The full moon peers through the window—manically naive, cold as neon, like the glowing sign of a toy store at midnight. It watches indifferently and, of course, does not see me. It has no idea that tonight, we will be on the same side. It does not know how greedily I gaze at its flat, white disk through the flames of five candles—two orange, three black. I watch through an invisible pentagram, its peaks formed by fire reflected on the glossy surface of the table, its center—a starving night. The moon does not know that in just a few minutes, it will be veiled in shadow, like a black veil, and become something else—dangerous, obscure, and omnipotent. And then, magical threads will bind the invisible disk in the sky to the faint glow of my pentagram, and this fleeting unity between human and celestial will change the world forever. It will become the way I have seen it in my dreams for years—just and right. And it will be inevitable!

Since childhood, I had known I was different from other people because I was invisible. Ofcourse, not in the literal sense—I could see my own reflection in the mirror—but no one else ever noticed me. No one had ever looked me in the eyes; their gazes either passed straight through me or slid away indifferently. At first, I thought this was how things were meant to be, that it was natural for parents to care for you mechanically, as if they were merely dusting furniture. But when my sister was born, I realized it was different with her—she was noticed. Probably because she existed, whereas I did not. Yes, I began to think that I simply didn’t exist. My teachers at school didn’t see me, nor did strangers on the street. And I was terrified by the thought that I had no soul. After all, aren’t there people born without souls? All because, at the moment of birth, they received only a tiny fragment of the sun, while others were given plenty. A weak sun—that’s what my horoscope once told me, generated long ago by some online astrology program. At first, I tried to fix it. I sought to absorb as much sunlight as possible—burning myself at the beach, throwing open windows in the peak of summer heat instead of drawing the blinds. I filled my notebooks with endless drawings of little suns, and at night, I slept with a nightlight shaped like the sun. But none of it made my skin glow or brought light to my eyes. It was all in vain. And so, having lost faith in everything, I finally told myself: Why strive for anything? Why study? If you don’t even exist? And for the first time in my life, I skipped school. I stayed in my darkened room, perched on the edge of my bed. And the sun—it became my enemy, because it had refused to be my friend.

"Amaya," my mother asked that morning, peeking into my room, "why aren’t you dressed yet?"

Of course, she said it automatically, her gaze fixed somewhere on the wall, never actually catching sight of me. But still, I answered, without expecting any reaction from her:

"Because I don’t exist." And then I added, "I never have."

I knew perfectly well she wouldn’t hear me. And if she did, she wouldn’t understand. She would simply grab my lifeless body—one that had never housed a soul—lead me to the bathroom, leave me by the sink, and order me to brush my teeth. And that’s exactly what she did. Then she sat my body down in the car and drove off somewhere. I knew right away we weren’t going to school—we had taken a completely different route. I tried asking her where we were going, tried to get any kind of response, but she didn’t hear me. This stupid invisibility was becoming unbearable. But I had no idea how to get rid of it—how to make them all see me.

There was another person in the room—a man, probably a doctor, dressed in a white coat. A healthy, well-fed smile played on his face. Only doctors smile like that. Of course, he didn’t notice me and immediately started talking to my mother, who eagerly answered his questions as if she actually enjoyed it. He addressed me only once—or rather, I realized he was talking to me when I heard my name. But since he never looked at me, I chose to remain silent.

"Some form of Cotard’s syndrome," he announced into the air, still smiling. "Patients like this tend to deny their own existence… hmm… nihilism. We see complete immersion in their inner experiences and some signs of stupor. For now, we’ll observe without hospitalization. But keep in mind—there may be suicide attempts or self-harm. In that case, bring her in immediately."

"Oh, sure!" my mother replied. "It’s all so terrible... But I’ll call you immediately. So… there’s no hope?"

"There is always hope. Sometimes there’s relief, and, though rarely, even recovery. But unfortunately, modern psychiatry still hasn’t fully understood these mechanisms."

So that’s what their way of not noticing me was called. And it wasn’t my fault that I was invisible—it was theirs. That meant my mother was sick too. And the doctor didn’t seem particularly healthy either.

"How sad," I told myself, without feeling the slightest sadness. You can’t grieve for the whole world, even if the whole world is sick. How wonderful it was that my parents had finally learned about their illness. No one sent me to school anymore, and I spent my days in my room, trying to make myself visible to someone—anyone. I thought they should all be treated with antibiotics, but there was nowhere to get any medicine. And that was so disheartening that I wanted to die. But can a lifeless body without a soul even die?

