Rapunzel came running into her house, throwing her school bag on the ground and kicking her shoes off before running up the stairs to her parents. "Mom, dad, did you hear the news?!" she questioned excitedly.

"That it's going to be in the 30's tomorrow?" her dad questioned, actually confused about what Rapunzel was trying to get at.

Rapunzel rolled her eyes, disappointed with his answer. "Ugh, no." she took a deep breath before continuing. "About the surgery for our hearts." she said. Her parents were a little concerned about how happy she sounded when saying that.

"Not this again, Rapunzel." said Rapunzel's mother.

"I know, I know. It sounds crazy. But I want to do it. You two of all people know how bad I've wanted something like this."

Rapunzel heard it from people at her school. Apparently doctors finally found a way to remove the glow of a soul mate from ones heart.

"I still don't understand why you wouldn't want such a lovely gift. How are you ever going to find your soul mate if your heart doesn't glow when you're near them?" said Rapunzel's father.

"I'll know. I don't need my heart to tell me. I can find it out on my own."

Her mother sighed. "Rapunzel, you're only 16. And then there's the money for the surgery..."

"I'm more than old enough, and it's not that much. I already thought about it. Besides, I can pay for it. I've been saving up my money for years for my first car but, well, this is more important to me."

Her parents looked at each other. They didn't say anything, they both knew how the other felt about this situation.

"Please. Everything will go smoothly. And I know I will never regret this. Promise." Rapunzel added. "You both know I never break my promises."

Her parents went off into another room to discuss the matter more before deciding what they were going to do. Rapunzel's heart was beating fast, she was nervous. More than anything she wanted them to say yes. She knows it's weird, and that she's asking for a lot, but this is important to her.

Her parents finally came out of the room. She tried to read their answer before they said anything by looking at their faces, but their expressions were the same. She couldn't make out how they felt or what they could be thinking.

"We'll let you go through with the surgery." the agreed.

Rapunzel jumped up in excitement and ran to her parents, throwing her arms over their shoulders and hugging them both. "Thank you! We won't regret this, I know it!"

A month later Rapunzel went through with the surgery. Everything went smooth and she recovered fast. Rapunzel's heart would no longer glow, and she couldn't be happier.

It's now two years later and Rapunzel walked into her school, kicking snow off her shoes and untangling her scarf. Her cheeks were rosy from the cold wind.

"Ay, Punz!" her curly redheaded friend named Merida shouted from her locker.

Rapunzel waved then walked up to her. opening up her locker which was right next to Merida's and put her school bag in there all nice and neat, unlike Merida who throws her bag right into her locker.

"Can you believe how much it snowed over the weekend?" Merida asked while digging for her History book.

"That doesn't surprise me. What surprises me is that we still had school today. Our school district just loves seeing us suffer." said Rapunzel, somewhat joking.

"At least someone enjoys the snow." Merida pointed over to a boy with white hair who was throwing snowballs at a brunette male, who didn't seem to enjoy the snow as much.

"Who, Jack? Well, I guess it's expected for someone with the last name Frost." the girls laughed playfully.

Merida finally found her book and the girls decided to head off to their class before the bell rang.

Later in the day it was lunch and the girls were at their table eating their food. Rapunzel was just about done with hers.

"I'm going to go put my tray away, I'll be right back." said Rapunzel

"I'll be here." Merida added.

Rapunzel got up and started walking over to where all the dirty dishes were. On her way there she tripped, her tray slipped out of her hand and went flying. Rapunzel closed her eyes. The cafeteria was filled with students and she knew she was going to feel super embarrassed after her tray hit the ground.

It was a few seconds later but she never heard the sound of her tray slamming against the ground, so she opened her eyes to see what was going on.

There was a tall male standing in front of her with brown hair, holding her tray. "Uh, I think you dropped this." he said.

"Ah, wow, thanks for catching that. That would have been so embarrassing." they both shared a small laugh, trying to block out the awkward situation.

"Look, I'll just put this away for you. We wouldn't want you to trip again or something. Names Flynn, by the way. And you're Rapunzel, right?"

"Yeah, I-" Rapunzel stopped talking when something else caught her attention. She could hardly make it out through his shirt, but it was there; a faint red glow coming from his chest. The same glow that appears when you're beside your soul mate.

