WHEN THE MASK FALLS

"Oh, it's you."

"Y-yes," I said, embarrassed. As I took the step into the classroom, Elin quickly turned her head towards me. Her green eyes, still tinged with that silent storm, locked onto mine.

"Oh, it's you," she said. Not with surprise, nor annoyance. More like... she had been expecting me.

"Y-yes," I replied, feeling like a kid caught stealing cookies. I swallowed hard. My lips were dry. Since when did I get like this just from a greeting?

We were silent for a moment. One of those awkward silences that make you wish you could rewind time three seconds and pretend you never walked in.

I didn't know if I should approach or stay where I was. She didn't say anything else. Just watched me. As if trying to read me inside.

And I... I'm not exactly an easy book to understand.

"Did you forget something?" she finally asked, lowering her gaze slightly.

"My backpack," I answered quickly, as if my brain had activated automatic emotional evasion mode.

She nodded slightly, as if expecting that answer, and sat back down at her desk. But her fingers... her fingers trembled slightly as they played with the corner of her notebook. That detail didn't escape me.

I approached slowly, as if each step were an attempt not to break something fragile in the air. Reaching my spot, I picked up the backpack with feigned clumsiness. But I didn't leave. Not yet.

"Elin," I said, without thinking too much.

She looked up, surprised.

"Yes?"

I wanted to say many things. That I noticed her sadness. That if she wanted to talk. That even though I wasn't anyone important, I was there. But no decent sentence came out.

So I said the only thing I could:

"Thanks for the eraser, earlier."

And I instantly hated myself for being so stupid.

But Elin... smiled. A faint smile.

"No problem"

She's strange.

I don't understand her.

To think that in class she was capable of smiling, as if nothing mattered to her. As if the world didn't weigh her down.

But now... this smile was different.

It didn't have that spark she showed in front of others.

It wasn't for the group.

It wasn't for show.

It was... something else.

Is she pretending?

What if she's always been like this?

What if all those smiles in front of the class, to the idiots surrounding her, were just a mask?

A carefully constructed version to avoid suspicion?

Is she really happy?

It doesn't seem like it.

Not now.

And that screws with me more than it should.

What's really going on in her head?

What the hell does she think when she goes quiet?

When she looks away?

When all those guys surround her, but she actually seems alone?

Who is Elin, really?

All these questions… increasingly complex…

They disturb me.

Not because I need an immediate answer, but because each new doubt drags another along.

As if her silence speaks more than anyone could say.

And I… I don't know if I'm ready to understand her.

But a part of me wants to try.

Because there's something in her screaming inside…

And nobody seems to hear it.

"Hey..."

She speaks, breaking the uncomfortable silence.

"You... How do you get along with your parents?"

The question drops like a stone in a calm lake.

Invisible ripples spread through my mind.

I don't know what to answer right away.

"Normal... I guess," I reply timidly.

Normal...

Yes... it's normal.

My father and I, it's not that we don't love each other, we just don't understand each other.

And that... that's okay.

There are no shouts. No hugs.

Just comfortable silences. Or uncomfortable ones. Depends on the day.

I don't know why I'm telling her this.

Maybe because there's no judgment in her gaze.

Just a kind of attention… silent, but heavy.

As if my words were more important than they should be.

Elin doesn't say anything for a few seconds.

She just nods, with a gesture that seems more for herself than for me.

"Ah... I see..." she responds distantly.

…

…

That heavy, dense silence returns, like a cloud no one wants to pass through.

My hands are on my backpack, but I don't move.

Neither does she.

"Can I tell you something?" she says, looking down.

Her voice sounds softer. Almost like a whisper struggling to exist.

"It's okay if you don't want to listen. Ignore me if you want… but... I feel like if I don't let this out, I'm going to explode."

I swallow hard.

I don't know why she's asking me. I'm not her friend. We've barely spoken a few times.

But something in her tone… in her eyes that don't dare to look up…

Just as the green-eyed girl was about to say something, I feel a chill.

[WARNING!!]

>THIS MOMENT IS CRUCIAL FOR FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF YOUR RELATIONSHIP.

