After moving to another city, I found myself in my second private school. I rarely spoke unless necessary. During lunch breaks and the long waits for food, I stood aside, leafing through a notebook of mathematical problems, thoughts, phrases, quotes, and excerpts. Sometimes I let my gaze wander over the flowers, paintings, and human anthill in the hallway. Being alone never troubled me—it was essential. Yet suffocation grew, whether with people or alone. Another circumstance no one knew: my chronic atopic dermatitis flared up badly. My back was in constant torment from the itch; clothes stuck to weeping eczema. The white shirt, stained with blood and serum, was hidden beneath a black cardigan with white stripes—I refused to take it off, even in the unbearable spring heat. I don't understand why I kept hiding under it. Perhaps then the habit took root: to conceal the burns of both soul and body. During one lunch break, a little girl approached me. I barely remember her – light brown hair, blue eyes, a squint. She asked: "Why are you always so sad?" The question surprised me; I didn't realise she meant me. I muttered something and shut myself off. I'd heard it often, but it had always brought indifference and irritation. This one caught me. Days later, she returned. "It makes me want to cry, seeing you always alone." For once, I felt awkward. Not because I felt forsaken—I replaced the word loneliness with the purer word solitude. She had a squint, like my cousin. Coincidence or law: the marked see those who've broken rank. This recalled my mother's stories of my grandfather. He ran a small restaurant and served customers himself. Regulars included villagers called strange or mentally ill. Mother spoke calmly, as if they were ordinary neighbours – for him, they were. One story stayed with me: the local eccentric nicknamed "the treasure seeker." He believed dreams showed treasure sites, and he set off to find them. Most saw him as odd. Grandfather went with him twice, though he didn't share the belief. They found nothing. When he returned, grandfather just told him to rest. There was no mockery in those words; they sounded like something said to an old friend. Perhaps that's why I think of my younger brother, who has autism. As a child, kids tormented him, used him. Unlike me, he yearned for people but couldn't befriend them. My parents reproached me for not defending him and I have no excuse for my passivity. It was not fear—I knew how to stand up for myself perfectly well. Was I protecting my inner world? Afraid to crack my shell? It sounds vile, but no other explanation. At home, another world existed. We invented a fantasy universe. I constructed it from outside – devising laws, history, characters – the protagonist was always my brother. I was director, never participant. I gave orders; he obeyed with joy. It seemed like a child's game, but now I'm not sure. A year later, father and I moved back; mother and brothers stayed. The school became part of the past. With it vanished the girl whose name I never knew. With time, these memories fused. When school noise fades, the corridor rises with her quiet words. I understand: it was not just pity. It was an antidote injected beneath my inflamed skin – hardened by pride. Her words and gaze were a dose of warmth that might teach me not to hide, but to heal. Sometimes a flaw becomes a gift: the ability to warm another's life in a few moments. Perhaps her squint gave her a different angle – the angle of compassion. The little girl, grandfather's visitors, our fantasy world – all past. Yet these memories walk beside me. Perhaps they remind me: one may differ in every way, but remains human. Independence doesn't diminish with kindness; solitude stays valuable when you stop beside the one others pass by. Perhaps God teaches me to see not only differences, but what makes us human. I think I finally know what to say to her: thank you for seeing me. Maybe that is what an oblique glance is for—not to look away, but to see what a straight one misses. I'm trying to see others the same way.