The Ross siblings sat at a square table in the center of an underground cafe in Brussels. They had just finished an hour-long tour of the obscure art museum above the cafe. The art museum had been Ravi's pick. And although his siblings hadn't been that excited, they preferred it to the alternative of a history lecture he had suggested. Plus, when Emma found a post about musicians playing at the cafe occasionally, she voiced her hope that there may be hot guys there. Which gave Luke hope that there may be hot girls there. Zuri had only spoken of her craving for waffles.

"Dude, that girl keeps staring at you," Luke said, nudging Ravi with his elbow. He tipped his head forward in the direction of the rounded tables near the staircase leading up from the basement.

Ravi didn't bother looking in the direction Luke was indicating. His brother had played this trick on him a number of times before while they were traveling. Instead, Ravi broke apart one of the miniature waffles Zuri had ordered.

Zuri took a sip of her hot chocolate as she looked over at the girl at the round table. She scrunched her nose and said, "Gross. Luke's right. She is staring at you."

Ravi raised his eyebrow at his sister. Zuri didn't usually didn't participate in these sorts of pranks with Luke. She had also been nice to him all week because he had pushed for Emma and Luke to let her tag along instead of making her stay at the suite until their parents were done with their business meetings. His older siblings had argued that if they met anyone while they were out, they didn't want to be responsible for making sure Zuri got back to the hotel safely. Ravi hadn't thought it was fair, and he was also wise enough to know that their little sister would seek revenge for being left out.

"Aww, she's cute, Ravi," Emma said as she looked over at the girl in the long-sleeved teal shirt.

He hadn't meant to look over. He knew it was a prank. But he couldn't stop his gaze from lifting up from the waffle and in the direction his siblings were all looking. His face heated at the sight of her. She wasn't looking his way when he looked up. She was glancing down at her phone. But Emma was correct; she was cute.

"You should go over and talk to her," Emma suggested.

"What?" Ravi stammered as he gave an incredulous look to his sister.

"Yeah, go find out if she's got any cute friends," Luke said, hitting Ravi's arm with the back of his hand.

"If she does, they're not gonna want to date a guy with a foot fungus," Zuri said to Luke.

"That cleared up days ago!"

"You're so gross," Emma said, grimacing.

Ravi looked back over in the girl's direction. She was no longer looking at her phone, but right at him. He quickly looked away and said to his brother, "I don't think she's looking at me. Maybe she's looking at you, Luke."

"The ladies do tend to do that," Luke said smugly, wiggling his eyebrows.

"Double gross," Zuri said flatly before taking a bite of her delicious waffle. She hummed, "But this is delicious!"

"Whatever. Point is she's checking you out, Ravi," Luke said. He grinned as he stood up from the stool he was on. "Watch. I'll prove it."

"Here we go," Emma sighed. "How much do you want to bet he'll use this as a way to flirt with the barista?"

Luke strolled over from their table to the counter on the other side of the cafe. He leaned casually near the menu and winked at his brother. He pointed his finger in the direction of the stairs. Ravi fully expected to see the girl drooling over how cool Luke looked in the dimly lit cafe. But he was surprised to meet the girl's gaze as she stared directly at him. His instinct was to look up as if he were searching the ceiling for something. But when he looked back down the girl still had her eyes locked on him. He gave her a nervous smile before ducking his head to whisper to his sisters.

"Oh goodness, he's right. What should I do? What should I do!" he panicked.

"Calm down, for starters," Emma advised as she pushed her glass of water towards him.

"We already told you to go over there and talk to her," Zuri said.

Ravi nervously fidgeted with his hands. "What if she's just staring because there's something on my face? Or what if there's a language barrier? We're in another country. She might not even be from Brussels. She could be an international traveler. Quick download a translation app!" He shoved his phone into Zuri's hands.

Zuri furrowed her eyebrows at her brother. She shook her head and handed him back his phone. Without waiting for him to respond to her actions, she shouted across the cafe to the girl, "Hey, you speak English?"

A couple seated on the couch near the stage in the corner gave her disgruntled looks, but everyone else seemed too absorbed in their own conversations or desensitized to outburst.

