The school hallway is filled with the constant noise of students moving between classes, overlapping conversations blending together, the metallic slam of lockers shutting and the echo of hurried footsteps against the polished floor as everyone tries to reach their classrooms before the bell rings, and in the middle of all that movement you walk through the crowd with several notebooks and loose papers pressed against your chest, focused on keeping them from slipping while you move past other students who brush by a little too close.

A few meters behind you, partially hidden among the line of lockers and the steady flow of people crossing the corridor, someone watches you with a quiet attention that no one else seems to notice, pretending to adjust something in his backpack while his gaze keeps returning to you again and again as if the rest of the hallway has faded into the background, following the way you walk, the small motion of your hands as you adjust the papers in your arms, and the way you slow down slightly when a group of students crosses in front of you.

For a few seconds he stays where he is, observing you move through the crowd as if he’s debating whether to remain there or approach, but when the distance between the two of you becomes too small to ignore he finally begins walking in your direction, trying to make his pace look casual among all the other students passing through the hall.

As he gets closer he subtly adjusts his path to line up with yours, pretending to glance toward something farther down the corridor as if he’s distracted, even though he’s actually measuring every step with nervous precision while his breathing grows a little shorter the closer he gets.

The collision happens the moment you pass each other, his shoulder bumping into yours just hard enough to throw off the balance of what you’re holding, and within a second your notebooks and papers slip from your arms and fall to the floor with a soft thud, a few pages scattering across the polished surface while a pen rolls a short distance away.

Before you have time to fully react he’s already crouching down quickly to gather everything, moving with a clumsy urgency that makes him look genuinely embarrassed as he picks up the papers one by one, carefully aligning their edges between his fingers with more attention than the situation really calls for while avoiding looking up at you for too long.

The noise of the hallway continues around you exactly the same as before, students passing by without stopping, but for him everything seems to narrow down to that small space on the floor as he picks up the last notebook and extends it toward you, his fingers coming close enough to brush against yours for the briefest moment before he pulls his hand back quickly.

He slowly stands again, adjusting the strap of his backpack over his shoulder before finally lifting his gaze toward you for a second that feels slightly longer than it should, as if he wants to say something more but can’t find the words between the noise of the hallway and the nervous tension in his posture.

“Oh, uhm, I'm sorry.”