Half a Heart •Ricky Bowen•

21 (final)

Ricky and Ella went back to his house after the theater group went to celebrate at Dennys. He wanted to show his girl what he wrote for her.

She smiled as she sat on his bed, her thumbs fiddling together. Ricky pulled out his guitar and began play the chords easily. "I started to write this after our first kiss..." Ricky trailed off, his face radiating pink. "I wanted to put it in 3rd person point of view because I was scared of admitting what I was feeling, and this was the easiest way I could put it."

"he said there's nothing like your smile, sort of subtle and perfect and real. He said you never knew how wonderful that smile could make someone feel." Ella couldn't help but cover her grin with her hand before removing it, giving him a toothy grin.

"And he knew whenever you get bored you scribble stars on the cuffs of your jeans. And he noticed that you still fill out the quizzes that they put in those teen magazines. But he kept it all inside his head what he saw he left unsaid. And though he wanted to he couldn't talk to you, he couldn't find the way, but he would always say." He paused, leaning in to give her a kiss on her forehead before resuming.

"If I could tell her, tell her everything I see. If I could tell her how she's everything to me. But we're a million worlds apart, and I don't know how I would even start if I could tell her, if I could tell her." Ella pulled her knees up to her chest, resting her chin on her knee caps. Her eyes looked up at him with admiration, he couldn't help but want to kiss her again.

He thought
You looked really pretty, when you put indigo streaks in your hair. And he wondered how you learned to dance
Like all the rest of the world isn't there." Ricky paced around the room, his heart felt like it was racing a mile a minute.

"But he kept it all inside his head, what he saw he left unsaid. If I could tell her, tell her everything I see. If I could tell her, how she's everything to me. But we're a million worlds apart, and I don't know how I would even start
If I could tell her." Ella's eyes began to water at his words, her breath getting caught in her throat.

"And how do you say, I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. But we're a million worlds apart, and I don't know how I would even start. If I could tell her, if I could." Ricky finished his song, placing his guitar to the side.

Before Ricky would speak, Ella jumped off the bed tackling Ricky down to the ground. She peppered kisses all over his face, "I love you," kiss to the cheek. "I love you." Kiss to the nose. "I love you." Kiss to the forehead. "I love you." Kiss to his lips.

She pulled away, resting her forehead on his, his hands holding her waist. "I love you El. Please never leave me." He mumbled, holding her to his chest. "I could never." She mumbled into the crook of his neck.

"You know I had this dream about us." He started, Ella rolled off of him, laying by his side. "Wait it's not gonna freak you out by talking about it, right?" Ella asked, making sure he knew he didn't have to talk about the future since it made him nervous.

"I want you to hear it so you know that the feelings I have for you are real." Ella faced her body towards him, tucking her arm underneath her head to look at him.

"I know we're only seventeen, but when I picture my future everything changes except you. You're always in it." Ricky smiled, his hand coming up to cup the side of her face. "Richard Bowen you cliche." She grinned.

"My dream was of us. We were maybe 20? I don't know, but we were living together in this beautiful house. And we had a puppy, a corgi puppy named Franklin. And we still kept in touch with everyone from theater, we would invite them over and go swimming at the beach. Everything... everything just felt happy and safe. And I'm sorry if that scares you I know the future scares you just as much as it does me but I want to be happy with you. And I didn't officially ask you to be my girlfriend but I figured you would understand-" Ricky was cut off by Ella kissing him.

He grinned into the kiss, laughing in his head that they were still on the floor. She pulled back, playing with his hair that was falling in his face. "You're the other half of my heart Rick, nothing will change that. I was your girlfriend as soon as you said 'I love you'."

____________________________________

(Its now Christmas break)
Ella and Ricky were cuddled up on Ricky's couch, 'Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer' playing on the tv. This was Ricky's first Christmas Eve without his mom, so Ella wanted to try to make it special for him. She came over while he was asleep and decorated the house with tinsel and ornaments, with the permission of Mr. Bowen of course.

A fluffy blanket covered their bodies as they melted into each other. Ricky smirked as he looked at his girlfriend, "psst. Babe. Hey babe?" "Hmm?"

"If I were a snowman right now I'd be melting because you're so damn hot." Ella rolled her eyes and sighed loudly. "Ricky- I. You're a dork." He was cheesy, cliche romantic, but that was all she wanted.

Ella softly hummed along to the classic Rudolph song, as Ricky traced small shapes on her shoulder.

"Babe I want you to open your gift." Ella said, realizing it was almost midnight. She stood up and walked to her bag that was in the kitchen. Retrieving the envelope, she sat cross crossed in front of him. She handed him the gift, a smile etched on her face. He carefully ripped it open to reveal a Christmas card, inside it was a $500 gift card for Guitar Center.

His jaw dropped in disbelief, "there's no way." Ella nodded her head, "a while ago you said your guitar was starting to get iffy. So I decided to get you this so you can afford a new one and get some other stuff you need." He remained speechless as he stared at it. "I'm sorry it's not a lot-" Ricky tackled her in a hug. "Its so much more than you think it is." He smiled into her hair.

Ricky pulled back, handing her a square shaped gift with a bow on it. Unwrapping it from the paper, her heart melted at the sight of a scrapbook of them. The title was 'Rella... or Eicky? Rel?' Ella laughed as she wiped a tear that slipped away.

"Ricky you-" "cliche, I know." He laughed as she flipped through the pages. He had pictures of the two since day 1 till then, with small little captions about what was going on in some of the photos.

On the last page was their most recent photo they took together, both of them has cinnamon sugar on their faces after they smacked each other around with churros. The caption for that picture was 'I'm half a heart without you.' Ella smiled, closing the book and holding it up to her chest. "Red is gonna give you so much crap once he knows you made a scrapbook." She joked as Ricky groaned.

"Oh! Speaking of Red, he told me I should do this." Ricky pulled out mistletoe from behind his back and held it over their heads. Ella laughed at his gesture. "Yeah I figured you'd laugh but I mean I'm a hopeless romantic what else would I do-"

"You can just kiss me now." Ella winked, Ricky happily leaned in and passionately kissed his girlfriend, dropping the mistletoe so he could hold her face.

The two pulled away, laying back down in their original cuddling position. "Merry Christmas Ricky." He kissed the top of her head before holding her close to him, "Merry Christmas El."

A/n
I'm SO sorry I'm just now updating! My phone shattered (just my luck during quarantine) and I had to wait for my new phone to come.

Thank you to everyone who has read this story, I can't believe it already has 4k😭 I will be adding onto this book when season 2 of HSMTMTS comes out! Thank you all so much for this support, till next time!🖤