Puzzle Solver

Hands covered her eyes, followed by a, "Guess who?" She laughed and said his name, and he released his hold over her eyes, and she could see again. A turn of her head and she saw his face grinning at her, slight uncertainty in his almond eyes.

"What's wrong?" she asked as soon as she noticed the uncertainty in the speck of brown, rolling in the tumbles of dark hay on a field.

He pulled out a piece of folded up paper from his pocket. "Nothing's wrong," he insisted. "I just made a word search game for you, and I want you to fill it out." He handed her the piece of paper, and she unfolded it, noticing the straight lines only help with a ruler could produce, going straight down, and across in a neat box. Down, sideways, up, across. "There's a message in it for you." She looked up at him, noticing that the nerves had spread to his voice, making it quake slightly.

"Are you sure you're okay?" she asked again, placing a hand on his forehead, and trailed her fingers and cupped his cheek. "You are always so sure of yourself."

He smiled, and held her hand to his face before taking it and holding hers in his, and then letting go of her hand. "I'm fine." He smiled, and then looked down at the word search. "Go on, figure it out."

The word search had no word box, so she had to find words within the word search. "Are you going to grade me on my accuracy?" she asked jokingly, and he played along.

"Yeah, I'll grade you," he smirked, the sure attitude back.

She shook her head at him, and turned her attention back to the puzzle. Letters raced up and down, some looking like they formed words, some not. She spotted her name backwards near the top, and circled it, moving on to search for words in the puzzle.

The word me she noticed in the sidelines of the crossword. "Is that one of the words?" she wondered out loud, unsure. He nodded, so she circled it.

"Most of the words are only two to five letters. That's why this word search is so small."

She nodded, all the while continuing to search for possible words. Out came across in the search, and she circled it, and also circled you, which intertwined with the word out. She saw with as well, laced at the bottom of the word out.

He laughed nervously. "Some of the words I had to place in the same area for the puzzle to work out," he explained, though she didn't care about that, and kept searching.

Will was scrawled at the bottom backwards, and she circled it.

"You're doing good so far. There are four more words."

Her eyes scanned the paper, and found yes on the side, going downward. Her pencil moved around it, and saw the word go written backwards just a few rows down from it, and did the same for it.

Soon enough she found the words no and maybe in the far left corner, and he said she had finished the puzzle. "Now, you have to solve it."

"Solve it?" she repeated.

He nodded. "I'll give you two hints: Yes, No, and Maybe are the answers. All you have to do is figure out the question."

She looked at the other words she had scrolled, and pieced it together. Her stomach was in knots, and she went and found the answers, Yes, No, and Maybe within the puzzle, and struck a line through the word Yes. She wrote out the question below the puzzle, and her answer.

Kris, will you go out with me?

Yes.

"Did I win?" she asked shakily, holding up the piece of paper so he could see.

He smiled widely, and replied, "Yes. You'll always be a Grade A in my book." He pulled her into a tight hug, and she hugged back, a smile never leaving her face.