Are You the One?

Chapter 1

  “Oh my god, have you seen the new transfer student? He's just so hot.”

  “So real girl. Have you seen the way he smiles? God, just strike me down already.”

  I rolled my eyes. What could the new transfer student possibly have that I didn’t already have? I had an amazing boyfriend who would give the world to me once I gave him the word. I mean, not my boyfriend, but soon. Trust me. 

  “Julia! Oh thank god I finally found you. And damn are you in for a shock. The new transfer student is in our AP Math! I mean you’ve heard about him right? You probably have, with everyone talking about him and all.” The one and only Dawn appeared, speaking a mile a minute, one of my best friends in the school.

  “Yes Dawn, I know, I heard, but Steven is still way better if you ask me,” came my dull reply.

  “What, the guy who left you on delivered for 2 days and finally gave you a one word answer? The one who’s like 4 years older than you? The one who looks like he got run over by a car?” Dawn retorted.

  I sighed. It wasn’t the first time an argument like this had happened. Though to be fair, Dawn thought that all my previous crushes were either run over by a car, got dropped into the sewer when they were born or got burned in a fire. Of course, I disagreed. Steven wasn’t that bad looking. Although ok so he wasn’t a complete 10 out of 10. But the thing that had drawn me to him was actually his personality. His completely unhinged humour coupled with his athleticism was just perfection in my opinion. Sure, maybe he didn’t reply to my messages immediately. But when he did it was always with something humorous. Most of the time. 

  Just then a sudden shove by Dawn pushed me out of my reverie. Rude.

  “Look, look. That’s the new transfer student. Can you believe it? He’s so much hotter than I thought,” Dawn hissed at me.

  Side-eyeing her, I gave in to my curiosity and looked. Worst decision of my life. Two seconds in and I was unable to take my eyes off him. If I were to observe his features – for scientific purposes, of course – his brown curly hair looked like it had been freshly permed, his almond-shaped eyes a warm chocolate brown that somehow suited him. His jawline was defined but also balanced. He had a button nose too. It was that kind of Asian beauty, completed with straight dark brows that just…worked. But we were all born and raised in Singapore, so that wasn’t really a surprise. 

  For some reason, my eyes wandered back to his hair. It was perfectly styled in a way that looked messy but also not too messy. And why in the world was he looking directly at me? Oh shoot. Averting my gaze, I quickly turned back to look at Dawn, only to find her watching me suspiciously.

  “Why do you look like you just got caught doing something you weren’t supposed to do? And why is it that I am fairly sure I know what you did?” Dawn narrowed her eyes.

  “It’s…it’s nothing. Trust me. Anyways, let’s get to class. The bell’s going to ring soon,” I stuttered, running in the complete opposite direction of class.

  Rolling her eyes, Dawn grabbed me by the elbow and literally half swung me through the doorway into the homeroom. Then a soft chuckle came from behind me. I whipped my head back around, glaring at the transfer student with distaste. How dare he laugh at me. The smirk on his face immediately dropped, replaced with a tiny grin, and he raised his hands up in a sign of surrender. 

  After being satisfied with the fact that he was at least a tiny bit “intimidated” by me, I finally allowed myself to be dragged all the way to my seat by Dawn.

  “What was that, Julia? I thought you preferred Steven? Why, you had a sudden change of heart?” Dawn smirked at me, with the teasing glint that was somehow always there whenever I had even a tiny interaction with a boy.

  “What? No. He was just being annoying. Of course I prefer Steven more. Wait, have I shown you the recent text thread between me and him? Oh, we had a blast,” I said, almost a bit too enthusiastically, fishing out my phone.

  Obviously, there were hours of intervals between our texts, with me texting the most. But he was busy. He’d said so himself. He was studying for his exams and he had to score amazingly well. So the hours in between weren’t important.

  Heaving a dramatic sigh for absolutely no reason at all, Dawn leaned forward and started reading the texts between me and Steven. And Mr. Transfer Student decided to use that time to claim the seat on my right. 

  Great. 

  So now I was stuck between Transfer Student on my right and Dawn who was giving me suggestive raised eyebrows on my left. What an amazing start to the week. 

  The click clack of heels sounded down the corridor, and with that Ms. Yong entered class with so much theatricality that I swore you could nearly hear the background music trailing after her.

  “Morning class. Today as you’ve all obviously noticed with the rumours spreading around, we have a new transfer student. Mr. Ong, please introduce yourself to the class.”

  Mr. Transfer Student stood up in a completely relaxed way, not worried at all. Somehow.

  “Hi everyone. My name is Dillion, and I transferred from a nearby school recently,” he said, voice not as deep as I imagined, but still deep enough to invoke a shiver in everyone else. The “everyone else” not including me, duh. His voice was smooth though, the kind of smooth that made you believe he could sing if he actually bothered to try.

  And then he sat down after less than two sentences of introduction. Could you believe it? But of course that wasn’t actually the end. At least for me.

  He leaned in to whisper directly into my ear, his breath tickling it. Muttering an “I love pretty girls too”, he leaned back with satisfaction, eyelids half open, looking as if he’d just been informed that he’d won a million dollar lottery. So obviously all the girls who were eyeing him like a treat turned to glare at me.

  What did I do? It’s not like I was going to steal their little prize. Plus, who would want someone as bad at flirting as him? Disgust rose up within me. What was with that line? Even I could do better than that and I had no experience at all.

  An elbow jab immediately came from my left. As soon as Dawn saw whatever was written on my face, she tore up a piece of paper from her notebook that she for some reason always had beside her, pen scribbling away rapidly.

  After a few seconds, Dawn passed the paper back to me.

  Dawn: What happened? What did he say to you?

  Me: Can you believe him?

  Dawn: What did he say?

  Me: He literally said “I love pretty girls too”.

  Being the loyal best friend that she was, Dawn widened her eyes, hand flying to her mouth to stifle a gasp.

  Dawn: OH WHAT NO WAY

  Me: EXACTLY

  Dawn: He should know that that kind of flirting doesn’t work on you

  At that one I gave her a glare. Maybe not a very loyal best friend after all.

  “Ms. Chen and Ms. Lee, are you done passing notes to each other, or do I have to change your seats?” came a stern voice.

  Half already bursting with laughter and half red with shame, I quickly hid my face to avoid looking at anyone. But of course I turned my head to my right and came face to face with Dillion. For god’s sake, why was a smirk dancing on his face again, like he somehow knew that I had just been talking about him? For all he knew, it could have been about literally anything else. 

  “Am I really that hypnotising?”

  And that was when I decided he was going to be my mortal enemy for the rest of the school year.