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You were infatuated with Brendan from the moment you laid eyes on him in freshman English class.
Throughout the year, you would obverse him—the way he talked to people, his little quirks, how he talked about his friends and hockey, how his whole personality could light up an entire room, and how much you loved that.
The thing was he never noticed the girl who knew everything about him. He knew of you, you were a smart student, you were called on frequently and always answered the perfect answer. Every time you spoke, his eyes widened at the use of your complicated words, he made eye contact with his friend asking 'we're in the same grade as this girl?' After that, he never thought of you again.
Until the midterm paper, he was struggling, he had no clue why a mentally ill woman in the 20s would write herself as wallpaper. He hated English in that way, he couldn't read people's minds! How the fuck was he supposed to do this?!
He was prepared to fail the essay until he remembered the girl that knew all.
Brendan separated from his friends when he spotted you in the lunch hall. You were sitting in a chair near the back of the cafeteria, both AirPods in, a book in your hand, and eating at the same time. He could hear the music coming from your AirPods and wondered how you could focus on so many things at one time. He could see your eyes moving left to right of the page at a rapid pace, he thought you were some kind of super human if you could read that fast.
He awkwardly stood in front of you waiting for you to notice him. He cleared his throat and slightly kicked your chair, trying to catch your attention. You jolted out of the focus of your book and angrily looked up at the person who bothered you.
You almost fell out of your chair when you saw Brendan looking at you with a smile. You slowly took out both of your AirPods, not knowing what he wanted.
"Hi!" He greeted you.
"Hi," You said awkwardly. "Can I help you?"
"Oh yeah," He rubbed the back of his neck. "I need help in English."
You looked around him, checking to see if he was pranking you. "Okay?" You say, not knowing why he told you.
His lips thinned, "Can you help me?" He asked.
"Oh!" You exclaimed, feeling stupid for not getting what he was saying. "With what?"
"The Midterm paper, I really don't know what I am doing with it," He laughs awkwardly.
You thought about your answer before you said anything. You had already finished it it was quite easy, but you didn't want him to feel dumb. You had to study for your midterms coming up, but you've been studying already for months. You looked up at him, his desperate demeanor, you knew he had to pass this class to stay on the hockey team. You shrugged, "Yeah, I guess."
His shoulders relaxed and he put his hand on his chest in relief. "Thank you so much!" He says. "Can I write down my phone number for you?" He gestured to the sticky notes you were using to annotate your book. You nod and he writes down his number.
"Thank you so much! Text me whenever please!" He gushed.
Your cheeks tinted red as he thanked you profusely. You didn't see the big deal, you helped people all the time. You shrugged again acting nonchalant, "It's fine. I like helping people," You smiled.
He smiled back at you, "Still thank you," He said then glanced over to where was sitting and noticed all of the boys looking at him. His cheeks lit up as they were all smirking at him. He turned back to you and his cheeks got redder as you noticed his friends too. "I've got to go thank you again! Text me anytime," He repeated stumbling away from you.
He practically ran back to his table and casually sat back down ignoring the stares from his teammates. They were all looking at his red cheeks and flustered composure with raised eyebrows. He still ignored them casually eating his food and avoiding all eye contact.
Beech was the first to talk, "She's in one of my classes, good one you chose."
Brendan sunk down into his chair as the guys started snickering at his smile.
"The wallpaper is a symbol for the narrator. She sees a woman in a cage in the wallpaper and that reflects on how her husband and society traps her into this space of doing nothing. The more she is driven into insanity, the more she is fixated on the wallpaper and releasing the women from inside. She sees herself in the wallpaper and tries to free herself by tearing it down, but her husband finds out she's going crazy and he hits her unconscious. Again symboling that she can't be free because of her husband and society's standards on women."
Brendan blankly stares at you while you rant about the story you guys were assigned to write about. When you finish, you laugh at his jaw-dropped wide-eyed face. "Sorry," You whisper. "Got a little carried away."
Brendan knocks himself out of his trance and shakes his head at your statement. "No, no, you're very smart, and I don't deserve to take up your brain time."
You snicker at his choice of wording. "Bren, don't say that you're smart too," You said softly.
He snorts, "At hockey, yes. At school, no," He frowned at his open laptop where he was supposed to be writing an 8-page paper.
You sighed sadly at the uncredited side of his brain. "School's not for everybody, not everybody has to be book smart to succeed in life. You've found your path and what you're amazing at, so being bad at school doesn't mean you're a failure." You said then pointedly looked at him. "Because you're not a failure and I bet that you're going to get an NHL contract in the next year. Then you never have to think about school again."
Brendan was speechless, literally speechless. You were so perfect, you always said the perfect thing, you knew everything about everything, you were everything good in the world. "You're amazing," He breathed.
Your cheeks tinted and you chuckled, "No, I'm not, but thank you B."
He shook his head at your dismissal. You never understood how great you were, but he would show you over time.
He would do anything for you, just to show his gratitude for everything you do. He brought you chocolates and flowers when you were sad. He comforted you when you got overwhelmed. He held you when you need it. He kissed you when you got along perfectly with his friends. He jumped around with you after the call from Vegas. He loved you when you moved to Las Vegas with him. He bought you a new book every week when you didn't know what to read. He brought you breakfast in bed on your anniversaries. He proposed to you when he thought he couldn't love you anymore. He loved you, even more, when he saw those two pink lines. He took the kids and dogs to play when you were overworked. He called you after every win because he couldn't imagine celebrating without you. And every day he smiled at you because you were the best thing that ever happened to him.
In the beginning, you fell first, but in the end, he fell a thousand times harder because you were everything good in his eyes. You were the reason for his very being—the reason he had a smile on his face, the reason he was stable, the reason he was happy. And he never forgot that.
