"When Petals Touched My Heart"

I don't want to be hurt again.

But I don't want to see others hurt either.

So I think… I should carry the pain alone.

Just like I always have.

That way…

No one else has to suffer.

Only me.

But the voices—they still haunt me.

"It's your fault."

"Why is he still alive?"

"He's disgusting."

"He should've just disappeared."

"Hey, freak—go die."

Yeah… I know.

I shouldn't be here.

I should just be alone.

I should just… die.

I close my eyes. The memories scream louder than my thoughts.

I put my headphones over my ears, but they don't mute the past.

Still… I pretend it helps.

And drift into the only place I'm safe: sleep.

6:00 a.m.

The alarm rings.

My body moves on its own—routine is the only thing I can trust.

I wash my face. Tie back my hair. Walk into the kitchen.

The fridge is nearly empty again.

Still, I chop the last of the vegetables. I'm proud of how well I can cook with so little.

"Itadakimasu," I whisper.

The food is warm. Flavors dance in my mouth.

"So good," I say, and I smile—a real one, just for a second.

But no one sees it.

After I finish, I clean everything.

Before I leave, I hear a familiar voice behind me.

"Don't burn the house."

Cold. Robotic. Distant.

But… she made the rice. Maybe…

Maybe she still loves me, somewhere deep down?

I hopped on my bicycle. Sometimes I take the train, but riding the bike in the morning breeze feels nice—like it's brushing away my sadness, even if just for a moment.

When I'm on the road, I feel free.

But freedom always has a time limit.

I park my bicycle at school.

My chest tightens. My hands shake.

What will happen today?

What will they say?

Will they trip me again?

Throw my bag outside?

Laugh?

I take a deep breath and open the classroom door—with my eyes shut, like a coward.

Silence.

Slowly, I open my eyes.

Nothing.

Everything seems… normal.

I let out a tiny smile.

But then…

"Why'd he come in like that?"

"Was he praying or something?"

"Creepy."

"He probably hears voices."

The girls laugh. A few boys chuckle behind their hands.

My ears burn. My face turns red.

I rush to my seat.

As I sit down, I feel every stare stab into my skin.

I glance up—and see Ayane looking at me.

I freeze.

Then quickly look away.

What is she planning now?

More humiliation?

A fake kindness to laugh about later with her friends?

The teacher enters.

"Everyone, stand. Bow. Sit."

She clears her throat.

"You've all been assigned groups for the upcoming exhibition. Please begin discussions with your team members and finalize your subject."

Her voice hits like a punch to my chest.

Group work.

No. No, no, no.

I can't talk to them.

I can't sit with them.

I just want to vanish.

But fate doesn't care about people like me.

Ayane, Yuzuki, and Reika get up from their seats and walk over.

My stomach turns.

They pull their chairs close and sit around me.

Reika sits to my left.

Ayane, near the window.

Yuzuki beside her, cheerful as ever.

I grip the edge of the table. My knuckles go white.

Then Reika speaks:

"So, Haruki… what should we do? You're good at studies, right? You could guide us on what project to do."

Of course.

That's why they're here.

For the grades. Not for me.

Yuzuki adds with a smile:

"Yeah! You're smart. I'll help however I can—I'm good at decorations and writing stuff!"

Ayane opens her mouth to speak too.

But I can't take it.

"Why do you keep saying 'we'?"

My voice cuts through the air.

"At the end, I'll be the one doing everything. You'll nod, pretend to help, and then vanish until presentation day."

They go quiet.

"Why are you pretending to be nice now?"

"What are you planning this time—after destroying my high school life?"

I know I'll pay for this.

I know the beatings, the whispers, the isolation will get worse.

But I can't hold it in anymore.

The dam is cracking.

Ayane speaks. Her voice… is soft.

"We're sorry."

I freeze.

"We're sorry for everything. We were wrong. We regret what we did.

If it helps… we'll apologize properly."

That should've comforted me.

But instead… it hurt more.

Why now?

Why kindness now, when I've learned to live without it?

The pressure in my chest explodes.

"You think an apology will fix it?"

"Do you know what it's like to come to school afraid every day?"

