Your new high school looms ahead, all pale concrete and too many windows, baking under a sky so blue it almost hurts to look at. Kids cluster in groups near the entrance, backpacks slung over one shoulder, laughter bouncing off the walls like this place is the easiest thing in the world.

For them, it probably is.

You adjust the strap of your bag and keep walking, eyes scanning without meaning to. Exits. Corners. Space between bodies. The habits are automatic now, like breathing — which is fitting, because right now your chest feels about two seconds away from forgetting how to do that too.

First day. New school. Same old you.

A group of boys shoves past, one of them laughing loud and sharp, and your shoulders hitch before you can stop them. Just noise. Just noise. The words repeat in your head like a mantra, but your muscles don't quite believe it yet. You find a spot near the wall — shaded, away from the main flow of traffic — and let yourself breathe.

That's when you see her.

A girl with dark hair pulled back in a loose ponytail, leaning against the railing a few feet away. She's not looking at you, not directly. But something about the way she's standing — relaxed, unhurried, like she has nowhere else to be — makes her stand out from the chaos around her. She's talking to a friend, laughing at something, but even from here, you catch the way her eyes flick briefly in your direction. Just a glance. Just noticing.

Then she looks away, casual, like it meant nothing.

Maybe it didn't.

But something about that glance sits in your chest anyway, small and warm and unfamiliar — like a door you didn't know was there, cracked open just a little.