The alarm ripped through the quiet morning.

I woke up to pale sunlight bleeding through my curtains, catching the dust in slow motion. The world outside was still half asleep, and for a moment, I wished I was too.

My room was a map of forgotten days—

books I never finished, some unknown letters I never sent and a cracked photo frame facing down on the desk.

It smelled faintly of damp air and dust. Cold, lifeless, but an honest reflection.

I sat on the edge of the bed, staring at nothing.

The night before replayed like a half-remembered dream—the bridge, the voice, the girl with blonde shining hair.

Was she real? Or just a hallucination before the fall I never made?

The sink’s water was cold enough to sting.

The kind that makes you blink too hard and remember things you’d rather not.

Her face flickered in the back of my mind, that smile too bright for the darkness she stood in.

I dried my face and walked into the kitchen.

The usual breakfast waited for me—toast, eggs, and a small folded note beside the plate.

“Take care. I was worried last night. Don’t be a rebel so early, Dear.”

He’d gone to work already.

He always did.

But it wasn’t the missing presence that hurt—it was the note.

Because my father never said things like that out loud. Maybe he believed words spoken too directly could break the illusion, the “beautiful lie” that everything was fine.

So he wrote them down instead, like confessions he couldn’t bear to hear echo back at him. So I also never argued and went along with it.

I ate in silence. The eggs were warm, but the kitchen wasn’t. The morning was slow and quiet like some people hope for in their life- the ones who now understand reality of life.

And for some reason, that note felt heavier than any lecture about life ever could.

The school gates loomed like the start of another endless day.

" Ahh... Here we go again."

Students rushed past—laughing, arguing, living.

It always amazed me how they made life look so easy.

I slipped into class, took my usual seat by the window, and let the noise fade into background static.

Same old jokes. Same hollow excitement.

Until she walked in. In that background noise I heard a familiar voice and the world stilled. The same sweet fragrance from last night.

It was her.

The death-wish girl from the bridge.

But today, she was wearing the sun like a costume.

Her laughter filled the room, easy and bright, her movements graceful but grounded—too natural to be a dream.

Everyone greeted her like she’d always been part of this world.

They called her name, shared inside jokes.

As if she’d existed yesterday, and the day before, and forever before that.

Was I the only one who remembered her from the edge, the wind, the water below?

"Not noticing a girl like her in my class before is too much for me too... I guess."

I watched her laugh with a group near the window—one of them, Rika, the class chatterbox, joked about the weather; another, Kenji, the self-proclaimed comedian, tried to impress her and failed miserably. She smiled at them all, unbothered, radiant.

But when her eyes met mine, she paused.

And smiled—like she’d been waiting for this exact moment.

I looked away like I didn't care...but.

Because if I didn’t, I might’ve believed she was real.

Halfway through the first lecture, she spilled coffee across her desk.

A small chaos of paper towels and apologies followed.

She laughed softly, embarrassed, tucking a strand of blonde hair behind her ear.

For someone who had looked like an angel last night, she seemed so human now—awkward, clumsy, alive.

And for the first time in years, I smiled.

Barely—but it was there.

At lunch, she walked over to me.

“Hey,” she said, tapping my desk with her finger and tilting her head with wide innocent eyes.“You didn’t fall off the bridge after all.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Neither did you.”

“Guess that makes us both bad at endings.”

“Or too stubborn to finish them,” I said.

She grinned, and for a brief second, the classroom didn’t feel so suffocating.

Her friends called her back, but she lingered a moment longer.

“You still don’t believe in love, do you?”

“I believe in facts like gravity,” I muttered. “At least it’s honest when it pulls you down.”

She laughed, soft and genuine.

“Maybe love is just gravity in disguise,” she said, and walked away.

Her words stayed long after she left.

By the time classes ended, rain had started falling.

Thin, silver sheets blurred the world outside.

Most students groaned about getting wet. I didn’t care much 

I walked toward the door, umbrella in hand.

Then I saw her again.

She stood at the entrance, her hand reaching out into the rain, palm open like she was trying to feel the heartbeat of the sky.

Drops ran down her fingers, her hair, her smile—like the rain itself was drawn to her.

In that moment, surrounded by gray clouds and trembling light, she didn’t look out of place.

She looked above it—like something divine pretending to be human just long enough to remember what warmth felt like.

And I don’t know why,

but I couldn’t move.

Because even through the storm,

she still seemed to shine.