DEPENDING ON THE DECISIONS YOU MAKE, IT COULD LEAD DOWN ONE PATH OR ANOTHER.

It was the system.

Again with its damn visual novel interruptions.

With the same message as always:

"Crucial moment."

As if I were playing a game. As if her emotions were just routes to unlock.

But this time…

I decided to ignore it.

I wasn't interested in the damn system.

I wasn't interested in its warnings, nor its paths, nor its rewards.

I just wanted to listen to her.

I wanted to know what was stuck in her throat.

What was about to explode.

And for the first time… I wasn't afraid to do it.

I just waited.

In silence.

Looking at her.

Wordless, but present.

"The truth is... I feel..." Her gentle voice breaks apart.

"I feel alone," she says, showing total vulnerability in her words.

"I... I recently lost my father..." Her voice shattered more with each word she spoke.

"He... He was my only pillar in my life..."

Her voice was barely a whisper. Broken, as if with each syllable her soul wore away a little more.

I didn't know what to say. I didn't have the right words.

I didn't even know if they existed.

I just looked at her.

And for the first time, I didn't see the perfect girl with the serene smile.

I saw a person who was trying not to fall apart in front of me.

"He always... He always told me that the moment he passed away... I should smile..."

Smile?

Why?

What's the point of that statement?

I wondered, it wasn't logical, it was beyond my capacity to understand...

But I decided to stay quiet, it wasn't the time for stupid complaints.

"He said that... if he saw me crying from wherever he was, he wouldn't be able to rest easy."

Elin rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand, though no tears fell.

"So I smiled. Every day. In front of my mother, in front of the teachers, in front of my classmates..."

Her voice was now a strange mix of determination and defeat.

"I smiled so much... that I think I forgot how it feels to do it for real."

I froze.

There was something cruel in that confession, as if she had been living inside a mask, forced by a promise that at some point stopped making sense.

"And when I'm alone... I don't know what to do. I don't know if I'm doing the right thing. I don't know if he would be proud of me or if he would just be sad..."

My mind raced at a thousand miles per hour, but my mouth didn't move.

I wanted to say something, anything, but the words wouldn't come out.

The fear of saying something that would ruin everything paralyzed me.

What if what I said sounded empty? What if, by trying to console her, I ended up making her feel worse?

All that came out was a lump in my throat, and I couldn't even swallow it.

I felt a pressure in my chest, as if everything I had been accumulating for years was threatening to escape too.

But this time, it wasn't about me.

It was about her.

"I... I'm sorry," I finally managed to say, though it sounded so bland I wanted to swallow the word back.

Elin didn't respond immediately.

Her eyes remained fixed on the void, on that place where words fall and vanish without a trace.

And for some reason, the silence we shared felt heavier than any explanation I could have given.

But...

I felt like my body was completely burning.

An uncontrollable flame was there.

The heat in my chest was unbearable, as if I were burning from the inside out.

Every second that passed, that fire intensified, coursing through my body with an urgency I couldn't ignore.

The silence, instead of calming me, fueled it. Every unsaid word, every gesture not made, fed that flame, that need to do something, to break that barrier separating us.

It was as if, finally, after all this time, everything I had repressed was looking for a way out.

The frustration, the anxiety, the desire to say something more than just "I'm sorry."

I didn't want to be just a spectator. I didn't want to be just an idiot watching from the shadows while she suffered.

What good was my silence?

What good was my fear of ruining it if I stayed in the same place, doing nothing?

I dared to look up, though my heart pounded in my throat.

Elin wasn't looking at me, but I watched her.

I saw the vulnerability in her posture, the fragility that had always been hidden behind her facade of strength.

And it was then that something inside me changed.

With a deep breath, I decided I wasn't going to wait anymore.

I didn't care if I didn't have the right words.

I just had to be honest. I just had to be real, even if it was a disaster.

"Every memory I have of him, I feel like I'm losing it... And that... That scares me so much-" she was already on the verge of tears.

"Elin," I interrupted her words.

She fell silent.

Her lips trembled, her breathing became more erratic. I didn't know if she was looking at me because she was avoiding my eyes, as if afraid she'd break even more if she did.

