There was a boy.
He could hear other people’s thoughts.
It helped. He could understand why one of his friends got annoyed.
But it wasn’t consistent.
Sometimes he could hear full conversations in someone’s mind. Other times — especially when he needed it most — there was only silence.
He learned to live with the inconsistency.
He also learned how to keep a poker face when he did hear something.
Reacting to a thought was usually... strange.
Not reacting to a word could be rude, but it was better than strange.
He became quiet, avoiding anything too specific in conversation.
In contrast, his understanding of people grew deeper.
He learned that what people say often contains very little truth.
He went to college.
He studied English literature.
Reading felt like hearing someone else’s thoughts.
He didn’t need to speak while reading. It was safe.
He loved books.
There was a girl in one of his classes who seemed to love books, too.
She was quiet.
She was beautiful.
She had tight lips, white skin, and black hair.
He couldn’t hear her thoughts.
That was... unusual.
He liked her. He wanted to be her friend.
Except for one moment — the moment everything changed.
They bumped into each other just outside class.
He felt startled — then quickly relieved, even excited.
He briefly thought: Maybe this is my chance to talk to her.
But what he heard was a grumpy: “Ugh, this guy again.”
His heart froze.
He never found the courage to talk to her again.
They had a couple more classes together, but both graduated without ever speaking.
Eventually, he was hired by a good publishing company.
He was still quiet, but he could read minds — and that helped. Especially with upper managers.
One day, there was a meeting.
His boss was supposed to lead it, but she asked him to take over — probably something to do with her son, who was having trouble.
He stepped into the meeting.
She was there.
The girl from college.
Still beautiful — her hair now a little shorter.
He was surprised and delighted, though his poker face showed nothing.
She said, “Rob, I didn’t know you work here.”
He was stunned that she remembered his name.
She must have come to publish a book. But strangely, she didn’t want to talk much about her manuscript.
Most authors in that room were like salespeople — eager, persuasive. But not her.
She didn’t even bring it up.
The manuscript was short. Probably poetry, he thought.
He asked what it was about.
She was quiet.
He had so many questions he didn’t ask: How have you been? Are you a full-time writer? Are you seeing anyone?
The meeting was brief.
All he had was her email and manuscript, passed along through his boss.
He told her he’d be in touch after reading it.
She said nothing. He still couldn’t hear her thoughts.
That evening, he came home early, made instant noodles, and opened her manuscript.
He had resisted the temptation to read it at the office — he wanted uninterrupted time. Two solid hours.
It wasn’t poetry.
It was a story.
A girl falling in love with a boy.
But the narrator wasn’t the girl.
It was the boy.
The story began:
"She is quiet.
She is beautiful.
She has tight lips, white skin, and black hair.
I cannot hear her thoughts. It's a little strange."
After finishing the manuscript, he wrote — and deleted — about a hundred emails.
Finally, at around 1 a.m., he sent one:
"Can we meet tomorrow?"
The reply came instantly.
"Yes,"
...followed by:
"But it wasn’t me. You never heard my thoughts."
He didn’t sleep that night.
He watched the sky turn from black to grey to gold.
Very bright gold.
