It was just another typical Advanced Literature class when she was back in the old classrooms with the sunlight flitting through the open windows. In all honesty, she was beyond exhausted but this was the last class of the entire tiring week and after this, Astrid was really looking forward to a long weekend.

The sun was beginning to set in the town and Astrid could not understand why on Earth she chose Advanced Literature. Sure, she loved Professor Mason with all her literature-loving heart but god knew that he had an awful sense of timing. Placing the advanced Literature class right at 5.00 PM on a Friday evening was one of the worst possible times that he could've ever conducted a class. She hadn't even gotten a break all day! She had been pretty occupied at the Committee reporting Session for the End of Year School journal and could not have made an escape before 4.35 PM.

Astrid was the first in class that evening. Her boots glided on the floors of the classroom and she quickly slammed her pile of books against her table and took a seat. The slamming of books echoed through the empty room but she did not have the energy to care for any of them. She was really tired. She hid her face in her hands and her once beautiful hair was now a perpetual wreck and fell over the sides of her face. After a few minutes of questioning what she was doing with her life, she gathered all the hair she had into a hastily made ponytail that was the worst sort of messy.

She proceeded to flip over her phone to see eight unread texts, all addressed by one person. Ryan Stelberg, the devil himself. To answer or not was a question.

It seemed as though her question had been voiced aloud by another sitting beside Astrid, "You gonna answer that?"

She looked to her left with a startled look in her eye, when did this dude get inside the classroom? And how had she not noticed him yet?

He was a boy of her age and had a very peculiar shade of brown eyes. With messy raven curls and rectangular framed glasses, he wore clothes that did not fit him particularly well and was unnaturally pale for a person. A pencil was tucked behind his ear and he had a questioning look in his eyes.

She realised that he was still waiting for a response and placed her phone face down on the top of her pile of books instead, "No, I might as well leave my future self to deal with that."

She brought her hands to her face again as she rubbed her face with an exhausted sigh escaping her lips but she could feel his gaze on her the whole while, "What are you looking at?"

"Oh, it's nothing much," he replied absentmindedly as he bend over to reach for a book in his grey backpack, "You're just beautiful is all."

She looked at him with an amused smile on her face but her eyes quickly fell on his novel copy of 'Call me by your name' that was now on his table.

She smiled a huge grin, "You chose 'Call me By Your Name?'"

"Can't really blame me, can you?" he mirrored her smile, "Timothée is a fine actor and he made me fall in love with Elio as a character all over again. A splendid movie that did right justice to the book."

"Poetic," she mumbled back. "The only justifiable way to describe CMBYN would be that it is an extremely poetic and a book that- actually the way CMBYN was written can not be described in words. It was a very relatable reading experience even though I did not really go through with anything that was written or portrayed by the movie and the book. To be completely frank, the movie had so many things that were different from the book but oddly enough, it got the message through really nicely. I don't know if I prefer the movie to the books or not at this point."

"Wow, you seem to have more knowledge about my book and its detailed analysis than what I've prepared myself," he whispered breathelessly in a way she had never heard anyone use before. "What did you pick out?"

"All the bright places," she looked back at him after placing her book on the table, "Really recommended book, I sobbed like a kid at the end."

The kid opposite her was about to say something when the Professor interrupted him, "Caelum, Astrid, would you like to share what both have been discussing so intently?"

Astrid looked up to the old man who stood at the front of the classroom with a huge green file in his right hand as his left paused midway, searching for something in particular. His grey eyes looked exhausted and she wondered if he was really alright until she snapped to the realisation about his question, "We were- uh-"

"Discussing why the movie edition of CMBYN is better than the books," Caelum replied casually.

"Oh, is that what's been going on now?" the professor looked at Caelum with an odd expression that one might even think that he knew something they didn't but the boy was as cool as a cucumber and his expression didn't faltert, "Yeah, professor Mason, and I was just about to ask Astrid here about which book she had chosen for the report."

With a slightly more curious look on his face, he turned to look at Astrid while she held his gaze for a beat and then looked at the professor at the front of the classroom and responded, "All the Bright Places."

"So, what do you have to say about the book you were reading?" Professor Mason asked Astrid, "Would you like to come here and elaborate the main themes explored in the book?"

Astrid took in a shaky breath.

School, people, crowds. They made her nervous. Yes, she knew that she was among the most liked people in the school. She knew she was beautiful, she knew she was really good at what she did - being a beacon of attention, but when it came to school work and public presentation in front of a class where she couldn't really crack jokes to escape the heat? She was definitely nervous then.

She stood up, doing her best not to stutter as she started, "Well, the bo-book I chose today for the re-reading was All the Bright Places by- uh- Jennifer Niven."

Astrid looked at the professor, lifting her gaze from the tattered book she held in her hand, "I- uh- I very much liked this book, actually." She paused, gathering her thoughts she continued, "It was a really good read an- and an informative one. It was great."

She knew she was rambling when she saw Professor Mason raise a thick black brow and she dropped her gaze to her hands that gripped the edge of the desk tightly. "Sorry," she mumbled.

