I didn't expect anything extraordinary the day I first saw him.
It was a regular afternoon in July 2024 — the kind of day that would've slipped by unnoticed, if not for him.
The office hummed with the usual background noise: the click of keyboards, hushed conversations tucked into corners. And then there he was — across the room, half-hidden behind glowing computer monitors.
For a moment, everything slowed.
Through a narrow gap between the screens, I saw his face — tilted slightly upward, searching for something unseen.
But it wasn't what he was looking for that caught me. It was his eyes.
Dark, quiet, unknowingly beautiful.
They held a kind of stillness I didn't know I had been looking for.
Something in me softened. A quiet admiration stirred — nothing loud or dramatic, just a simple warmth settling into my chest.
Beautiful, I thought, almost in awe.
At first, it was just that: a secret smile folded gently into the corner of my heart.
I told myself it was harmless — just a stranger with kind eyes.
But the days slipped by, and I found myself noticing more.
The way he laughed with his friends, head thrown back like he carried sunlight in his throat.
The easy way he moved — calm, unbothered, never demanding attention but always quietly radiant. And slowly, without meaning to, I began collecting these fragments.
I remember the first time our eyes met — a passing glance, a polite nod.
He probably doesn't remember. But I do. The world paused, just for a second, and let me wonder, "What would it be like to know him?"
I laughed at myself afterward. Silly. Hopeless. Dramatic.
But the heart rarely asks permission when it begins something.
Even something as small — and as fragile — as a wish.
Before I knew it, the little things began. The invisible goodbyes I waved when he wasn't looking.
The quiet detours I took to avoid walking too close.
The silly way I sent arrow hearts through the air, just for myself, knowing they'd never reach him.
The way my heart raced when our eyes accidentally met — and how I always, always looked away first.
It was silly. It was sweet. It was safe.
Because it stayed tucked in the spaces between glances and unsaid words.
A small, secret world I carried alone — where it was still okay to hope without consequence.
I didn't fall instantly. Not the way stories sometimes say.
No — it was more like a seed, quietly planting itself in a forgotten corner of my heart.
I barely noticed it at first. Just a subtle shifting, a gentle light.
Looking back now, I realize that sometimes the most important chapters of our lives begin so quietly, we don't even hear the page turn.