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It was perfectly quiet.
For Lu Guang, this didn’t mean total silence. He found that when things were too quiet, his mind got too loud. So, he preferred it just like this: the gentle rustle of the wind over the wide wheat fields, rustling leaves along the ground and whispering in his ears, tickling his hair.
He sought out that quiet now—the only place where his heart seemed to settle, the only place his shoulders would ease. The quiet of him, alone underneath the towering trees, made real only by the wind as it brushed over him as if he were just another blade of grass in a field.
The wind in the fields beyond the house tended to carry a chill despite the season, but Lu Guang liked it: it was consistent, predictable. He knew that the wind would gently prickle his back beneath his shirt as he walked, jogged, ran away from that old house and into the endless stretch of dead fields. He knew that those tall, winding trees would cast giant, hazy shadows from above, shielding him from the light and the loud like a net. He knew that no matter how intensely his heart hammered against his ribs, that perfectly crafted quiet would eventually lull his pulse into calm.
He was running for his life towards that quiet now, unsettled by the volume of his heartbeat thudding in his ears. Dead wheat, long discarded and left to fend for itself, scratched against his bare legs as he ran along, singularly focused and determined.
Trees. Shade. Quiet.
He ran like a lost traveler scrambling through the desert at the first sight of water. As far as Lu Guang was concerned, there was nothing else in the world except his pitiful, aching body and his joyous destination: an oasis of safe, shaded silence, miles from the house he never could breathe easily in.
When he finally crashed against the sturdy trees, it was like air was finally able to pass through his lungs. It was only then when he stopped, pale hand pressed against the wrinkly bark, that he realized how entirely out of breath he was. He wasn’t sure how long he had been running: normally he didn’t run the entire way here to the tallest tree, but he had bolted out of the back door and not looked back for a second. He had closed his eyes most of the way: his body knew the path like clockwork, and like a protective spell coaxing him home, surely enough he found himself in his beloved safe haven, hidden beneath the trees, alone save for his own ragged breaths, the familiar scratch of the grass, and the wind playing at his bruised, sweating skin.
With one final exhale, Lu Guang let himself fall to the ground, completely exhausted. His little chest rose and fell in labored breaths, but he allowed himself to sprawl out against the grass and let the smell of it enter his nose, lifting his lungs like giving them new life.
Time passed: Lu Guang laid there, breathing evening out into something less desperate, less afraid. He was satisfied to lay there, staring up at the blue-green expanse above him, drawing patterns in the leaves and the sky. The wind shook the branches, occasionally drawing leaves down around him—Lu Guang let them fall over them, as if he were a part of the ecosystem, quiet and unassuming and… belonging.
Clouds peeked from behind the crowns of the trees, and Lu Guang enjoyed watching them float slowly by, hazy and dream-like, like they belonged in an atmosphere so different from the world he lived in. Even as the grass irritated his sore, exposed skin, he liked it; there was just enough sound, just enough sensation to feel himself somewhere in the world, somewhere that accepted him into it without breaking his body to fit the mold. As if he could really have a home somewhere in this silence.
Time continued to tick on. Lu Guang didn’t catch himself drifting off to sleep, but at some point he must have, because when he opened his eyes next, the sun was casting shadows on his face at a different angle than before. He guessed, with a tired disinterest, that this unexpected ray of sun hitting his face was what had woken him up.
He sat up slowly, not motivated by any desire to leave this place. Even when he was awake, this sanctuary felt like a dream: it was a deadly secret for him to have a place that provided him with such tranquility, such unshakeable calm. Yet, despite all his fears, Lu Guang bit his tongue and dared to be selfish, just this once: he indulged in this perfect quiet beneath the trees, let himself pretend the world beyond the fencing of this wild grove didn’t exist, wasn’t waiting for him to return with a hot hand ready to strike.
He’d certainly be in trouble if anyone found out he ran all the way out here, but he decided he was willing to risk it for the peace that this little corner of the world brought him. After all, there was no one and no reason to find him out here… right?
He groaned, the sound threaded with the lull of sleep and physical exhaustion. Lu Guang’s body was still sore, pushed to its limits by his mad dash here hours ago—that journey made with fresh wounds, which now throbbed annoyingly against his consciousness.
Lu Guang sat up slowly, feeling sharp disagreement in his ribs as he did so. He looked at his arms and legs like a student might a math equation: all factual, no attachment, simply an observational gaze to evaluate the situation. He hadn’t so much as glanced at the red and purple brands over his body when he received them earlier—he didn’t spare a second in his retreat as soon as he was able to flee. But now, as he evaluated the damage with a slight detached frown, he’ll admit he was surprised by how quickly these ones had turned maroon and scarlet over his wrists and arms. Maybe he had irritated them further by running through the fields to get here. It didn’t matter now, anyhow, so Lu Guang didn’t think about it any more.