All her worries, however, melted away when she felt something warm gently trying to loosen her death grip on the edge of the wooden table. She looked down and saw the pale hand that belonged to the kind boy sitting next to her grasping her hand with a gentleness she hadn't seen a lot of times in her life before.

She looked at those warm brown eyes and the small absentminded smile on his face as he pretended not to look at her but at the professor in front of the class and after a really long time, she understood someone without the need of words. And he was telling her to relax that it would be alright.

She fluttered her eyes shut and taking his single hand in both of hers, she squeezed it once and opened her eyes as she spoke, "The morals of this book are deeply grounded. We are shown the picture of a girl who learns to live from a boy who wants to die, which is indeed very ironic. Both the characters are very well written and honestly, it was hard to say which character was my favourite from the whole book."

"All the Bright Places focuses on an important aspect in today's world that is - in most places - still considered taboo to talk about, which I think in my personal opinion is absolutely bullocks," Astrid rolled her eyes.

Professor Mason retorted, "Ms Finlay, language."

"Yeah, right," she nodded sincerely and continued, "As I was saying, suicide should not be an issue people don't talk about. Mental health is very very important and just because you get diagnosed with certain disorders, doesn't make you a weirdo. It makes you brave for getting diagnosed, seeking help, wanting to be better and still living every. single. day."

Astrid had never looked more sincere when she spoke the next words, "Living itself is hard and we are all trying out best to survive in this world. It isn't easy, really, it isn't. But that doesn't mean we give up just because it gets hard, you keep trying and we're proud of you. At least I am."

She spoke with passion in her eyes and hope in her heart, "And I implore you, just because you are diagnosed, it doesn't make you a person unworthy of love, it doesn't make you different. It makes you brave. It means you're still trying. The scars you have over you are there as a sign of who you've become, of how much you've progressed. And yes, some of them can never be repaired but they heal over time."

"It's high time we start acknowledging mental health as something serious. It's high time, we encourage our generation not to bottle up emotions but let them out. The more you keep inside you, the more it hurts, and the more the effects of the aftermath will be. It's a dangerous affair to keep everything in, it eventually explodes all over the place and that isn't healthy."

"And at the same time, we've got to learn that bullying people, stereotyping people, none of this will help any one of us. What do you even get from doing such deeds? Self-satisfaction? No, and if you do, you've really got issues, buddy. We're all humans. Messy, complicated individuals with highly developed brains and all that, but if you and I can not make the world a better place than it was a few centuries ago, what good at us? What good is evolution?"

Astrid paused to look around the room, only to find all eyes on her which made her nervous and so, she quickly mumbled, "Thank you."

And took a seat.

It took a few prolonged seconds for the old professor to realise where he had been as he blinked and adjusted his glasses, scrambling his thoughts for words and he finally spoke, "I think we've all learned something valuable today. Miss Finlay had something deep to say and I think she's right. Even if it steered off-topic, it was highly educational and touching. Thank you, Astrid."

She smiled down absentmindedly as she drew circles around the hand that she still held on to. It was only after a few minutes that the Professor began droning off too did she realise that she was holding someone's hand in hers and startled, she stopped tracing circles around it.

Without really turning her head quite noticeably, she turned to face the boy beside her.
"Thank you," she whispered under her breath.

"It's nothing," he told back and leant in closer to her even with his eyes trained on the old professor, he said, "That was really touching, Finlay."

"Astrid," she whispered back, praying that they wouldn't be caught, "You can call me Astrid, uh- I never caught your name."

"Best if that remained a mystery, ain't it?" she noticed his lips switching into a smirk.

"Hey, not fair," she retorted, playfulness in her tone even as they whispered, trying to avoid getting caught, "I don't know yours."

"I'm Caelum," he said, voice soft like feathers caressing, "But most call me Cal."

She nodded slightly, only to notice the Professor's gaze on her again and so this time, she paid attention to him and noted down things he said. Her eyes trained on the professor, thinking deeply about the books the professor was talking about. Tennyson, Shakespeare, Austin, and the names of the greatest authors of all time ran through her mind.

And she felt something on her crossed lap.

She looked down and smiled at the oddly shaped folded chit of paper balancing on her lap. Her tied-up hair was slowly coming undone because of the volume it had but she was yet to notice that as hair snuck out and framed her beautiful face really well. Her lips twisted into a soft smile as she unfolded the note.

you were pretty amazing. and you're beautiful.

She could feel her cheeks turning red at that and she took out the old tattered notebook that she rarely used for anything as she cut out chits of paper from it and wrote on one.

Thank you, not many notice.

'Not many notice?' was the wild thought that ran through Caelum's mind. She was a real beauty, how could many not notice? While he was still in disbelief at how Astrid Finlay could think that people did not find her beautiful, she wrote him another note.

Thanks for what you did back there,

holding my hand,I mean It meant a lot to me,and I also needed that

He smiled back at her and gave her a small nod which she returned. And it was at that moment, Astrid knew that the Caelum boy was something special.