Chapter 1: Outcast

Hi… thanks for picking up this book.

I’m not really sure how to start this, but… I’m glad you’re here.

If I tell you everything now, that would ruin the story, right?

So let’s take it slowly.

Oh—and maybe, after each chapter, you could tell me what you think.

That would mean a lot.

…

My name is Lily.

I’m twenty years old.

Pisces. Born February 27th.

And apparently…

I bring bad luck to people.

Both my parents died on the same day.

It wasn’t just tragic—it was sudden, inexplicable, like the world had snapped a finger and my life changed forever.

After that, things just kept going wrong.

People leaving. People avoiding me. Whispering. Judging. Pretending I wasn’t there.

So tell me—

Would you stay close to someone like that?

…

I grew up in an orphanage.

I watched other kids get picked. Chosen. Loved.

Over and over again. Birthday parties, weekend trips, families who came to meet them and smiled as if they’d been waiting their whole lives.

But no one ever chose me.

At some point, you stop hoping.

You just… exist.

I had this strange way of coping.

I imagined people differently.

Everyone had a perfect, glowing circle in their eyes.

Everyone… except me.

Mine looked like a star.

Funny, right? Something that looked beautiful…

was the very thing that made me an outcast.

Some nights, I would lie awake, staring at the ceiling, wondering why the universe thought it was okay to make me different.

Why did it choose me to be the one who didn’t fit in?

I couldn’t stop imagining what it would feel like to be like everyone else. Invisible, maybe—but normal.

…

Then, on my 18th birthday—everything changed.

An organization came for me.

Not just me… but people like me. People who didn’t belong.

“Outcasts,” they called us.

At first, I didn’t want to go.

I was scared, uncertain, clinging to the only life I’d ever known.

But staying hurt more than leaving ever could.

So I left.

…

And that’s how I ended up here.

A place that’s part school, part college… part something else entirely.

Everything you need is here. Classes. Dorms. Cafeterias.

It’s like a whole country built for people like us.

Sounds perfect, doesn’t it?

Yeah…

That’s what I thought too.

…

My first year wasn’t so bad.

I focused on my studies. Stayed quiet. Kept my head down.

I even won awards. Small victories, but they felt like proof that maybe, just maybe, I could belong.

For a while, I thought maybe… I had finally found my place.

I was wrong.

People here may be outcasts…

but that doesn’t mean they’re kind.

Groups formed. Circles closed. Secrets whispered. Alliances made and broken.

And somehow—I became invisible all over again.

So I kept to myself.

Only leaving my room for classes, for food… and nothing else.

It was easier that way. Safer.

I decorated my room with small things that made it mine—posters, a few plants, a tiny jar of stars I’d painted myself.

Even those small comforts weren’t enough to make the world outside my door feel welcoming.

I watched the other students from afar, laughing in groups, forming bonds I could only imagine having.

…

Until him.

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