In that moment, he wished he had a sweater: not because he wanted to hide these new and old wounds (what was the point in that?) but because there was an uncharacteristic chill in the air. Even for the way the wind blew here, it was cool. It was summer, but Lu Guang felt too cold.
He was usually comforted by the way the wild air was always chilled enough to make you feel alive, but this was almost the opposite: Lu Guang felt too exposed, too aware of himself and his body, too grounded in his pitiful existence in a world where he didn’t truly belong.
Reflexively, and as if to push the thought away, Lu Guang wrapped his arms around himself. The loose sleeves of his beige shirt fluttered in the wind as it picked up, and Lu Guang brought himself to his feet.
The sun hit his eyes, forcing him to squint. It provided a brief respite in the growing cold, but the light still stung his eyes. After a moment’s calculation, he looked out to where the sun was shining down. In the far-off distance, there was the outline of… something.
He squinted again, this time to try to observe the mysterious blotches of color at the edge of the horizon. He couldn’t make out whatever it was, just the outline of shapes in the distance that he couldn’t begin to guess.
He was surprised: how had he never noticed them before?
It was odd, and almost unnerving to Lu Guang that he could let something go unobserved. He had learned how to do this successfully enough; it had gotten him this far. But what lied beyond? And why had he never seen, never imagined it before?
A bird chirped in clipped bursts somewhere nearby. A morbid curiosity swept through Lu Guang’s system before he tried and failed to stamp it out. He managed to subdue the feeling to a hum grounded in his toes, granting him the coordination to put one foot in front of the other as he began his pursuit of the mysterious shapes on the other end of the horizon.
He didn’t think about the growing chill beneath his bones, or the fury that awaited him at home if he were caught wandering so far. He focused only on the prospect of discovering what lay at the unimagined end of the world, and the way it lit some unidentifiable spark of hope in his stomach.
The kindling of it was enough to keep his body warm as he walked. It was a taunting journey: every step grew more effortful, every brush of icy wind a warning to turn around. But Lu Guang held onto that newfound fire, humble as it was, in the bottom of his stomach and used its fuel to propel him forward.
Step by step, inch by inch, mile by mile—finally, the blurs came into focus, like a camera narrowing in on its subject. Lu Guang froze as he finally approached something identifiable, and it was just in front of his feet.
Train tracks?
For a few moments, he just stood there, observing the tracks with an unmarred disbelief. He had never imagined there would be train tracks so far in the countryside, never heard the rumble of trains passing through outside his window. He had never heard a train in real life, only played with his toy model at home, but he imagined they were quite loud.
Just how far was he from the house?
The thought crept over him with the same icy chill as the unwelcome wind on his spine. The cold snapped him out of this thoughts, urging him forward, compelling him to investigate.
There was a modest building just beyond the tracks. A concrete platform bridged the space between the tracks and the entrance to some kind of building with a strange, slanted roof. Lu Guang’s fingers curled tightly around his skin, prickling the hairs standing on end as he observed the space.
It was unclear who the stranger was in the scene. As Lu Guang crept slowly closer to the structure beyond the train tracks, he found himself both curious and nervous. He couldn’t remember the last time something had surprised him like this: usually, he was able to anticipate even those unexpected incidents, whether through his practiced calculations or by the obvious patterns his parents always played into. But this mysterious train station that seemed to materialize suddenly at the edge of his world—how could he have ever guessed something like this was waiting for him?
He carefully traversed one foot on top of the concrete platform, then another, as if stepping on it might set off some kind of trap.
A beat.
Nothing.
He continued on, curiosity piqued like a spark drifting up from the warmth in his belly holding him together. His footsteps were quiet like a mouse against the rotting wood, second nature and silent.
The station was dark: there were no lights on, and Lu Guang had to wonder if they even worked. The building, inside and out, seemed relatively abandoned. If not that, then whoever did use the station apparently didn’t mind the splintered wood of the signboards or the discolored maps wilting at the corners under gravity.
There was a counter, long and disorganized, by a window at the edge of the wall. Lu Guang peered at the old documents left at the desk and guessed that this was for someone who worked at the train station, probably coordinating the trains’ schedules and the passengers’ tickets.
