Girl in the shadows

If I were a color, I’d be beige. Not black or white... too bold. Not red or pink... too noticeable. Beige. Safe. Forgettable. That’s what I tell myself as I sit in the farthest corner of Room 3B, pretending to take notes while my eyes betray me, drifting again. Always drifting. To him. Remiel. Even his name feels like sunlight. He’s sitting three rows ahead of me, leaning casually back in his chair, talking to someone with that easy kind of charisma that makes people want to listen. He’s smiling at something the math teacher said like anyone ever laughs in math class. His hair falls into his eyes in that annoyingly perfect way, and when he runs his fingers through it absentmindedly, I swear my stomach drops. I hate that I notice these things. Hate that I’ve memorized the way his left dimple appears when he laughs too hard, or how he taps his pencil against his notebook when he’s thinking. I hate that I can’t just look at him and see a person. I see… everything. And the worst part? He doesn’t even know I exist. “Melle!” I jump, nearly knocking my pen to the floor, as Xena plops down into the empty desk beside mine. Her perfume hits before her voice does, a sweet, bold scent that lingers like her presence. Xena doesn’t walk into rooms. She storms them. “You’re staring again,” she says, smirking as she follows my gaze. “I wasn’t,” I blurt out too quickly, too defensively. She arches an eyebrow. “Please. You’ve been crushing on Remiel since, like, the first day of school. I don’t know why you don’t just talk to him.” “Because…” My voice trails off as I lower my eyes to my notebook, pretending to be busy scribbling down notes. “He wouldn’t notice me.” Xena bumps my shoulder playfully. “You’d be surprised.” But she’s wrong. People like Remiel don’t notice girls like me. They notice girls like Xena that are bright, loud, the center of every room. Not the one hiding in the corner, blending into the beige walls. The bell rings, and Xena tugs my arm, pulling me out of my seat. “Come on. Lunch. My treat if you promise to at least smile once today.” *** *** *** *** *** *** *** I let her drag me through the hallway as she rambles on about her cousin’s disastrous date with a guy who apparently thought ‘Netflix and chill’ meant actual Netflix and actual chilling. I nod and laugh at the right moments, but I’m not fully listening. My mind is still stuck on him. And that’s when it happens. “Hey, Melle.” It takes me a full three seconds to process that someone said my name. His voice. I blink. And there he is. Remiel. Talking to me. For one horrifying moment, I’m convinced I misheard. Or worse that he meant to talk to someone else. But then his gaze locks on mine, warm and easy, and I forget how to breathe. “Uh… hi?” My voice sounds like I swallowed a frog. He chuckles a low, warm sound that makes my heart slam against my ribs. “You dropped this.” He holds out my pen, the one I didn’t even realize had slipped from my grip. “Oh. Thanks.” I take it, my fingers brushing his. Sparks. I swear, actual sparks. “No problem.” He gives me a quick smile before walking away, joining his friends without a second glance. My knees feel like someone replaced them with jelly. “Melle,” Xena hisses, elbowing me hard enough to nearly knock me over, “you’re literally red. You’re welcome.” “For what?” I mutter, trying and failing to steady my breathing. “For manifesting your meet-cute. Seriously, that was some movie-level stuff.” I roll my eyes, but I can’t fight the stupid grin tugging at my lips. *** *** *** **** Lunch is the usual chaos: crowded tables, loud laughter, and the faint smell of overcooked fries. Xena chatters about something I don’t catch, and I nod along automatically, replaying that single moment in my head. He said my name. He knew my name. When did he learn it? Has he noticed me before? Stop. Don’t read into it, I scold myself. It was a pen. A tiny, insignificant thing. But still. “Melle.” I snap out of my thoughts to find Xena studying me with narrowed eyes. “You’re somewhere else. Spill.” I shrug. “It’s nothing.” She smirks knowingly. “It’s Remiel, isn’t it? You’ve got that dreamy look.” “I don’t have a look.” “You do. It’s your I’m-trying-not-to-smile-but-failing face.” I throw a fry at her. She dodges, laughing. “Listen,” she says, leaning closer, “you overthink everything. You want something? Go for it. Or at least talk to him. What’s the worst that could happen?” I want to tell her the worst that could happen is him realizing I like him and laughing about it with his friends. Or worse... pitying me. But instead, I just shake my head. “You wouldn’t understand.” Xena shrugs like it’s no big deal, already moving on to the next topic. But my heart is still somewhere back in the hallway, where he said my name like it wasn’t strange to know it. Maybe just maybe I’m not as invisible as I thought.