To bring some color to my dull, immortal existence, I arranged dolls and plush animals on my bed, on the nightstand, on the floor. They all had eyes, and I hoped that at least one pair of plastic eyes would notice me—after all, inanimate objects couldn’t be sick. But plastic, glass, and even painted eyes stared past me all the same. No matter how I turned the toys, no matter how I shifted my position on the bed—it was all in vain. Even my most treasured doll, with her porcelain face and real hair, the pride of my collection—even she couldn’t see me.

And so I punished the doll, branding her as a traitor. With an invisible hand, I knocked her off the nightstand and shattered her to pieces. I had only recently begun using this trick, after discovering that, in moments of intense distress, some kind of force protruded from the center of my forehead—a phantom limb I could wield as if it were a real hand. I could, for instance, pull a glass of water closer or strike someone. It was a convenient skill. After a few rounds of practice, I could already draw the curtains without leaving my bed or… punish the doll. All that remained of her were two eyes, still connected by a metal bar with a small weight, the mechanism that made her eyelids close when she was laid on her back. I gave a sharp look at the two glassy blue orbs, their black pupils frozen in place—two shimmering flowers on wire stems. Then I placed them in a vase. I loved flowers because, once, they had made me visible—if only for a moment. Back when my mother was still healthy, we often went for walks together. One spring day, she bought a bouquet of daffodils from a street vendor and placed them in my lifeless hands. I walked beside her, invisible as always, but the flowers had a soul, and anyone could see them. So it wasn’t surprising when a little girl stopped, her eyes fixed on the bouquet in admiration. And then she suddenly cried out:

“Daddy, look! An ugly girl is carrying beautiful flowers!”

The sullen man looked straight through me and replied gruffly, "What girl? There's no girl. Hurry up, or we’ll miss the bus."

Needless to say, the child’s words stayed with me forever. And I didn’t know whether to be glad that someone had finally seen me or to grieve over the fact that I was ugly.

At home, I immediately went to the mirror and examined my face. There was nothing particularly ugly about it—everything looked ordinary. Two eyes, a nose. And then it struck me—the mirror only showed my face from the front, never from any other angle. I picked up a second mirror and, for the first time in my life, saw my profile. The girl had been right. My low, heavy forehead was level with the tip of my bulbous nose, while my jaw jutted forward as if trying to catch up with both, aligning them into a single plane. My profile resembled a brick with two notches—one at the bridge of my nose, the other at my upper lip. Ugly? I was monstrous, repulsive. And if I truly existed, the only thing I could do was frighten small children. From that moment on, I never again walked the streets carrying flowers. But I often admired them in the windows of flower shops or in garden beds. Flowers had no eyes with which to overlook me, and so I had a warm spot for them—just as I did toward all plants. They were living beings, yet they were not obliged to notice anyone. And there was no need to expect an answer from them—because, of course, they would never give one.

Yet everything else seemed to have an obsession with eyes. They emerged in the patterns of the carpet, in the stains on the ceiling, in the wings of a butterfly. Yes, I saw them—but they never saw me.

Loneliness is the best teacher. Dragging out my miserable and half-conscious existence, I had endless time for contemplation. And besides my invisible hand, I had developed other abilities. For instance, every morning, I materialized breakfast for myself. Though I could never order anything specific—if I wanted coffee, I would get tea instead; if I craved a sweet bun, I would receive scrambled eggs. The menu never obeyed my desires, yet breakfast always arrived on time, just like lunch and dinner. Clean clothes also appeared on their own, and the chamber pot emptied itself without my intervention. I had no idea how any of it worked, but if not for these abilities, I would have died long ago—starved or swallowed by filth. Because my mother had grown too ill and had vanished. They had all vanished—my father, my sister. I held no hope that one day a kind stranger would come to rescue me from this captivity. And even if such a person did appear, they wouldn’t see me anyway—sitting at the window, lonely and forlorn. Outside, things changed too. Sometimes it snowed, sometimes it rained. Shadows of people passed along the sidewalk, shadows of animals flickered by. Cars sped down the road, but I never once saw a single one stop, never saw anyone step out. From my window, I could see the pedestrian crossing, the toy store across the street, two wilted trees by the roadside, and a few bushes that, in warmer months, bloomed with tiny pink flowers.