The idea seemed silly to him: Lu Guang didn’t give any importance to time. If he could predict when something was going to happen, and there was nothing else in the world beyond these predictions, what did it matter how the rest of the world might calculate time? It seemed like a concept for other people, people who didn’t live within that old, gray house, didn’t live on predictions and punishments and orders and hushed footsteps and hung heads. Not that he could well imagine what a world like that was like, not one with him in it, anyway.
His eyes fell away from the papers and drifted around the rest of the station. There seemed to be an area on the other side of the station, obscured by walls and a single wooden door. Lu Guang felt unease upon seeing the closed door, curiosity quickly subdued by another, more polished instinct, and he swiftly turned away.
The draft inside the train station seemed worse than the wind outside. Maybe the building was in even worse condition than it appeared. Maybe that was why it had been abandoned: people probably didn’t want to travel if they were going to have to freeze in an old train station before they ever got to their destination.
…Their destination?
The thought hit Lu Guang suddenly, like the crack of a whip on his skull.
He struggled to conjure an image of the station from some time long gone, full of light and people and life. Travelers in transit, chatting excitedly with hands full of luggage and stories to tell. Trains whisking by with a roar and proud puff of an engine, stoutly chugging along.
The image faded over him similarly to when he saw through photos. A scene beyond his reality seemed to fade over his vision, press against his eyelids and his consciousness, not quite transporting him somewhere else, just meant to see. He never got to leave: he only got to look, to watch, restrained to his reality while he peeked into worlds beyond the one he was trapped in.
He couldn’t readily imagine a place brimming with the promise of new beginnings and intertwined lives, not so close to his house. It was like trying to imagine yourself looking completely different in the mirror: a tiring, disappointing, fruitless endeavor. And Lu Guang had long rid himself of such a fanciful way of thinking.
Still, the thought lingered, like he was reminiscing about a time that he hadn’t experienced in the first place. It left a strange, hollowed feeling in Lu Guang’s belly. Between that and the persistent chill beneath his skin, he felt just a bit sick to his stomach. When was the last time he ate, anyway?
Just as the thought managed to creep into his mind—
“Hey!”
Lu Guang spun around. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up straight, like a cat.
What the hell?
His heart raced suddenly against his chest, and he couldn’t keep his eyes from widening.
Behind him, standing in the doorway to the train station, was a boy with dark hair and a wild sparkle in his brown eyes. His knees were scraped below his denim shorts, around some skin already covered in bandages. He wore a shirt with a trio of superhero-looking characters Lu Guang didn’t recognize, a hat that failed to tame his wild hair, and dark shoes meant for running around, which were scuffed with dirt at the toe.
“When did you get here?”
The boy’s voice bounced around the station excitedly, filling the empty space. Somehow he trekked light into the room behind him as he bounded over to Lu Guang, as if he had no idea of personal space and what it meant to intrude upon it.
Lu Guang leaned carefully away, then steadied his footing, ready to run. The boy was just out of arms reach, which Lu Guang knew was far too close. At this distance, it became obvious that the stranger was taller than Lu Guang, even though they looked about the same age; he fought against the urge to curl into a ball, smaller and smaller until he was invisible.
The boy’s head titled sideways, his lips curled in childlike confusion. “What’s up? Did I scare you?”
Lu Guang was watching every movement carefully. He had already allowed himself to be surprised by the train station, by this boy who appeared out of thin air. He wouldn’t let himself be caught off guard again.
Lu Guang braced himself as the boy’s hands moved quickly. To his surprise, though, the boy planted them on his hips, making him look like a duck with his head craned out. His body was still tense with anticipation as he forced words to come out of his mouth.
“No…” he said meekly, quieter than he meant to.
This brought the boy’s head back straight, slanting his curious eyebrows further.
“What!? I totally did! It was all over your face when you turned around!”
He grinned, mischievous and innocent all at once. Lu Guang swallowed, calculating his next move.
“Whatever…”
The boy let out a triumphant humph, which irritated Lu Guang for some reason. Why did this boy act like he had won something? He clearly hadn’t. If anything, it was weird that he was in this abandoned train station in the middle of nowhere, trying to scare strangers. Did he not have any sense of caution?
“Well, anyway. What are you doing out here?”
His voice had a cheerful quality to it that took a while for Lu Guang to parse. Honestly, it was a bit annoying: how could he stand to be so loud and carefree? Surely it had to be exhausting.
Lu Guang straightened his posture slowly, still analyzing the stranger with watchful intent.
“I could ask you the same thing.” His voice regained its composure, unwavering even in the face of the bouncing sound of the boy in front of him. Seriously, why was he here?
