Roses Stained Red

The Blinded Buffoon.

"Dude, are you blind? How can you not see it?"

"See what?"

"She's in love with you!"

The boy looked very confused. "Me? Really?"

His friend vigorously nodded. The boy scoffed and looked away in disbelief. Hsi friend sighed and rolled her eyes, very annoyed with this absolute idiot.

"She looks at you like you are the stars on a very clear night, or like you are her favorite clouds on the perfect, cloudy day.She talks about you like it's her job, like you are her passion. She wants nothing but happiness for you."

Now the boy was shocked. He didn't realize how much she cares. Yeah, she asks many questions, constantly says how proud she is of him, and compliments him a lot, but that's just how she is with friends. What detail did he miss that set the rest apart from that?

"You should see the way she describes you when she writes." The boy leaned in closer to his friend, struck with even more disbelief and a little bit of nostalgia. "Are you serious? Really?" He quietly asked. She nodded. "She still writes about me?" She nodded again, smiling widely. "Wow."

"So... what are you going to do?"

"I- I have no clue. I wasn't exactly expecting to hear anything like this today."

The boy's friend sighed dramatically and facepalmed, which earned an eyeroll from the boy. "Well, I'm sorry," he said sarcastically. "I just can't believe she still writes about me. How do you even know that?" 

"How do you not?"

"Wel, I didn't even know she still wrote."

"Writes." She corrected.

"What-? Whatever." He shook his head.

His friend chuckled. "Anyway, she writes about anything and everything. She says it takes her to another world, an escape land basically, to live however she wants and to witness all different kinds of beauty." She said, back on topic, amazement glimmered in her eyes just thinking about how this girl has the right words for everything.

"Hm..."

The boy's friend just stared at him. The boy looked behind himself then back at her. "What?"

"Is that all you have to say? 'Hm'?"

"What else am I supposed to say exactly?"

She scoffed. "How about "I need to find her, where is she?"?"

He squinted his eyes in confusion, but the blush rising to his cheeks says otherwise. "Why would I do that?"

His friend slapped him extremely hard on the arm. "You frickin' know why, you buffoon."

The boy immediately gripped where she slapped him, in pain. "Ow, okay, okay. Well, where is she then?"

"I think she's supposed to be getting out of class right now." The boy's friend said, looking around for the girl, just in case she could be wrong.

His eyes grew wide for a moment, and he quickly responded, "Yikes, alright."

They continued to stand around in awkward silence. Neither of them making a move. His friend looked at him, stressed and confused.

"So...?" She spoke up.

"What?"

She motioned her hands to the right, for him to leave. "What are you doing? Go!"

"Where?!" The boy stressed.

"To the class that she's leaving! You're bound to run into her! Go!"

"Okay, okay!"

The boy scurried off, partly because he realized the urgency of the moment and partly because he didn't want to get slapped for his stupidity again. He ran up the stairwell for once, opened the door, and sharply turned the corner; then he did, in fact, quite literally run into the girl.

"Sh—!" She quietly exclaimed as she cut herself off.

They collided like a glass platter and hard-wood floor. The girl's few books, pen, and pencil fell out of her arms. She immediately went to her knees and started picking up her things. The boy got to his knees and helped her. 

"I am so sorry!" They both, very genuinely, apologized at the same time. 

They stood up together. She sheepishly chuckled and looked down as he did the same. They looked back up at each other, and then the girl looked at her pencil that the boy was holding.His eyes followed hers. 

Sudden realization hit him.

"Right! Sorry, sorry. Here."

The boy stepped a little closer to hand back the pencil to the girl. She smiled and softly thanked him. He nodded as a way of saying 'you're welcome'.

"Uh, so," They both started. They both laughed.

"I'm sorry, you go first." The girl said, still slightly laughing. 

The boy chuckled and nodded. "I wanted to, uh," He paused, trying to think of what he's to say. The girl very curiously continued to stare at him. "Well, I just-" He cut himself off.No... that's not it. The boy huffed in frustration. The girl chuckled lightly at him, very amused and still very curious.

"Take your time." She joked.

That earned an eyeroll from him. "Just say the first words that form and go from there." The girl advised. He nodded, let out a breath, and looked her straight in the eyes.

"I like you."