The second week at St. Crescent Academy arrived with mist curling across the courtyards, swallowing the towers in pale shrouds. Students rushed between classes, laughter echoing, scarves fluttering like banners. Anaya moved among them with her books hugged tight, but it felt less like walking in a crowd and more like drifting in someone else's dream.
It began with small moments.
In Philosophy, Professor Darius paused after calling roll, frowning at his list. "Hmm. That's odd. Says we should have twenty-three, but I only count twenty-two."
Anaya raised her hand timidly. "I'm here."
His eyes scanned the rows, sliding past her. "Ah, of course," he said absently, but the puzzled look lingered, as though she were a smudge he couldn't quite wipe from the page.
In Mathematics, the teacher divided the class into groups. Anaya sat waiting at her table, but the other students paired off around her as though she were invisible furniture. She waved once, awkwardly. No response. Finally she joined Rafael's table because it was the only one with a free chair.
He slid his notes toward her without comment, as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
By the third day, the cafeteria incident broke her.
She stood in line with her tray, surrounded by the press of bodies. When her turn came, she stepped forward—only to have another student slide neatly into her place. The lunch lady didn't even glance at Anaya, serving the other girl instead.
"Excuse me—" Anaya tried. Her voice was swallowed by the clatter of trays.
Three more students passed in front of her before Rafael appeared, grabbing two plates. He pressed one into her hands. "You'd starve waiting," he murmured, leading her toward their corner table.
She forced a laugh, but her throat tightened. "Do they not see me?"
"They see what they expect to see," Rafael said cryptically, tearing into a roll.
Her appetite shriveled. She pushed the food around her plate.
Across the hall, Mira caught her gaze. For once, there was no mocking smile. Just a tilt of her head, curious, like a scientist observing a specimen that didn't belong in the jar.
That evening, Anaya retreated to the library. The vaulted ceiling soared above her, chandeliers swaying gently. Rows upon rows of ancient tomes whispered of certainty: laws of destiny, theories of glimpses, biographies of the gifted.
She pulled down a heavy volume: The Cartography of Futures. Dust coated the cover. She flipped through pages of diagrams showing branching paths, each one glowing toward an endpoint.
No diagram showed a blank space.
Her hand trembled. She whispered to herself, "What am I?"
A rustle. She looked up to find Rafael sliding into the chair across from her. His presence had become a strange comfort—like a lantern one could rely on always being lit.
"You're hiding," he said lightly, leaning back.
"I'm studying."
He tapped the book. "Studying how everyone else works, or how you don't?"
She snapped it shut. "You don't get it."
"I get more than you think." He folded his arms. "You think it's easy, seeing two futures? Knowing no matter what I choose, I'm betraying one part of myself? You think that's clarity? It's torture."
She blinked. For once, his bravado cracked, raw frustration beneath.
"Maybe," she whispered, "but at least you exist in the map. I don't."
Rafael's gaze softened. "Or maybe you're the only one not trapped by it."
The chandeliers flickered overhead. Both of them glanced up. No one else in the library reacted.
Anaya's stomach tightened. It's me. It has to be me.
The days blurred. The invisibility grew sharper.
In Literature, a group project formed. Her name wasn't written on the team sheet. She raised her hand. "You forgot me."
The teacher blinked, startled. "Were you… not assigned already?"
She shook her head.
"Oh. Well. You can… join Mira's group."
Mira's jaw clenched. "Fine," she said flatly.
But during meetings, Mira never looked at Anaya, never assigned her tasks. When presentations came, Mira breezed through without once acknowledging her contribution.
It was as though she were a ghost tethered to the living.
The isolation clawed at her. Loneliness wasn't new—she'd felt it back home, too—but here, it was amplified, sharpened by contrast. Everyone else sparkled with possibility, glimpses like armor. And she—she faded.
One night, unable to sleep, she wandered the courtyard. The moon hung low, silver pooling across stone.
She sat beneath the fountain, water gurgling softly. Closing her eyes, she whispered into the dark, "Why me? Why bring me here?"
A sound carried across the courtyard: hushed voices near the cloisters.
She stilled, listening.
"…shouldn't have been admitted," a man's voice hissed. Older, weary.
"She was chosen," another replied sharply.
"By whom? The ledger held no name. She arrived unmarked."
A pause. Then, quieter: "If she unravels the others—"
"Silence," the second voice cut. "Do you want the walls to hear? The Headmistress will decide. Until then, she stays."
Their footsteps receded.
Anaya pressed her fist to her mouth, heart pounding.
Unmarked. Not supposed to be here.
And yet… chosen.
By whom? For what?
The fountain gurgled on, heedless, as though mocking her with its eternal voice.
She sat in the moonlight until her bones ached with cold, whispering to herself the words she didn't dare say aloud:
"I'm not invisible. I can't be."
The chandeliers in the library weren't the only things flickering. Reality itself seemed to tremble at her edges.
And something—whether curse or gift—was beginning to wake.