The boy hummed, equal parts thoughtful and proud. A silly grin pulled at his lips and he rubbed a finger under his nose, not really sheepish. Birds somewhere outside were singing more loudly than before.
“My parents are looking for students to attend their school! My dad’s a language teacher, so he’ll be working at the school once it’s finished. They’re still building it, but it’s going to be super cool! My mom’s going to help him too, but she runs a photo studio back home, actually. Do you know what a photo studio is?”
Lu Guang felt a headache coming on.
It was all he could do to stare. How on earth could this boy talk a mile a minute without tiring? If anything, he seemed energized by the words flowing endlessly out of his mouth, at such a high rate and volume. His eyes glimmered with an enviable brightness in the darkness of the train station as he spoke.
Once the throbbing in his head subsided, Lu Guang graced the boy with a reply.
“Yes, I know what a photo studio is.”
It wasn’t a complete lie: he could reasonably guess what a photo studio was, even if he hadn’t encountered one before. Though he didn’t have any guesses as to what one might look like, much less the one this boy was clearly picturing with stars in his eyes. Like the look of someone who was imagining somewhere else, and truly missing it, truly belonging there, eager to return.
“Cool! Well, that’s what we do. I think I’ll work with my mom someday. I like taking photos. She’s showing me some really cool ways to use a camera. Oh! She even let me go in the dark room with her the other day!”
“Dark room?”
“Yeah, the dark room! It’s a room where we develop photos. It’s all red because of the light or something. It’s a little creepy at first, but it’s actually pretty cool!”
Cool, cool, cool. Was this boy always so excited? Lu Guang couldn’t imagine the sight of him bored, or quiet for that matter.
As if to mock him, another gust of wind swept through the train station, rattling the splintering wood and skin. Lu Guang braced himself tighter, feeling the deep-seated chill clash with the heat flickering at his stomach. He shut his eyes tight, willing these strange feelings away.
The boy reached for his hat to secure it from blowing away in the wind, leaving his shirt to sway in all angles as the gale tore through the room. His dark hair curled around his eyes when he released his fingers from the brim of his hat, brushing the locks away, when he suddenly stopped.
The gust tore through the room, ripping papers away and tearing at rusted signage just outside. The old metal hit the ground with a crash—one that sent shockwaves through Lu Guang’s entire body, and he froze.
It wasn’t a shiver in the cold, not just a flinch at a sudden loud sound, but a full-bodied stillness, activated as if being invisible in the dark could shield him.
In an instant, he curled in on himself, arms locked tight around his stomach, eyes widened with unfiltered fear before they were shut tight. He hadn’t registered doing it until the spell was broken by a voice—not the one he expected, but one much softer, rounder around the edges. It broke through the pulsating heartbeat like a siren in his ears.
“Woah—hey, you okay?”
Lu Guang hated how quickly his body had reacted. It hadn’t even been anything. But it was practiced, muscle-memory that lived side by side with everything else he had come to know. His fingers were still curled tight around his bruised skin.
He hated, too, how seen he felt under the boy’s eyes. He could feel himself being watched: it wasn’t the looming, predictable sort of stare he had grown familiar with, but something much more novel. More open, more concerned, more… pure.
“I’m fine,” Lu Guang said, too sharp, too late, even when he tried to purge the rotten taste in his mouth before speaking.
The boy didn’t argue. Lu Guang couldn’t look him in the eye, but noticed as the boy stepped between him and the doorway, a tiny, proud shield. He did it quietly, without fanfare, like he simply couldn’t help but protect someone shivering in the cold.
The gesture settled under Lu Guang’s ribs, unexpected and unexplainable, but it managed to fight the pain and panic that dwelled there.
For a moment, the world was silent, wind dying down, birds resurfacing like the sun over the horizon. Lu Guang would have reveled in it longer if it weren’t for the dull ache in his bones and the sudden, soft break of silence.
“Hey… What happened?”
The boy’s voice was careful, as if he were speaking to a frightened animal, treading on ice and afraid to step too hard, too loud and crack the surface. Once the sound of the gust ripping through the room died down, Lu Guang opened his eyes again—he noticed the sudden serious shift in the boy’s face, his lighthearted glee replaced by something tense, something unnatural as it wrinkled his brow.
Lu Guang blinked, feeling his heartbeat quiet, and trying to understand what brought about the shift in the boy’s tone. He followed his gaze down to his own arms, which were wrapped tight around his chest and midsection. He unfolded his arms to inspect them, but found nothing of interest.
“What?” he asked earnestly, confused and a bit unnerved by the gap in his knowledge of the situation. He didn’t want to be caught unaware again.
