Iris, had never been much of a secretive person. She didn't like keeping secrets and she never found a reason for it. She especially told everything to Barry, her best friend. He made her feel comfortable and she always felt like she could tell him anything. Until she didn't, last year when she was re-arranging her closet, she moved a pair of shoes aside and saw a loose floorboard. Iris didn't think much of it at the time, but the next day she searched for the board and lifted it up, there was a small space underneath. She'd always enjoyed writing, it was part of the reason she joined yearbook, that and that she could make sure she and Barry were very prevalent in the book. Barry and her were in their sophomore year and last year, Barry only made it into the yearbook where his photo was and she could tell he was sad about it, so this year her mission was to get

She tried to move on, but she couldn't stop thinking about that hole in the floor. Maybe she could put something there? But what? And that was when the idea occurred to her. She always thought that diaries were kind of stupid, so she never kept one. But now, it's not like anyone would know and no one knew about her perfect hiding spot. So it was settled. The next time she went to the store, she found a nice small journal with flowers engraved on the front. Plus she really needed to tell someone what she couldn't tell anyone but now she was gonna write all about her crush on Barry Allen in her journal.

...

Iris rolled out of bed, while slapping her annoying alarm clock which proved ineffective. She'd slept through her alarm, but after she turned it off, she realized it was quiet, no footsteps, no shower running, no pouring milk. Was everyone else asleep? Oh god, they were gonna be late. Iris looked across the room and saw her diary sitting on the floor. Why hadn't she put it away? Then she remembered, she was writing last night and fell asleep on the floor around 1 am, she had turned off the light and hopped in bed, but she was extremely sleep deprived. She quickly lifted the floor board and placed the book underneath.

She crept down the hall to Barry's room "Barry, " she said lightly knocking on the door "Barry," she said again but a little louder. Still no response, she pushed the door open and there Barry Allen was completely asleep with his mouth hanging open. What was Barry doing last night, Iris thought to herself. Though Barry had a tendency to be late he always woke up early and got to school on time, usually cause he couldn't wait to partake in the chemistry course he had enrolled in. Part of her didn't want to wake him, he looked so peaceful in his sleep and they were probably going to be late at this point anyways. "Barry, wake up." she yelled, not noticing how loud she was.

"Wha-" Barry rolled off the bed with a thud, tangled in the covers.

"Oh my god Barry are you okay?" Iris said, covering her mouth in shock.

"What time is it." He groaned, rolling over and looking at the clock. His eyes widened when he saw the time.

They both quickly got ready, it would look so bad if they were late. Joe was in keystone for a few days completing an investigation and they insisted he didn't need to send grandma Ester over to watch them. On top of that, Joe would get a call if they were extremely late and that would just solidify his idea that they weren't responsible. They jumped up and tried to get ready quickly. After that, they ran and I mean literally ran to school. They slid into their classes unnoticed and were not marked late. Other than this morning the last few days had been pretty chill, they would just go to school grab some big belly burger end the day with a movie or something. Things were going pretty good.

...

The next day

"Barry, what's taking you so long?" Iris, called out impatiently leaning against the door frame. Barry was still upstairs shuffling through his closet in search of his favorite coat.

"I'll be there in a minute." He said, finally seeing it poking out behind one of his sweaters.

"Wait, Barry can you grab my boots."

"Yeah, where are they."

"In my closet."

He went into Iris's room and saw the boots in the back of her closet. When he lifted them, the floorboard underneath moved slightly and he noticed it was loose. Huh, that's strange, he thought to himself.

"Did, you find them?" She yelled up the staircase. Iris quickly glanced down at her watch and got worried, she really didn't want to be running to school again today. "Finally," she laughed as she saw Barry making his way down the stairs, carrying her boots.

They got ready and headed off to school. Iris was going on and on about who knows cause Barry wasn't paying attention. He was staring off into space, thinking about that floorboard and what could be underneath it. He had seen many documentaries of things like it, maybe the old owners of the house put gold or valuables there or maybe there was a key to a hidden safe in there or the possibilities were endless. What if-

"Barry." Iris snapped him out of his daydreaming.

"Yeah, what?"

"What are you looking at?" She asked, staring into the direction his eyes had wandered towards when he was deep in thought. But there was nothing there, just a couple houses and a small corner store.

