I used to think loneliness was just a phase. Something that would fade when I grew older, or when I got “better” at being human. But no. It’s like a fog that never leaves, a sticky weight under my ribs. Every morning I’d wake up and stare at the cracked ceiling above my bed, scroll endlessly through feeds of people who smiled, laughed, touched — and I’d pretend it didn’t burn that I had none of that.

No friends. No one to text. Just noise. Just me, and the noise in my head.

Until her.

I still remember the first time I saw her. My classmate’s sister — she came to pick him up after school. That old car of hers rattled louder than my heart, but when she stepped out, the whole world just… stopped. She had this careless kind of power, the kind that made people shut up without a word. Everyone watched her. I did too — I couldn’t not.

And then she looked at me. For a second. Maybe she didn’t even mean to, maybe she just scanned the crowd, but it was enough. That glance burned into me like fire.

That night I couldn’t sleep. My chest hurt like I was dying, and I laughed and cried at the same time. I kept whispering, “I saw her, I saw her, she looked at me…” I didn’t even know her name back then, but I felt like I’d known her for centuries.

After that, I started to wait. Every day. I’d pretend to read my notebook but I was watching the street, waiting for that old car. Sometimes she’d honk twice and yell at her brother to hurry, and I’d catch myself smiling like an idiot. God, I was pathetic.

And then… I followed her. Just once, I told myself. Just to see where she went. But once turned into twice, then ten times, then months. I memorized her route, her music, the rhythm of her life. She became my religion, my only prayer.

When her brother — my classmate — started bragging that his “cool sister” was getting paid to hang out with his friends, I felt my whole body go cold. “Meetings,” he called them. Just sitting, talking, eating snacks. Nothing more. It sounded like heaven to me. I didn’t care what it cost.

I begged him to put me first. I offered everything I had — my allowance, my old console, even my favorite headphones. But he said I’d have to wait, that there was a line. A line. For her.

I waited anyway. I counted the days. I couldn’t stop picturing it — sitting across from her, hearing her voice, maybe she’d laugh at me, maybe she’d insult me, maybe she’d look bored — I didn’t care. I just wanted to exist near her for once, to breathe her air, to see her eyes when she wasn’t behind a windshield.

And then today… it finally happened.

My heart’s been breaking all day. My stomach hurts, my hands won’t stop shaking. I must’ve changed clothes five times before I picked this — black shirt, beige shorts, my sneakers. The shirt says かわいいマゾヒスト. I don’t know why I bought it, maybe because it felt like a confession I could hide behind.

When I got to her house, I thought I’d faint. The smell of cigarette smoke, the faint music from inside — it was hers. Every little sound stabbed my chest.

The doorbell felt heavier than a gun.

Ding.

The moment I pressed it, my breath stopped.

The door opened — and she was there.

She looked… just like I remembered. Maybe rougher, more tired, but still the same impossible energy, that unbothered fire that made me want to kneel and scream and cry all at once.

“Hehehe… hi, senpai!” I said before I could stop myself. My voice cracked. “M-my name is Hikaru…”

Her eyes flicked down at me like I was some bug she wasn’t sure she wanted to squash.

And in that second, every cell in my body whispered: I found you. Please don’t push me away.