Eyes on You

Chapter Seven: The Orbit

Chapter Four: The Orbit

It is funny how one person can completely rewire your internal clock.

By the third week of September, my morning routine had entirely changed. I used to drag myself out of bed, throw on my school uniform with my eyes half-closed, and sleepwalk through breakfast. Now, my alarm would go off and a jolt of nervous, electric energy would instantly hit my chest.

I started spending an extra ten minutes in front of the mirror every morning. I would meticulously brush out my hair, make sure my collar was perfectly crisp, and check my reflection from three different angles. I told myself I just wanted to look neat for school, but I knew exactly who I was getting ready for. I was dressing up for third-period French.

The first two periods of the day—Math and Science—suddenly felt like nothing more than waiting rooms. I would sit at my desk, tapping my pen against my knee, watching the second hand on the wall clock tick at an agonizingly slow pace.

But the moment the bell rang and I crossed the threshold into the French classroom, my entire nervous system switched on. I would take my seat next to Aarna, pull out my notebooks, and wait for the rhythm to start.

Over the next few weeks, that single, accidental glance turned into a dangerous, intoxicating little game.

It was always the same. The teacher would turn to the whiteboard, the classroom would dissolve into a low hum of whispers, and he would shift in his chair. He would lean back, turn his head over his right shoulder, and look back toward my row. And every single time, I would be waiting for it. My heart would do that familiar, violent flip. I would quickly look down at my open textbook, pretending I was deeply engrossed in French grammar, before stealing a look back at him through my eyelashes.

It felt like we were having an entire, silent conversation over the heads of our classmates. I was entirely convinced it was our own secret language, completely hidden in plain sight.

The hardest part was sitting right next to Aarna while my brain was completely short-circuiting. There were times she would be leaning over, whispering a joke to me or complaining about how much homework we had, right as he turned around. I would have to force myself to nod, laugh at the right moments, and keep my voice perfectly steady, praying she couldn't see the dark flush creeping up my neck. Keeping the secret from her made the whole thing feel even more heavy and thrilling. I felt like I was living a double life.

I was perfectly content to stay in my safe little orbit, watching him from two rows back, mapping out the exact shape of his shoulders and the way he ran a hand through his hair when he was bored.

But then came the Tuesday of the worksheets.

The teacher had printed out a thick stack of grammar exercises. Instead of passing them back down the rows herself like she normally did, she handed the heavy stack to him. "Distribute these, please," she instructed him.

He pushed his chair back and stood up.

My breath instantly caught in my throat. Watching him from a safe distance was one thing, but as he started walking down the aisle, closing the physical space between us, my brain completely flatlined. I watched him hand a paper to the girl in the first row. She took it casually, without even looking up, completely oblivious to the fact that she was interacting with the center of my universe.

He moved to the second row. He was getting closer. I desperately stared at my blank desk, suddenly hyper-aware of where my hands were placed, how straight I was sitting, and how loudly I was breathing.

Then, his shoes stopped right next to my desk.

I slowly looked up. He was standing so close I could see the faint shadow of his eyelashes and the slightly messy way his uniform tie was knotted. He smelled faintly of clean laundry and something like rain. The classroom noise faded entirely into a dull, white static.

He peeled two worksheets off the top of the stack and held them out toward me. I reached up to take them, my fingers trembling slightly. As I pulled the paper toward me, the edge slipped, and for a fraction of a second, the side of his index finger brushed lightly against mine.

A literal electric shock shot up my arm.

"Here," he mumbled. His voice was low, slightly raspy, almost drowned out by the chatter of the room.

"Thanks," I managed to whisper back. My voice sounded thin, breathless, and entirely foreign to my own ears.

He held my gaze for one more fleeting second—a second that felt like a tiny eternity—before turning on his heel and moving to the next desk.

I stared down at the black-and-white grammar worksheet, my hand actually shaking where it rested on my thigh. I couldn't focus on a single word on the page. I didn't hear a single thing the teacher said for the rest of the period. For the next week, I played the sound of him saying "Here" on an endless loop in my head, overanalyzing the exact temperature of his skin where our fingers had collided.

I was so deeply caught in the fantasy, soaring so incredibly high.