Second First Impression

I went back to the day he confessed to me.
He was lounging on the sofa, one leg casually crossed over the other, a newly lit cigarette dangling from his fingers.
His gaze swept lazily across the room before landing on the figure huddled in the corner.
“Her, then.”
In the sudden silence, his voice was pitched just right—not too loud, not too soft—and dripping with casual indifference.
“Hey. I like you.”
And just like that, I was back in that moment.

1.
The private lounge was a chaotic blur of noise and flashing lights, the air thick with the cloying mix of smoke and spilled liquor.
“Alright, everyone, quiet down! Time for Jason’s dare!”
A buzz-cut guy from the card table stood up, holding a card aloft. He read from it dramatically, “Find any woman in this room…” He paused, his voice climbing with excitement, “and confess your love to her!”
“Damn, Jason only lost one round and the dare is this intense?”
“But his actual target isn’t even here. Who’s he supposed to confess to?”
A murmur rippled through the room. Amidst the chaos, the boy on the sofa remained the sole point of stillness, leaning back with a lazy grace and lighting a cigarette as if he were the only one there.
“Jason, shouldn’t you wait for Lana…”
He lifted his gaze just slightly, and the room fell silent. The jokes, the whispers, the arguments—all of it evaporated.
It was as if he couldn’t even be bothered to fully open his eyes. His gaze drifted for a second before settling, with deliberate carelessness, on the darkest corner of the room.
“Her, then.”
He tilted his chin, his voice a familiar, lazy drawl that was laced with a flippant sort of cruelty.
“Hey. I like you.”
I was back.

2.
At eighteen, Jason was all sharp angles and defiant eyes. Every move he made radiated a kind of reckless charm.
Our eyes met across the dimly lit room, and in that instant, mine filled with tears.
“Jason, man, I don’t know about this…”
No one had expected him to end the game so quickly, so carelessly. And no one had expected him to choose me as the “lucky” one.
The guy with the buzz cut, Finn, lowered his voice. “Dude, that’s Lana’s sister. It’s not cool.”
Tonight was Lana Monroe’s eighteenth birthday party. Everyone at Crestwood High knew she was in love with Jason. The whole night had been building towards their big moment; everyone assumed he’d use the dare to finally ask her out. No one saw this coming.
Finn glanced at me and saw the tears welling in my eyes. He flinched.
“She’s a good kid… Look, you made her cry.”
Jason had already looked away, the cigarette halfway to his lips. At Finn’s words, he froze, his gaze snapping back to me. A slight frown creased his brow, and the air around him grew colder, as if my inability to take a joke had personally offended him.
The silence stretched. Finn was scratching his head, about to try and smooth things over, when I finally found my voice, my heart hammering against my ribs.
“Say it again.”
I stared straight at him, my tone unwavering, though my voice trembled.
“I didn’t hear you. Say it again.”

3.
At seventeen, I was a walking bundle of insecurities—shy, sensitive, and a loner, but with a fierce, fragile pride.
I was the kind of girl who could disappear into a crowd. But because my sister was Lana, I was always being watched.
The Monroes were real estate tycoons in Crestwood. Lana was my opposite in every way: stunningly beautiful, effortlessly charming, born for the spotlight.
I was their adopted daughter, brought in to be her playmate.
Lana had a wide circle of friends and loved to party, and she always dragged me along. To everyone else, I was just Lana’s shadow. She was always telling me to lighten up, to make some friends, but she never understood how much I hated those scenes. My quiet awkwardness only served to highlight her dazzling confidence.
On her eighteenth birthday, I did what I always did: I found a dark corner and tried to become invisible, praying for the night to end.
Until Jason looked at me.

4.
I knew who Jason was. I knew all of Lana’s friends. He smoked, he drank, he cut class, he partied… he was the biggest degenerate of them all.
A single, lazy glance from him was enough to make girls swoon. He treated affection like a game, thoughtless and cruel, embodying every single trait I despised in teenage boys.
Someone like me, crippled by insecurity, could only burn with a silent, helpless rage.
I was so focused on my own humiliation that I didn’t notice the cigarette slip from his fingers and fall to the floor.
Back then, I hated Jason.
But now, I wanted a fresh start with him.

5.
If Jason confessing to me was a shock, me demanding he do it again was an earthquake.
Who dared to speak to Jason with that kind of command in their voice? Especially me, the girl who barely spoke at all.
An awkward silence fell over the room, broken only when the door swung open. A collective sigh of relief went through the crowd.
It was Lana, back from schmoozing in the next lounge.
“Well, well, why the sudden silence?” she asked, her red lips curved into a smile as she sauntered toward the card table in her high heels. “What are you guys playing?”
Finn, still holding the dare card, quickly handed it to her. “Lana, you’re back just in time! I lost again, and I was trying to figure out which girl to hit on for my dare.”
He made a goofy heart shape with his hands. “Lana, I love you!”
The room erupted in laughter and jeers, the tension finally breaking.
“Sorry, sweetie, but I’ve already got my eye on someone,” Lana said, her smile bright and confident as she walked over to Jason.
“Jason. Be my boyfriend.”
He had already looked away before she even reached him. His eyes were downcast as he stubbed out the untouched cigarette in the ashtray.
His voice, stripped of its usual laziness, was low and deep.
“Not interested.”

