Friday morning brought back its pale light and its heavier schedule. First period: philosophy.
The board gleamed under the room's chalky glare. The sentence written in white chalk carried a particular weight—almost physical.
"Does life draw its value from its finitude?"
Silence took the room. You could almost hear the scratch of pens, the muffled sighs. Everyone seemed to be waiting for someone to crack the shell first.
Madame Laurens, our teacher, watched us quietly—attentive, almost patient. She knew this kind of topic needed time to sprout in people's heads.
Hypnos, true to himself, raised his hand first. His voice rang out like a soft note—foggy, distant.
"Maybe it's precisely because life is limited that it becomes precious… If it went on forever, each moment would end up blending together. Rarity makes things valuable, right?"
A student nodded. The teacher jotted something in her notebook without intervening.
Hemera followed calmly, hands folded on her desk.
"The end creates a kind of urgency. It forces us to choose, to feel more strongly, to love intensely. Without a deadline, life might be more comfortable… but surely less human."
Murmurs of approval rose. The mood felt almost serene, like we were walking familiar ground.
And then, without warning, Zoé's voice cut through the air. She hadn't raised her hand.
"I think you have to live to the fullest."
Every gaze swung her way. She sat straight in her chair, arms crossed, chin lifted. Her voice vibrated—not loud, but tight.
"Because you never know when it all stops."
A shiver moved through the rows. Even the rowdiest stilled.
Zoé drew a breath. Her eyes had darkened, but she didn't look away.
"My father died when I was thirteen. He said good night like usual. And the next day… he wasn't there."
A thick silence crushed the class. You could barely hear the piece of chalk rolling on Madame Laurens's desk.
Maëlys gripped her pencil case until her knuckles went white. Raphaël looked away, uneasy. Ayaka bit her lip. Hemera stared at Zoé without blinking, straight-backed, like she wanted to absorb every syllable.
Zoé went on, quieter, but each word hit the air like a stone dropped in water:
"Since then, I swore I wouldn't miss anything. That I wouldn't hold back from living. Because all it takes is one morning for everything to vanish. And when it's over… it's over."
Her voice broke. Not a sob. Just a clean fracture.
No one clapped. No one chimed in. Even the biggest chatterboxes stayed mute.
Madame Laurens—normally ruthless about the rules—didn't scold her for speaking without raising her hand.She simply inclined her head.
"Thanatos?"
That name, spoken into the quiet, cracked across the room like a chill.
I lifted my eyes. Now everyone was watching me. Even the ones who usually avoided me.
I didn't straighten up. I didn't force anything. But my voice—low, clear—sliced the silence.
"The end doesn't give value. It doesn't give anything. It takes."
A few students blinked. Others tensed. Zoé stared at me, taut as a bowstring about to snap.
"Just because something goes out doesn't mean it ever shone. Light, pain, love… those are chemical reactions in an organism that's going to rot in the end. What you call 'value,' I call denial. A refusal to look the void straight in the eye."
A breath moved through the room. Bastien let out a half-whispered "wow." Léo frowned. Ayaka muttered "grim" without looking up.
Zoé was shaking. Not with fear. Not with fragility. With indignation.
"So what?" she breathed, voice cracked but steady. "Even your brother? Your sister? Even what you have together—does that mean nothing to you?"
I raised my head toward her, slowly. There was no anger, no mockery in my eyes. Just a cold lucidity. Razor-sharp.
"Nothing lasts. Not bonds. Not feelings. What I feel for them… for anyone… doesn't weigh more than what gets carried off by the wind."
In Zoé's pupils, a hairline fracture appeared—fragile, trembling. But she didn't cry. She clenched her jaw, arms folded like armor, hands trembling despite herself.
Hemera looked away, neck stiff, like a weight had settled on her chest. Hypnos sighed—long and soundless. He wasn't judging me. He was noting it.
The bell finally rang. Not the end-of-day bell—the ten o'clock recess. Yet it sounded like an escape, a breath of air in a saturated room.
Chairs scraped. Voices began again, carefully. A few forced laughs tried to lighten the air. But no one really forgot what had just been said.