The boy was watching Lu Guang like he was a puzzle, his stare shifting pieces around to try to fit them together. The expression seemed too heavy for his little face.
“Um… never mind,” he muttered, and the resignation took Lu Guang by surprise.
Lu Guang lowered his arms to his sides, still feeling the soreness poking against his ribs. It was like his world was threatening to tilt on its axis, like gravity spun differently in this pocket of earth, pulling him toward this train station at the edge of the world and this boy made of pure sunlight.
Silence followed, and for the first time in a while, Lu Guang wasn’t sure how to proceed. Eventually, he settled on speaking, but he couldn’t rationalize why he did so. It was like this boy was compelling him to speak, to press against the boundaries of the world he knew before wandering into this train station.
“Are you here with your parents, then? To find students?”
The boy seemed surprised this time, and his face did nothing to hide it. His brown eyes widened, shocked out of a thick, syrupy stupor, then regained nimble motion.
“Oh, yeah, we’re going to a few different places. Pa mentioned specific towns to visit.”
The boy had softened again, but still held something fragile in his eyes as he watched Lu Guang in turn.
“Have you always lived in Mianyang?”
Lu Guang blinked again, as if he weren’t expecting the question.
“Um, yeah,” he agreed, noncommittal. “What about you?”
“Guidu,” replied the boy, but his focus seemed elsewhere. Lu Guang couldn’t help but notice how easily everything was painted over his face: there seemed to be nothing that didn’t reveal itself with this boy.
Lu Guang nodded, not sure of what else to say. Truthfully, he had never heard of Guidu, and wasn’t even sure if Mianyang was a word he had ever heard before either.
“Are you… cold?”
The question managed to take Lu Guang by surprise again. This time, though, fear didn’t pulse through him like a gunshot, like he had already lost a battle by being ambushed. The feeling was unnatural, but not so unwelcome; just… new.
Lu Guang nodded meekly, not eager to admit the way the wind bit at his skin, highlighting the pain throbbing against his arms, legs, and chest. The boy pursed his lips, clearly troubled.
“Sorry I don’t have a jacket. It’s summer, so…”
Silence filled the air again. The wind rustled the floorboards and loose ends of old papers in the train station, a quiet hum of life that used to be here. The dull ache in Lu Guang’s head was easing slowly.
The quiet here wasn’t the same as the one he cherished. It was completely different: not even the wind felt comforting like he knew it to be. But somehow, it wasn’t bad, either. In the breaths between the boy’s booming voice and bright presence, there was enough peace to push past the pain in his body, the fog in his system, and Lu Guang could breathe.
The terror at being caught unaware in a strange place had faded from Lu Guang’s nerves. He still felt nervous static in the tips of his fingers and toes, but it just felt cold now. This boy was new and weird and talked entirely too much and too loud for any average person, but he was… safe.
Safe enough to breathe around, to stand around silently while feeling the cold and allowing yourself to be seen in it. He was unexplainable and unexpected, but it was like he belonged to a different rhythm entirely: maybe it wasn’t a threat, it was just… different.
A gentle warmth settled over Lu Guang, slowly, like a wave meeting the shore as the sun beamed down. The foam brushed his skin and cleaned his cuts, stinging but real, survived. It was a marvel how bright and full an abandoned train station could feel.
“My name’s Cheng Xiaoshi, by the way.”
The boy grinned, toothy and unguarded in a way that captured Lu Guang’s full attention, beautifully, bravely novel.
Finally, like cogs finding their place, Lu Guang spoke.
“I’m Lu Guang.”
The boy somehow managed to grin wider.
“It’s nice to meet you, Lu Guang!”
“Nice to meet you… Cheng Xiaoshi.”
Cheng Xiaoshi beamed. Lu Guang’s instinct was to look away, because staring at Cheng Xiaoshi head on was, frankly, overstimulating. But he fought it. He dug his foot in, and once more, dared himself to feel this.
Cheng Xiaoshi seemed to take this as an invitation to lean in closer. Lu Guang’s face scrunched reflexively, but Cheng Xiaoshi appeared unbothered as he inspected his new friend’s face more closely. What he was looking for, Lu Guang couldn’t begin to guess.
“What are you doing?” he hissed, pushing the boy away without much force. He felt, somehow, instinctually, that it was wrong to be too rough with Cheng Xiaoshi; like his system wouldn’t understand, like his body wasn’t made for the only touch Lu Guang knew how to give. Like he was made of glass, and that’s why light filtered through him so.
“Your eyes,” Cheng Xiaoshi said, annoyingly matter-of-fact, as if this gave Lu Guang any insight into what he meant.