"Elin..." I repeated, this time softer, almost a whisper.

I didn't have a prepared speech. I didn't have a perfect phrase to console her.

I only had my trembling hands, my cracking voice, and the sincere desire to be there.

"You don't have to carry all this by yourself."

Yes... you don't have to.

"It's okay to cry. Cry as much as you need. You don't have to keep it all inside... Nobody should. That's not human."

I know my words aren't perfect. Maybe they sound clumsy, even blunt…

But I had to say it.

"I'm no one to judge your father's words… I can't say if what he asked was fair or not. But if it's hurting you, if it truly hurts... then you don't have to endure it."

"If he truly loves you, surely he'll forgive you." "B-but my father…" she murmured through tears, her voice trembling.

I looked at her firmly.

"If he truly loved you… then he would forgive you. I'm sure of it."

At that moment, she…

Exploded.

It wasn't contained crying or a weak sob. It was as if all the emotions she had been accumulating for days, weeks—perhaps months—had found the perfect crack to escape through.

She cried.

She cried inconsolably.

Tears and more tears streamed down her cheeks, as if each one carried the weight of a memory, of a farewell, of a goodbye she never wanted to say.

And I…

I just stayed there. Without saying anything. Without moving.

Because I understood that sometimes, just being present is more than enough.

——

After about seventeen minutes, her crying finally stopped.

A warm silence filled the air, as if the world itself had held its breath along with us.

"Thank you... thank you for listening to me," Elin murmured, her eyes swollen, her voice broken but strangely relieved.

I didn't know what to say. Words didn't come easily to me, especially in moments like this.

So I let out the only thing my emotional clumsiness allowed:

"You're welcome... I guess."

It didn't sound elegant. Or profound.

But at least it was honest.

And for some reason, she smiled again.

One of those smiles that, although subdued, held a truth that needed no explanation.

"It's been a long time since I did this…" she murmured, almost as if talking to herself.

What exactly did she mean?

Crying?

Trusting someone?

Showing weakness?

I didn't know. And I doubted she would explain it to me so easily.

Elin… this girl is an enigma.

"By the way, what's your name?" she asked me innocently, as if those moments before hadn't existed.

"Eiran, Eiran Solen..."

She blinked a couple of times, as if savoring the name in her mind.

"I see... Eiran Solen..." she repeated softly.

Yes, that's me, you don't have to repeat it.

Elin watched me for a moment and then, almost delicately, asked:

"Eiran... could you keep this secret?"

"Y-yes, of course..." I replied, somewhat shyly.

Besides, I had no one to tell anyway.

"Okay, then I have to go now," she said, standing up quickly.

As she walked towards the classroom door, just before leaving, she stopped abruptly... and turned around slowly.

"Eiran..." she said, her voice barely louder than a whisper.

"Is something wrong...?" I asked out of habit, somewhat bewildered by her sudden pause.

Elin lowered her gaze for an instant, as if doubting her own words, and then lifted it with a faint smile.

"Would you like... for us to meet here again?"

…

What?

I drew a blank. The question echoed in my head as if time had stopped. I couldn't process it, as if my brain had stopped working right at the most important moment.

Her? A girl like her...? With a guy like me?

This… this only happened in manga or in dreams broken by the alarm clock.

And yet, with my heart racing and words stuck in my throat, I managed to blurt out:

"Well… I'd have to see… if I'm not too busy, of course."

She smiled, as if she knew I was lying, but didn't say anything else. Just nodded slightly.

"Okay. Then, see you tomorrow. Same time."

With that said, she turned and left, leaving me alone.

A screen appeared.

No, rather the fucking system.

Saying:

[CONGRATULATIONS!!!]

>DUE TO THIS IMPORTANT EVENT YOU HAVE INCREASED STATS FOR:

>Love: +5 Points

>Interest: +13 Points

>Trust: +20 Points

…

Seriously?

She opened her soul to me, cried in front of me… and the first thing this damn system does is turn it into numbers as if it were a side quest completed successfully.

I don't know what to think.

Is this what I am to this world? A player in an emotional simulation?

But for the first time, what she said mattered more to me… than what the system had to show.

And that, I suppose, is rare for me.