"Some silences are loud enough to hear."
Sayaka wasn't looking for anything in particular that day.
She had simply forgotten her phone in the courtyard after lunch and had returned to fetch it. That was all. That was the plan.
She wasn't expecting to see him there.
Still sitting on that bench beneath the cherry tree.
And she certainly wasn't expecting to see her again — the quiet girl with the long hair and book she never seemed to read.
But they were both there. Like always.
Only today… they were closer.
Not physically, perhaps. But something had shifted.
And Sayaka saw it instantly.
She stopped walking. Pretended to fix her shoe. Watched without watching.
Hana sat under the tree, her head tilted downward toward her book. Ren sat on the bench, eyes flicking between his sketchbook and the mailbox as if something inside it mattered more than the world.
Sayaka narrowed her eyes.
They weren't talking. Not even looking at each other.
And yet—
There was a tension in the air between them. Not a bad one. A string, maybe. Invisible, but clearly there. Pulled tight.
She knew that feeling. She had seen it before.
Sayaka retrieved her phone from the edge of the planter where she had left it — the screen still dark. She didn't turn it on. Instead, she lingered.
A soft breeze stirred the petals. A few clung to Ren's sketchbook.
He didn't brush them away.
She watched him tear a small slip of paper from the corner of a page and fold it once before slipping it into the mailbox.
Sayaka's brow furrowed.
Mail?
To her?
She tilted her head, curiosity blooming like something slightly uncomfortable.
Ren never talked. Not to anyone. Sayaka had always thought it was a choice — or maybe a quiet kind of arrogance.
But maybe she'd been wrong.
Maybe it was just that… he hadn't found the right person to speak to.
She stepped back, slowly. Quietly.
She didn't want them to see her watching.
This wasn't spying. Not really.
It was just… noticing.
But as she turned to leave, something made her glance back.
And just then, Hana looked up.
Not at Ren — at her.
Only for a second.
Their eyes met.
Hana's expression didn't change. But Sayaka felt something cold settle in her chest. Not anger. Not fear.
Recognition.
She knew she'd been seen. And somehow, that made her feel like she was part of something she hadn't been invited to.
Later, in class, Sayaka couldn't concentrate.
The teacher's voice drifted somewhere above her head. Her notebook stayed empty. She found herself turning pages without meaning to.
She didn't dislike Hana.
If anything, she admired her. That calmness, that quiet. That soft, unreadable way she moved through the world — like a ripple in still water.
But she also didn't understand her.
And Sayaka hated not understanding.
That evening, she walked past the courtyard again on purpose.
The bench was empty now. The mailbox closed.
The air smelled like fading sunlight and cherry petals.
She crossed the courtyard slowly, then stopped in front of the tree.
Her fingers hovered over the mailbox.
Don't open it, she told herself.
It's not your story.
But still… her hand moved.
Just a little.
Then stopped.
She sat on the bench instead. Just for a moment.
And only then did she notice what had been drawn in the dirt near the tree — not with chalk, but with a fingertip or a stick.
A small paper star. Not real. Just a sketch.
And next to it: one word.
"Almost."
Sayaka looked at it for a long time.
Then stood.
She didn't erase it.
Didn't need to.
On the walk home, the sky was the same color as the petals — pale pink bleeding into dusk.
Sayaka walked slowly, listening to the sound of her own footsteps.
She felt something strange in her chest. Not quite jealousy.
More like… being left behind.
She had always thought she saw everything.
But maybe not.
Maybe this time, she had been watching too late.