Zoé rose slower than the others. She traded a few words with Élina and Ayaka, then laughed softly at a joke from Rômanella. But her gaze… wandered elsewhere.
We, as usual, lingered back a bit. Hypnos stretched with his arms overhead, cracking a low joke. Hemera tucked a strand of hair behind her ear while talking to Maëlys. Then the four of us headed out.
And that's when Zoé took one step, then another. She left her group. And without the slightest hesitation, she walked toward us. Toward me.
Hypnos leaned against the railing just beside us, idly twirling a lock of hair like his mind was somewhere else. And Maëlys, silent, arms crossed, looked like she wanted to brace for what was coming.
Zoé came closer. Frank. Frustrated. Her steps barely sounded on the tiles, but her eyes made plenty of noise.
She stopped in front of me. Not in front of us. In front of me.
"Do you do this a lot?" she shot. "Dropping sharp lines without raising your voice, and acting like it has nothing to do with you?"
I didn't answer right away. Her emotions were vibrating too loudly. She wanted something immediate. That's not how I work.
She inhaled—on the edge of blowing up.
"During class, you talked like nothing was worth existing for. Even your family—you threw them in the same pile. So what? You have no ties at all? Even what you share—Hypnos, Hemera, all of that—is just noise before oblivion to you?"
She'd leaned in, almost too close. Her eyes hunted for a crack. There was nothing to find. No one moved. Hypnos barely lifted an eyebrow. Hemera stayed straight, gaze fixed somewhere between us. Maëlys turned her head slightly, as if to fade from the frame.
I exhaled. Slowly. Then let the words fall, clean:
"This isn't about attachment, Zoé. Or pain. It's about lucidity."
She took half a step back, shook her head. Her fingers trembled.
"No. It's about cowardice. You're just scared to feel. Because you think everything that dies never mattered. But that's not true. My father died. And still… he mattered. He still matters. It's because he's gone that I want to live at full volume. So I won't regret it. What about you? Are you burying yourself alive?"
Her tone rose. With each word, her voice grew more vibrant, more unstable. She was barely shaking. But I saw it. In her eyes.
So I answered. Slowly. In a flat, clear tone. Glacial.
"You think we're so different? You think you're the only one who grew up without a father?"
I watched her breath catch.
"At our place, there wasn't some tragedy, Zoé. No story you tell between two silences. He was just… absent. Never there. We grew up like that. Me, Hypnos, Hemera… the little ones too. No figure to look up to. No explanation. Just absence, like background air. And Mother had to raise us alone. Six kids. By herself."
She blinked, surprised. Then looked away. She hadn't said it out loud, but she'd thought her pain gave her a claim on the world. Maybe it does. But I grew up with a void too. I just… never learned to fill it.
Then I went on, lower:
"You want pain to serve a purpose. You want loss to grant meaning. I won't make one up for it. That's all."
She faltered. Not in her body—in her gaze. Her mouth opened, but nothing came out. For a heartbeat I saw a strange brightness in her eyes. A tautness held back. A tear that refused to fall. Then she exhaled:
"You annoy me. You're insufferable."
I didn't answer. Hypnos murmured, almost amused:
"He's good at that."
She shot him an irritated look… then let out a tiny laugh—a breath, barely there.
Her eyes met Hemera's, she hesitated… then stepped back.
When she rejoined the other girls, Élina took her in at once. Rômanella slung an arm around her shoulders. Ayaka said something I didn't catch, but it made the whole group laugh. And Zoé… Zoé didn't resist. She let herself be carried. Almost buoyed.
"Don't mind Thanatos," Élina whispered. "He's in cemetery-poet mode, but deep down he has a heart. I mean, I hope."
"He acts scary on purpose," Ayaka added. "It's his natural filter."
Zoé smiled. A little. Her eyes still bright.
She answered something we didn't hear.
I didn't take my eyes off her. She was alive. Confident on the surface. But full of shards she couldn't control.
And I was still there. Cold. Steady. Not because I had nothing to feel. But because I refused to cling to what dies.