The teacher's voice droned on like the steady hum of an old ceiling fan. Rows of students scribbled dutifully into their notebooks, the occasional cough or rustle of paper punctuating the silence.
And in the background of it all, Itsuki's pen had not moved in over ten minutes.
His gaze was fixed beyond the glass window beside him. Watching as sunlight spilled over the football field outside and the breeze swayed the goalposts on opposite sides of the field ever so slightly.
Reflected faintly in the glass was his own face — dark hair falling into hazel eyes, a shade caught indecisively between green and gold. People often told him he looked athletic, like the kind of person who might spend hours in the gym, working to carve out his build. The truth was less flattering. His frame had simply… happened. He had never worked for it.
As he stared, he thought of how out there nature looked so simple. A couple of birds fought over scraps of food in the grass. The wind moved freely through the trees.
In here, the air was thick with the choking pressure of competition. Every student battling for grades, approval or recognition to prove they mattered. To Itsuki, it all felt pointless— a desperate chase after something none of them would ever really catch.
The truth of the reality they refuse to face… he thought, his expression unmoving as he stared through the glass window. "Everything is hevel'.
To him, he had always seen life that way, and he always would.
---
The sharp scrape of chairs against the floor jolted him back. The bell had already rung a while back, though he hadn't noticed. Students shuffled out in noisy clusters, chatter swaying across the room.
Itsuki didn't move. His eyes went back to linger on the field outside, as if what he saw out there carried more meaning than anything that had happened in there in the past hour.
"Hey," a familiar voice broke in.
Itsuki blinked, glancing up to see Seiji leaning casually against the edge of his desk. His messy black hair fell across his forehead, and his sharp dark eyes searched Itsuki's face with effortless concern.
"You looked like you were somewhere else," Seiji said. "Thinking about skipping lunch again?"
Itsuki shrugged. "I can't be bothered how my lunch goes. Whatever happens, happens."
Seiji smirked, "You're weird, you know that?"
He wasn't wrong. Itsuki often skipped meals, not from lack of time or appetite, but simply because he couldn't bring himself to care. Food, hunger — they were just details of existence, to him, unimportant in the grand scheme of things.
Seiji leaned comfortably on a chair and placed some food on his desk. They had known each other since they were ten, and despite Itsuki's distant nature, Seiji had never left his side. Maybe it was because he worried too much. Maybe because he was the only one stubborn enough to stay.
Itsuki sometimes tried to imagine himself in Seiji's place — caring so deeply for someone else that wasn't him or his mother, but the thought never fit right. Like putting on clothes that belonged to someone else.
Maybe that was just who he was. Or maybe it was simply what was left of him.
---
The rest of the day dragged like dry paint. Teachers came and went, their words blurring into one another until they were indistinguishable. The classroom clock ticked on, slow and hollow.
The final bell eventually rang and Itsuki couldn't have been more glad.
The hallway erupted with the usual after-school noise. Shouts bounced off the lockers, laughter echoed in uneven bursts, and the metallic clatter of locks and doors filled the air.
Clusters of students gathered, their conversations overflowing—karaoke, dinner, arcades, parks, libraries.
Itsuki passed through them like a ghost.
"Why do they try so hard? What's the point?'
"They live, they laugh, they make plans', he thought "But everything they do is meaningless. Friendships, ambitions, the dreams they cling to — all of it eventually crumbles. Even the adults, the ones who preach about responsibility, spend decades breaking themselves on jobs that drain their souls. They trade joy for paper, for numbers on a screen.
And for what? Pleasure? Security? Some form of success they were told to chase?'
"It eventually all ends the same — we all return to the ground. Dust, swallowed by dust.'
---
Outside the gates, the late afternoon light pooled across the pavement on the streets. Seiji was waiting, leaning against the wall with his usual half-smile.
"I'm gonna do it," he blurted the moment Itsuki approached. "I'm asking her out."
Itsuki raised an eyebrow. "Her?"
"You know who," Seiji muttered, his eyes flicking nervously as though the streetlamps themselves might overhear. "I don't expect advice. I just… I'm too excited to keep it to myself."
They started walking, steps unhurried. As they rounded the corner, noise spilled from an electronics store, the TV in the window blaring loud enough to rival the traffic.
