They don’t notice me.

That’s the first thing I learned about Hwa Yang Academy—the higher the walls, the less people see what’s underneath. The uniforms are pristine, the corridors are bright, and the smiles are fake. The students here glide like they’re above gravity, perfect and polished, with gold-plated names and family trees longer than the Han River.

Then there’s me.

I press my back to the cold stone behind the east staircase, just far enough behind the oversized ficus plant to disappear. I’ve timed it. At this angle, no one walking down the hallway will glance left. They’re all too busy chasing dreams their parents bought for them. I’m not part of their world. I never was.

And yet, I watch it anyway.

My fingers curl around my sketchbook, its leather edges cracked and worn. I hold it like a secret, a shield. My grandmother gave it to me on my first day here. “Draw what you feel,” she whispered with that soft smile that made her eyes crinkle. “Even if no one listens, your heart will still speak.”

So I do. Every day. From the shadows.

The hallway hums with noise—shoes clacking, laughter echoing, lockers banging open. But my eyes are searching for just one thing. One person.

There.

Lee Ji-won.

I see him as soon as he turns the corner. He always walks like he knows where he’s going, even if he doesn’t. His uniform blazer is unbuttoned, his tie loosened just enough to look effortless. His black hair falls across his forehead in that frustratingly perfect way. Everyone watches him—but not the way I do. Not closely.

I see the way he tugs his bag strap tighter when the noise gets too loud. I see the flicker of hesitation in his eyes before he speaks to someone. I see the smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes.

And I draw it all.

I slide the sketchbook open and flip to a blank page. My pencil moves before I think, tracing the tilt of his chin, the line of his shoulders. He leans against his locker now, talking to Min-ho, but his gaze drifts—just for a second—to the window.

There’s always something distant in his eyes. Like he’s waiting for something. Or someone.

I wonder what he would look like if he smiled for real.

“You’re so weird.”

I freeze.

The voice snakes around me, smooth and sharp. I don’t have to look to know who it is.

Yoo Na-ri.

Her heels click closer. I hear the amusement in her tone. “Seriously, hiding behind plants again? What are you even doing?”

My chest tightens. I snap my sketchbook shut and hug it to me like armor. “I’m not hiding.”

She laughs, soft and cruel. “You’re spying. Again. Let me guess—drawing Ji-won oppa like some lovesick fangirl?”

“I’m not—” I try to say, but my voice comes out thin.

Na-ri steps closer, blocking my view of the hall. “Do you really think he’d ever look at you? A nobody scholarship girl with cheap shoes and a ratty notebook?”

I stay silent. Words stick in my throat like needles.

“Seriously,” she says, her voice colder now. “This isn’t some drama. People like us and people like you don’t mix. Get that through your head.”

The bell rings.

She smirks, gives my skirt a once-over like I’m a stain, and walks away.

And I—I can’t move.

Everyone rushes to class, the hallway emptying fast. I wait, frozen, until the last echo fades. Only then do I slip out from the alcove, my face hot, my heart too loud.

I don’t go to class. I can’t.

Instead, I duck through the side doors, past the art wing, to the garden courtyard. No one comes here in the morning. It’s quiet, green, safe. Lavender blooms in soft waves behind the benches, and the stone walls are warm from the sun.

I sit on the far bench, hidden behind a tall bush, and finally let out a shaky breath.

This place is the only one where I can breathe.

I open my sketchbook slowly, flipping past the page of Ji-won’s half-finished portrait. My hand trembles. Na-ri’s words still crawl under my skin.

I turn to a fresh page.

My pencil moves again—not to draw Ji-won, but my halmeoni. My grandmother. Her soft smile, her tired eyes, the delicate lines of her hands folded in her lap. I remember how she stayed up late sewing my uniform before the entrance exam. I remember her tears when I got the scholarship. I remember her voice, gentle but steady.

“Even when they don’t see you, you are here.”

I blink hard. The pencil presses into the page a little deeper than I mean it to.

I wish I could tell her how hard it is.

“Is that your grandmother?”

I jerk up so fast I nearly drop my sketchbook.

And he’s there.

Ji-won.

Standing in front of me.

I stare, wide-eyed, too shocked to speak.

He gestures toward the drawing. “The woman in your sketch… she looks kind.”

I nod dumbly. “She is.”

He steps a little closer. “You’re… Seo Ha-run, right?”

My mouth goes dry. “You know my name?”

He smiles, faint but real. “Of course. You sit near the window in homeroom. You’re always drawing when the teacher turns around.”

I think my brain breaks for a second. He noticed?

He looks at the sketchbook again. “You’re really talented. There’s emotion in your lines. Like you don’t just see people—you understand them.”

No one’s ever said that to me.

Not once.

My voice comes out quieter than I mean. “I just… I don’t know how to say things. So I draw them instead.”

“That’s a good way to live,” he says. Then he glances toward the school building. “You’re skipping class.”

I flush. “Just needed some air.”

He nods, then sits beside me—not too close, just enough that I can smell the faint scent of pine and something clean. I don't dare move.

