I stood dead centre in the middle of my room. What had just happened with Sadie at the courts? I rushed to check my phone, but this time not to see if mystery mint kisser had emailed me. I was hoping for messages from Sadie.

None!

I paced a little and then I ran over to my window and looked out. Her curtains were closed, it was late, so she was definitely home. I reached for the pellet gun and fired. My hands were shaking so much that it missed. I fired again. Missed again—Fuck!

I took better aim now, forcing my hands to be steadier. BANG. It hit and I waited for Sadie to pull back her curtain. It felt like I waited forever. I shot again. And again. Still no movement. I was desperate to talk to her.

Then it hit me: she was probably with Jarrod. This was all wrong. Why was she hanging around with that guy? She was supposed to be hanging with me. We should have been in her room right then, eating chocolate and playing video games, Netflixing and chatting. Laughing. Doing what we always did together...

Suddenly, I was unable to put into words what was going on inside my head. Images of Sadie and I staring at each other on the court kept flashing through my mind. That, and other images of time we'd spent together started flicking through my head one-by-one, by one. I was now watching an internal slide show of our entire relationship. From the very start, until now.

I wanted to message her, but I didn't know what to say. And I didn't want to hear that she was with Jarrod either. I sat on my bed trying to calm down, to silence whatever was going on inside me. But whenever I thought of Sadie and where she might be, my heart started pounding and anxiety closed in around me.

I have a tournament tomorrow. I needed to focus. Whatever this was, it couldn't be happening right now... so I pushed it down as far as it could go and walked downstairs to grab some leftovers from the fridge.

**

I'd just managed to fall asleep when the message woke me up. In my frenzy to grab my phone, I knocked it off my table. It fell under my bed and I crawled onto the floor, unable to fish it out fast enough.

It wasn't Sadie. It was Brett. To say I was disappointed was an understatement. And what the hell was Brett doing messaging me at 11:30 pm anyway?

Brett: You need to come over to my house, now!

What the fuck? There was no way—

Brett: NOW!

Connor: No ways. Tournament's tomorrow.

Brett: This is more important. It's about Sadie.

Sudden panic gripped me.

Connor: Is she ok?

Brett: She's fine. But I need you see something. Come to the back door.

I didn't need any more convincing, so I grabbed a warm top, shot down the trellis and started jogging to Brett's house. I was there in about five minutes. I snuck around to the back door where Brett was standing there waiting to usher me in.

"Shhhh." He put a finger over his lips and I followed him through the house, walking as silently as possible. He lead me to the spare bedroom on the far end, aka Brett's edit suit. He'd bought a fancy Mac the year before and set it up in there. Now he spent hours down there making strange little movies and messing around. Once, we were in, Brett closed the door behind us and begun.

"Right, Connor Matthews, I'd like you to take a seat over there." He pointed at the chair in front of a screen mounted on the wall.

"What's going on?"

"What's going on is that you and I are going to watch a movie and take your head out of your fucking arse... popcorn?"

He reached for a bowl behind him and offered it to me. He had actually made popcorn. I shook my head.

"I'm okay."

"Cool. But before I press play, I just want you to know that this could potentially be life changing. I feel like I should make you sign an indemnity form or some shit like that before we start."

"What you mean?" I asked.

"I mean, once you see what I'm about to show you, your life will never be the same again."

"That sounds..." But I couldn't find the word.

"So can I press play?" he asked.

"Sure." I nodded tentatively. "I guess."

"No. Wrong answer, Connor. No more guessing. Can I press play?"

"Ok." I nodded. "Yes." I said it more firmly this time.

"Ok. Here goes." He pressed play and the screen flickered to life. An image filled the screen and I recognised it immediately; it was a black and white photo of Sadie and I, but from year ago.

I remembered that moment immediately. A few summers ago, we'd swum in the lake all day. Sadie had that stupid spikey hair and I teased her about it. So this is where all Brett's footage went to. I turned to look back at him, but he snapped his fingers and I turned forward in time to see some words fly onto the screen.

This is a story about a boy and a girl.

"What's this?"

"Keep watching." he ordered.

So I watched.

I was chasing Sadie now and she was shrieking with laughter as I caught up and pushed her into the water before we both emerged laughing.

But this is no ordinary love story.

"WHAT?" I whipped around again and stared at Brett. He threw a popcorn kernel at me and pointed back at the TV screen.

A weird montage of moments flashed across the screen. In each one, Sadie and I were laughing and smiling at each other. In each one, she was looking at me like... like... what the hell?

She was looking at me like she was...

