeat starts to quicken, and my mind suddenly stops working. I subconsciously start twisting that white and gold ring on my left hand, a habit I only do when I’m nervous, and look back over to my friend about to say something but for some reason I can’t form a coherent sentence. She’s sitting there on her phone scrolling through instagram oblivious to my actions. I don’t know why I feel this way or why I am acting like this. I don’t like him.

_The next song that turned on in my AirPods will now be the song that I play on loop for weeks, maybe even months, because when that song turned on it’s when I looked back over at him. _

I can’t help but feel a sudden rush of an emotion that I can’t place. Was it nervousness? Maybe I was just distracted. I can’t stop myself from looking over at him sitting across from me. Looking out the window, he runs a hand through his sandy blonde hair and watches as the trees pass quickly by. I bite down on my lip to stop myself from smiling but it’s no use. I look to my right to stop getting distracted and look out of the window me and my friend are sitting by. I’m smiling now and I even laugh about how crazy I probably look. My friend looks at me and chuckles, “A, why are you smiling?” I shrug awkwardly and we both break into laughter to the point where we are almost in tears. She smiles and then looks back down at her phone. I then look over to my left and he is now on his phone too. I grin and am now aware of how much I am spinning the ring on my finger. As I go to turn away he turns his head and looks over at me. We make eye contact for at least ten seconds, which is ten seconds too long, and I immediately begin to feel myself blush. My heartbeat quickens just as it had minutes before and I quickly turn the other way. What was wrong with me? I have never felt this way before. I thought I already knew what it was like to have a crush on someone but now I’m questioning that. Then that song that I never really liked in the first place and have no clue how it got on my playlist turns on again and I smile to myself. I have this thing where I associate songs with places or memories and now this song has its very own association.

_I am even listening to it now. _

It won’t be real. But it could be. He’s my age. I want to break into the business. Maybe our paths will cross. But then again, My success is not guaranteed. He’s someone I might never meet. And still, even if I did, Wouldn’t he find it weird, That long before he knew I existed, I was sitting here thinking of him? What does it matter. I can have my crush. Maybe someday someone in real life will come up. This will fade. I know it will. But right now I want the delusions to be real. It’s harmless, isn’t it? What does it do? I fantasize and it’s fun and all, And then there’s someone new. But it’s never fully satisfying, Never truly. After all, How can it be? It’s one way, Not real, Separated by a screen. But it’s fun, And I like him. Logically it won’t be real. But maybe it could be,

Somebody teach me to fall in “like” Like just plain attraction, no strings attached The kind that doesn’t control your whole mind Or leave your peripheral vision black

Ive been consumed by the thought of you Though I hardly know more than your name I envy those who’s nerves stay relaxed As they juggle with hearts like some sort of game

Somebody teach me to fall in “like” Stop my thoughts from sweating through my skin Is it not enough to tell myself you are cute? Must I be plagued by dreams of your grin?

You shouldn’t be in my fantasies so soon The sun’s hardly set on the previous day Despite all the fears coursing through my mind I can’t seem to keep my fingers away

Somebody teach me to fall in “like” To stop trying to fit everyone like a glove To call someone hot without batting an eye Cause I’m just so tired of falling in love