Actually, I like when everything stays in its place. The store, the two trees, the flower bed. And the crosswalk. As long as everything remained where it should be, the days rolled on smoothly, and the nights were calm. Could I have imagined that their reality—that foreign, distant world—would still find a way to unsettle me? One rainy spring morning, I discovered that the crosswalk had been moved about ten steps to the right. In its place, they had installed a grated barrier, an ugly shade of mimosa yellow. The pavement slabs had been removed, and in the bare patch of earth, they had planted a few wilted, leafless shrubs. My space had been altered. And I became agitated—something that hadn’t happened in a long time. Of course, deep meditation might have helped me accept this crude interference from the outside world. But as it turned out, the world had yet another shock in store for me.

I heard a sound!

For years, an indistinct murmur had drifted from my window, a monotonous noise without distinct elements. But that day, everything was different. It was a soft tapping against the pavement tiles, as if someone were dragging a piece of metal back and forth, its edge catching on the seams and producing a rhythmic knock. It had been so long since I had heard anything distinct that my weary mind instantly translated the sounds into images—rusted metal, gray pavement. But soon, the source of the tapping entered my field of vision. A blind man was walking along the sidewalk, marking each step with a sharp scrape of his cane. That’s what bats do—they catch the echoes of their own cries, using them to navigate the darkness. Of course, this man wasn’t flying. He walked, creating yet another background sound—the shuffling of his soles, a faint, short hiss: shhh… shhh…

He was dressed in a black waterproof jacket with a hood that obscured his face. I could see only a pale patch of his chin and a lipless mouth, opening and closing in sync with the movement of his cane. Perhaps he was counting his steps. Then, suddenly, everything fell silent. The blind man stopped, turned toward the place where the crosswalk had once been—now blocked by the barrier—and extended his cane forward. He tapped at the metal once, twice, then recoiled at the unfamiliar clang. Then, as if completely lost, he began striking the fence with all his strength, unable to understand why the path he had walked a thousand times before had suddenly become a dead end.

The metallic clatter and crashing meant nothing to him—they were sounds he had never encountered before.

Unable to bear the discomfort the stranger was causing me any longer, I slipped my feet into my slippers and, just as I was—in my pajamas—rushed out of the room. I passed through the living room and hallway without interruption; they were empty. I ran outside into the entryway—also deserted—and in an instant, I found myself in the very epicenter of the maddening noise.

The man was furiously striking the barrier. There was nothing else I could do but take his hand and say, "The crosswalk is no longer here. I’ll help you across…"

It was a strange sensation—holding a stranger’s hand, damp from the rain, in my own. I had never allowed myself such a liberty with anyone before. And yet, strangely enough, he heard my words and even felt my touch, because he followed me without resistance, carefully placing one foot in front of the other. Silently, I led him across the road, trying not to lose the astonishing feeling of connection with another being. But that wasn’t all.

We stopped near the entrance of the toy store, and I placed his hand against the cold wall so he could orient himself from there. I was shivering from the cold, my rain-soaked pajamas clinging to me, while my slippers, swollen with water like sponges, felt like the shackles of a prisoner. Along with the chill, fear crept in—it was done, my courage had faded, and I was left utterly alone in a hostile reality. The way home seemed insurmountable.

I let go of the stranger’s hand, hoping he had already stopped noticing me. But then, the blind man turned his head and looked straight at me with his sightless eyes.

"You are a kind girl," he said in a low, slightly hoarse voice. "A golden soul. Thank you."

The scraping and tapping of his cane had long since faded into the distance, yet I remained standing in the pouring rain, unable to comprehend what had just happened. Had someone… noticed me? But how could that be? Did that mean this man was healthy? That he didn’t suffer from… Cotard’s syndrome, like everyone else who couldn’t see me?

Dolls sat in the store window, their glassy eyes wide open. I looked at them with hope. But in the very next moment, I understood—nothing had changed. They still didn’t see me.

For many days and nights, I pondered what had happened. I kept waiting for something else to occur. But my hopes were in vain, and little by little, I slipped back into my half-dreaming existence, realizing in despair—the world was beyond saving. They say ideas float in the air. They say that even the most insignificant event or object can be a sign—but it takes talent to recognize and interpret them. And sometimes, the subconscious marks a sign for itself, slowly processes it, and one day, delivers a ready-made solution. That’s exactly what happened to me. One morning, a thought appeared—one that would soon take shape into the recipe for a cure-all.

