Marie leaned her head against the bus shelter wall, biting her lip to keep herself from crying. Was it possible that she really had broken his heart? Did he love her that much?

He does a little voice whispered to her.

A picture of him swam into her mind... ordinary except for his eyes -eyes which her friends unanimously agreed were gorgeous. He'd been smitten with her from the first time he'd seen her... and persisted until ten months later, they became an item. Now, five months later, she was having second thoughts about him.

Maybe I just went out with him because he was always there... or maybe it's normal to feel like this...

Was it just infatuation... or is it still true love?

Instead of his comforting embrace, she was now alone in the drizzling rain. Assuming this would be another cosy get-together for the couple, her best friend had vanished around the corner looking out for the bus and kicking at the stones on the pavement.

Blinking fiercely, she turned her head to look at Donald, standing well away from her, head hanging down, determinedly not looking at her. Slipping her bus fare out of her pocket, she moved quickly down the street towards Gabrielle.

“Call me when the bus comes, okay?”

“Whatever,” Gaby shrugged, shivering slightly in the cold wind.

“Come into the shelter,” Marie suggested.

“No way -it's not really that cold,” she lied.

Walking back towards Donald, she wondered what would happen now. Looking up at him through swollen eyes, she saw that he too was about to cry.

People walking past them looked at them, both sobbing, both unable to speak.

“Was it me?” Donald asked, just as Gaby called softly “Marie... the bus is here.”

As the bus pulled away, she looked back at him, and asked herself yet again What do I feel towards him?

Silently, Gaby passed her a tissue and waited for her to speak.

“It's easier for you,” Marie managed to choke out. “You know you fancy Jonathan -I don't know what I feel towards Donald.”

“Donald adores you, and I doubt Jonathan even cares whether I'm alive or dead.” He'd prefer me dead, she added to herself.

Both halves of the “Couple of the Year,” as their friends had dubbed them, were in emotional torment: one broken hearted, the other hopelessly confused.

Marie's phone rang with a text from Donald.

Please don't cry.

With a faint glimmer of a smile on her face, she showed it to Gaby, then started keying in a reply.

Back to square one... where it is excruciatingly embarrassing and awkward and painful to be in their presence, her friend thought cynically, driving a fingernail into the flesh of her arm.

Next day, Donald was at school earlier than usual, waiting to apologise for whatever he'd done to make her cry. Three quarters of an hour later, Marie arrived. Ignoring the crowd milling round the foyer, and not noticing the conspicuous absence of her friends... and in flagrant disregard for the rules, she fell into his embrace.

“A kiss is a secret you tell to someone's mouth,” Bernardette said, waiting for Marie to notice their presence.

“And I would not like to know what secrets are being said,” Gaby added dutifully. Her belief that true love did not exist was constantly contradicted by her two friends, who at that moment did not know or care what was going on around them -their world was limited to each other and the passion of the moment.

Dedicated to two people who are living proof of the existence of love... I hope you like it!