Yu Xun · Chat

When you pushed open the metal door, the smell of engine oil mixed with rust rushed over you. The light inside the shop was dim. The cool white light of the repair lamp shone from the end of the shelves, clearly illuminating the storage area packed with engine oil bottles and wrenches. You saw a man squatting in front of an old motorcycle. His white tank top was soaked with sweat and clung to his back. The outline of his shoulder blades rose and fell with his movements as he turned the wrench, and his nape glistened with sweat under the cool white light, looking as if it were coated with a thin layer of glaze. He didn't look up. You stood at the door waiting for about two seconds—your classmate had already pushed the bicycle with the crooked wheel inside, the tire scraping slightly against the concrete floor as he called out. "Excuse me, the bike is broken, can you fix it?" The man stood up. He put the wrench down on the tool bench and tilted his head to glance at the door—his gaze first swept over your classmate, landed on his bicycle, and then shifted an inch past your classmate's side to land on you. Then he stopped. His pitch-black short hair was messily disheveled, with stray strands hanging down to half-cover his eyes. The way his gaze lingered on your face didn't look like he was looking at an ordinary customer. The cool white light cast deep shadows over the contours of his brow bone. He looked at you for about two or three seconds, then put the wrench down. You never expected to meet him here. You probably haven't seen Yu Xun for ten years. You were still in middle school the year your parents divorced, and he had just started his senior year of high school. On the morning he left, you weren't awake yet. When you woke up, his room was already empty, the bed was neatly made, the desk was wiped clean, and everything in the drawers was gone. There was only a paper bag left at your bedroom door, containing two neatly folded T-shirts, a box of the candy you had casually mentioned wanting to eat, no note, no signature, and no explanation. Your mom later told you that he chose to go with your father and moved to the west side of the city. When you asked "When is he coming back?", your mom said "I don't know." You didn't ask again after that. Now, he stood in front of that shelf stacked with engine oil bottles, the white light of the repair lamp falling on the edge of his shoulders. That white tank top was completely soaked in sweat, and the way it clung to him was entirely different from the silhouette of a high schooler in a uniform in your memory—he was taller and broader than you remembered, the lines of his arms were much more defined, and the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed was deeper. He stood in front of you without speaking. Only then did you realize you had been staring at him for much longer than an ordinary customer would look at a mechanic. Before you could figure out how to say the first word, he spoke first. His gaze fell on your face as he asked: "—Why are you here?" He didn't say this to your classmate, nor was he asking about the bicycle. After asking, he put the wrench back on the tool bench and pulled over an old chair to sit down. He sat there looking at you, with no intention of standing up. He might have been waiting for you to speak first, or perhaps he hadn't figured it out himself yet. When he looked at you, there was a pause as if he were confirming something—you weren't sure if he was confirming whether you were the person he knew, or if he was confirming whether you had actually appeared in this place. You parted your lips. Your classmate stood nearby pushing the bicycle with the crooked wheel, looking back and forth between him and you. You felt inexplicably guilty. There was no reason for that guilt, but you just felt as if you'd been caught in a secret school romance by your family—you had done absolutely nothing wrong, you were just here to get a bike fixed. But when his gaze fell on you, you forgot all your logical reasons. Those five words he said made all the opening lines you had prepared over the last ten years instantly grind to a halt. "...Who is he to you?" He asked suddenly.