The next day there was a recording workshop.
She'd known about it for days. She'd written it in her notebook, circled in pencil, the way you do with things you're really looking forward to.
When she walked into the room, she stopped in the doorway.
The light came in through the large side windows, bright and almost warm, drawing luminous rectangles on the linoleum floor. The air smelled of light dust, wood, cable plastic - that specific smell of technical spaces, unlike anything else.
Cameras on tripods. Microphones on adjustable stands. Studio lights that could be angled. Tripods lined up along the wall.
A smile came naturally to her.
She walked over to the first free desk and set down her backpack without thinking, her hands already moving before she'd even sat down. Touching, adjusting, watching. Every object gave her a strange feeling - familiar yet new, like recognizing a language she'd never spoken but had heard many times.
Everything came back to her. Her grandmother describing the sets with her hands, saying every detail mattered, that a light off by ten centimeters could ruin an entire scene. She'd listened to those things for years without truly understanding them. Now she understood.
She picked up a microphone, raised it, tilted it slightly to the right.
She stopped.
"No... not like that."
She adjusted it again, more upright, shifted slightly on its axis.
Better.
A boy next to her was struggling with a stand that refused to stay upright. She watched him for a second, then walked over without saying anything and fixed the mechanism from below.
"That holds better."
The stand stayed still. The boy nodded, relieved.
A small smile escaped her - not for having helped, but for that feeling of knowing, of having hands that already knew what to do.
He was nearby.
He wasn't looking at her. Wasn't looking at anyone in particular.
He moved chairs along the wall, arranged bundles of cables on the floor, lifted a video camera, set it on the tripod, checked the alignment with a precise hand movement.
Clean movements. No hesitation.
She noticed him only after a few minutes, when she happened to look up and realized that everything around him worked better than before.
A crooked cable was straight. A chair out of place was aligned. A wobbling stand had become steady.
He hadn't said anything. Hadn't asked anything. He'd passed by, fixed it, moved on.
She went back to working.
A little later she walked over to a group setting up a small shot in the corner of the room.
"Can I?" she asked.
They made room for her.
She leaned toward the camera, adjusted the framing by shifting the focus slightly, then raised the light a few centimeters and tilted it five degrees to the left. Small movements. Precise. Nothing flashy.
When she straightened up, the image on the preview screen was clean. More balanced.
"That's better," she said.
Someone nodded. Someone else came closer to the screen to look.
She felt something inside - not pride, more like a confirmation.
Passing behind her, he stopped.
Half a second. Maybe less.
He looked at the framing on the screen without saying anything. Then he crouched slightly - a minimal gesture, almost imperceptible - and shifted the tripod a few millimeters to the right.
That was it.
He straightened up and walked away, as if he hadn't stopped at all.
She stayed still.
She looked at the tripod. Then the screen. Then the tripod again.
The image was different. Only slightly - but different. More centered.
She turned toward him.
He was already on the other side of the room, back turned, fixing something else.
She lowered her gaze. Adjusted another detail on the equipment in front of her, without saying anything.
Time slipped by fast.
---
Outside, in the courtyard, she sat with her friends at an outdoor table, still a bit inside the classroom from before.
She explained, told them about it, made gestures with her hands.
Her friends listened, smiled, nodded.
"How was the movie?" one asked, changing the subject.
Her eyes lit up.
"Really beautiful. I got emotional."
"You can tell," one said, smiling.
She lowered her gaze slightly, then went on quietly. "The director was my grandmother."
Brief silence. Her friends softened.
"Who did you go with? Alone?"
"No. With him," she answered, simply.
One friend raised an eyebrow, then let the topic drop without pressing.
She went back to talking, and the conversation moved on.
---
That evening, the TV was on.
He was on the couch - back straight but relaxed, one leg slightly stretched out, completely absorbed in what he was watching.
She came out of her room, crossed the hallway, walked past the living room. Slowed down.
She came closer and sat beside him, not too close, not too far.
"What anime is this?"
"My Dress-Up Darling."
She nodded slowly. Looked at the screen.
The scene changed. A small room, warm light. Two children. The boy showing something he'd made, hands open, face open. Happy. Sincere.
The girl looked at him.
Then - a grimace. A light giggle. Words landing the wrong way.
The boy's smile stopped. Faded. Slow, small, but final.
A few minutes later, the same boy. Older. Calm on the surface. But different.
She leaned slightly toward the screen. "That scene there... it changed him."
"No." His voice was flat, immediate. "It closed him."
She turned her head slightly toward him. "Closed?"
"As a person."
She looked back at the screen. Watched the character more carefully. His eyes. The way he avoided certain gazes. He hadn't changed - he'd built a distance. Subtle. Functional. Invisible until you knew what to look for.
"...that's true," she said quietly.
He didn't answer.
They stayed there, watching, in silence.