Now or Never

It was now or never, she thought. Before she could have second thoughts, she ran up to the boy gang.

"Hey, Sam!"

He turned around, now facing towards her. Her stomach doing somersaults she quietly examined him from head to toe as he said to his friends softly, "I will catch up with you guys later." as they caught a look of the girl behind them and continued walking. He looked dashing in his wheat coloured formal dress pants and thistle coloured button-down shirt with a blue cap on his head protecting him from the direct exposure of the sun.

"How are you?" he asked politely.

"I'm good, I uhhh. I'm sorry for interrupting while you were with your friends, it is just that I wanted to talk to you," she said reluctantly almost in a whisper scared of how the conversation was going to go.

"Of course, what's up?"

"ARE YOU GONNA PARTICIPATE IN THE UPCOMING TALENT SHOW?" She blurted out loudly.

"Uh What?!" he laughed looking puzzled at what was happening. "Is this why she stopped me?" He thought to himself confused.

"The talent show! Auditions are next week, you should participate! You should sing!" she said cheerfully. "What the hell am I doing?! He is gonna think I'm crazy!" She thought to herself.

"Ha-ha! I'm a horrible singer but maybe next year. Are you singing?" he asked smiling shyly.

"ME!? In front of people? Not in this life!" She laughed.

It was obvious he knew this wasn't the reason she had stopped to have a chat with him, but he was interested to hear what the mystery girl had in mind.

"Would you like to walk with me to the library?" he said courteously pointing over the library building at a distance.

Ashley nodded as she accepted his offer, and stepped forward as the two started walking.

"So dentistry huh?" He asked sweetly trying to understand the girl beside him.

"Yeah, my lower teeth are a little crowded, probably my future kids are gonna have slightly crowded teeth too so I decided why not become a dentist and fix em up myself. Besides, dental treatments are so expensive." She joked. "Oh my God, I'm babbling!! I have to stop it! Now!!" she thought.

"So, you don't like medicine?" he asked curiously.

"I do! But my older brother already is a medical doctor so why not bring variety to the family?" She joked again. She could sense her stomach flipping. "It's useless!" She thought to herself. "I'm only gonna make things worse if I speak another word! Better let him go before he starts to question my sanity!"

To her surprise, he seemed amused by her straightforwardness as he chuckled softly and stopped walking.

The blazing midday sun was shining relentlessly on them as they stood under the sun, face to face, not moving just staring directly into each other's eyes. This was the first time Ashley was looking into his eyes from such a small distance. His dazzling light brown eyes had small flecks of gold in them, scattered throughout around the pupil resembling the sun as it stretches out its golden arms after a rainy day or maybe a glass jar of pure honey gleaming when hit by the sunlight. "His eyes alone were enough to make any girl fall in love with him." She thought to herself.

"Come, let's talk under the shade?" his voice interrupted her thoughts as he pointed towards a tree nearby. "You're gonna get all tanned here under the sun."

She looked at him compassionately, "Does he really care about me this much or is he this sweet with everyone?"

"Actually I think I'm gonna take off now, find my friends," she said nervously as she changed her mind about complimenting him.

"Wasn't there something you wanted to talk about?" he asked curiously

"No this was it." she smiled awkwardly

"Oh okay, I'll see you around then!" he said softly

Just as he turned around, something inside her told her she had to seize the opportunity of him being alone with her and she had to do it right.

"Sam listen!"

He turned back to her once again, "Yeah?"

His warm brown eyes looking straight into hers once again, luring her in.

"I...I uhhh. I wanted to say that..." She mumbled as she choked on her words, with her tongue-tied, words trapped in her throat.

She looked down at her feet trying to distract herself from his eyes on her and the words finally managed to escape her lips. "Your shirt... It looks nice. It suits you. You don't usually wear formal shirts like these." She said in a whisper but loud enough for him to understand her clearly.

She didn't get any response in return. With her anxious heart wondering what was wrong, her chest tightened, her body tensed up, she felt like she would faint. After what felt like an eternity she finally forced herself to look up only to get awestruck by the most beautiful smile her eyes had ever landed on, a smile that caused all her anxieties to melt away in a split second, captivating her heart, a smile so bright and pure it could put sunflowers to shame as she finally heard him say, "I will try to wear them more often." He said softly and then adding excitedly, "Hey! Do you wanna meet my friends?"

"I'm sorry, not today, I have to go!" Her heart skipped a beat and she turned around immediately, facing the gym as she hurried back to it, not knowing how to react. Not only had she managed to throw a compliment at him but she also received the sweetest response from him. "He wanted me to meet his friends!" She thought happily but she couldn't possibly meet them today, it was too overwhelming for one day. When she reached the gymnasium door she finally turned around to see if he was still in sight but he had already vanished.

"Maybe he had run off to tell his friends about this!" She smiled "The same way, I am gonna tell Roxanne and Anna about him." She thought.