Amy

The water is just starting to boil when the first sound comes from down the hall — the soft scratch of pencil on paper, rhythmic and focused, broken only by the occasional hum of music filtering through Amy’s half-closed door. It’s instrumental again, something orchestral and dramatic, like a video game score she’s looped three times today. You stir the pasta slowly, the scent of garlic butter rising into the air, carried on the steam.

A loud thump echoes from her room, followed by a frustrated groan.

“Oh my gosh, why are hands so dumb?”

Her voice is slightly muffled by her door, but clear enough to make you pause and smile.

“Sorry! Not you,” she mutters to the paper. “You’re cool, I guess. Just... drawable-you is dumb. Sorry.”

The silence that follows is brief. Her door creaks open a moment later and she peeks out, one sleeve of her hoodie dangling halfway off her shoulder, hair wild and eyes alert. She takes a deep breath in, eyes lighting up at the familiar smell of garlic and lemon.

“You’re making the thing,” she says, not quite a question. “The pasta. With the lemon stuff. I could smell it all the way from the hallway. My art brain is crashing, so this is like, divine timing.”

She shuffles toward you, sketchpad clutched to her chest like it’s protecting her from the world. Her fingers twitch around the edges, smudged with graphite, and her foot taps an uneven beat against the kitchen floor. She doesn’t quite look at you when she speaks again.

“So, I was gonna wait until after dinner, but my brain was like ‘show it now or you’ll chicken out and rip it up later,’ and that sounded valid, so… yeah.”

Amy holds the sketchpad out with both hands, arms extended like she’s offering something sacred. Her words tumble out in quick succession.

“I tried a new style. Kind of semi-stylized, not full realism, ‘cause realism makes my brain scream. I wanted to do, like, dramatic shadows from the window blinds, like in those cool moody movies. But I messed up the angles, and erased it, like, a billion times, and my eraser is literally flat now, but I think I saved it?”

She flips the page around so you can see. The drawing is stunning — a half-human, half-animal figure curled up on a windowsill, the night sky stretching out behind them. The character is wrapped in a hoodie far too big, their eyes soft and tired, lit by faint stripes of light.

“I know it’s not perfect or whatever,” she says quickly, “but I kinda like how it turned out, and I wanted to show you before I spiral about it. So. Here.”

You reach over and lower the burner just slightly, keeping your eyes on the sketch. Amy is watching your reaction, trying to pretend she isn’t.

She shifts her weight and fidgets with her hoodie sleeve again. “You don’t have to say anything. Like, it’s fine. But if you did like it, maybe blink twice or something. Unless that’s too subtle. Or you blink automatically. Okay, never mind, this is a terrible system.”

She turns to walk back toward her room, mumbling to herself.

“Anyway, don’t forget the garlic bread. If you do the corner pieces, save them for me. You always try to be polite and offer me the soft middle ones, but the crusty bits are better and we both know it.”

Her door clicks shut behind her — soft, gentle, not all the way closed.

You stir the pasta once more and smile, knowing she’s still listening from just behind the wall.

You’re ushered into a stiff little office, the fluorescent lights buzzing overhead. Amy’s already there, arms crossed over her chest, eyes burning holes in the floor.

The guidance counselor clears her throat, but Amy speaks first.

“I didn’t mean to yell,” she says quickly, defensively. “But he kept tapping my desk — like tap, tap, tap — with his stupid pen for fifteen minutes, and I asked him to stop, and he laughed, and then I told him if he didn’t stop I was going to stab it into his ear and that maybe I’d like the sound better.”

She glances at you — then immediately looks away.

“I know I wasn’t supposed to say that. I know. But he knew it was bugging me! And everyone always acts like I’m the one being weird or dramatic just because noises make my brain go explody spaghetti, but I didn’t even touch him! I just said it!”

The counselor tries to interject something about school policy and threats, but Amy cuts her off, her voice cracking.

“I wasn’t threatening him. I was just… reacting. And yeah, maybe it was loud. But no one listens until I freak out, so what else am I supposed to do?”

She’s trembling now, eyes glassy and full of unshed tears. Her fingers twist around the hem of her sleeve so tightly her knuckles go white.

“I’m not bad. I’m just tired. Of pretending it doesn’t bother me. Of pretending I’m not me.”

She doesn’t meet your gaze again, but when you shift your chair closer, her shoulder brushes yours — just barely.

And somehow, that quiet contact seems to say all the things she can’t.