"…the largest single-day collapse in stock exchange history. LionsStone Inc. has filed for bankruptcy with no hope of revival. Industry experts call it unprecedented—"
Seiji let out a low whistle. "Crazy. I actually know the guy who owned that company, or my parents do. I managed to see him once doing business with my dad."
Itsuki's eyes stayed on the screen a moment longer. "Another corporate king brought low. Another man chewed up by the same system he thought he mastered. Yesterday he had the world at his feet; today, it spat him out like rotten fruit.'
After they had walked a little distance, they reached the train station. It was a short journey, with Seiji always getting off first then Itsuki later.
When Itsuki finally reached his stop, he stepped into the cool air and made the short walk from the station to his house.
The apartment greeted him with silence, broken only by the steady chopping of a knife against a cutting board. At the counter dividing the kitchen from the living room, his mother stood with her sleeves rolled up, focused on chopping up the next ingredient to slip into whatever was cooking on the stove behind her.
She had the kind of face that never raised its voice. Gentle, calm, the kind of person who was always searching for the good in people — even when it cost her more than she would admit.
"How was school?" she asked without looking up.
"The same," Itsuki answered.
He went upstairs, dropped onto his bed, and stared at the ceiling.
"Why am I here?'
"Surely the dead have it easier — they no longer have to go through this farce. Even the unborn are luckier, they haven't yet been Introduced to the ugliness of the world.'
As he was lost in thought his phone lit up. The top story mirrored the news broadcast from earlier: 'LionsSton Inc.'s unprecedented collapse' plastered across the screen. He scrolled past it in seconds.
"Noise all round, the world devouring itself, yet never changing'.
"It's all hevel," he muttered into the empty air.
Then, came the scream.
It pierced the silence, raw and sharp, from downstairs.
He was already moving before it came to his mind as his heart hammered against his chest. "Mum?' — it had to be her. He imagined the worst with every step he made.
But when he burst into the kitchen, she was standing there unharmed, holding a small bag of trash.
"You okay?" she asked, tilting her head.
"I thought—" He stopped, tilting his head as he looked round. She was fine. Maybe he imagined it. "I'm fine. Just really tired I think."
She brushed past him toward the door, carrying the garbage bag. He sighed, taking it from her wordlessly. And at that moment of taking the bag, their hands brushed — his finger touching hers.
And instantly it felt like the world shattered.
He was no longer in the kitchen.
It felt like he was everywhere, all at once.
Moments flooded his vision, an endless reel spinning faster than thought. Yet he lived through each one. The sounds, the agony, the pain — all of it felt real.
And she was always there.
His mother.
Dying.
Over and over again. Different ways, different details, the same outcome.
Her eyes always ending the same — lifeless.
It never stopped. Time bent, stretched, felt like it devoured itself until a second started to feel like a century.
Then—
"Itsuki!"
Her voice snapped him back.
He gasped, choking on his own breath, his cheeks wet from the tears rolling down his face. His hands trembled violently.
She stood in front of him, garbage scattered at his feet. "What's wrong? You look pale—"
He flinched back, stumbling before he fell on the floor. He couldn't say anything.
His knees felt stiff. The floor rushed up cold against his palms.
"Itsuki—"
He scrambled away from her. He couldn't touch her. Not again.
Then, instinct took over. He ran upstairs and slammed his room door behind him. He pressed his back against it, his mother's muffled voice calling from the other side.
"Itsuki? What's wrong? Why did you look so scared?"
He tried to answer, but his throat locked. His own words failed him.
"She's alive.' He repeated it to himself. "She's alive.'
Finally, he forced out a strained excuse. "Just… a headache. School was rough."
She hesitated. "…When you feel better, come down and talk." She said as her footsteps retreated.
Itsuki collapsed on the floor, his hands feeling like they were ice cold.
"What did I just see?'
The question gnawed at him, the images pressing against his skull. No matter how tightly he closed his eyes, her dying face always returned.
His heartbeat slowed, but the unease coiled tighter in his chest.
He told himself to forget. That it wasn't real. That it was just exhaustion. But deep down, he couldn't shake it.
That endless vision of her death.
It wasn't just some hallucination. It couldn't have been. To him, it felt too, real.
Little did he know, that what happened to him, would soon completely change the trajectory of his life completely.