So This Is Love...?

Cassie is the girl who treats every mundane trip to the grocery store like the opening scene of a romantic comedy. She doesn't just "exist" in a space; she curates herself for a hypothetical audience, constantly wondering if the guy checking his watch in line next to her is the "one" she's been waiting for.
Cassie is a professional optimist with a heart that's been bruised but never broken. She's the one who still believes in soulmates, red strings of fate, and eye contact that stops time. While other people are checking their bank accounts, Cassie is checking her "vibe," making sure she looks approachable yet mysterious-the perfect protagonist for someone else's story.
Her struggle is that she over-engineers the organic.
She'll spend forty minutes picking out an outfit that looks "effortlessly tossed on" just to go to a bookstore.
She has a rotation of "deep" books she carries around, hoping someone will ask her about the metaphor on page 42.
She's the queen of the "accidental" run-in, memorizing the schedules of her crushes just so she can happen to be at the same coffee shop at 2:14 PM on a Tuesday.
Underneath the curated playlists and the vintage dresses, Cassie is exhausted. She's tired of being the only one holding the magnifying glass, looking for clues of affection in a "like" on a photo or a casual "hey" in the hallway. She wants to be found, but she's so busy building the trail of breadcrumbs that she forgets to just stand still and be herself.
She doesn't want a transaction; she wants a collision. But in a world that moves as fast as college, her "hopeless romantic" heart often feels like a dial-up modem trying to connect to a high-speed fiber-optic world.