"Sure do!" The girl shouted back brightly.

"Then come over here!" Zuri said. She pushed back her chair from the table as she waved the girl over.

Emma tried to diffuse the glare of the couch couple with a bright smile as she pushed her own seat away from the table.

"What are you doing?" Ravi asked in a panic. "Where are you going?'

"You've got this, Ravi," Emma said encouragingly.

"Make us proud," Zuri added with a light laugh.

His heart beat wildly in his chest as he watched his sisters leave the table. Both Ross sisters were giving him teasing grins and thumbs up. Zuri could only give one thumb up because she was holding her plate of miniature waffles. Ravi wanted to shout for them to come back but he couldn't find his voice. His eyes searched the cafe for Luke, but his brother was at the coffee bar chatting up the barista.

"Howdy, I'm Lou."

Ravi stared at the girl, who was now seated directly across from him. He couldn't believe his siblings had abandoned him. He gulped as the girl looked at him expectantly. He felt like the table had been much larger earlier. It was crowded with glasses and cups, but the distance between him and the cute stranger didn't seem like much.

"And you are…" She prompted.

"Oh, uh, Ravi," he said, flinging his hand across the table to shake hers. He didn't get the chance, however, because his hand knocked over an empty glass. He shakily tipped it back up and repeated, "I'm Ravi."

Ravi felt heat creep beneath his collar as Lou continued to stare unblinkingly at him. She leaned forward and he felt his stomach drop as if he were on a roller coaster.

"Your eyes…" She said as if mesmerized.

"My...my eyes?"

Ravi had never been on a roller coaster before. He tended to avoid things that were scary, no matter how thrilling they presented themselves as being. He had never understood the appeal of your heart racing or your tummy filling with butterflies. And he had escaped that feeling. Until now.

"Yeah, your eyes," Lou said as she rested her arms on the table as she leaned ever closer. "I mean, everything... just everything about you…"

Ravi was starting to worry now. Why would a complete stranger be so entranced without a motive? He made a mental note of where his wallet was and if he was wearing anything particularly expensive.

"When I walked in here," Lou continued, "I saw you immediately. And I knew…"

Ravi decided he didn't care if she was going to rob him. It was worth it. She had the most brilliant shades of green in her eyes. And the watch he was wearing he had borrowed from Luke anyway.

"You knew what exactly?" he asked.

"That you were him," she said with an awestruck smile.

There was a heavy pause. Ravi ignored the part of his brain telling him this was weird. Instead, he was seriously considering the demands of his heart, telling him to lean forward and kiss her like he's kissed something other than his pillow over the last seventeen years. It would be like something out of those romance movies that he watched with his sisters. Lou with the wide green eyes and brown hair that flowed over her shoulder had him under a spell. But it was broken with her next words.

"That guy from the painting!" Lou exclaimed as she leaned back in her chair. "Well, I mean, I know you're not the guy from the painting cause it's like a hundred years old. But you're the spittin' image of him."

Ravi's expression was a mix of shock, disappointment, and confusion. He folded his hands on the table. "Um, I don't follow?"

"The guy! From the painting!" she repeated as she pointed her thumb behind her in the direction of the staircase. At his blank look, she tapped on her phone and stood. She pulled the empty chair beside him closer to him and sat down so that their shoulders were touching. "See. From the museum."

Ravi ignored how warm her arm was against his. He focused on the picture she was showing him on her phone. He recognized it instantly because Zuri had brought their attention to the painting when they were at the museum earlier. The man in the picture did look like an older version of him, except the subject's hair was much longer and his shoulders were broader. Zuri had said Ravi and the painting had the "same dumb face." Emma had said the man had similarities to Ravi except "the guy in the painting was hot." Luke asked why the man was "dressed so stupid."

"Weird, huh," Lou said as she looked from Ravi to her phone. "Man, people in Europe dressed funky back in the day."

Ravi frowned at the image. This was not the reason he had hoped Lou was staring at him. He wasn't sure if this was worse or better than her trying to rob him. He considered explaining to her like he had explained to his siblings that the painting wasn't from hundreds of years ago but was a modern take on the rococo style of art and fashion by local artists.