"To open your locker and find your books torn, your shoes gone, your bag soaked in water?"

"To see your desk scribbled with 'kill yourself' and 'trash' every week?"

"To walk past people whispering behind your back… every single day?"

"And you—you three—you laughed. You watched it all."

My voice is cracking. My body is shaking.

I stand up and shout.

"YOU LET ME BREAK!"

Gasps fill the room.

But no one stops me.

Not even the teacher.

I run. My legs move on their own.

As I slam the door behind me, I hear them.

"Who does he think he is?"

"He talked to Ayane like that? He's dead."

"Let's teach him a lesson after school."

"Ugh. What a drama queen."

"He's so disgusting."

Even the teacher mutters,

"Let him go. It's not worth dealing with him."

That's all I've ever been. Not worth it.

I climb the stairs, floor by floor, until I reach the third floor.

I open the old storeroom.

My safe place. My cave of silence.

I shut the door, fall to my knees, and let the tears come.

No screaming. No punching walls. Just… shaking. Quietly. Alone.

"Why did they say sorry now…?"

"Why… now?"

My voice cracks into nothing.

Haruki curled against the wall, holding his knees, as sunlight slices through the dusty air.

No one comes. Not yet. 

Just silence.

I thought no one would come.

That room — dark, dusty, silent — felt like the only place left in the world where I could still breathe.

But a few minutes later, I heard the door creak open.

I didn't need to look. I already knew it was her.

My voice cracked, wild and bitter.

"Why are you here?

To mock me?

To punish me again?"

I laughed — not because it was funny, but because it was all so pathetically familiar.

"It doesn't matter. Nothing matters anymore.

I've been through so much, Ayane.

So much you could never even imagine."

She didn't say anything at first. Just stood there.

Then finally — softly — she said:

"I know how you feel."

I clenched my fists.

"No. You don't."

"Yes, I do."

I snapped.

"Don't say that.

Don't ever say that you know how I feel.

If you did, you wouldn't have done what you did to me.

You wouldn't have laughed when others broke me down.

You wouldn't have stood by and watched while I fell apart."

My voice rose — raw, shaking.

"How can you say that after all those things —

when you have friends, when you laugh and smile like you've never felt a single scar inside you?!

You don't know what it's like to be truly alone!"

"Today I said it. In front of the whole class.

And now you're here — pretending you're the victim?

That I'm the one who needs to apologize?!"

I laughed again, bitterly.

"Fine. I'll apologize. I'll say I was wrong in front of everyone tomorrow.

Just… don't stand there and tell me you understand.

Because you don't."

I stood up.

I faced her.

For the first time in years, I looked her in the eyes — really looked.

And what I saw…

Her head was down.

Her shoulders shaking.

Her hands trembling at her sides.

Tears. Quiet, slow, falling one by one like they had waited years to be allowed.

I froze.

"No… no, don't—"

"Not again…"

I grabbed my hair, my face, gripping it like I could pull the regret out of myself.

"I messed up again.

I said too much.

I ruined it again.

Now I'm doomed."

And then — she finally spoke.

Ayane (voice trembling):

"You're right.

I don't know everything about how you feel."

"But I know what it's like to beg your parents to stop fighting and be ignored."

"I know what it's like to come home and hope no one's there, because the silence is still kinder than what waits inside."

"I know what it's like to help someone and then be punished for it."

"To be hated… for doing the right thing."

"To scream in your head every day, Why me?, and never get an answer."

She looked up, eyes swollen with grief she had buried for years.

"I broke your flower that day because I didn't know how to hold anything kind.

Because I thought if I didn't stomp it, someone else would stomp me."

"I betrayed the only person who ever thanked me."

"And I've hated myself for that ever since."

She took a step closer.

"You think I'm surrounded by people now?

You think that means I'm not lonely?"

"Haruki…

Every time I laugh, there's a voice in my head that whispers you laughed at him too.

Every time someone says I'm kind, I remember the day I looked away from you."

She broke down.

"I'm not here because I want you to apologize.

I'm here because I never said I'm sorry.

Because I couldn't carry it anymore.

Because I hoped — even if you never forgive me —

you'd hear the truth."

"What are you talking about?

