Ding!

Hey, I'm Shiri. Seventeen. Just a regular student.

At least, that's what I tell myself.

Life twists and bends like an unpaved road, never leading where you expect.

So, I prayed, every night, for a miracle.

And maybe one day, I could fly, like the bluebird soaring across an endless sky. Free and untethered.

But my reality was quite far from it.

"Hey, did we force you to stand there?!"

A hard shove sent me stumbling. The damp grass rustled beneath my scraped palms.

"You stood there willingly, didn't you? And then you had the nerve to report us?"

"Exactly! Now it looks like we're bullying you in front of everyone... Tsk."

I lowered my lashes. The camera lens loomed close, capturing my silence.

The shutter of the camera echoed in my ears.

Their faces blurred and twisted into smirking mosaics.

Then came the rush of cold liquid.

It splashed over me, drenching my uniform in filth. The stench of drain water clung to my hair and soaked into my skin.

My hair dripped, strands plastered to my face.

Laughter erupted like a chorus of devils, their giggles curling in my ears.

"Hey, you got me too! Disgusting." A girl beside me shrieked, flicking the stray droplets from her sleeve.

"Ew, gross—" More laughter, followed by exaggerated retching sounds.

I sat there, motionless.

I was used to it.

"Hey, curly hair! Can't you take a proper picture? Do you want to take her place?!" Someone snapped.

The short girl holding the camera flinched, her hands trembling. "...Sorry!" she stammered.

Those guilty eyes and that fleeting sympathy...

I was used to that, too.

So, don't pity me.

More, don't look at me.

My white uniform, now stained brown and yellow, clung to my skin. My textbooks, lay scattered on the ground, their pages filled with crude scribbles of curses.

Each moment weighed heavier than the last

I just needed this to end.

And, I made a choice.

Yet I regretted it.

The look in my mother's eyes when she found me, anguish so raw it ripped through the air made me realize…

She was the one drowning. Not me.

Live.

Even if it's unbearable. Even if it suffocates you alive.

I still remember her hands trembled as she held me close, her body wracked with sobs.

"Why?! Why didn't you tell us? I'm your mother, your guardian!" She sobbed, gripping my shoulders.

I turned my face away, silent.

"We were supposed to protect you! How am I supposed to live without you? Do you want me to send my black hair to the grave before you?!"

Her cries trembled in my ears.

I forced a breath, my voice hoarse. "If I told you, Mom… what would've changed?"

"What would've changed?! Everything! How could you go through this alone? How could you—"

The words shattered between us.

My throat ached. "Mom, here… I feel like I can't even breathe. I— I can't—"

My breath hitching on every word, my fingers clawing at my sleeves.

My voice cracked. "Mom... it's too hard."

Every day felt like breathing underwater.

I just wanted to disappear.

I must have looked pathetic and weak. A girl who gave up too easily.

I hated myself.

My life felt like me... pathetic, cowardly, and undeserving of escape.

But then, my mother pulled me close.

She held me so tightly and fiercely, as if willing the broken pieces of me back together.

"Don't think about it anymore," she whispered, her voice trembling but firm. "I'll take you away. If I can have my daughter, I don't care about anything else."

Her warmth seeped through the cold that had settled in my bones.

Like the first bloom of spring after a merciless winter.

Like she was trying to shield me from the world itself.

Like hope...

That was my past.

Now, in my second year of high school, we moved.

To San City, the bustling capital, where everything was new, unfamiliar, and full of possibilities, far from the memories I buried.

A fresh start with a blank slate.

But peace was never mine to keep.

Because life is never that kind.

This is a journey through the echoes of the past, the chaos of the present, and the hope of a new beginning.

Blooming at Your Fingertips~