I sit in a comfortable orthopedic chair with the footrest extended, in the same posture as astronauts in their spacecraft. They drift through space among the stars, while I float in complete darkness. Only five candles faintly push back the gloom, and the full moon hangs motionless beyond the window. The parted velvet hangings are a theatrical backdrop, the candlelit table—a stage, and the night sky—a grand set design. The moon is self-satisfied, full-blooded. It gazes down as if it has never been visited by dark premonitions. It has no idea what is about to happen in a few minutes—when something far stronger than its cold light will appear. But the moon too will know fear—fear of vanishing, of dissolving forever like a lump of brown sugar in the black glop of the night. And then, ashamed of its own weakness, it will turn toward me, absorbing the flickering candlelight in my window, clutching onto that faint glow as a last hope. It will wrap itself in that light and, for an instant, take the shape of a pentagram. In that moment, we will be equals. I will give it hope, and it will give me power. And then…

I feel my body becoming weightless, filling from within with a piercing blue light. The thin shell of my skin still holds its shape, but it is already fading, dissolving into the darkness. All that remains is a single, tangible point in the center of my chest—a guardian, keeping me from shattering beyond return. And I see the same thing happening to the moon. The darkness bites off pieces of it, consuming it bit by bit. What remains of its glow turns a deep, blood-red hue, melting into the void just as my body does. And at the very moment when only a crimson shadow is left of the once-bright disk, I summon all my will and cry out in silence, "From the depths, I call to you!"

Into this cry, I pour the foolish victimhood of my name, the funeral toll of a final farewell, and a plea for healing—for all of them. Because I know how to heal them. And I know how to make them see me, to finally say that I exist. Just as that man in the rain once did.

"Amaya," the captive moon tells me in a thunderous whisper that shakes everything around me. "Amaya, this is all your fault."

Let it be me. Of course, it’s me. But it’s not too late to fix everything. I cling to the blood-stained moon and drink in its power, feeling the world shift with every gulp. I drain it to the last drop, losing all sense of time. The candles crackle, throwing out their final sparks before extinguishing—one by one. And as they fade, so does my consciousness.

I wake up to noise. But not the familiar kind that has seeped into my very being over the years—no. My ears pick up the clatter of dishes, the heavy footsteps of someone moving beyond the wall, pained groans, and an unrelenting, high-pitched wail. Just as I once heard the blind man’s cane tapping against the pavement, now I hear the voices of my family. They have returned. With effort, I pry open my eyes, swollen from a sleepless night, and see my hands—still stained with the moon’s blood.

I hurry out of the room, eager to embrace my healed parents. The kitchen is just down the hallway—I haven’t been there in what feels like a thousand years. I step inside and see my father, hunched over a mountain of shattered dishes, fumbling clumsily across the floor. Among the broken plates, pill bottles roll back and forth, scattered tablets mixed in with the shards. I see my mother, staggering through the hallway. She clings to the walls, stepping unsteadily on bare feet, as if afraid she might fall. I see my younger sister sitting on the floor, pressing both hands to her face. Blood drips from between her splayed fingers. My mother lifts her head, and I see two crimson trails streaming down her cheeks—like tears from sightless eyes. At the creak of the door, she turns her blind face toward me and asks in a voice trembling with pain, "Amaya? Can you see us? Call an ambulance."

I want to scream with joy. At last, the sickness has been banished from our home. Oh, how happy we will be now! I would kiss her with all my heart—but there’s time for that later.

"Right away, Mom," I say in a mild voice. "I just need to wash my hands."

Our telephone is white, and I don’t want to stain it. Filth is revolting—especially on hands. Hands should always be clean.

I take a step and stumble over a pair of large tailor’s scissors, carelessly left on the floor. What an unforgivable recklessness—leaving scissors lying around like this. Someone could step on them and get hurt. Twirling the shears in the air, listening to their satisfying metallic click, I make my way to the bathroom. With pleasure, I step under the warm shower, lathering my sponge with gel until it foams into a piercingly white lather. Generously, I spread it over my shoulders and chest. The water carries the foam down, swirling in the tub in murky, reddish clots—washing the moon’s blood down the drain.

*From the depths.