The first time he saw her was when he was wandering in unknown corridors after school hours. Walking down the unfamiliar path in hunt for an exit he could hear a faint melody in the distance. Walking towards the source without hesitation he could hear the sound getting louder and more audible with each step. He looked through the window and there she was. Sitting by the piano, her sleek black hair fell over her shoulder covering most of her face but he could still make out the contour of her nose and chin and as she moved slightly, he could see the thick lashes of her closed eyes. Her long delicate fingers swayed across the keys and produced the most beautiful piece he had ever heard. He saw her face clearly after she tucked a lock behind her ear. He was certain he hadn’t seen the girl before but somewhere, at the back of his mind, he felt like he had. Somewhere outside school maybe, he couldn’t put a finger on it but the girl definitely looked familiar to him in some deranged way. He wondered what a girl like her was doing all alone inside an empty class room at this hour. He would’ve asked, but he might come off as creepy, besides it’s only natural for her to ask him the same question and he didn’t want a girl to know that he was sweeping floors as detention. He tried telling their coach that he had nothing to do with the prank and he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time surrounded by the wrong people which in his case were his idiot friends who were laughing hysterically at their doing. His only mistake was laughing along and not noticing the short fuming figure approaching them in time to run away. He had cursed his friends a lot while scrubbing the shoe prints off the linoleum but as he saw the anonymous girl in front of him play, he mentally thanked his coach for giving him detention or he may never have the opportunity to witness such a mesmerizing piece. Judging from the scribbled notes on the sheets he figured that the girl might have written this herself. He noticed how the song picked up pace before the chorus and drops back after it, how it goes soft at the bridge and then jumps back to the chorus. The song held a lot of feelings, he could tell, there was so much sorrow and sadness in it that it made him wonder what exactly the girl had been through to come up with such a mature and heart breaking piece. And that’s when he knew that he needed to hear more of it and that he had to learn the name that graces the petite figure in front of him, for he had never heard a melody so beautiful.

The first time she saw him up close was when she decided take a walk around the school garden. Her teacher had dismissed the class early and what better way to kill time other than walking alone accompanied by birds and flowers? The usually busy garden was deserted since the other classes were still in progress and so she enveloped herself in the beauty of nature before the demon of her mind came back to haunt her. And then she felt another presence. A presence different form the chirping birds and swaying flowers. She could hear the strumming of a guitar coming from somewhere nearby. She turned towards the sound and saw a figure sitting cross legged on the bench with closed eyes and a guitar resting on his lap. She was surprised to see someone other than herself in the almost empty area. Normally she’d walk away. Pretend the other doesn’t exist. But this time, she couldn’t move. The tune entering her ears was so sweet that she couldn’t bear to lose the sound of it. So rather than walking away, she unexpectedly found herself walking closer. She stopped near the bench but far enough so the boy couldn’t see her and listened. She couldn’t recognize the tune so she assumed it was the boy’s own composition. While listening, she took a look at the guitarist himself. His sharp nose and deep dimples were what stood out the most in his appearance and when she saw his light brown hair she knew they matched with his eyes. She knew who he was; in fact every girl in school knew who he was. He and his boisterous group of friends were popular all over school, mainly because they were all captains of their respective clubs. The melody stopped and she snapped out of her daze that she didn’t know she was in and inhaled a sharp breath when she was the boy stretch and yawn. Taking careful steps she walked backwards. She didn’t want to come off as a stalker because she wasn’t one to begin with. She increased her pace as she got further from the spot and stopped next to wall as she steadied her breathing after her little run. She knew shouldn’t have done that. What was she thinking listening to the boy play? She spent months avoiding people, being indifferent towards them hence gaining her the title of an introvert which she was satisfied with. She wanted to hear more of that piece but she couldn’t, not without risking exposure. So she decided to pretend that it never happened, that she never heard the boy play and that she never wished to hear it again.