Flynn looked down where Rapunzel was staring and noticed the glow himself. "Oh, this-" Rapunzel cut him off.

"I, uhm, I have to go. My friend is waiting for me." Rapunzel backed away slowly until she turned around and ran towards Merida's direction, almost bumping into a girl on the way. She apologized but continued running.

"Mer, let's go. I need to get to class early."

Merida could tell Rapunzel seemed rushed, but didn't know why. She shrugged and got up without asking questions. Leaving her tray on the lunch table for someone else to pick up.

The rest of the day Merida noticed Rapunzel was only focusing on the clock during class. Why did she seem so distracted? Merida remembered whenever she looks at the clock it's usually because she's watching the time waiting for the bell to ring, so she safely assumed Rapunzel wanted to go home asap.

The day was finally over. Rapunzel was at her locker putting her books in her bag before Merida could get her own locker open.

"Okay, what's bothering you?" Merida was finally curious enough to ask.

"Nothing. I just want to go home. Oh, uh, I'm not taking the bus home today. I'm going to walk."

"What? you're crazy. The snow hasn't stopped yet. You'll be buried before you even get home."

"It's safer than being on the roads right now. And Flynn rides our bus. I don't want to-" she stopped herself. "It's nothing. I just feel like walking. I'll text you later." Rapunzel shut her locker door and wrapped her scarf around her neck. "See ya'." she was already walking away before Merida could respond.

Half way home Rapunzel found herself sitting on a yellow bench staring at a frozen pond. It was quiet. She needed to sit and relax. There was too much on her mind. She didn't want to go home because she knew her parents would ask her about school and how her day went. She did want to vent a little, just not to her parents. Not to anyone she knew, because she already knew what they would say. I told you so.

Her quiet was disturbed when a snowball came and hit her in the arm, followed by a white-haired male running up to her.

"Sorry, sorry. That was an accident, I swear. I kinda threw that snowball without thinking, and before I realized, it was heading right towards you. Sorry, again." said the male.

Rapunzel smiled. "It's fine, honestly." she pushed the snow off her coat sleeve with her hand. "You might want to pay more attention next time, thought."

"Yeah, I will." he looked around a bit. "Are you waiting for someone?" he asked.

"Oh, no, sorry. Do you normally hang around here? I'll leave, it's no problem. I should start heading home, anyway." Rapunzel started to get up and reached for her bag that was taking up the sitting space next to her, but before she could do this, the male grabbed the bag and took its place, sitting next to Rapunzel.

"I'm Jack."

Rapunzel sat back down, confused. "I'm Rapunzel..." she said, a little surprised with his sudden introduction.

"What's bothering you? Not many people come to the park in the middle of a snow storm just to stare at a frozen pond." he said, sarcasm attacking his words.

"It's stupid." Rapunzel commented. Yet for some reason, she really did want to talk about it to him.

"I doubt that."

"Would you really listen?"

"All night if I have to. Just go for it; vent it all out."

Rapunzel sighed, but took his offer. "Okay, well... I found my soul mate today."

"And that's a bad thing?" Jack chuckled a little.

"Yeah. I mean, no, yes? I don't know. It shouldn't be. I should be happy, but I'm not. You see, a few years ago I did that whole surgery thing to take out the glow in my heart."

"You actually went through with that?" he questioned. Rapunzel looked down a bit. "Sorry, keep going."

"It's not that I don't want to find my true love or anything. It's just... Everyone's stories end the same. It's always "And when our hearts glowed at the same time, we knew it was meant to be.". Which is cute and everything, but I just wanted something different. I wanted to find out what true love was on my own. I guess I wanted to change my ending a bit. But before I knew it, Flynn's heart was glowing."

"Sounds tough." Jack commented.

"I should have known you wouldn't understand."

"I understand completely. Why should we be told who we love before we even get to know the person? This whole glowing heart thing is a little overrated in my opinion."

"Right?!" Rapunzel got excited and couldn't help but smile.

Jack laughed but quickly covered his mouth to try to hide it.

"What's so funny?" Rapunzel glared a little.

