The sound of shouting slipped up from the lower floor to you, a rough whisper you had grown accustomed to more than any child should. The coloring pencil froze between your fingers, the line veering off the drawing. The arguments were frequent words you didn’t understand back then, yet their tone alone was enough to plant anxiety in a small heart. The nanny’s hand passed gently over your head, urging you to keep coloring, a fixed smile painted on her face. You stared at that smile for a long moment, not because you believed it, but because, even at such a young age, you understood it wasn’t born of emotion. It was merely her job… and you had never tasted affection in a cold house.

You were the victim of two people successful in their careers, failures as parents. Your room was filled with everything any child could dream of: toys, new clothes, everything… except warmth. There was no father returning home to hug his daughter at the door, no mother sitting beside the bed to tell a story before sleep. There was no look of pride, not even concern. In their conviction, money solved everything but they forgot that it cannot buy warmth.

And Firio? He wasn’t just a name repeated in your life, nor merely a face present in every childhood photograph, nor even the frame near your bed. He was safety. His hand was the first warm hand to hold yours a strange feeling for a girl raised in a family that had never known warmth. You only discovered your genuine smile in his presence. He wasn’t just a friend… he was the unspoken compensation for everything you had missed.

As the years passed, that feeling didn’t fade; it grew, transforming into something you didn’t know how to name back then. And although you dropped all your guard around him, there remained a silent part within you, never spoken aloud. But your eyes always betrayed you and he… was blind enough not to see it.

Your heartbeat quickened at his laughter, your cheeks flushed when he held your gaze for too long. You weren’t shy… but with him, everything was different. All you knew was this: he wasn’t just a friend to you. But the truth was harsher you were only a friend to him.

You saw the way he looked at Kiara, your classmate from high school. Clear, obvious admiration that needed no explanation. For just one second, something selfish screamed inside you, wishing those looks were meant for you. But Kiara was beautiful, kind… so who were you to even think he might return a fraction of what you felt?

During a school-organized field trip a scouting trip into the forest students were divided into groups to search for a treasure, following clues among the trees. And to your misfortune, you and Kiara ended up on the same team. Phones were forbidden, and each team was given a walkie-talkie for communication. You didn’t miss Firio’s glance, that look that seemed to wish you weren’t the one there… beside Kiara.

You ventured deeper into the forest, and little by little the path was lost. The air grew colder, dusk approached. There was only one solution left: to split up in search of the camp. And so you did, staying in contact through the walkie-talkie. But your foot slipped, and you fell down a small slope. Your knee was injured, darkness settled in, and before the walkie-talkie stopped working from the fall, Kiara told you she had reached the camp safely.

Firio didn’t know that. He was among the students who went out searching for you. You walked with difficulty, the darkness thick around you, until the beam of a flashlight fell upon you followed by a voice that made your frozen limbs forget the cold. It was Firio. He approached, worry written all over his features. Happiness seeped into you. You thought he had come for you, afraid for you, concerned about you.

But his words shattered something in your chest something that never healed afterward.

“Where is Kiara? Is she okay?”

And in that moment, you realized that all your life, you had never once gotten what you wanted.