“Huh?”
“They’re, like, really familiar!”
Lu Guang narrowed his gaze, judging. A sour look spread over his face—maybe he had given this boy too much credit.
“But we’ve never met before. Why would they be familiar?”
Cheng Xiaoshi groaned, the gears turning clearly and awkwardly in his head.
“I don’t know! They just… are, you know?”
Lu Guang deadpanned, feeling the inexplicable urge to heave a deep sigh.
“No, I don’t.” Then, under his breath: “Obviously.”
But Cheng Xiaoshi was too lost in his thoughts to be bothered. Lu Guang watched with a bewildered interest: how could someone so… open have made it this far? It defied all logic, all patterns, all predictions.
Suddenly, Cheng Xiaoshi snapped his fingers, startling Lu Guang out of his thoughts. “I’ve got it!” he proclaimed, quickly searching through the pockets of his shorts.
Lu Guang watched with a furrowed brow, clueless as to what this boy could possibly do next.
Cheng Xiaoshi pulled something out of his pocket and held it out in front of him. Lu Guang craned just slightly closer, emboldened by the boy’s brazen nature, and saw that it was a long, shadowy strip. He didn’t know what it was, even as Cheng Xiaoshi held it up to the light, squinting at it from different angles. Cheng Xiaoshi, though, looked unreasonably proud.
In another swift, sudden motion, Cheng Xiaoshi held the strip out towards Lu Guang, smile pure sunlight.
“See! It looks just like you, Lu Guang!”
Lu Guang carefully took the strip from Cheng Xiaoshi. Upon closer inspection, the strip was translucent in parts, and there was just enough light to reveal a clear shape beneath. The image of a white cat with striking blue eyes stared back at Lu Guang, its expression playful in a way that was hard to decipher.
Light filtered through the strip onto Lu Guang’s eyes as he stared expectantly at the cat, as if looking long and hard enough could reveal some kind of answer.
“Is this… supposed to be me?”
“Huh!? Duh! Look at the cat’s eyes,” Cheng Xiaoshi instructed, his figure fumbling back into view.
Lu Guang kept his gaze trained on the image of the cat. He did as Cheng Xiaoshi said, squinting for a better look: the cat had blue eyes (that couldn’t be it, unless Cheng Xiaoshi was colorblind as well as a loudmouth), but white fur, so maybe that was it? Still, the connection didn’t sink in, despite Cheng Xiaoshi’s insistent fervor.
As if sensing his disbelief, Cheng Xiaoshi pouted and leaned in close to Lu Guang’s shoulder.
“Come on, you’re even making the same face.”
Lu Guang studied the strip for a second longer before surrendering it back to Cheng Xiaoshi.
“If you say so.”
Cheng Xiaoshi huffed, then let his gaze fall to the strip Lu Guang held out to him.
“Why don’t you keep it?”
The surprise was painfully obvious on Lu Guang’s face this time. He couldn’t help it; never in a million years could he have anticipated hearing that.
“You want me to keep it?” he asked, unsure.
“Yeah! It’s a present. So you’ll think of me.” He grinned shyly, and the expression was stark on his cheerful frame.
Lu Guang watched Cheng Xiaoshi carefully. Too many times before had he fallen for such a trap, only to be burned in the end. The pain coursed through him hot and familiar.
“So you’re leaving?”
The question seemed to catch Cheng Xiaoshi off guard.
“Oh, um, yeah. I’m going with my parents to wherever our next stop is, so I can’t stay…” His voice trailed, as if embarrassed to admit it. Lu Guang thought the expression didn’t suit him at all.
He glanced down at the strip between his fingers again. The cat stared steadily back at him, some kind of warped mirror. He didn’t understand everything, certainly couldn’t predict it, but for some reason, he felt… warm. It was like gravity finally settling into its proper place, lulling Lu Guang in somewhere he had never imagined existed.
“Are you sure?” Cheng Xiaoshi’s ears perked like a dog at the question.
“About the…” Lu Guang couldn’t find the word to describe whatever it was he was holding, so he shook it gently to convey the message. His voice was nearly timid. “…Giving me the cat, I mean.”
As the realization dawned on him, Cheng Xiaoshi chuckled. It was loud, piercingly loud, but Lu Guang found that he didn’t mind.
“Yeah, it’s yours! A present from your friend Cheng Xiaoshi.”
Cheng Xiaoshi grinned again, boyish and proud, beaming like the sun in this dark room in the middle of nowhere. Lu Guang found it difficult to look him in the eye, but he wanted to.