"You get excited easily." he moved his hand to show a smile. "It's kinda cute."

Rapunzel blushed at his comment then looked away. "It's actually annoying. I do it without realizing. Sorry."

"Don't apologize for something like that."

There was a pause of awkward silence between the two.

"So, uh... Has your heart ever...?" Rapunzel asked bashfully.

"Me? Nahh." his answer was quick.

"I guess it's not surprising. Some people don't bump into their soul mate until they're 50."

"Mine probably lives half way across the world." said Jack. They both shared a laugh.

"Mine probably-" Rapunzel paused when she remembered Flynn. "Oh, that's right..."

"Do you not like Flynn?" Jack asked calmly.

"I don't know. That's the point. Just because his heart glowed I'm supposed to spend the rest of my life with him? What if I don't like the same movies as him? What if he's always busy and we hardly get to talk? What if he's into different things than me and we have nothing in common?" Rapunzel took a deep breath. "I just wanted it to be different. I wanted to fall in love with someone slowly. Taking away my glow was pointless."

"Then don't get with him." Jack commented.

"What?"

"Don't get with him. Tell him you don't want to be with him."

"But what if he's perfect for me? Well, apparently he is but..."

"If he's your soul mate I'm sure you'll bump into him again someday. But for now, why not take it slow? You don't have to get together right this second, right?"

"You're right... Yeah" Rapunzel confirmed it with herself. "I'll talk to him tomorrow. I shouldn't keep avoiding him, anyway. That's a little harsh."

Rapunzel got up and Jack handed her bag to her. "Thanks for today. Talking to you really helped me out. I feel a lot better now.

Jack smiled. "Anytime." and after that, Rapunzel started walking home again. Jack watched her, his smile slowly fading away.

The next day at school Rapunzel and Merida were at their lockers, Rapunzel was digging through her bag looking for her Math book. "Where is it? This is bad."

"We have different Math teachers so I can't help you there." Merida said, closing her locker.

"My Math teacher hates when people come unprepared. He yells at us in front of the class if they do that. I can't handle that embarrassment." Rapunzel was getting nervous, digging through her locker some more.

"Take mine." Jack came walking up holding his Math book out to Rapunzel.

Rapunzel turned around to see him. "Jack- But you'll get in trouble. I couldn't."

"Don't worry about it. I listened to everything you had to say yesterday. Consider it paying me back. Just take my book."

"You two are friends?" asked Merida, awkwardly standing in the middle of this.

Rapunzel ignored Merida's comment. "Are you sure?" she asked.

"Positive. It's not like it's the first time I'll be getting yelled at by the teacher in front of the class. I can handle it."

Rapunzel laughed and took the book. "Thank you."

Jack smiled. Merida raised a brow, looking at the two. "Uh." The bell rang. Jack and Rapunzel quickly went on their way to Math. "...Okay?" Merida shook her head then went off in the other direction to her class.

Jack was in the middle of getting lectured by the teacher. Rapunzel was covering her mouth with her hands trying not to laugh while Jack was making funny faces to her, implying the teacher talks a lot.

The teacher finally stopped talking and asked Jack to take a seat, which he did. Jack then turned to Rapunzel and gave her a thumbs up. Rapunzel laughed quietly, smiling, then looked down at the math book Jack let her borrow, trying not to get more distracted.

It was finally lunch once more when Rapunzel spotted Flynn across the room. She took a deep breath and made a brave face, walking up to him.

Flynn saw her. "Hey, Rapunzel. I've wanted to talk to you. Listen-" Rapunzel cut him off. She seemed to like doing that.

"Yeah, I know. We're soul mates. And I'm happy with the offer, really, but I don't want to do anything about it. Maybe in the future, but for now I just want to figure things out on my own. I hope you understand." she stood there confidently waiting for his reply. Some students around them over-heard and were staring at the two.

Flynn looked shocked. "I wanted to talk about that, too. I really wish you would have let me speak first. This is awkward."

Rapunzel was confused. "What are you talking about?"

"You left before I could explain yesterday. I was kinda hoping you didn't notice. Anyway, about the whole glowing heart thing, it wasn't for you." Flynn said, trying to put it as nicely as possible to not embarrass her.