"Oh nothing, I just uuuuuhhh got distracted, " he squeaked the last part.

"um, Okay." Iris said, still unsure of what he was saying being true, cause she knew that look. That was his thinking look, but he only did it when he was thinking about something intensely and he never did it while walking cause that would be a safety hazard. What was he thinking about that he didn't want to tell her?

Iris and Barry didn't have first period together, but they were in the same class for second, fourth and fifth. Before class, they both stopped at their lockers, which luckily weren't too far apart. That was also where Iris would meet up with her best friend, Linda, who was kind of a gossip but Iris didn't really mind. Iris walked up to her locker, where she found Linda already there with her foot propped up against the wall eyes glued to her phone. Which she put away when she saw Iris walk up.

"You wouldn't believe what I heard." Linda squealed.

"Let me guess someone stole someone else's boyfriend again?" Iris rolled her eyes, trying to remember her combination, cause the one she was putting in now wasn't working.

"No, actually it has to do with you"

"There's a rumor about me." Iris turned to Linda and her eyes were wide with terror. Rumors at their school spread like wildfire. No matter how untrue or unbelievable they were people would take them as fact and just keep the chain going.

"Calm down" she rubbed Iris' shoulder " I said it had to do with you, not that it was about you."

"What does it have to do with me?"

"Well, its about Barry."

"Oh god, what is it?"

"Well Becky has a crush on him." She said, looking past Iris's locker ,which she finally managed to crack, over to unsuspecting Barry who was at his locker, reading a book.

"Becky has a crush on everybody."

"Yeah, but she actually plans on asking him out."

"Who told you all of this?"

"You know, I have my sources"

"Okay whatever, why would I even care."

"You're gonna let Becky date Barry?" She said, actually sounding surprised.

"Yeah why not." She slammed her locker, a little bit louder than she would have liked.

"Cause you know, don't you like him?"

"What! No. why do you think that? No!" Iris had started freaking out. If Linda found out about this, the entire school would find out about it, she was a really good gossip.

"So it is true." She said slyly.

"You heard that somewhere?" Iris choked, a lump formed in her throat. Was there a rumor about her crush on Barry? She thought she was being pretty good about it, she never acted like she had a crush on him, right? Well she was always kind of affectionate but she was also just a touchy feely person.

But before she could keep freaking out Linda kept talking "No, I just always suspected it"

"Oh thank goodness." Iris said, leaning her head against her locker.

"Wait, so you do?" Iris opened her mouth to speak but Linda kept going, "you cannot deny it after that reaction." And Linda was right.

"Please don't tell anyone."

"Don't worry, your secret's safe with me."

Iris sighed in relief and they walked off to class.

After school, Iris had soccer practice so she didn't usually come home until almost two hours after school was finished. Barry took this as his chance to investigate the floorboard. He crept into her room, opened the closet and kneeled down. He lifted up the floorboard and underneath there was a little box. Inside were some bracelets and photos of Iris and her mom. That was when he realized he wasn't going to find any old treasure or anything like that cause the box was all that was down there and it was Iris's. Before putting it back he took a second to look at the photos in most of them she was a baby and her mom was holding her. She had passed when Iris was really young and she didn't remember much of her, it was nice that Iris had this, Barry thought. But then he noticed under the photos was a small journal, a diary perhaps? He opened the first page and it read Iris's diary. But he couldn't read that it would be a complete invasion of privacy, but it's not like she would know. He would put everything back where he found it and never speak of it. Barry still felt guilty, but he pushed it aside and opened the first page. Staring off it was pretty boring, more like a daily log than a diary, but then he found a bookmarked section near the back labeled Barry. Why was there an entire section devoted to him? His eyes widened when he realized the entire section was devoted to her crush on him.

4/12

I wish us going out to big belly burger was a date, cause it was kind of like one. The entire time I was just getting lost in his beautiful green eyes. And when he leaned in to hug me I just wish he would have kissed me. But maybe Barry will never like me, I feel so deep in the friendzone. But I'll take him in my life anyway I can get.

Iris had a crush on him, Barry thought to himself. But before he could think about it more he heard someone coming up the stairs. It was Iris, she was back from practice, he was so busy reading the journal, he hadn't heard her open the door. He put the box back and started thinking quickly, how could he explain being in her room. Would she think that he found the box? So he slipped into the closet and closed it.