“Welcome to the madhouse, bro.”
I smirked.
Yeah, it really was a madhouse—
a crazy house of freedom, knowledge, temptations,
and endless “Who even are you?”
First night.
First party.
The first time I saw her.
She walked into the room like someone had turned on the light.
Everyone was talking, laughing,
pouring beer into plastic cups.
The music shook the walls.
But I saw only her.
Nicole.
I learned the name later.
But her face… it struck me instantly.
Pale. Tall.
With the cold beauty of a northern actress.
A half-playful smile.
Confident movements.
She wasn’t trying to impress.
She just was.
I felt my fists clench—
not from anger,
but from how she crashed into my world
without knocking, without asking—
and went straight to the center.
I didn’t approach her.
I just remembered.
Later, lying on the bed,
staring at the ceiling,
I kept seeing her profile,
her gaze,
her shoulders,
her hair—like sunlight on ice.
America didn’t greet me with words.
But it gave me my first pain.
I had come to study law.
But for the first time,
I realized I’d have to learn myself first.
Chapter 2. Nicole
Some people don’t enter your life like a storm.
They come like light.
Quietly. Gently.
And then they disappear—
leaving only night behind.
I met Nicole in the third week of classes.
We were assigned to the same seminar group for logic.
She sat behind me, chewing on a pencil and muttering quiet curses
every time the professor scribbled another formula on the board.
I turned and whispered,
“Do you also feel like a lost chess piece?”
She laughed.
First, surprised—then, truly.
That’s how it began.
We became friends.
Real ones.
No flirting. No hints.
Just… near each other.
We’d walk after class, share earbuds, argue about movies,
and drink coffee on the steps of the library.
Sometimes she’d take my hand.
Sometimes I’d wrap my arms around her when she was cold.
It wasn’t called love.
It was closeness—without promises.
I remember once she said,
“You’re different. With you, it’s quiet. Even when the world screams.”
And I wore that sentence inside my chest like a medal.
Silently.
Gently.
Two months passed.
Autumn crept into the campus.
Leaves crunched underfoot.
Students hurried—some after coffee, some after someone else.
And Nicole began to disappear more often.
“Sorry, can’t hang out. I’ve got exams,” she said.
Then it was “a project.”