"I don't understand." Rapunzel's face was turning red. She just then realized a lot of people were staring at them. Some were even laughing in the distance. She tried not to look around and kept her focus on Flynn.

"There was a girl behind you when we were talking yesterday. She's, uh, well." he was carrying the topic on trying to think of a decent way to put all this. Eventually he decided to just be straight forward about it. "That girl is my soul mate, not you. She was the reason my heart was glowing. I'm really sorry for the confusion.
Rapunzel stood there trying to take everything in. Her face get more red every second. She heard people chatting behind her and could only assume they were talking about her. She tried to keep her cool. "Y-yeah, I knew that" she stuttered "I was just joking, haha..." she grabbed a strand of her hair and played with it by habit, sliding her fingers through the strands. She felt her body burning up from embarrassment and began to mumble. "It was nice talking about this. I'll s-see you around." Rapunzel finally turned around and got herself out the lunch room. She wanted to leave unnoticed, but all eyes were on her as she left.

When she got back to class she told the teacher she wasn't feeling well and he sent her to the nurse. She hid in there for the rest of the school day. After, she stalled in the bathroom for twenty minutes until she knew all the students who took buses home were gone. Including Merida.

"Looks like I'll be walking home again." she mumbled to herself. She got to her locker and put on her coat. She forgot her scarf today. She couldn't wait to go home and put this day behind her.

On her way home she stopped by the yellow bench. Jack came to mind and she couldn't stop thinking about him. All she could think was how badly she wanted to talk to him. He made things seem okay. "Ah!" she had a sudden thought about Math and quickly slid her school bag strap off her shoulder and dropped her bag into the snow, opening it and digging around a bit until she found Jack's math book. "I have to go give this back to him. Maybe he's still at the school. I'll just go back and-." she took a second to actually think things through. "What am I thinking? There's no way he's still there." She picked her bag back up and threw it over her shoulder.

She took one last look at the frozen pond and bench before continuing her way home.

Later that night before Rapunzel went to bed she was doing some last-minute homework. Math, of course. She started flipping through the pages trying to find the page they were assigned to do. While flipping, a piece of paper fell out of the book.

She picked the paper up and unfolded it. It was a doodle of a girl and a guy sitting on yellow a bench. There were names under them. "Jack and Rapunzel.". she laughed to herself. "Did Jack draw these?"

She unfolded the last part of the paper and realized there was more. One small sentence. his handwriting was sloppy and his doodle wasn't too perfect, either. But reading it made her smile like she never has before. Her cheeks were red as she read it over and over.

"Her smile is the cutest thing."

Rapunzel laid in bed completely forgetting about her math work. She'd do it in the morning before school. Right now she only wanted to think about one thing, and that was indeed the only thing she was thinking about; Jack.

She couldn't stop thinking about him. She couldn't stop smiling while doing so. She would picture all his cute quirks in her head. His half-smile, the way he'd look at her while she was talking to him about stupid things, the way he's always there for her whether it's to let her vent or lend her a math book. Everything.

"Is this what it's like to fall for someone?" she asked herself but didn't want to think too much about it. She closed her eyes and forgot about it.

She held the piece of paper close to her heart. Eventually dozed off and fell asleep without realizing it. In her sleep, she was still clutching the paper tight and close.

The next day Rapunzel was able to return Jack's math book. They had a short conversation before class but she didn't bring up the piece of paper. All day during school Rapunzel couldn't wait for it to end. She wanted to ask Jack if it would be okay to walk home together.

At the end of the day Rapunzel was already leaving her locker before Merida even got to hers.

"What's the rush?" Merida asked. "I hope you're not avoiding me. Are you really walking home again?"

Rapunzel smiled. "Of course not. It's just- I recently realized how nice it is to walk home. Busses are too loud, and stuff. I would never ignore you."

"I hope you're not keepin' anything from me." Merida snickered, somewhat joking around.

Rapunzel stopped and looked at Merida. She didn't realize it until now, but she has kept Merida out of the loop. She didn't want that. "I want to see Jack, actually. That's why I'm walking home. I'm hoping I'll bump into him on the way. I don't really know why... I just want to talk to him."