"Sure," he said.

"It's the eyes. You've got the exact same look," Lou said in a friendly tone as she gazed at him.

Ravi wondered if it was the look of an idiot because that's how he felt. He decided that he needed to lay off the romance movies if he was going to be naive enough to believe a cute stranger in a cafe in Belgium was going to whisk him away on some romantic adventure because he had nice eyes.

Lou squinted at the image and then at Ravi. She added, "Same pretty eyelashes too."

"Yep, looks just like me," Ravi said with a disheartened chuckle. "Cool." He wanted to search the cafe for his siblings, but he didn't want to seem rude. So, he looked up from the image on the phone to look her in the eyes. His heart had calmed down, but seeing her smile at him was making it act up again.

"I wasn't keen on leaving the good ol' U.S. of A for the first time, but so far, I've been so lucky! The hostel my bestie picked out has the best breakfast. Tons of people speak English. And what are the chances I find a guy as good-looking as the one in the painting!" Lou said excitedly. Her face flushed and her eyes widened slightly. She mumbled, "Should've kept that last part to myself."

"I'm glad you didn't," Ravi said. His heart was back to running marathons. He didn't care much about the man in the painting looking like him. But if Lou thought he was good-looking, then that changed things. He smiled at her.

Lou's eyes lit up as she grinned back at him. She looked around the cafe for a moment and then turned back to him like she hadn't spotted what she was looking for. She said, "Hey, my friends are supposed to meet me here in like half an hour. If you have time, and your friends don't mind, do you want to go back up to the museum with me? I don't usually care much about art, but the paintings are really nice… and seeing you… It's kinda like a sign, right?"

"You want to hang out with me?" Ravi asked dumbstruck.

"If I haven't freaked you out. My frenemy Hazel says I come on too strong, but she's one to talk. You'll get what I mean when you meet her cause she'll be drooling over Xander. Xander's my bestie." She took a breath and chuckled nervously. "Why am I telling you all this?"

Ravi couldn't believe it, but Lou actually looked shy. She had so boldly stared at him and walked over that he would have been certain that shyness was not an issue for her. But there she was, tucking her hair behind her ear and looking up at him from beneath her eyelashes. He felt that if someone so obviously brave could be nervous, then someone nervous could be brave.

"I don't think you come on too strong," he said. He leaned slightly to the side where their shoulders were connected. "I'd love to go to the museum with you."

"Great!" Lou said, the confidence back in her voice and her posture. She stood from the table and grabbed his wrist. "Let's get a move on. I think the gallery closes soon."

Ravi was used to being dragged around by his sisters, so he wasn't bothered by the contact. Not that he would have been bothered anyway because duh cute girl. His pace was slower, though, as he scanned the cafe for his siblings. He wanted to let them know where he was going, but as they approached the stairs, he realized something. His jaw dropped.

"My family ditched me!" he said.

Lou stopped and let go of his wrist. She looked around the cafe and then frowned at him. "Those people you were with earlier? Yeah, I don't see um. Do you need to find them? I can help," she said sweetly.

"That's so nice," Ravi said as he gazed at her with a dopey smile. He couldn't believe he thought she was going to rob him. "No, it's okay. The rule was if one of us meets someone the other has to make sure Zuri gets home safe and to text every hour."

"Oh, okay," Lou said with a shrug. "Here I'll put a timer on my phone. I mean, in case you want to hang out some more when my friends get here. They're really nice… Well, one of them is nice."

"Sure, thanks," he replied. He didn't mention that he was wearing a watch and could just check the time. But honestly, he wanted to know more about her than what time it was.

He watched her set up the timer and then look up at him. He wondered if she would take his wrist again, but she stood there staring at him.

"You must've really liked that painting," he said with a small smile.

"Sorry," she blinked and gave him that shy look again. "You've just got really nice eyes. Easy to get lost in." She took an audible breath and her confident expression returned. She linked her arm casually with his and asked, "So, you said that was your fam? Do y'all live in Brussels? I'm here on a trip with..."

As Lou continued talking as they made their way up the stairs to the museum, Ravi wondered if the roller coaster feeling or the urge to kiss this stranger would ever stop.