It happened in the examination hall during the Class 8 exams—a time when tension hung in the air like fog, thick with the weight of silence and stress.
The school had just reopened after the long COVID break. Masks were still in use, desks were spaced out, and everyone looked slightly unfamiliar, like strangers relearning how to be students again. The buzz of the old routine hadn't returned yet; it was as if school life was holding its breath, waiting for someone to press play again.
She sat in the second row, her heart racing, her pencil box organized with shaky fingers. The faint sound of pages flipping and invigilators' footsteps echoed like thunder in her ears. Her mask fogged up her glasses, but she didn't dare lower it. Math had always been her weakest subject, and the exam paper felt like a wall she didn't know how to climb.
Equations blurred before her eyes. She chewed her pencil. Her mind kept blanking, panic rising like heat under her skin.
But for a moment, her mind drifted from the question paper.
That's when he walked in.
Tall, calm, and slightly late, he entered the exam hall like he didn't mind the stares. His shoes echoed softly on the floor, his steps unhurried. His black jacket clung to him as if it belonged there—half-zipped, revealing a dark T-shirt beneath. His glasses sat perfectly on his nose, giving him a serious, focused look.
But it was his face that caught her: the way his messy hair fell across his forehead, the sharpness of his jawline, the shape of his lips, and the slight puffiness around his eyes, as if he hadn't slept enough. There was something about his presence—like he had stepped out of another world into hers.
Their eyes met—for a second. Maybe two. Long enough to make her look away quickly.
She turned back to her exam paper, pretending to read the next question, but her mind was blank. She could no longer remember what she had just read.
Her heart had picked up speed—not from anxiety about the test, but because of him. It thumped against her ribs like a drumroll, unsure what was coming next.
From the corner of her eye, she saw him take his seat at the back, far behind her. He didn't talk. Didn't fidget. Just sat, adjusting his sleeves slowly, taking out a black pen, and settling in. Like he belonged there. Like he owned the moment.
The sunlight from the window fell across his desk, catching the veins on his hands, making them look even more defined. His fingers were long, elegant. She watched the way he clicked his pen once before lowering his head over the paper.
She couldn't help herself.
She looked back—once, then again. Each time pretending to stretch her neck or glance at the clock. But it was him she was watching. The way he rested his head on his hand. The way he sat like the exam didn't matter. Like everything around him was just background noise.
She noticed everything: his fingers tapping lightly, his quiet focus, the way his eyes scanned the room once, landing on her for just a breath before moving on.
Her heart stopped. He saw her. She froze in her seat. "What if he thinks I'm staring? What if he thinks I'm weird?" she thought, a flush rising to her cheeks. She tried to act normal, but inside, it was chaos. Her pencil slipped from her fingers, landing on the floor with a soft clink. Her hands trembled as she picked it up.
And still, she kept looking. His presence felt oddly comforting. It wasn't love—no, not yet. It was curiosity. Admiration. Fascination. A kind of quiet magnetism she couldn't explain.
She admired him silently—the boy who didn't know her name, who hadn't spoken a single word, who might never even glance her way again. But something about him had etched itself into her mind.
Minutes passed. The invigilator moved from one row to the next. She forced herself to attempt the next question. But the numbers looked like foreign symbols.
In her head, a story began to write itself.
"He probably likes literature," she thought randomly. "Or maybe he's good at drawing. Maybe he sketches during classes."
It was a silly thought, but it made her smile faintly under the mask. Her hands moved again. She started writing—not with confidence, but with a strange determination that came from somewhere deep inside.
She didn't know why, but she wanted to do well. Maybe just to impress someone who didn't even know her name.
The bell rang. Pens dropped. Papers shuffled. Chairs scraped against the floor. The air shifted with collective relief and exhaustion.
She stayed seated for a second longer, gathering herself. Her heart still hadn't calmed.
As she stood up and packed her things, she dared to look toward the back bench.
He was still there, head bowed, adjusting the pages of his answer sheet before standing. When he finally looked up, she found herself looking away quickly, pretending to zip her pencil pouch.
They exited the room at the same time but through different rows. He walked ahead, quietly. She walked a little slower, watching his back from a distance, memorizing his gait, the way his hoodie creased at the elbows.
She didn't tell anyone.
Not even Ruqayyah, who hadn't come into her life at that time. Back then, she had no one to whisper about crushes or first glances. Her heart held the secret like a fragile paper flower pressed between the pages of an unread book.
But even as she walked out of the exam hall that day, she carried him with her—not his name, not his voice, but the feeling.
That one glimpse. That one heartbeat.
And days later, when she sat in class again, she found herself looking toward the door every time it creaked open, half-hoping it would be him. She never admitted it to herself, but deep down, she was waiting.
She began watching the back row more often. Not obviously—never obviously. But in stolen glances and soft shifts in posture. Some days he wasn't there. Some days he was.
And when he was, her whole day changed.
She would draw tiny hearts in the corners of her rough copy. Or write a line that sounded poetic, then cross it out immediately. Everything felt cinematic. Even silence.
She began writing about him in her diary, not naming him, but describing moments—the way he looked, how he spoke (or didn't), what she felt. It became her refuge, a way to hold onto something that felt too delicate for the real world.
And though nothing more happened that day, she carried it with her like a treasure. Because now, he was no longer just the boy from the exam hall.
He was the boy who changed everything.
And sometimes, the smallest stories are the ones that stay the longest.