She laughed too easily.
Jokes like coins, scattered everywhere.
Teachers called her brilliant.
Friends called her sunshine.
She let them.
It was easier that way.

Her notebooks were perfect.
Handwriting straight as fences.
Answers quick.
Always right.
They thought she never stumbled.
They were wrong.

At night she made lists of failures.
Read them like bedtime stories.
Called herself names softer than knives,
sharper than truth.
She didn't cry.
She joked.
Turned bruises into punchlines.
It fooled almost everyone.

She was two people.
One walked the hallways,
hair tied neat,
smile bright enough to blind.
The other sat in empty rooms,
sipping silence like it was medicine,
mocking her own reflection.

He saw both.
The shine.
The cracks.
The way her voice tilted when she lied.
The way her jokes landed too heavy.
She didn't know what to do with that.

So she said,
"Don't look at me like that.
Like I'm a tragedy."

And he answered,
quiet,
steady:
"You're not a tragedy.
You're just... real."