BEFORE WE EVEN SPOKE

The pencil in Noelle Amari's hand moved with careful intention, scraping soft arcs into the textured page of her sketchpad. Knees drawn to her chest and oversized hoodie sleeves nearly swallowing her fingers, she leaned against the foot of her bed, surrounded by a comfortable mess. Her room was cluttered in the way only artists or storm survivors understood sketchbooks layered over folded clothes, markers tangled in charger cords, loose pages curled from tea stains and neglect.

Outside, the Kyoto breeze stirred the open window, drifting through lace curtains with a whisper of coming winter. Late October sunlight spilled across the floor in narrow strips, warming the dusty hardwood just enough to make her forget she hadn't left the apartment all day.

The girl on her page had scissors for fingers. Not in a horror-movie way more like melancholy poetry. Her eyes were heavy, her hair long and knotted, her posture defiant. A metaphor maybe. Or maybe just something cool Noelle had seen in a dream.

She sighed and sat back. Her graphite-streaked fingers hovered midair like they'd forgotten what they were doing. Music pulsed faintly from her phone speaker some ambient lo-fi mix she could get lost in without paying attention.

"Noelle!"

The voice hit like a dropped dish in a quiet room.

Noelle didn't respond. She stared hard at the drawing, then rubbed at a smudge near the girl's chin.

"Noelle! I know you hear me!"

Still, she didn't move. A socked foot nudged her door open a second later and in came Tessa,her older sister, her sometimes drill sergeant, her eternal eye-roll.

Tessa was every inch composed. Button-up shirt, sleeves cuffed just so. Slim charcoal trousers. A sharp silver watch. She always looked like she was heading to a courtroom even when she wasn't. Today, she was clearly on a mission.

"You're ignoring Mom's email again," Tessa said, arms crossed.

"I'm ignoring everyone's email," Noelle replied.

"She sent the scholarship link. Twice."

"Which makes it easier to ignore. Two birds, one delete button."

Tessa exhaled sharply. She stepped further into the room, careful not to crush any papers. "You know you can't keep skating like this."

"Skating? I'm barely crawling."

"Exactly. You're wasting time. Mom's trying to help you "

"No," Noelle interrupted, finally looking up. "Mom's trying to fix me. There's a difference."

Tessa's expression flickered something like sympathy trying to surface beneath the lawyer-face. She sat down at the edge of the bed, brushing aside a roll of washi tape. "You're not broken."

Noelle stared at her for a long second before glancing down at her sketchpad. "Then why does everyone act like I need to be repaired?"

The silence that followed wasn't heavy. Just tired.

"You're smart," Tessa said. "You just don't apply yourself."

Noelle chuckled humorlessly. "Classic parent-approved insult."

"It's not an insult, Elle. It's the truth."

"Maybe I'm tired of being a truth someone else gets to define."

Another silence. Another inhale from Tessa. Another restrained storm behind her brown eyes. "You have potential."

"I have anxiety."

"You have talent."

"I have no idea what I'm doing."

Tessa didn't argue that one.

Noelle sighed and stretched out flat on the floor, arms flopping to her sides like she was a cartoon character giving up on life. The sketchpad slid from her stomach and landed beside her. Tessa stood.

"I'll tell Mom you're still thinking about it."

"You can tell her I'm planning a circus career."

"She'll still send the link."

As Tessa left, Noelle whispered to the ceiling, "Tell her to stop pretending a scholarship's going to make me love calculus."

The door closed.

Alone again, she stared at the blankness above her, the late afternoon shadows stretching longer across the walls. Her hand drifted toward the sketchpad again, fingertips brushing the page like it was the only thing that made sense.

She didn't want to be a scholar.

She didn't want to be saved.

She just wanted to breathe without feeling like she was failing someone.

And lately, even that felt impossible.