He doesn’t say anything for a while. Neither do I.

The silence isn’t awkward. It’s… peaceful.

“I come here too, sometimes,” he says. “When it gets too loud.”

I glance at him, startled. He meets my gaze and shrugs, almost sheepishly. “Everyone always wants something from me. Sometimes I just want to disappear for a bit.”

Something aches in my chest.

I nod. “Me too.”

He looks at me for a long second. Not past me. Not through me.

At me.

And then he smiles—small and warm.

“I’m glad you didn’t disappear today,” he says.

And then he stands, brushes invisible dust from his blazer, and nods once before heading back toward the building.

I sit there, still frozen, still gripping my sketchbook.

And then I laugh. Quiet, surprised. A real laugh.

Because maybe—for the first time—

someone really saw me.

The melody from Ji-won’s phone fades, but it doesn’t leave the room.

It lingers.

Like something unfinished. Something alive.

He looks at me, and I see it again—that quiet sorrow under his smile. Not the kind that demands attention, but the kind that waits for someone to notice it.

I set my brush down, heart still thrumming from the way his music fit so perfectly into the silence I’ve always lived in.

“That was beautiful,” I say.

“It was messy,” he replies, rubbing the back of his neck. “Unfinished.”

“Like most beautiful things,” I whisper.

He looks surprised. Then… relieved.

It’s strange. For two people who’ve barely spoken before today, it feels like we’ve always known how to talk to each other—just not with words.

“You know,” he says after a moment, “when I first saw you, it wasn’t in the courtyard or at lunch.”

I blink. “Then… where?”

“In the library. Second floor. You were sketching the spines of the books instead of reading them.”

My cheeks flush. I remember that day. I was sketching how the dust settled on old literature like memories no one had touched in years.

“I didn’t think anyone noticed,” I say.

He shrugs. “You were the only one in the room who looked like she belonged there.”

I look down at my hands, stained with paint and color, suddenly aware of how exposed I feel—and how warm it is to be seen.

Ji-won walks over to my painting again. “Do you have a name for this?”

“Not yet.”

He points to the girl with her arms open. “What if you called it Skybound?”

The name fits. Like a final brushstroke. Like the whisper of wings.

“I like it,” I tell him.

He leans against the windowsill. “Can I show you something else?”

I nod.

He opens his backpack and pulls out a thick black notebook. “I usually don’t let anyone see this.”

He hands it to me, and I open it slowly.

Lyrics.

Page after page, written in messy ink. Some are crossed out. Others are circled or rewritten. There are tiny drawings in the margins—stars, broken pianos, a lonely boy standing under an umbrella in the rain.

“I write when I can’t sleep,” he says. “When my thoughts won’t shut up.”

My throat tightens.

“Do you… feel alone?” I ask.

He doesn’t answer right away. When he does, his voice is barely a whisper.

“Not right now.”

I don’t say anything, but I reach over and place my paper crane next to his on the windowsill.

Two fragile wishes, side by side.

The sun catches the edges of the cranes, casting soft shadows on the desk between us.

Then I speak before I can stop myself.

“My grandmother used to say that paper cranes carry pieces of our souls.”

He turns to look at me.

“I fold them when I’m scared,” I confess. “When I want something I don’t think I’m allowed to want.”

“What do you want now?” he asks.

I hesitate. Not because I don’t know. But because I do.

“I want… to stop hiding.”

Ji-won steps closer. Not enough to crowd me. Just enough that I can feel the steady rhythm of his presence.

“Then don’t,” he says. “You don’t have to.”

Tears sting my eyes, but I blink them back. I’ve cried alone before. But this—this isn’t the same. This is what it feels like to be held without touch.

He sits beside me on the floor. The room feels warmer now.

“Do you think people like us—quiet people—ever get to have loud dreams?” he asks.

“I think those are the dreams that matter the most,” I say. “Because they’re the ones we’ve fought hardest to keep alive.”

He smiles, and I swear it reaches all the way into me.

“Let’s make a pact,” he says.

“A pact?”

He holds out his hand, pinky extended.

I pause, then hook mine around his.

“What kind of pact?”

“We each chase one dream. Out loud. No matter how scared we are.”

I nod slowly. “What’s yours?”

He looks toward the grand piano down in the music hall courtyard, visible through the high window.

“To write a full song,” he says. “About something real. About someone real.”

My heart thuds. “Who?”

His eyes find mine. “Maybe I’ll tell you when it’s finished.”

My cheeks warm.

I ask, “And what if I don’t know what my dream is yet?”

“Then I’ll help you find it,” he says. “We’ll fold as many cranes as it takes.”

I laugh softly, wiping at a stray tear. “It might take a thousand.”

“Then we’ll start with two,” he replies.

We sit like that until the bell rings.

The moment shatters—but not completely. Not permanently. Like a dream you remember even after waking.

Ji-won helps me gather my paints, and before he leaves, he places something in my hand.

A folded slip of paper. Another crane.

But this one is different.

On the inside, I find a small line of handwritten lyrics:

"Some dreams are stitched from silence—but they still sing."