I gasped and my hand flew up over my mouth. My heart started beating faster and faster and faster.

"Jesus!" I looked at Brett again and this time he nodded.

"Yup! Amazing what you can't see sometimes. Even when it's been right in front of you. "

I turned back to the screen just as more words flew into view.

Because he doesn't know that she's in love....

Shots of Sadie's face flew onto the screen, one after the other. In every one, she was always laughing, always with that look and she looked so...beautiful—Oh my God! It was as if I'd never seen her, until that very second.

And he doesn't know that he's in love either...

Another gasp escaped my mouth as I watched the scenes he'd cut of us together over the years. Me sidling up to Sadie in the canteen. Walking with my arm draped over her shoulder. Climbing up her trellis. Waving at her. Carrying her bags to class. Daily things that I'd taken for granted.

But he is!

And then the footage switched to slow mo. It was Sadie and she was dancing. I remembered that night. Giovanni's. Her birthday. It was one of the only times I'd seen her in a dress and she was smiling and twirling with that creepy old Mafioso guy. When it got to a close up of Sadie's face, the image froze. Her eyes were lit up, her smile was big and wide and she had a few strands of hair flying across her face.

NOW WHAT THE FUCK IS THE IDIOT GOING TO DO ABOUT IT?

The end: A short film by legendary, Oscar winning filmmaker Brett

Brett flicked off the TV while I just sat motionless. In shock. Sadie was in love with me. Is in love with me and I... I....

Was I? Am I?

The realization slammed into me and took my breath away. All these years. I thought of all the girls I'd dated. None of them had ever lasted. None of them had ever matched up to her. I'd inevitably always ditched them to spend time with Sadie. It was her. Sadie. It had always been her.

My brain swirled. My heart raced. Sweaty palms. Dry mouth. Shaky legs... I... I—I'm in love with her. I guess I'd always been. That was what I'd been feeling earlier that night. I'd noticed the feeling creeping in slowly over the past few weeks, but until that moment, I wasn't able to name it. Now I could—Love.

Sadie was the most important person in my life. She was the first person I wanted to talk to every morning and the last person I wanted to talk to when I went to bed. I looked up at Brett. I had questions. How did he know? He just shrugged.

"I guess when you see someone every day, all the time, and that person just kind of becomes an extension of you, maybe it's hard to see it for what it really is? Maybe you need a bit of perspective. So? Do you get it now?" he said.

"Yeah, I'm... I'm..." I paused—Am I about to say it out loud?

"Yes...??." Brett urged. "Say it for God sake."

"I think I'm in love with Sadie," I said tentatively.

"Um...I think you can do better than that. Don't disappoint me, Connor."

"I'm in love with her. I love Sadie. I'm in love with Sadie." I breathed out a sigh of relief that I didn't even know I'd been holding in.

Brett threw his hands in the air, "Fucking Hallelujah Hallelujah and Praise Baby Jesus!"

"She's been right under my nose this whole time!"

"Yup!"

"I've been so fucking blind"

"Uh-huh!"

"I've been such an idiot!"

"Amen!"

"Oh my God, I'm totally in love with her." I jumped out of my seat. I knew exactly what I needed to do now. It was so obvious. I needed to end this stupid fantasy with mystery mint kisser, stop chasing something that wasn't real, and wake up to what was real and right in front of me. Sadie was real. Not some mystery girl I'd kissed in the dark and was now messaging.

"I've gotta go!" I half ran out of the door but turned around and hugged Brett first.

"Thanks! I totally owe you!" And with that I was gone. I ran to Sadie's house faster than I'd ever ran before. I basically flew up the trellis and into her window. But when I got inside, she was lying in bed, fast asleep.

I walked over and sat down carefully on the bed so as not to wake her—Fuck she looks so beautiful. Why had I never realized how beautiful she was? I gently tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. She didn't even stir and I decided I wasn't going to wake her. She looked too peaceful. But I wanted to leave her a note. So I found a piece of paper and scribbled the message down and placed it on her bedside table. I wasn't sure if I should, but....

I knelt on the floor until our faces were just centimeters away and I leant forward, and my lips touched her forehead. I wanted to kiss her so badly. More than I'd ever wanted to kiss anyone before. More than the mint kisser even. So I planted the softest kiss on her forehead and wondered if I should risk moving down to her lips. I didn't. Instead, I pulled the duvet up over her shoulders and climbed back out the window. I walked home with the biggest smile on my face. The picture in my head was crystal clear now. All the fog and mist had lifted and for the first time, I was seeing clearly.

Tomorrow... everything will change tomorrow.