The First Meeting by Anonymous

Sierra

I’ve never spoken to him, only admired from afar. He’s never seen me as clearly as I see him. He thinks we haven’t written ourselves into each other’s stories, but I say we have. 

A doorknob could be touched 10 seconds after him, one desk could be sat on by two different people, two hands could be turning up the radio at the same time, unaware of the other. Everything done by him, I could have done too, with our paths winding into each other’s secretly. I like to think about that, how the world isn’t so big and how everyone’s connected by something, even if they don’t know it. He goes to that library across the way. Have we ever brushed our fingers against the same covers or turned the pages of the same books? I’d like to think so. Gone to the same store and pushed past a shirt on the rack I hated that he loved? Maybe so. 

I don’t know what really drew me into him. He’s part of the “socially acceptable” boys who play basketball and football and really only date girls with high popularity. I guess it was his kindness. Different from them, he’s a good guy, tutoring students, helping out with projects and volunteering at shelters, none of which any of his friends could ever dream of doing. I really admire how much he does and how much he actually cares. 

—

Finn

One may say that the first time you pass someone through a crowd, you’re strangers, but what if it’s just not the right time for you to meet? Could an even bigger event come and cause you to crash together? I look across the classroom and hope to meet her eyes as usual, then remember she isn’t here today. She likes that art museum a block from the school, could she be there later? She travels by bus after bus. Imagine if we’ve ever been on that same bus even before school started. With one of us in front and one of us in back, headphones in and eyes down, we never would have known. Like she’d ever talk to me, though. She hangs out alone most of the time. I haven’t really seen her with others. She’s one of the few girls I see who wander on their own by choice, as if she likes the quiet more. That’s a hard thing to find here. 

Would she even want to talk to me if I said hi, though? Maybe all we need is a slight push, a force from the universe, something that would move us together and start the story. If only something like that were to happen.

—

One long school hallway with two on opposite ends. Along one side comes a young girl running with textbooks and along the other walks a young boy looking down at his phone. Two different and parallel lives that aren’t yet connected to the other. They meet with a crash and it’s a mixture of “sorry's" and “are you ok?” till they look up. There’s a long silence between them. One heartbeat… two heartbeats… three… then,

“Hi, I’m Finn.”