He didn’t want to be left alone in this train station, forced to walk back to that old gray house before nightfall came and his absence would be noticed. He wanted to hold onto the warmth and the new feelings that Cheng Xiaoshi gave him, wanted to feel something new in his small world that wasn’t precalculated, wasn’t pressed upon him again and again until his skin bruised. He wanted to breathe and feel the full force of the air in his lungs, feel brave enough to wander all the way to the train tracks more than once in his life. He wanted to understand how Cheng Xiaoshi did it: how his world worked, what it looked like, what his perfect silence sounded like. It had to be so different from his own—and somehow, it wasn’t as scary to imagine with Cheng Xiaoshi by his side.
Lu Guang couldn’t put any of this to words. His tongue felt numb, failing him like it had fallen off with frostbite. It frustrated him in ways he hadn’t felt in a long, long time.
“Maybe you can convince your parents to send you to my dad’s school!”
Lu Guang’s head raised, slow and cautious.
“That way, we could be together all the time!”
Cheng Xiaoshi’s voice completed the empty train station, filling it with something that made the dark less ominous, the unknown less frightening. Lu Guang felt a lump in his throat.
I don’t think my parents would allow that, he wanted to say. It was the truth, but it tasted bitter on his tongue. He didn’t struggle with what to say or not say, not until now, not until Cheng Xiaoshi. He found himself wanting to spare him words that might hurt him, as nonsensical as this thought may have been.
He swallowed the words, shoving them far, far down. He wanted to commit to this alternate reality where he went to Cheng Xiaoshi’s parents’ school, lived in a world outside of a house locked by fields of dead wheat, could speak to someone who made him feel warm, didn’t send every inch of his body into a protective fight-or-flight.
It was inexplicable, and totally unreasonable, but still—
Lu Guang hoped.
It would be another secret of his. Like a quiet, steady core, this bittersweet, wonderful feeling would be his to harbor, unspoken and unshown. A blue-eyed cat would wink at him from a thin piece of film, and Lu Guang would say nothing about the hope it sparked in his heart. He would hold onto this film strip, this memory, this boy, tight enough to keep the fire in his belly burning even when he felt the most dreadful, world-lurching cold. He wouldn’t feel hollow even when his stomach was empty, because he had an anchor rooted firmly enough to support him even when his limbs gave way.
Cheng Xiaoshi had given him such a gift, and probably had no idea.
A faint smile crept over Lu Guang’s pale face. Cheng Xiaoshi caught it, held the expression close. It was like seeing a flower bloom before the turn of spring.
“That’d be nice,” Lu Guang murmured, thoughtful as he beheld the film strip he had long given up on trying to decipher.
Heat washed over Cheng Xiaoshi’s face, blending him seamlessly into the summer evening with a golden glow. He was happy, so happy that he was sure it was written all over his face (Qiao Ling loved to remind him how much of an open book he was). But he didn’t mind: it was worth it to see the sweetness of a smile on Lu Guang’s face, which he couldn’t help but think, with a faint twinge of guilt, was probably a rare sight.
He was sure he’d remember this moment forever.
It was eerily quiet.
The usual balance in the room was nowhere to be found. Cheng Xiaoshi should have been arguing with Qiao Ling over something comically unimportant, voices raised and baseless threats bouncing back and forth. Lu Guang should have been observing quietly just nearby, expertly navigating the chaos like he could have faded into the background.
The air was far too heavy for anything lighthearted; the atmosphere would have surely shot down any hope that tried to rise from the ashes along Qiao Ling’s bedroom floor.
There was only the frantic back and forth of the siblings as they crashed head-first into an impossible scenario, and the faint smell of spilled vegetable congee growing cold against the tile. Though Qiao Ling and Cheng Xiaoshi were both sure they could hear their own heartbeats thundering in their ears.
Qiao Ling’s chest felt tight as her gaze darted back and forth: her brother on the phone with someone (she guessed an ambulance but couldn’t actually make out anything he was saying), her friend on her bedroom floor, limp and unmoving, quiet as a mouse.
She couldn’t breathe properly; it’s like her lungs were fighting her, and it was all she could do to inhale and exhale. It was pathetic; here she was, watching her friend mysteriously, terrifyingly unresponsive, and she was freaking out?
She was relieved beyond belief that Cheng Xiaoshi was beside her. He had arrived with superhuman speed after they spoke briefly on the phone—
“Cheng Xiaoshi!? Get over here, and hurry,” she had commanded. “It’s Lu Guang.”
Her brother was there in an instant. Qiao Ling still clearly saw the look on his face when he burst through the door, sheer panic and stunned disbelief. It wasn’t unusual to see Cheng Xiaoshi flustered, but such obvious fear? It was rare and unsettling, down to her core.
