The Color in My Heart
The classroom was noisy again today.
Laughter, chatter, the sound of chairs scraping across the floor it was all there, but none of it ever reached me. I sat in the far corner by the window, staring out at a sky that was neither blue nor gray, but something in between.
Nobody talked to me. Nobody noticed me.
It wasn't like they hated me. It was worse than that. They just… didn't see me.
So I smiled.
A small, harmless smile, the kind that doesn't belong to me. My classmates probably thought I was daydreaming about something funny. In truth, my chest felt heavy, like breathing itself had become a chore.
That's how it always was. That's how it always would be.
The next morning, I left for school with my usual tired steps. Tokyo's streets were crowded, filled with voices, car horns, and the endless rhythm of people hurrying to places that mattered.
I wondered what it was like to matter to someone.
That was when I saw her.
A girl. Running.
Her footsteps echoed on the pavement, fast, desperate, as if the world itself was chasing her. Her long hair caught the sunlight as she turned a corner, and for a brief moment, our eyes almost met.
I froze.
Something inside me whispered, Go home. This isn't your problem.
But my legs betrayed me.
I followed. Not quickly, not obviously just a step, then another. Like I was drifting toward her without meaning to.
When she finally stopped, bent over to catch her breath, I recognized her.
My chest tightened.
She wasn't just some girl. She was the girl. The one on posters, on TV, on every late-night music program the rising star everyone adored. A top idol who lived in a completely different world from mine.
Her world was bright. Mine was gray. We weren't supposed to meet.
She noticed me standing a little distance away. Her eyes widened slightly, then softened.
"You… followed me?" she asked, her voice calm, not accusing.
I scratched the back of my neck, forcing a crooked smile. "Not really. I was just… walking the same way."
It was a lie. A bad one. But she didn't press.
Instead, she laughed softly, like a bell. "Well, that's good. For a second, I thought I was being chased again."
Her words carried something heavy, hidden beneath the smile she gave me. A weight not unlike my own.
"…Are you okay?" I asked.
She looked at me for a long moment. Then, surprisingly, she nodded.
"Yeah. Thanks to you."
Me? A boy no one noticed?
I didn't understand it. But in that instant, for the first time in a long while, the sky above didn't look so empty.
We met again. And again. At first by accident, then by choice.
Her name was Hoshino Akari.
She said mine Aqua Yamato like it mattered. Nobody ever said it like that.
I didn't treat her like an idol. I treated her like a girl. Maybe that's why she kept coming back.
She told me about her life, the endless cameras, the stalkers, the pressure. People adored her smile but never cared about the pain behind it.
I told her about mine, the silence at home, the emptiness at school. How people didn't hate me, they just… didn't see me.
We laughed anyway. Not because things were funny, but because it hurt less when we laughed together.
For the first time in years, my laughter wasn't fake.
Time passed. Days blurred into months.
She shined brighter with every performance. I drifted through school unnoticed. And yet, somehow, our worlds met in secret corners. Convenience stores. Empty parks. Streets after dark.
She'd smile at me, and I'd feel something fragile in my chest.
I didn't call it happiness. I didn't know what happiness was.
But I knew it was real.
"Do you have a dream, Aqua?" she asked me once.
I shook my head. "No. I never thought about the future."
Her smile softened. "Then make one. Even a small one. Live for it."
I wanted to say, You're enough. My dream is just to keep meeting you like this.
But the words never came out.
Graduation came faster than I expected.
My classmates cheered, laughed, hugged each other. I stood at the edge, clapping without feeling, until I saw her.
Akari. She had come to see me.
She handed me flowers, congratulated me, and for a moment, it felt like the whole world had stopped just for us.
We laughed. Took a picture together. It was the happiest I had ever been.
And then, the world shattered.
It happened in an instant. A shadow in the crowd. A flash of steel.
Before I understood, Akari was on the ground. Blood soaking her clothes.
I caught her. My hands shook, my body numb.
"Stay with me—please—stay with me!"
Her lips trembled, but no sound came out. Her eyes, once bright, dimmed as they looked into mine.
And just like that, she was gone.
I didn't even notice the screams around me, the flashing cameras, the voices accusing.
All they saw was me, holding her body. Covered in her blood.
The headlines the next day: Top Idol Murdered. Unknown Boy Arrested on Scene.
That unknown boy… was me.
I stopped smiling. I stopped laughing.
The jokes I once told to hide the pain—gone.
What was left was only silence. A hollow chest. A heart stripped of everything warm.
The day Hoshino Akari died, the last color in my heart disappeared.
Now there is only gray.]