I was born into a middle-class family — the kind that sits quietly in the background, never too loud, never too broken, but always just surviving. We had dreams, big ones, but reality never quite let us reach them. My parents tried their best. They still do. But hope doesn't pay bills, and hard work doesn’t always bring rewards.
Growing up, I learned early that money was something we had to be careful with. I never asked for anything — not because I didn’t want it, but because I knew better. School trips? I’d lie and say I wasn’t interested. Group photos? I’d pretend I forgot to bring the form. Deep down, it always stung — watching classmates laugh and pose for pictures while I stood off to the side, smiling like it didn’t matter. But it did. It mattered more than I’ll ever admit to anyone.
I didn’t want to burden my parents. They already carried enough weight. So I swallowed my wants, buried them somewhere deep, and kept walking with a smile stitched to my face.
I was never the smartest kid in class, never the worst either. Just average. Just… there. If you lined up the entire class and asked someone to name everyone, I’m not sure they’d remember me. Sometimes I feel like even my own teachers barely notice. It’s like I’m living behind a thin sheet of glass — present, but unreachable. No one really sees me. No one really hears me.
People always talk about making memories in school — moments they’ll never forget. But mine? Most of them feel like echoes. Days blending into each other. Faces I’ll probably forget because they never looked my way in the first place.
And then there’s her.
There’s this girl. She’s not in my class. She’s not even someone I talk to. I don’t know why I like her — maybe it’s the way she smiles, or the way her laugh feels like sunlight in a grey room. But I can’t talk to her. I wouldn’t even know what to say. I’ve built up a thousand conversations in my head, all ending the same way — in silence. She doesn’t know I exist. I don’t think she ever will.
And I guess… that’s a reflection of my whole life.
Unseen. Unheard. Unspoken.
I don’t even know if I’m hoping for anything anymore. I just keep going, day by day, blending in with the walls, pretending the quiet doesn’t hurt.
But it does.
The quiet hurts more than I let on. More than I ever show.
And maybe that’s why, on one of those long, invisible days, I finally broke. Not in some dramatic, earth-shattering way — no one would have noticed if they were watching. It was just me, sitting in the back corner of the classroom, my head down, pretending to read while the world carried on without me.
I remember the moment clearly. It was during lunch. The classroom buzzed with voices and laughter, groups gathering like constellations I could never be a part of. I sat alone, as usual, eating a sandwich that had gone soggy in my bag. My classmates talked about weekend plans, birthday parties, relationships, dreams — things I wasn’t invited to have.
I stared at the empty desk beside mine, thinking how even the silence had grown tired of sitting with me. That was when a thought hit me, small and fragile at first, like a whisper: What if I told my story?
Not because I thought anyone would read it. Not because I wanted pity or applause. But because maybe, just maybe, if I wrote it down, I wouldn’t feel like I was disappearing anymore.
That evening, I went home, locked myself in my room, and opened a blank notebook. The first page stared back at me — clean, untouched, unjudging. I stared at it for a long time. My pen trembled in my hand. It felt ridiculous at first, like I was pretending to be someone who mattered. But then the words began to fall out.
“I was born into a middle-class family — the kind that dreams quietly and lives even quieter…”
And just like that, the dam broke. Everything I had kept bottled up — the loneliness, the fear, the longing, the shame — spilled onto the pages. My voice, the one I’d buried beneath years of silence, finally had space to breathe.
I didn’t know what the story would become. I still don’t. But for the first time, I wasn’t waiting for someone else to see me. I wasn’t wishing for someone to understand. I was writing it all down — every unnoticed moment, every invisible scar — for me.
Because even if the world never listens, I want to leave proof that I was here. That I felt things. That I mattered, even if only to myself.
That was the moment I decided: If no one else will tell my story, I will.
So I kept writing. Day after day, night after night, pouring pieces of myself into that notebook. It became something more than just paper and ink — it was a version of me that could finally speak. A version that didn’t flinch or hide. A version that felt real.
For once, I wasn’t just a shadow in the corner. In those pages, I was alive.
I wrote about everything — the small, aching details of being overlooked, the hollow laugh I practiced so people wouldn’t ask if I was okay, the girl I could never speak to, and the way I envied the ease with which others existed. I wrote about the anger, too. The kind you can’t aim at anyone because there’s no one to blame. The kind that festers when you realize you've become so good at being invisible that even you have forgotten how to be seen.
And then, somewhere along the way, a strange hope crept in — quiet, dangerous.
What if someone read this?
What if they finally saw me?
What if I mattered, even just once?
That thought haunted me. It wrapped itself around my ribs and refused to let go. And so one day — after weeks of pacing, doubt, and rehearsing every possible outcome — I made a decision. I would show it to someone. Just one person. A classmate. Someone who laughed and joked like life never touched them. Someone who probably never thought of me once.
I didn’t expect praise. I didn’t even expect kindness. I just wanted acknowledgment. I just wanted someone to look at my words and say, “I see you.”
I slipped the notebook into my school bag the next day. My hands shook every time I touched the zipper. My heart felt like it was clawing its way out of my chest. I sat through every class in a haze, waiting for the right moment that never came. Every time I looked around, my throat tightened. Everyone looked so far away — like they were living on a different planet.
I couldn’t do it.
The fear was louder than the hope.
What if they laughed?
What if they didn’t understand?
What if they read everything I’d written — everything I was — and still looked right through me?
That night, I walked to an empty lot behind our building with the notebook pressed against my chest. The wind was cold. The sky was dark. I stared at those pages, filled with every part of me that had never been seen.
And then… I lit a match.
I watched the paper curl in on itself, blackening at the edges, until it was nothing but ash. My story, my voice, my fragile attempt to be more than invisible — gone.
And now?
Now I’m back where I started.
Sitting in the same classroom. Smiling the same fake smile. Nodding at jokes I don’t find funny. Living among people who still don’t know I exist. Nothing’s changed — not really. Except now, even I’m not sure if that version of me in those pages ever existed.
I tried to matter. I really did.
But some of us are just meant to be background noise.
And maybe that’s all I’ll ever be.
Still, there's a thought that floats quietly in the back of my mind —
Maybe next year… with new people, in a new class… maybe I’ll change.
Maybe I’ll speak up. Maybe I’ll finally be seen.
But deep down, I know the truth.
I won’t change. I’m too afraid.
Afraid of what people might think.
Even though — and this is the cruelest part — no one really cares what anyone else is thinking.
And yet, the fear is louder than that truth.
So I stay the same.
Quiet.
Invisible.
Just like always.
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