Her Sunlight
Chapter One: Her Sunlight
“Norelle, darling, breakfast is ready,” her mother called, voice warm as a song.
Norelle set down her pencil with a sigh and tucked her sketchbook beneath her pillow. When she came downstairs, the smell of toast and tea wrapped around her like a blanket. Her mother greeted her with a smile, already pulling a chair out for her.
“Sit, love. You’ll need your strength for school,” she said, brushing crumbs off the table. As Norelle ate, her mother moved behind her, gentle hands parting and weaving her hair.
“I’ll braid it for you,” she murmured. “That way it won’t tangle while you’re running around.”
Norelle smiled softly. Her mother’s touch was the kind of comfort that steadied her. At school, things weren’t so simple.
She thought of the two girls she used to call her closest friends. They had started to change—pressuring her to do things she didn’t want to, whispering about boys, daring one another to smoke behind the schoolyard and acting like feelings were just toys. When they ate lunch together, sometimes they split into a duo, voices lowering, leaving her to walk a few steps behind.
It hurt in ways she never said out loud. She laughed when she was supposed to, stayed quiet when she had to, and learned to carry her loneliness silently.
And still, she looked forward to mornings.
Because there was Garrison.
He didn’t do anything grand—no secret notes, no sweeping gestures. Just a boy who sat near enough to notice when she smiled, who let his laughter reach her when she was quiet. He was kind in the small ways others weren’t, and that was enough. Enough to be her sunlight in a place that often felt gray.
“Norelle,” her mother’s voice came again, soft but grounding. “You’ll be late if you keep daydreaming.”
She blinked, cheeks warm, and nodded quickly, finishing the last bite of toast. Her mother tied the green ribbon at the end of her braid and kissed the top of her head.
“Go shine, my girl,” she said.
And Norelle tried to believe she could. "See you later.."
The walk to school was short she lived near it after all not even seven minutes of walk, but Norelle always felt the weight of it. Sharon and Nora were already waiting by the corner, giggling about something she wasn’t part of.
“There you are,” Sharon said when Norelle finally caught up, though her tone wasn’t warm—it was sharp, almost impatient.
“Sorry,” Norelle murmured, clutching the strap of her bag.
They fell into step together, but it was never quite together. Sharon and Nora walked side by side, shoulders brushing, their laughter spilling between them. Norelle kept to the right, just a little behind, like a shadow.
She tried not to mind when they whispered about boys, about whose hand they wanted to hold, about which lipstick looked best. She tried not to wince when they dared each other to sneak cigarettes or talk about parties Norelle hadn’t been invited to.
It wasn’t that they didn’t notice her—it was that they seemed to notice her less and less.
By the time they reached the school gates, Sharon and Nora had already moved ahead, greeting others loudly, as though they belonged to something bigger.
Norelle lingered, tugging at the ribbon in her braid.
That was when she saw him—Garrison.
He was seated at the steps with his sketchbook open, head bent in focus, sunlight brushing the curve of his cheek. Something about him was different—quieter, softer. And when his gaze lifted and caught hers, just briefly, the noise of the schoolyard faded.
He smiled, just enough to reach his eyes and looked down at his sketchbook again.
Norelle felt the warmth of it all the way down to her hands.
For a moment, it was enough.
Inside the classroom, Norelle slipped quietly to her desk. She placed her bag down, smoothed her skirt, and tried not to look around too much. Sharon and Nora were already in the middle of a conversation about some new lip gloss Sharon’s older cousin had bought her. Their voices were bright, cutting through the room.
Trying to join in, Norelle tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear and said softly, “Let’s go to the balcony? It’s quite pleasantly sunny.”
Sharon’s head tilted, lips curving into that polite-but-sharp smile. “Mmm, maybe… but we’ll see. I don’t know if we feel like it.”
Nora giggled, leaning into Sharon’s shoulder. “Yeah, we’ll let you know. Why don't you go alone?”
Their sweetness was so practiced it almost stung. Norelle swallowed back the ache and nodded as if it didn’t matter. She turned away, clutching her school diary.
By the time the chatter swelled again, she had already slipped out of the classroom. The balcony was quiet, a long stretch of the broken, holes of a floor ending in a railing. She sat down near the grill of the wall, hugging her knees, the sunlight warm on her face. Opening her diary, she tried to pretend reading the school's hymn but her mind was clearly somewhere else.
“Hey.”
The voice broke the silence. Norelle looked up to see Garrison standing there, his sketchbook tucked under one arm, shoulders slightly hunched. He stepped closer, eyes catching hers with a mix of shyness and ease.
“I… kind of suck at drawing,” he admitted, giving a crooked smile. “You’re good at it, right? Think you could help me out?”
End of chapter one.
