Rain dripped down the cracked window, each drop a countdown she could not escape.
Lilly curled into herself on the edge of her bed, hugging her knees, pressing her cheek against them.
The walls carried the echoes of her father's anger—shouts, doors slamming, a vase breaking somewhere.
Her mother's muffled crying followed, quiet enough to almost not exist.
Lilly had learned to block it out, to vanish into silence, because there was nothing else she could do.
Happiness was a lie she had grown up believing in.
She had seen it everywhere but never in her life: in children laughing with parents who celebrated them, in homes filled with warmth and light.
Her parents never said they were proud. They never cared.
They never saw her.
Why am I here? she thought bitterly.
Why was I allowed to exist in a world that never meant to let me feel anything that matters?
She hated her home.
She hated the false smiles, the pretenses, the way her parents pretended to be proud only when it suited them.
She hated the years she had spent thinking effort could make her visible.
Every act—raising her hand in class, volunteering, laughing quietly at jokes she didn't care about—was a desperate attempt to exist.
And every time, it failed. She was still invisible.
School was no refuge.
She walked quietly, head down, speaking only when necessary, withdrawing from anyone who looked too closely.
Sometimes a glance or a brief word would make a warmth flare inside her chest, but it never lasted.
No one wants me.
No one will ever want me, she whispered to herself.
Her parents continued their quiet cruelties. Praise never came.
Recognition never came.
Attention was only granted when convenient.
She had tried to believe love could exist in fragments, that someone might see her, but each time the truth hit harder: she would never be loved the way she wanted.
She would never be proud. She would never belong.
Even the rare acts of kindness she experienced—moments of recognition, smiles, or attention—were cruel reminders of her place.
The warmth always left.
The cold always returned.
Lilly stopped hoping.
She stopped imagining belonging.
Even happiness itself became unbearable.
It will never be mine, she thought one night, staring at the ceiling.
Life does not give happiness to people like me.