Valentine’s Day is the perfect excuse to admit your love to the crush you’ve been pining over for months. But without the proper research and preparation, your heart will pay the price.

Take, for example, the cautionary tale of Wilhelmina Brooks, an SCHS sophomore. She stayed up late preparing a batch of sweets from her grandmother’s peanut butter cookie recipe, passed down for generations and assured to be the best one out there.

It took Brooks weeks to gather the courage to approach the boy of her dreams, a classmate since elementary school where she was nothing but a shy, braces-clad video game fan. She has since blossomed, ready to put herself “out there” in the dating world.

Brooks offered the container to James, her hands trembling. She was shocked when he smiled – and even more shocked when, having taken a bite, he went into anaphylactic shock and cursed her name on his way to the hospital, strapped uncomfortably to a stretcher.

Elsewhere on campus, varsity soccer player Nathaniel Oglethorpe proofreads more diligently than he never has for an English essay. He wipes nervous sweat from his forehead, stepping into his math class and unfolding the crinkled paper, addressing to “the most beautiful girl I’ve ever laid eyes on,” Oglethorpe explained.

Oglenthrope stammered as he poured his heart out to her, explaining how her helping him understand long division unlocked something deep within his own heart. His hands shook like startled rattlesnakes as he ended with a hesitant proposal to the Sadie Hawkins dance.

He was greeted with a scowl, an intimidatingly buff upperclassman putting his arm protectively around the girl’s shoulders.

Our last cautionary tale comes from senior Janet Dubai. Waiting for the man of her dreams to ask her on a date, but too scared to approach him herself, she stands by the sidelines as Jacquelin Romanoff strolls confidently through the halls, ukulele in hand, feeling faint when he winks at her.

As lunch begins, she sees him walk towards her locker, a stunning bouquet of roses in hand and an anxious expression on his face. She stops at the end of the hallway, waiting to see his next move until the moment her heart falls through the floor in despair.

Heartbroken, she watches as he tapes roses to the locker next to hers and walks away nervously, a white-knuckled grip on his Jansport backpack.

Dubai has no idea the note taped next to the flowers begins with “Dear Janet,” and that her man is, in fact, just bad at remembering locker numbers.

Though these love-struck individuals never crossed paths, their stories are connected in ways that can only be blamed on some divine power.