"You know why I started bullying you?"

"It was the day I saw you at the entrance ceremony."

"You were trying so hard to smile. To act normal. To belong.

But I saw it — the way your shoulders curled, the way your eyes kept scanning the ground.

You were trying to look okay, but inside… I could see you were breaking."

"And that's when I remembered my past."

My parents were always fighting at home.

Their voices weren't just loud — they were venomous.

Broken dishes. Slammed doors.

Words I was too young to understand, but too old to forget.

Every time I tried to step between them —

every time I cried, begged them to stop —

I was the one who got hit.

I used to think,

"If I'm quiet… maybe they'll stop."

But even my silence seemed to irritate them.

Home became a place where I never felt like a daughter,

just a mistake waiting to be corrected.

So school…

School was the only place where I could breathe.

I arrived early.

Not because I was studious — but because I wanted to be anywhere else.

In class, I sat by the window, watching kids gather in groups, laughing and talking.

Their voices made my heart ache, but I always smiled.

Fake smiles.

The kind you wear to avoid being noticed.

Then there was him.

A boy — always sitting alone near the back.

Quiet.

Too quiet.

Sometimes, the boys would throw paper at him. Sometimes they'd whisper loud enough for him to hear.

"He's creepy."

"Why is he always staring?"

"He's like a ghost."

He never reacted.

I told myself it wasn't my business.

One afternoon, something changed.

We were all outside —

playing in the field.

The teacher was gone, and for once, I was part of it.

I was laughing. I felt human.

I remember the wind brushing against my skin,

my heart thudding from running.

Then… a girl tripped.

She screamed.

Her nose was bleeding.

Everyone stopped.

And there he was — Haruki — sitting beneath a tree near where she fell.

He stood up and rushed toward her.

But before he could even touch her…

"He pushed her!"

"I saw it!"

"He was just sitting there like a freak!"

I knew it wasn't true.

I had seen it.

He hadn't moved until after she fell.

I stepped forward.

"He didn't do it! He was trying to help her!"

But the others wouldn't listen.

The girl looked up — tears and blood mixing on her face — and said:

"I was scared because… he was staring at me."

"That's why I fell."

I froze.

The teacher arrived, demanding answers.

"Did you push her?"

"Is this true?"

Haruki shook his head.

"I was looking at the birds… on the roof."

There was silence.

"Birds?" someone mocked.

"There were no birds."

"He's just weird."

The teacher sighed and brushed it off as an accident.

But something inside Haruki cracked.

I could feel it.

And then…

he turned to me and whispered,

"Thank you… for speaking up."

It was the first time anyone had ever said those words to me.

I held onto that thank you like it was a gift.

But the next day, my shoes were gone.

My locker had scratches all over it.

Someone wrote "traitor" on the back of my desk in pen.

When I tried to talk to my classmates — they looked right through me.

Just like they did to him.

I thought,

"It's because I defended him."

I was scared. I was alone again.

That afternoon, Haruki came up to me.

He held out a little flower — yellow, delicate, still with morning dew.

"I thought you might like this. For… yesterday."

His eyes were kind.

And I…

I crushed the flower under my foot.

I shouted at him.

"It's because of you!

Why did I even help you?!

Don't come near me again!

I hate you!"

He froze.

Didn't even flinch.

He just nodded once and walked away.

I wanted to cry.

But I didn't.

Because that's what weak people did.

The next day, everyone smiled at me again.

"Wanna sit with us?"

"You look cute today!"

"Come with us after school!"

All it took was betraying him.

I never saw him smile again after that.

Weeks passed.

My parents split up.

I was taken by my mother and transferred schools.

I never got to say goodbye.

But on the last day, when I opened my bag…

There was a flower.

Crushed.

Pressed between notebook pages.

The same kind he once tried to give me.

That was his goodbye.

And I never had the courage to say mine.

"It was you, wasn't it?"

Ayane looked up slowly, like her heart had been waiting for this moment and fearing it at the same time.

"When I saw you at the entrance ceremony," she began,

"my chest tightened. My hands trembled."

"Because I knew… if you recognized me, if you remembered what happened back then,

everything I'd tried so hard to bury would come rushing back."

