Emma’s palms are sweaty, her throat is closing up and her breathing quickens as the clock ticks by. She’s so nervous… but no one can blame her, I mean, it’s her first day at NYU—who hasn’t panicked before entering the large building for the first time?
    She takes a deep breath and tries to calm herself down.
Don’t worry Emma, there’s absolutely nothing to be afraid of. This is what you wished for since you were a little girl. This is your dream. You can do this.
    She takes courage and walks into the imposing building. She stands still and scans the whole room, taking in the walls covered with posters and the students with their heavy backpacks rushing to class to make it on time. She smiles a radiant smile. She’s happy. She finally made it; she made her dream come true. She can definitely do this.
She walks towards her classroom—although she has no idea where that is—and bumps into some guy. Her books drop to the floor and she frowns and apologizes to the guy while bending over to pick them up. Emma stands on her feet and looks up, her eyes meeting brown ones. The guy is staring at her intently, his lips are parted and his eyes wide open. He’s clearly surprised, just the same way Emma is.
She’s stunned by his presence. She didn’t expect to see him here. God, she didn’t expect to see him ever again! What is Henry doing here? She thought he would stay in Miami and study there. She hasn’t even considered the possibility of him studying at the same college as her, but seems like fate had other plans.
They both keep staring at each other, speechless. And it’s clear that in this very hallway memories abound, though words lack. But what can they possibly say? They haven't seen each other for three years now and they have kind of a… history together, so what can you say to a person with whom you have been through so much, yet so little?
They feel like strangers, they feel as if they were miles apart, though what they don’t know is that they’re both reviving the same unhappy memory: the day Henry left Chicago and moved to Miami. They both were heartbroken, but he hid it very well while a fifteen-year-old Emma was crying loudly at the airport and drawing the attention of many people. Now that she thinks of it, she claims to be ashamed of herself, yet at the moment didn’t even care. The only thing that mattered to her three years ago was that the boy she loved was slipping away from her. He, on the other hand, remained expressionless, hiding his feelings so well that it almost seemed as if he didn’t care, but the truth is, he did. Emma left the airport thinking it was pointless to care for a boy who hasn’t shed a tear for her, but what she doesn’t know is that as soon as Henry got on the plane, he started to weep like a two-year-old boy who misses his mommy.
Henry and Emma thought they already have moved on and forgotten about the day they went separate ways, but thinking about the last time they saw each other proves them wrong and puts them in a melancholy mood.
Their minds keep going back to the past and they realized that not every moment they shared was an awful one. They recollect the moment they said I like you for the first time, oblivious to whatever the future held for their fresh relationship, which was… nothing, actually. They were very young when they started to feel an obvious attraction for each other, so their love only remained in a simple ‘I like you. I like you too’ and that was it. The caresses, the kisses and the hugs were missing but, at the time they confessed their love, they were only twelve-year-old kids and were ashamed to even talk to each other face-to-face, so nothing could have possibly happened. At this very moment, those memories arouse a feeling of nostalgia to both of them and weak smiles spread over their faces.
So much has changed since the first I like you… now they’re both adults about to start college, so clearly they’re not the same and not even the love they once felt is known to be the same after Henry moved to Miami. At least that's what they thought, because right now, being this close to each other again, they can't help but feel something. Something deep and overwhelming. They don't know exactly what it is or why they are feeling this, but I could guess it's the love that has been behind bars these many years and that wasn’t allowed to get out and be free. I would dare to say that what they both feel is the need to finish something unfinished. To begin what never began. To do what they couldn’t do. To satisfy a strong desire they both have had since that first I like you.
“Hey,” he says, smiling shyly.
“Hi,” she replies, looking down, away from his intense gaze.
And it all started just like that. A simple hey, sometimes it’s all you need to start a relationship. It’s all Emma and Henry needed, because—as much as they want to argue with me on this—their love never faded away, it’s always been there: locked in their hearts, waiting for them to bring the key and set it free.
And remember, sometimes life can go on and completely separate two people, but when the love they both feel is too great to avoid, fate takes care of putting them back together, just the way it should be.