Peak

The schoolyard during lunch break. The sunlight is harsh, and voices are abuzz. Varu stands in the center of a small group of classmates. He's just made a good joke, and everyone is laughing. His green hair, perfectly layered, seems to have absorbed the sun's rays and glows from within. The corners of his lips are raised in a flawless, open smile. But if you look closely—and Pik is doing just that—you can see a slight glaze in Varu's gaze. He nods, says something else, his posture relaxed and confident. A perfect picture.

Peak watches from his "zone"—a shady corner near an old oak tree, away from the noise. He leans against the trunk, his eyes half-closed, but his silver gaze is as sharp as a scalpel. He holds a sketchbook in his hands. With his thumb, he pushes back an unruly strand of purple hair, which, as always, sticks out like a horn. He's not drawing a noisy group. He's drawing Vara alone. Not smiling. But the way he saw him this morning: standing by the window in the empty hallway, gazing out into the rain with an expression of such tired, such genuine sadness that Peak almost drops his books. Lines emerge on the paper—not the captain's proud posture, but slightly hunched shoulders; not a confident chin, but the soft, exposed line of a neck.

“Fake,” the thought flashes through Peak’s mind, and the pencil sharply emphasizes the shadow under the drawn eye.

A couple of days later, Peak, wandering the empty hallways after class (he always lingers to avoid the crowds), stumbles upon something interesting. On a windowsill in a rarely visited wing, next to the music room, lies a spotless, expensive notebook with a dark blue leather cover. A dropped pen with an engraving lies nearby. Peak picks it up. On the first page, in calligraphic handwriting, is a schedule, monthly goals, and a training schedule. And in the corner, a small, neat signature: Varu A. Peak flips through. Everything is perfect: chemistry notes with color diagrams, calorie calculator, bibliography. And not a single extra line, smudged letter, or silly doodle in the margins.