Now, Qiao Ling was sure of another sight she would never forget: Lu Guang’s still face, pale and fragile like porcelain in the harsh light of her bedroom, fallen unnaturally against her floor.
Nothing about it felt right. Maybe if she didn’t know Lu Guang well enough, she could have convinced herself he was sleeping. He did that often enough, sometimes in the strangest of places. But never so… calmly.
It was an odd thing to notice, but she did—all the times she caught Lu Guang napping in the sunroom or the rare occasion she woke both of the boys up in their room, he never seemed to sleep peacefully. He tossed and turned often, and had a permanent crease between his brows. It bothered her, but she never said anything. Now, she wishes that she had, if not for the simple fact that it might have provided her with some kind of explanation for the oddity she watched now.
Lu Guang was smiling.
Just slightly, but softly, as if the expression had been gently coaxed out of him and none too difficult to achieve. Like a sweet dream was the culprit stealing her friend away from them, and for yet another inexplicable reason, wouldn’t give him back. What could he be dreaming about that gave him such peace? Was he even dreaming at all?
The look on Lu Guang’s face, Qiao Ling realized with a twinge of guilt, was something unnatural, and she didn’t immediately grasp why. Instead, a terrible wave of something loomed over her, ready to overtake her at any moment. She could feel the pressure on her back, pressing against her spine until she felt like her limbs were liquid—
She grit her teeth, set her jaw. She would not falter here. Not when she most needed to stay upright, to pull her boys out of this tidal wave that threatened to drown them all with each passing second.
“The ambulance is on the way,” Cheng Xiaoshi informed, his attention immediately concentrated on Lu Guang. His face twisted with concern and something else he wasn’t totally sure of.
“How is he, jie-jie?” he asked, the anxiety still threaded tight through his voice. The sound snapped Qiao Ling from a daze, and she blinked over and over to ground herself.
Lu Guang didn’t so much as stir, but for some reason, Qiao Ling felt the overwhelming urge to cry.
The tears welled up in her throat, flooding her system. She felt it before she knew it; it had happened again. And this was the aftermath.
Lu Guang…
The thought died on her lips, choked in her throat.
Cheng Xiaoshi noticed the extra time it took Qiao Ling to respond. He watched his sister seem to come back to her senses, like she had been somewhere else before he spoke to her.
Finally, she removed her hand from Lu Guang’s forehead, a frown tugging at her lips. Were her eyes watering?
“He’s still burning up,” she admitted. More resigned, as if thinking aloud, she added, “I don’t understand…”
Silence held in the air for just a beat. Cheng Xiaoshi felt the weight of it stretch the moment out for far too long. Every second in this nonsensical situation ate at his patience, replacing his stomach with an echoing pit of anxiety. He felt sick.
“What happened, Qiao Ling-jie?”
He wasn’t angry, or hostile. He was afraid: for his best friend, for his sister, and of the suspicious situation that had appeared with nauseating force. Something isn’t right.
Qiao Ling took a breath to steady herself. They both watched Lu Guang, quiet but desperate. It was surreal: their friend lay flat against the ground, sweat starting to slick his white hair, as still as a toy tossed aside, yet with the gentlest expression Lu Guang had ever worn. It was almost as if he had been replaced with a doll, and their efforts to pull Lu Guang’s spirit out of the model were in vain.
“Cheng Xiaoshi, there’s something I need to tell you. Both of you.”
Her gaze flittered over Lu Guang’s, wishing despite her nervousness that he would wake up, open his eyes, and look at her. All of the worries and questions that separated them recently seemed laughably unhelpful and unimportant now. Why couldn’t she have been honest with her boys? With herself?
“I don’t understand all of it yet, but…” she began, finding the courage to push past the lump in her throat.
And just as she formed the words, she was hit with another sudden wave, like a realization dawning upon a dark room. Her breath hitched with the magnitude of it all, and her spine shot up straight. Her ribs quivered with fear and some distant pain that wasn’t her own, but her resolve didn’t waver.
Cheng Xiaoshi looked at her carefully, swiftly on alert.
Qiao Ling’s gaze fell on Lu Guang again, stern and hardened by something much older than her, much older than either of them should have been. Her friend was still scarily slack against her legs, unmoved and burning to the touch. Qiao Ling wasn’t sure whose heartbeat she heard against her chest—it could have been any of the three of them, and she would have believed it.
The air felt heavier—like gravity itself knew secrets yet unshared.
“Something’s wrong.”