I look up to thank him, but he’s already halfway down the hall, shoulders relaxed in a way I’ve never seen before.

Maybe that’s what happens when you find someone who sees you.

You both start to breathe a little easier.

---

Sometimes, I wonder when it began.

The watching. The waiting.

The way my eyes always found him in a crowd, even when I told myself not to look. The way my heart would tighten, not from pain, but from some strange, aching hope.

Ji-won.

His name lived in the spaces between my sketches. In the piano notes I imagined when the world was too loud. In the paper cranes I folded beneath my desk.

And though he never looked my way—at least not until today—my smile had always been his.

Only his.

I never gave it to anyone else, not really. Not even the teachers who praised my paintings or the classmates who tried to include me out of polite obligation.

But for him, it came easily.

It bloomed quietly—when he passed me in the hallway, unaware. When he sat by the window, humming to himself with earbuds in, tapping rhythms against his thigh. When his fingers danced over piano keys during morning assembly, and I imagined what his music might sound like if he played for no one but himself.

For so long, I lived in the safety of those invisible moments.

Now, suddenly, we’ve shared real ones. Words. Glances. Paper cranes and dreams too fragile to speak aloud.

And I don’t know what scares me more—the hope… or the possibility that I could lose it before it ever becomes real.

Lunch comes too quickly.

The courtyard is buzzing with laughter and chatter, but my feet drag as I cross the paved path under the cherry blossom trees. A few petals cling to my blazer. The wind brushes past like a whispered memory.

I see him.

Sitting on the same bench as this morning, alone this time. His sketchbook is closed, resting on his lap. He’s staring up at the sky, brows slightly furrowed, lost in thought.

And for a second, I hesitate.

This isn’t like me. I don’t approach people. I don’t interrupt.

But something changed in the art room. Something I can’t ignore.

I take a step forward.

Then another.

And suddenly, I’m standing in front of him, heart pounding like a paint-splattered drum in my chest.

He looks up.

His expression softens. “Hey.”

I try to speak, but my voice catches. I end up offering a tiny smile instead—the one that’s always been his, whether he knew it or not.

He sees it this time.

And smiles back.

“I was hoping you’d come,” he says.

“I wasn’t sure if I should,” I admit.

He pats the space beside him. “You should.”

I sit.

Our shoulders don’t touch, but the space between us hums like an unfinished chord. The breeze plays with the paper cranes still resting beside him. He’s brought them here. Mine and his.

“Do you always carry them with you?” I ask.

He shrugs. “Not always. Just when I don’t want to forget something important.”

I blink. “What’s important about today?”

He glances sideways at me. “You.”

My breath catches.

He says it so easily. No hesitation. No dramatic pause.

Just truth.

I’ve spent so long hiding behind silence that I forgot how powerful a single word can be when it’s real.

I lower my gaze, unsure what to say. He doesn’t rush me.

After a while, he asks, “Do you smile like that for everyone?”

My head jerks up.

“What?”

“That smile,” he says, not teasing. “It’s different. Not the kind people give just to be polite.”

I swallow. “No… it’s not for everyone.”

He nods, as if he already knew the answer.

And suddenly I feel seen again, in a way that makes my chest ache and bloom at the same time.

“I want to tell you something,” he says, looking at the paper cranes. “But you have to promise not to laugh.”

I smile. “I won’t.”

“I think…” He hesitates, rubbing the back of his neck. “I think I’ve been writing about you for longer than I realized.”

I stare.

“You’ve… what?”

He pulls a folded page from his notebook and hands it to me. It’s from one of his lyric drafts.

I unfold it carefully.

The words are soft, poetic—rough in some places, but honest. Lines like:

"She moves like shadowlight,

Not to disappear,

But to stay unseen—

Until someone looks deeper."

Tears prick the corners of my eyes.

He watches me gently. “I didn’t know it was about you at first. I just kept thinking about this girl I saw… always sitting alone, always drawing like she had entire worlds no one else could touch.”

I press the paper to my chest.

“I always thought I was invisible to you,” I whisper.

“You were,” he says. “But only because I was blind.”

I shake my head. “No. You saw me exactly when I needed you to.”

He smiles. “Maybe we both did.”

We fall quiet again.

But it’s a golden kind of silence. The kind that doesn’t demand to be filled.

Around us, petals drift down like confetti from a celebration no one else can hear. The breeze is gentle. The sunlight warm. The paper cranes stay still, like they know this moment matters.

I lean back, letting my eyes close for just a second.

And in that moment, I imagine a future.

Not a loud one. Not a perfect one.

Just a quiet studio with tall windows. A boy humming while he writes music beside me. My paintings on the walls. My smile no longer hidden in shadows, but given freely.

To him.

Always to him.

Because somehow, without ever asking for it, he gave me a reason to believe I could exist beyond the silence.

When I open my eyes again, Ji-won is looking at me—not the way others do. Not like I’m strange or fragile or forgettable.

But like I’m real.

Like I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.

And maybe—just maybe—he’s right.