It had been building for days—the suffocating weight, the gnawing thoughts, the overwhelming sense of failure. You tried to distract yourself: music, scrolling, cleaning. Nothing worked. The noise in your head grew louder, until it was impossible to ignore.

Every little thing felt like a reminder. The unfinished homework on your desk stared back, a glaring symbol of everything you couldn’t handle. The mirror reflected a face you barely recognized, lined with exhaustion and doubt. It all felt like too much. You’d tried to push through, to convince yourself it would get better, but you didn’t believe it.

You curled up in bed, pulling the blanket over your head to block everything out. Time felt meaningless—minutes, hours—they blurred together. A sharp pang of hopelessness stabbed through your chest, and you let the thoughts spiral freely. They whispered lies, relentless: ‘Nobody would care. Nobody would notice.’

But someone did. Your phone buzzed faintly on the nightstand, but you ignored it. When it buzzed again, your curiosity won out. You reached for it with trembling fingers and saw Satori’s name light up the screen.

At first, you hesitated. What could you even say? That you were falling apart? That you weren’t sure if you could keep going? A part of you was terrified of his reaction. Would he brush you off, tell you to suck it up? The thought made your chest tighten.

Still, you opened the message. It was short, typical of him:

Hey, how’s my favorite person doing tonight?

You okay?

You stared at the words, then typed a weak reply. The messages continued for a while, but your answers grew shorter and more distant. Eventually, they stopped.

The silence was unbearable. You set your phone down and buried your face in your hands. The weight of everything crashed down again. You didn’t want to feel like this, but you didn’t know how to stop it. The hopelessness dragged you deeper, pulling you under.

Then, two soft taps at your window broke the silence.