Asher

He believed that love was capable of overcoming any difficulty.
For years, he lived happily with the girl he loved. She was kind, fun, and made his days seem lighter. For him, there was no one else but her.
However, there was another person.
A girl from the same school who had been silently watching him. She had fallen in love with him long before he started dating anyone. One day, she gathered all the courage she had and confessed her feelings.
I've liked you for a long time.
He smiled gently, but shook his head.
— I'm sorry... my heart already belongs to someone else.
Those words hurt. A lot.
The girl cried in secret that night, but she never blamed him. She knew that no one was obligated to reciprocate another person's feelings.
The person he loved... was, in fact, his best friend.
No matter how much envy tried to take root in her heart, she never allowed it to happen. She preferred to keep the pain to herself and continue wishing them both happiness.
"If he's happy... then everything's fine," she repeated to herself.
Months passed.
Until one night, everything changed.
An explosion in the kitchen caused a fire in his girlfriend's house. The flames spread rapidly, trapping the girl inside.
She was screaming desperately for help.
People were trying to prevent anyone from entering, waiting for the firefighters to arrive.
But he didn't think twice.
Ignoring the shouts around him, he ran towards the fire.
He braved the smoke, the suffocating heat, and the flames until he managed to find her.
Even though he was having trouble breathing, he took the girl in his arms and managed to get out of the house seconds before part of the ceiling collapsed.
She survived.
But the price was high.
The flames burned part of the left side of his face, leaving scars that ran from his forehead, past his eye, and down to his cheek.
He spent weeks in the hospital.
When he was finally discharged, he believed that everything would go back to normal.
But I was wrong.