"The snow lover? I thought somethin' was going on. Well, 'hope all goes well. Text me how it goes."

Rapunzel waved and ran out the door getting an "I will!" in before she was too far away.

Rapunzel was sitting at the yellow bench again. She wondered why she never bothered to stop here before; it was a beautiful sight. She figured if she waited for a few minutes, Jack would show up. And he did. Rapunzel stood up quickly and waved to him.

"Fancy meeting you here." she said playfully.

"Were you waiting for me?" Jack asked.

"Well when you put it that way it sounds kind of stalkerish."

Jack laughed. "I have no complaints."

Rapunzel stood there, playing with her fingers awkwardly. There was a small pause of silence between the two.

"Want to go get some hot chocolate or something? It's pretty cold out." Jack broke the silence.

"That's simple." she thought, and she didn't want anything more. "That would be perfect."

They both went off to the closest coffee shop, and each got a hot chocolate to go. It was too crowded inside for them. I guess no one wanted to be outside at the time.

Rapunzel took a sip of her hot chocolate too soon and burned her tongue. She didn't want Jack to know, so she tried to keep a cool face. Jack was laughing and Rapunzel looked over at him.

"Burn your tongue?" he asked.

she sighed. "Yeah." she then let out a laugh, and jack did the same.

They went back to the yellow bench. Jack's hot cocoa was gone, but Rapunzel's was still half full. She decided to take slow sips in fear of burning her tongue once more. At least, she thought that was the reason. in truth, she just wanted any excuse to stay with Jack a little longer.

Jack finally spoke up. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Rapunzel was confused.

"I heard people at school talking about it. About what happened between you and Flynn." he added.

"Oh.." Rapunzel's voice was quiet. "I can't say it hasn't been bothering me, but I can say it's bothering me a lot less than I thought it would. I guess something better has distracted me." she hinted about his note in the math book.

"Are you sure? I feel a little at fault."

"Why would it be your fault?"

"Because I-" he paused and sighed before continuing. "I was the one who told you to talk to him about it."

"I would have done it either way. Don't put any blame on yourself."

He sighed again but didn't want to drag this on any longer. "So you're okay?"

"I'll be fine. I think I'm over it, anyway. I have other things on my mind."

"Like what?"

Rapunzel kept quiet. This was probably the one thing she couldn't talk to him about. Not yet. Jack took the silence as a hint that she wasn't going to talk about it.

Jack stood up and walked behind her. He grabbed some snow and formed it into a ball. Rapunzel turned around to see what he was doing, and as she was turning the snowball hit her back.

"What was that for?" she asked playfully.

"C'mon, it's fun." Jack knelt to get some more snow for another snowball. While he was standing back up, a snowball coming from Rapunzel's direction hit him in the chest. He looked over at her and she smiled innocently.

"Now it's on."

Rapunzel tried to hide behind the bench and use it as a shield. "I bet you can't even hit me!" she laughed.

The snowball fight went on for almost and hour. Both of them were now laying in the snow where they made snow angels, staring at the sky as it got darker.

"Today was fun." said Rapunzel.

"I'm glad you think so." Jack replied.

Rapunzel heard voices and looked over in that direction. It was a couple. They were happy, laughing together. She could tell just by looking at them that they were soul mates, destined to each other by the glow of their hearts. She sat up and looked at the ground.

"Rapunzel." said Jack, his voice was calm.

"Yeah?"

"I like you. I want you to know that."

Rapunzel smiled at what he said. But it didn't take long for that smile to change to a frown. She stayed silent for a few seconds before getting up. "I have to go home."

Jack sat up. "Why?"

"Dinner's probably ready." she lied. Her parents wouldn't be home until late that night.

"...Alright." Jack understood. Rapunzel wanted to leave and he didn't want to force her to stay. And she did. Rapunzel was gone before he could stop her.

When Rapunzel got home she went up to her bedroom and called Merida.

"Hey, Punz. Something up?"

"I like him."

Merida was silent for a second but soon spoke up. "Then why do you sound so upset?"

The next day at school Rapunzel made her conversations in the halls with Merida quick to avoid running into Jack. In math she went to the nurse and stalled there for the hour. All day she did whatever she could to avoid Jack. At the end of the day, she took the bus home with Merida.

