They’d both finally be living their dreams.

“Can I see you with your hair down?”

She jerked her face away from the view of a passing ocean, city lights, and the place they would dock, the place she would finally abandon her silly dream and turned instead to face the dream itself.

“No, you can’t.”

“Why not? You never wear your hair down.”

“I do. You just never noticed me.” But what she didn’t say was how she’d noticed how he noticed every other girl, flirted and taunted with them but not her and yet, out of all those girls, she’d been the one to fall in love with him.

“What do you think of me?” he asked, taking her by surprise.

“I think you’re a jerk.”

But what she didn’t know was he always wore a mask, an ugly one, to keep people away. Her answer was exactly what he was looking for. He wanted someone to see how ugly he could be and someone who wouldn’t be afraid to say it, to be angry at him for it.

“But…” She said. “I think, underneath that, you can be kind. Like you’re when you’re with your family or when you’re with those you truly care for. You know… those you let in.”

He felt vulnerable as she said that, he felt the walls crumbling down around his heart. As that went on, he suddenly felt the way she’d been feeling all along.

“Would you like to take a walk with me?”

And as they headed to a level beneath the boat, she knew when it docked that her dream wouldn’t be over. Instead, it would finally be a reality. But not just for her.

They’d both finally be living their dreams.