The next few days passed not like moments, but like wounds—each second slow, stinging, and impossible to ignore.
I didn't speak to Anna. I didn't speak to Yamada.
And they didn't speak to me either.
But they didn't have to.
Their silence carried everything they didn't say. It floated in the air between our desks, sharp and suffocating. It echoed in the glances they shared when they thought I wasn't looking, in the way they smiled in front of the class, pretending everything was normal.
But I knew better.
I saw through every grin. Every fake chuckle. Every moment when Yamada tried too hard to seem relaxed, or when Anna nervously tucked her hair behind her ear whenever she passed me. The truth—my truth—had scorched away my illusions, and now, I saw everything in high clarity.
At first, I sat alone during lunch.
Not because I wanted to, but because my heart needed space. People whispered when I walked by. Maybe it was curiosity. Maybe rumors had already started—twisted words, shaped to make me the villain of someone else's story.
I could almost hear it:
He's overreacting.
Maybe he didn't treat Anna right.
Yamada wouldn't do something like that. They were best friends.
But I didn't care. Not anymore. Let them believe whatever made them sleep easier at night. Because unlike them, I wasn't sleeping much at all.
That was when Ruri sat beside me again.
Same sakura tree. Same silence.
She didn't say hello. She didn't ask how I was. She just opened her sketchbook and began to draw.
I glanced over.
Not at the drawing, but at her. She looked… still. Steady. Like a lake before a storm. I envied that stillness. My insides were anything but.
"I heard someone from the front row whisper about us," she said eventually, her pencil moving smoothly across the page.
"Us?"
"Yeah," she replied, eyes locked on her drawing. "They said the gloomy girl found a gloomy boy, and now they're drawing manga love stories together."
I chuckled. Not because it was funny—but because I realized I didn't care what they said. For the first time in a while, I felt real.
"What were you drawing?" I asked.
She tilted her sketchbook slightly so I could see.
It was a rough sketch, but recognizable. A boy sitting under a tree, slumped forward, his expression blank but his shadow looked... alive. Writhing. Angry. Broken.
"You draw me like a tragic protagonist," I said.
She shrugged. "Only tragic protagonists become the strongest by the end."
I didn't know what to say to that, so I just looked away—out at the yard, the sky, anything to hold back the emotion rising in my throat.
After school, I walked alone again.
Until I heard my name.
"Raido!"
I turned.
Anna was standing behind me, hands clutched in front of her, nervously twisting her fingers. She looked like she was carrying a storm inside her.
"What is it?" I asked, my voice flat. I wasn't angry anymore. Just… tired.
"I just…" she struggled to speak, searching for words that wouldn't come. "I didn't mean for it to happen the way it did. Yamada—he—he was always there, and I was confused, and—"
"Don't," I cut her off. "Don't try to explain it now. You had your chance."
"I just thought we could still be friends," she said softly.
The audacity of that statement hit me like cold rain. Friends?
"Friends?" I repeated, my voice quiet but sharp. "You think after everything, we could go back to pretending?"
Her eyes filled with tears, but this time, I didn't reach out. I didn't comfort her. Because now I knew: just because someone cries, doesn't mean they're the victim.
"You made your choice, Anna. And I made mine. It ends here."
I turned to walk away.
She called after me, but I didn't look back.
My heart hurt, yes. It ached with every step. But for the first time, I wasn't running from it. I was carrying it forward.
The next morning, I stood in front of the mirror and stared at my reflection. I saw someone I barely recognized. Not because I was changing how I dressed or styled my hair. But because the person staring back at me looked less like a boy lost in betrayal—and more like someone about to rebuild.
When I reached class, Ruri was already there.
This time, she smiled first.
"Morning, Raido," she said.
"Morning, Ruri," I answered, and as simple as it was, that exchange held something solid—something kind.
During lunch, we sat under the tree again. No one approached us. A few whispered. But their words didn't pierce like before. They just… faded into the wind.
That afternoon, Ms. Reika gave us a creative writing prompt:
"Describe a moment when you realized the truth—about someone, or about yourself."
I stared at the prompt for a long time.
Then I began to write.
And I wrote everything.
About the moment I saw them. About the conversations that followed. About how the truth shattered me… and then slowly began to set me free.
I didn't write it for a grade. I wrote it for me.
Because the truth wasn't the end.
It was the first flame in a world I hadn't dared to shape yet.
And now?
Now, I had the matches.