When she got home she went straight to her room. Her phone was off. She laid on her floor and stared blankly at her ceiling, trying hard to not think about Jack. Yet at the same time, she wasn't doing anything to distract herself from him, either.

She turned over and saw the note on her floor. The one from Jack's math book. She looked at it for a while until she finally decided to get up and go to the yellow bench. She was sure Jack would be here. She had to talk to him.

Rapunzel walked up to the bench. Jack was there, just as expected. "Hey." she mumbled.

Jack turned around to see her. "Rapunzel."

Rapunzel forced a smile. Jack knew it was fake; her normal smile was much more genuine. She stopped where she was, staying behind the bench.

"Please don't ignore me." Jack said. He looked so upset, it was hard for Rapunzel to look at him.

"I'm sorry." her voice was quiet. She could hardly look him in the eyes.

Jack stood up and walked toward her, now standing in front of her."I'm sorry about yesterday. Please forget I said anything."

That was it. She really couldn't look him in the eyes now. She looked down, hiding her pained expression. "I like you, too." she whispered. Jack could barely make out what she said.

"Then why-" Rapunzel cut him off for the last time.

"I didn't think falling in love would hurt. Everyone was right, I should have never taken the glow out of my heart. I thought it was just something that got in the way of true love. In reality, it was really just here to protect us from falling in love with the wrong person."

"I'm sorry... I don't think I understand what you're trying to say." He was worried. He just wanted to hold her. He didn't like seeing her so upset. But he knew his limits.

Rapunzel looked up at him, tears were pooling in her eyes, but refused to fall. "I'm not allowed to love you." she had to force those words out, her voice cracked while doing so. "You have someone out there for you. I want to be selfish, I want to be with you and have you to myself but I won't do that. Your soul mate is somewhere out there, waiting for you. Your hearts will glow and you'll forget all about whatever feelings you had for me." A few tears finally fell. "I can't take you from your true love. I'm sorry I ever even thought about it. I-" Rapunzel stopped talking when she noticed a smile on Jack's face.

She wanted to yell at him for not taking her seriously but couldn't bring herself to do it. Jack moved closer to her. "How can you be-" Jack cut Rapunzel off this time by placing his lips gently against her own, raising his hand to her left cheek, cuffing her face with care. His eyes were closed but Rapunzel's were open with shock. Eventually her eyes closed so she could enjoy the moment. She couldn't bring herself to pull away; she didn't want to. Finally, Jack pulled away and looked at her. "I love you, Rapunzel." he whispered.

Rapunzel mumbled. "It's not fair... What about your soul mate?" She wanted to yell at him more but couldn't stop thinking about what just happened. She wanted to hate him but couldn't bring herself to that. Mostly, she wanted him to do it again.

Jack gave a chuckle and smiled at her. She didn't understand why he would be laughing. "It's not funny." she forced.

Jack unzipped his winter Jacket. "It sucks having to wear so many layers of clothing during winter, huh?"

"W-what are you doing?" Rapunzel felt her cheeks become warm but couldn't look away.

Jack pulled up his thick hoodie that was under his jacket to show his bare skin. Rapunzel was confused, but then she saw it. The red glow coming from Jack's chest. She could only see it, but it felt warm and comforting.

Jack pulled his hoodie back down. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you." Rapunzel was silent, so Jack continued to talk. "You said you wanted to fall in love slowly. You wanted to know the person before knowing your fate with them. I wanted you to have that. I wasn't going to tell you until you were to admit you liked me. Everything that happened between us wasn't because of some glowing light. It was real, Rapunzel. You fell in love with me all on your own."

She didn't want to take her eyes off him. She was happy and couldn't help but smile big. This entire time she kept fearing that she would lose Jack before being able to fully fall in love with him. She didn't want to lose him to someone else before he was even hers. She thought she was being selfish, but this whole time, she was wrong. It was okay to fall in love with him. He was her perfect imperfection, and she was his.

"There's that smile."

She rolled her eyes playfully then leaned up and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, pulling herself close to him in a tight embrace.

Jack wrapped his arms around her waist, keeping her close and smiled. "Are you okay with your ending?"

"It's just beginning."