"All the pain. All the shame. All the things I did to survive."

She took a breath. It shook on the way out.

"I wasn't strong like you. I didn't want anyone to know the girl I used to be.

So I thought… if I push you away first, then I could keep pretending."

"That's why I bullied you. That's why I isolated you.

So no one would see how gross and broken I really was."

She choked back a sob.

"I'm sorry… I'm so, so sorry…"

Haruki didn't speak.

Couldn't speak.

He just stood there — frozen in the middle of a storm of memories.

Ayane stepped closer.

She gently took his trembling hands into hers.

"You don't have to forgive me," she whispered.

"You don't have to believe me.

But because I was the one who gave you pain…"

Her grip tightened.

"I'll be the one to bring your smile back."

"Even if you hate me. Even if you push me away.

I'll stay by your side until the day you no longer feel alone."

That was when the tears came.

Not silently — not shamefully.

They poured, warm and aching, from Haruki's eyes.

Tears that remembered what it felt like to be seen.

Tears that hadn't fallen in years.

"Those words," Haruki whispered,

"they're not just words…"

He took a shuddering breath.

"They're everything I've been dying to hear."

He reached forward.

And without saying anything more — he hugged her tightly.

Ayane blushed deeply, caught off guard.

But she didn't step back.

Instead, she gently laid her hand on his head and whispered:

"From today onward, I'll be the one to protect your heart."

He cried into her shoulder — years of silent suffering washing away like rain off a rooftop.

She stood still.

Held him.

Didn't flinch.

Didn't move.

She was there — and that was all that mattered.

When he finally pulled away, her hand never left his.

"Let's go," she said.

As the sunlight poured through the cracked window, Haruki turned to look at her face.

For the first time since middle school,

he truly looked at someone.

Her soft pinkish hair glowed under the morning light.

Her deep brown eyes sparkled.

And her smile…

It was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

He blushed.

Hard.

Did I really just hug… her?

Then suddenly—

BANG!

The door burst open.

"We heard everything!!"

Yuzuki and Reika stood at the doorway, grinning.

Yuzuki gave an awkward wave.

"We're sorry too. For… y'know… everything. We were awful."

Reika dashed toward them, her twin braids bouncing.

She jabbed her finger right into Ayane's forehead.

"Baka! Why didn't you tell us?! You could've asked for help, you know!"

Ayane flailed her arms, embarrassed.

"W-Why are you even listening from outside!?"

Reika spun dramatically and flopped beside Haruki like a puppy.

"And you!" she pointed.

"You cry so cutely, you made me cry too, dummy!"

Yuzuki facepalmed.

"You were literally cheering and crying at the same time."

Reika grinned like a 5-year-old who got caught stealing candy.

"Ehehe~ Sorry~"

Then she leaned close to Haruki and teased:

"But… you two were sooooo cute hugging like that.

It was like a live shoujo manga panel!"

Haruki's face turned red.

Ayane, equally flustered, shouted:

"W-What are you even saying!?"

And then—childishly, impulsively—Ayane darted over to Reika.

She raised her hands like a child scolding a naughty friend and began lightly flailing at her:

"Reikaaaa!! Don't say embarrassing stuff like that!!"

Reika laughed, shielding herself with her arms, squealing:

"Eek! Ayane-chan is attacking! Help!!"

Yuzuki sighed, smiling warmly, and stepped in between them, grabbing both of them gently by the shoulders.

"Alright, alright, you two. Calm down. You're making a scene."

Seeing them like that… I laughed.

Not a smile.

Not a chuckle.

A real, full laugh.

A laugh I hadn't known I was capable of anymore.

Ayane's Point of View:

Seeing him laugh like that…

It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

It was like… petals were falling from a sakura tree.

Like something fragile and beautiful had quietly bloomed.

It was like… "Petals had Fallen on a Quiet Heart."

We all looked at Haruki, stunned for a moment—then we looked at each other.

And laughed together.

Not out of politeness.

Not to cover the silence.

But because it felt good.

It felt right.

This was the beginning…

A story of healing each other's pasts.

Of understanding.

Of forgiveness.

Of support.

A story where broken hearts learn to beat again.

Together.