The Girl In The Apple Tree And The Boy In The Window.

Burke's life had take a whole three-sixty while in just a couple of months due to Danielle. School became something that was enjoyed and even anticipated , because he got to spend nearly six hours with Danielle. She had insisted on him sitting with her and her friends at lunch, and they really weren't that bad. A bit immature, a bit loud, but they excepted him quick enough, once they heard he was a friend of Danielle's. It was if no one even knew he existed until Danielle was seen next to him, and then he was almost normal. He didn't like normalcy very much.

Danielle seemed to always be a popular subject with the other kids. Everyone wanted to hear a story that Danielle was telling. Danielle had a voice that could suck you in, and she was very animated when she was speaking. People were grateful to have such a wonderfully unique girl as a friend. Burke was the luckiest though. Danielle had taken the "best friends" thing to heart, and made sure Burke was at her side everywhere. Not that Burke minded, it was just strange, being surrounded by so many people talking at once, years of solitary had grown on him, and he wasn't used to all of the attention. He didn't know how to react.

When Burke was a little bit to uncomfortable, Danielle could tell automatically, squeezing his hand and diverting the conversation away from him. And sometimes, she would deliberately set the conversation so that there was no room for herself or Burke, and sneak him away to an empty table where they would talk quietly about the things that Burke liked to talk about, like art or modern science or books, and sometimes they would talk about what Danielle liked to talk about, things like history or outrageous fashions that she had seen online or French, even though it frustrated her. (Burke knew some conversational French, Danielle was trying to learn from him, and he couldn't help but laugh at her, because she would get so angry with herself over little pronunciation mistakes.)

After a while, Danielle began to notice her group slowly moving away from her and Burke, so, being her usual bold self, she asked them why.

"Well, you and Burke are really close." explained Kate gently, almost patronizingly. She flipped her blond hair over her shoulder, "We just feel like we're intruding on some intimate moment whenever you guys are around."

Danielle scoffed. "Yeah, we're close, but you guys aren't interrupting anything, it isn't like that."

A short boy named Kyle piped up. "Well, it seems pretty….. intimate."

"Well it's not." Danielle huffed, and stomped away to go find Burke.

He was sitting outside on the cement ledge, reading a book, chuckling or grimacing every once in a while.

"What'cha reading?" Danielle asked.

Burke looked up, startled, and smiled at Danielle. "The Deathday Letter. You told me it to read it once. You never told me it was so dirty. Shame on you."

"Yeah, yeah. It's good though, right?" She asked. Burke nodded enthusiastically. "Wait 'till the end. You'll never believe that Oli-" Burke cut her off.

"Don't ruin it!" He nearly yelled.

"Okay, dang." She climbed up next to him on the ledge and read over his shoulder. Every once in a while she would giggle in his ear, or whisper a sentence or joke that she particularly liked. Burke hadn't ever been more content than he was in those moments, when it was just him and Danielle, doing something that wasn't unusual or special in any way, Danielle just made it all so much better.

Danielle kept looking at the clock, praying that time would just move a bit faster, because in five minutes, school was out. Right after school, Burke and Danielle always went to the park and did their homework together on a park bench. Danielle briefly wondered if she had become too dependent on Burke. After all, they had only been talking for a couple weeks. But Danielle knew Burke well, and they were best friends. The bell finally rung, and Danielle bounded out of her seat, ran into the hall, threw her books in her bag, and got to Burke's locker.

Danielle beat him to his locker and was leaning up against it when he got out of class. He couldn't have been happier to see her there, the day had been long, his seventh period was brutal. Without saying a word, they both left the school side by side.

"Burke?" Danielle asked quietly while they finished some algebraic equations.

"Yeah?" He asked looking up. Whenever she used that voice, she was about to say something important, something he should listen to.

"Why don't you smile?" She asked, nibbling on her lip and turning a bit pink in the face.

Burke frowned slightly. " I do."

"Your smiles aren't real." She murmured. Burke wasn't surprised. He had always been an open book to Danielle.

"I don't know. Why do you smile?" Asked Burke, pretending to be indifferent.

"There are a lot of reasons to smile."

Burke sighed and put his pencil down. "You know, I don't know why. But I think that it's easier to recognize reasons to smile when you've got someone there to point it out to you. I'll promise to smile more. Starting now." He paused for a moment, looking straight into Danielle's bright green eyes, and he gave her the biggest, happiest, most breathtaking smile.

"Your smile is great." She whispered.

And Burke just kept smiling. Just a small smirk, and it came completely natural to him. Danielle didn't know it, but she had broken a wall in his mind that had needed to fall for quite a while. His mind had been a blank, emotionless notebook, but Danielle always seemed to come in and fill the pages with her artful poetic presence.