Megan

There are seven billion something people on planet Earth right now. Seven billion separate people tethered by an invisible force to a burning sphere hurtling at millions of
miles an hour through a vast and unthinkably large unknown.
We are a seven million strong people, each one of us bleeding air and breathing red. We were all born to a mother and a father, we all will live and stand firm on our common soil, and eventually, we all will die.

Out of those seven billion people, she was the most beautiful.

She was the prettiest girl I had ever laid my partial and judgmental human eyes upon. Seeing her was like being nailed in the chest by a sledgehammer. Throughout our entire written and spoken language, no word could ever do justice to the sheer, untainted beauty that she possessed. Her eyes were like round window into infinity, each retina a
portrait of star collisions and each pupil a magnificent supernova. She was so entirely and completely beautiful that every bit of my body went dumb while I was around her. My heart was like a runaway engine, the out of control powerhouse thundering and shaking my entire being. I was dumbfounded. Each word she spoke was like a separate symphony unique upon itself, serenading a brilliant and triumphant melody to my ever-eager ears. My insides melted when I laid eyes upon her. In the raw definition of beauty and wonder, she was the most pure example of every positive description a boy could muster up the courage to name a girl with.

I knew that there could never be anything between us. She was but one girl out of billions, living out her own life, our paths accidentally intersecting by the dice rolls of fate. Her and I were separated by a thousand miles of invisible boundary, a series of numbers and distances clumsily given to things that we cannot describe by haphazard scholars. She was a gorgeous an breathtaking princess from Atlanta, and I was just another goofy and awkward Seattle boy. I had no idea what to say to her, much less begin to touch upon the depth of the feelings that I held for her. And deep in my heart, I knew that these emotions would never manifest themselves in any form other than the wandering and hopeless dreams of a teenage boy.

It didn't have to be that way. Maybe I could muster up the courage to choke out a couple of decent words to her. Maybe if I was lucky, she would take pity on me and acknowledge my attempt at conversation, or at least be kind enough to grace me with a reply. And perhaps if I was extraordinarily lucky, this awkward exchange of shy "hello"'s an nervous smiles might flourish into a friendship. Perhaps her and I might grow close, and I could keep in touch with her by crating letters to my dreamy princess in a faraway land. And perhaps, if I was fortunate beyond words, her and I might one day stand hand-in-hand together at a church altar in front of our entire collective family as we are read words that would forever bind us together and unite us in the spellbinding love that I had only dreamt was real, and I would gaze into the breathtaking pyrotechnics display that she held in her eyes and she would blink back tears of joy as she realized that out of those seven billion people on planet Earth, she had finally found the one for her.

None of this is real.

Life can be a brutal and cold place, and the split second that you embrace something dear to you and realize that you do indeed want it in your life, that thing is ripped away from you and lost to to the endless expanse of untold miles and plethoras of people. That person that you had once felt such a deep and wholesome connection with can be torn away from you in an instant, and what was once a friend becomes just another face in the crowd. The odds are never in our favor. We live in a complex jigsaw puzzle of warped emotion and rigid rules imposed upon us by those who do not understand. Everything you want can be gained instantaneously, but everything you have can be ripped away as well.

In some deep psychological way, this rambling on of emotional words somehow quells the bitterness that ever eats at me knowing that I may never see her again. Time was running out, but how does one explain to an almost complete stranger that you are in love with them? Her and I were separated by this awkwardness between us, our interactions being small talk and shy laughter at best. She was captivating. I had known her for not even a week, but it felt like she was an old friend. Being around her entirely melted away all feelings of doubt that festered in my heart when she was away. But I had no words to describe to her what I felt, nor the courage to approach her and speak the truth. Nothing in the world meant more to me than being with her.

What really was keeping us apart was my own personal unwillingness and furthermore, altogether lack of bravery to fess up to her what I felt. I was unwilling to risk what delicate friendship that was balancing between us, but time was running out. If I did not act, she would be gone like that, and I would never see her again. My current lifestyle satisfies me fully, but could I really live on knowing that I had passed up possibly the greatest blessing to ever grace my life?

Bill Watterson once said "If you can get away from people, you are lucky. If you find someone that you can stand, you are very lucky. And if that person can also stand you, than you are lucky enough". There is no doubt in my heart that I would be content to spend the rest of my existence with this girl. If I ever was going to find someone that I could actually tolerate unconditionally, it would have to be her. You only do live once, and some chances are worth taking. This was one of them. I could not just stumble upon the girl of my dreams and just let her go. I had to act.

Seven billion people covering planet Earth. Each one of us with our own life, our own personality, and our own dreams. We are mixed together through mass media and public interaction, conversing with each other and moving on, but too often, the greatest of friends often stay strangers until too late. Our dreams are only made reality though action, and the time for action was now. Out of the seven billion people on our planet, she was the most profoundly beautiful and elegant girl I had ever had the privilege to come across. Looking at her fed my mind an image too beautiful to process, and my body went into a catastrophic self-destruct sequence as my brain went haywire with adoration for her. This girl knows who she is, and by confessing this in full view and judgement of the public eye, maybe I could inspire someone to act and make their dreams a reality as well, and in doing so, one out of those seven billion people on Earth is that much happier.