Chapter 4 – The Distance Between Us

The classroom looked the same as it always had — rows of desks, sunlight slipping in through half-drawn curtains, the faint scent of chalk lingering in the air. Yet to Irisa, it somehow felt different now. Maybe it was because summer had passed, or maybe because she was carrying something inside her that hadn’t been there before.

She slipped into her usual seat, laying her books out carefully, her heart quietly expectant. A part of her wanted — though she wouldn’t admit it even to herself — to catch his eyes. To see if the small spark she had imagined before the holidays was still there.

But when Ren entered, his steps unhurried, his bag slung loosely over his shoulder, he didn’t look her way. He walked past her row without pause, without even the flicker of a glance, and settled into his seat a few desks back.

Irisa’s chest tightened. For a moment, she wondered if she had been mistaken all along. Maybe her friends’ teasing had meant nothing. Maybe her summer thoughts had been nothing but foolish daydreams.

She opened her notebook, forcing her focus on the blackboard as the teacher began. But her mind strayed, tugged insistently toward the boy behind her. She wanted to turn around, to confirm whether he was even paying her the smallest bit of attention. Yet each time, she held back, her pen scratching against the page a little harder than necessary.

Days passed like this. Ren seemed quieter now, less restless, less full of those small glances she had grown used to. He didn’t look at her, not the way he once had. Or maybe he did, and she just couldn’t catch it anymore. Either way, to her it felt as if an invisible wall had risen between them.

Her friends noticed her distraction. “Why are you so quiet these days?” one of them asked during a break, nudging her with a teasing smile.

Irisa shook her head quickly, hiding behind a practiced laugh. “Nothing. Just tired.”

But inside, she felt something different — something that was harder to admit. She was hurt. Not because she had expected anything grand, but because she had felt a connection, however small, before the holidays. Now, with Ren’s silence, it felt like that connection had slipped away.

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For Ren, the story was not so simple.

It wasn’t that he didn’t see her. In fact, the moment he walked back into the classroom after summer, his eyes had gone searching for her automatically. The sight of her sitting there, neat and focused, had filled him with a relief he hadn’t been ready for.

But he had also seen the danger of his own heart. The summer had made him realize just how much space she occupied in his thoughts. And that realization had scared him.

I can’t be obvious anymore, he told himself. If she notices, if she thinks I’m strange, everything will fall apart.

So he had decided to be careful. To look only when he was sure she wasn’t watching. To keep his distance, even if it meant hiding the feelings that kept pressing at the edges of his silence.

From the outside, it looked like indifference. But inside, Ren was fighting harder than ever to hold his heart still.

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Irisa couldn’t see that. All she knew was the ache of being unseen, the sting of what felt like rejection without even a word exchanged.

And yet, that strange distance made her think about him more. Why did it hurt, if she had promised herself she didn’t care? Why did her chest feel tight each time she caught herself wishing he’d look her way again?

The answer was uncomfortable, but slowly becoming undeniable.

Somewhere along the way, she had begun to like him too.

But liking someone who didn’t seem to feel the same anymore was a quiet, difficult thing. She told herself to focus on her notes, her exams, her future. Still, late at night, when the house grew still and the only sound was the hum of her table lamp, she found herself staring at her notebook, her mind wandering back to a boy who seemed farther away than ever.

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And so, the new term began not with closeness, but with distance — two hearts aching quietly, both believing the other had slipped away, neither knowing that the truth was far gentler, and that their story had only just begun to shift.

To be continued......

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