6.
“Oh, well. Let me know when you are.”
Lana just shrugged, completely unfazed by the stares, and rallied everyone to start another game.
The room filled with noise again. I took one last, long look at Jason and slipped out of the lounge unnoticed.
Outside, the street was a river of traffic and neon lights. I stood under the bus stop sign, lost in thought.
In my past life, Jason and I had crossed paths a few times. We ended up at the same university, in different programs. He always seemed to show up right when I needed help, but I just assumed he was doing it as a favor to my sister and tried to avoid him.
He grew up a lot over those years, and I eventually shed some of my insecurities. There were moments when I wondered… but after that night, he never once told me he liked me.
Not even at the end, when he lay bleeding out to save me, all he could manage was a weak smile.
“Don’t cry…”
I was lost in the memory when a shadow fell over me.
“Can’t the good girl take a joke?”
It was Jason, a cocky smirk on his face. I looked up, and the smirk vanished.
“You’re… crying?”
I blinked, tears streaming down my face. For a second, eighteen-year-old Jason blurred with the twenty-two-year-old version.
His voice softened, a hint of panic in it.
“Don’t cry…”

7.
The eighteen-year-old Jason didn’t know how to comfort anyone.
His voice was softer, but his face was tense, his eyes dark and stormy. When my tears kept falling, he kicked the bus stop sign in frustration.
The sudden noise startled me, and I stopped crying, staring at him in shock.
Jason glared at me for a second, then turned his back, shoving his hands in his pockets. His entire posture radiated a tense, frustrated energy.
He looked genuinely menacing.
“So you think I took advantage of you?” he snapped, his voice rough with irritation. “Fine. I’ll let you get me back. What are you crying for?”
I stared at his back, dazed. “How?” I asked quietly.
A long moment passed before his voice came back, feigning nonchalance.
“…How about you confess to me to make it even?”

8.
The night breeze felt cold as it swirled in the space between us.
I was silent. I could feel the tension in his rigid back, and my heart ached. I forced a small laugh, changing the subject. “Do you have a tissue?”
I tried to wipe my face, but my hands were slick with tears. I was shocked at what a mess I was. I was about to use my sleeve when a pair of hands cupped my face, their warmth startling.
Jason leaned in close, the rough pads of his thumbs gently brushing away my tears.
He wouldn’t meet my eyes. “Tissues are dirty,” he mumbled, as if that explained everything.
I stared at him, at his completely serious expression, and found it oddly amusing.
I sniffled. “You smell like smoke,” I said, my own attempt at deflection.
His hands stilled. He curled his fingers slightly, and when he continued, his touch was impossibly gentle, a delicate dance between tenderness and caution.
He lifted his gaze just enough to meet mine, his voice dropping to a husky rasp.
“You like guys who don’t smoke?”
From my upturned angle, I could see the streetlight reflecting in his pupils, tiny fragments of light that burned straight through me.
This time, it was my turn to look away.
I didn’t know…
I didn’t know if the Jason of four years from now still smoked. I didn’t know why he had been so good to me. I didn’t know when he had started to like me…
I knew nothing about him.
My entire understanding of Jason was built on a foundation of prejudice.

9.
Jason took me home that night.
I had a dream, a memory from my freshman year of college. I was taking a bus from campus to the suburbs. Just as the doors were closing, Jason appeared out of nowhere and squeezed on.
The bus was packed. I was clinging to a pole, trying to make myself as small as possible. The bus lurched to a stop, and the person in front of me stumbled back, sending me falling backward…
Directly into Jason’s chest.
Looking up and seeing his face, I panicked more than if I’d hit the floor.
“S-sorry.”
I tried to pull away, but he reached out, gripping the seats on either side of me and trapping me in a cage of his arms.
He leaned down. “That scared of me?”
I said nothing, just turned my head away.
He straightened up. “Where are you headed?”
I mumbled my answer, my eyes on the floor. “Out of the city.” I was running an errand for a professor, fact-checking an article with an interviewee.
“You want to be a journalist?”
I was surprised he knew. “Yeah.”
I thought I heard him chuckle. “A quiet journalist is kind of an oxymoron, don’t you think?”
I didn’t answer. I took it as a slight, another black mark against his name in my mental ledger.
When I got off the bus, I glanced back. The bus wasn't crowded anymore, but he was still standing in the same spot, staring at me through the window.
His gaze was so intense it scared me. I turned and walked away as fast as I could.

10.
I never wondered where Jason had been going that day. I never questioned why a guy who drove a Porsche to campus was riding a city bus.
But last night, sitting on that bus, I asked him directly, “Do you know my name?”
“Maya.”
“Yeah,” I said, my voice tinged with self-deprecating humor. “Maya. As in, ‘Maybe I’m not wanted.’”
“Just a friendly tip,” I continued, the words feeling reckless, “next time you confess to someone, you should probably use their name. ‘Hey’ isn’t very sincere.”
My palms were sweating. I didn’t dare look at him. I just leaned my head against the cool glass of the window and pretended to sleep.
I was twenty-one now, I told myself. I wasn’t that timid, insecure girl anymore. I was still quiet, but I had found my voice in my work, becoming a promising young journalist before I even graduated. I had investigated countless stories, always searching for the objective truth.
And now, my subject was Jason.
I must have drifted off for real, but I was awake when he gently lifted my head and rested it on his shoulder.
I heard his voice, a soft murmur from just above me.
“It’s for ‘the rest of my life.’”

11.
As the first semester of senior year drew to a close, Jason was still cutting class like it was his job. I waited for days, but I never saw him at school.
I did, however, hear the rumors.
Jason had brutally rejected some girl who confessed to him, practically knocking her over.
Jason had dropped a fortune at some downtown bar, spending an absurd amount in one night.
Jason this, Jason that… It was always the same old stories, the same ones that had fueled my prejudice against him before.
“I just saw Jason in the alley behind the school,” someone whispered. “He’s with that crew from the vocational school… I think they’re about to fight.”
I froze, then grabbed my backpack and bolted for the exit.
By the time I reached the alley, Jason was just landing a clean punch, knocking the other crew’s leader to the ground. He calmly stepped back as the two groups descended into a chaotic brawl. He leaned against the brick wall, his hand slipping into his pocket as if to pull something out, then stopping.
I suspected he was reaching for a cigarette but changed his mind.
Perhaps because that was the moment he looked up and saw me standing at the mouth of the alley.

12.
We stared at each other for a few seconds. Then, he turned and started walking down a side path.
Without thinking, I ran after him. “Jason!”
At the sound of my voice, he stiffened but walked even faster.
I picked up my pace, panicked, and promptly tripped over my own feet.
I was about to eat dirt when a strong pair of arms caught me, and I slammed into his chest with enough force to make him grunt.
I looked up. We spoke at the same time.
“Why are you running?”
“…”
I untangled myself from his arms. “I heard you were fighting, so I came to see.”
“Nothing to see here.”
I tilted my head. “It’s the first time I’ve seen you like this. It’s…” I paused, meeting his gaze, which was a mixture of anxiety and feigned indifference. I smiled. “It’s actually kind of cool.”
The corner of his mouth twitched upward. He quickly looked away, clearing his throat. “Hmph.”
“But Jason,” I asked, my voice sincere, “don’t you have classes to attend?”
“…”
By the time Jason’s friends finished their fight and found us, I was pressing a thick stack of notebooks into his hands.
I looked at him with the gravity of someone entrusting their last will and testament.
“Jason, these are my notes for every subject. Take them and study hard, okay?”
His hand, clutching the notebooks, was so tight his knuckles were white. His face cycled through shades of red and pale.
His friends, peeking around the corner, quickly ducked back. “Dude,” one of them whispered loudly, “you can’t hit a girl!”
I saw his eyelid twitch.
“It took me three all-nighters to make these,” I added.
He forced the word through gritted teeth. “…Fine.”

13.
I pressed my advantage, inviting him to study with me at the library the next evening. He agreed, probably out of sheer resignation.
The next day, I checked to make sure he was actually at school. Satisfied, I packed a few extra practice exams to bring to the library.
He hadn't arrived yet, but I ran into my deskmate, Mike.
Mike was the class genius. He was always number one; I was always number two. He was quiet and studious, just like me. People used to gossip that we were a couple of nerds made for each other. He was one of the only classmates I ever really talked to, mostly about difficult homework problems.
“Maya,” he called out.
I walked over. He pointed to a reading comprehension passage on an English test. My English was better than his, and I was grateful for all the times he’d helped me with physics, so I sat down next to him and explained it.
The passage was about high school romance. After we finished, Mike suddenly asked, “What do you think about dating in high school?”
“I’ve never really thought about it.”
“People say if you don’t date in high school, it’s harder to find someone later… Are you waiting for college?”
“Yeah. I’ll think about it in college.”
“Are you applying to Avington University?”
“Yeah.”
Mike smiled. “I’m applying there too.”
“Good luck,” I said earnestly.
As the words left my mouth, I froze. This exact scene, this exact conversation… it had happened in my past life. Back then, after I’d spoken, I had looked up and seen Jason standing by a nearby bookshelf, watching me with an unreadable expression.
Not long after that, rumors started flying that Jason had suddenly started studying, his grades skyrocketing.
I felt like I was grasping something important. I whipped my head up.
Jason was leaning against the bookshelf, his gaze even darker and more inscrutable than I remembered.
Before I could decipher his expression, he turned and walked away.

First, search for and download the MotoNovel app from Google. Then, open the app and use the code "247464" to read the entire book.