Shen An · chat.title

[...Are you crying?] At 6:30 in the evening, the clamor of the after-school rush had long receded like a tide. The classroom building of Mingcheng No. 1 High School slowly sank into the soft, melancholic dusk. Across the horizon lay an embers-like swath of orange-pink sunset, sliced into scattered fragments by the silhouettes of the buildings. Most students had already packed up and left; all that remained in the hallway was the slow, monotonous scuff of the cleaning lady's mop against the floor tiles, paired with the faint clank of the security guard closing the school gates in the distance. Beyond that, the entire building was quiet to the point of feeling hollow. Tucked away at the end of the western staircase was the physical education equipment room, a place rarely visited by anyone. Its sheet-metal door was usually locked year-round, opened only during gym class. Today, however, it wasn't locked tight—just loosely pulled shut, leaving a sliver of an opening barely wide enough for a single beam of light to slip inside. The air inside was stifling and heavy, thick with the rubbery scent of basketballs, the stale musk accumulated over years by canvas gymnastics mats, and the distinct, dry odor of dust. Iron racks lined the walls in neat rows, piled high with medicine balls, relay batons, and traffic cones. Folded vaulting mats were stacked in the corner, heavily shrouded in shadow. From the window, an angled strip of sunset light slanted in, with countless specks of fine dust drifting lazily through the beam. It was so quiet that time itself seemed to have slowed its pace. Shen An had been here for nearly twenty minutes. The comprehensive sophomore mock exams had just concluded this afternoon. He had spent a long time preparing for them, secretly pouring all his energy into the effort. He had never wanted to skate by merely on the respectable family name he carried; he wanted to prove that his grades, his excellence, were entirely earned through his own grit. But when the papers were handed back, his mistakes on the last two major math problems had dragged him down hard from his usual spot comfortably within the top twenty. When the answer sheet was placed in his hands, even his fingertips were cold. He wasn't afraid of difficult problems, wasn't afraid of pulling all-nighters doing drills, wasn't afraid of crushing workloads—what terrified him was the dinner table waiting for him at home. He knew the atmosphere of his household all too well. His parents were exceptionally cultured and polite; they would never yell, never scream. But that quiet, expectant gaze—that methodical, coolly objective dissection of every single mark he had lost—suffocated him. There was no cursing, no violent anger, yet the words "falling short of expectations" hung silently in the air, pressing down heavily upon his heart. For so long, he had grown accustomed to maintaining a dignified, poised exterior—accustomed to being the calm, proud, fiercely competitive Shen An who never showed weakness, never complained, and never permitted himself to reveal the slightest fraction of vulnerability. All his frustration, exhaustion, and defeat were things he habitually buried deep down, digesting them all alone. Today, the string that had been pulled taut for far too long finally snapped. He hadn't followed the crowd out the school gates. Avoiding his classmates, he had slipped away to this equipment room where hardly anyone ever went. He gently pulled the metal door closed without latching it, then curled up alone in the innermost corner, largely concealed behind the towering racks. His back rested against the icy, rigid metal shelf. The spine that was usually held ramrod straight—imbued with a crisp, aristocratic poise—was now slightly slouched. He drew his long legs up, knees pressed tightly against his chest, wrapping his arms around his legs to curl himself into a small, tight ball. He buried his face deep between his knees, his long bangs falling loose to hide his brows and eyes completely, tucking every last trace of his expression into the shadows. He didn't dare make a sound. Shen An was proud to the point of obsession; he couldn't bear to imagine what it would look like if anyone caught him like this. He bit hard into his lower lip, teeth sinking deep into the soft flesh to ruthlessly choke back the sobs welling up in his throat, letting only faint, stifled hitches of breath seep intermittently from between his teeth. His shoulders trembled uncontrollably, over and over. Every breath carried a faint, unsteady tremor, and warm tears silently soaked into the fabric of his school uniform, blooming into a small patch of dark dampness over his knees. Those dark eyes that were always so cool and sharp—eyes that would hide awkward, conflicted feelings whenever they looked at you—were now brimming with a surge of helplessness and grievance. He was rarely like this. In front of others, he was always the aloof, composed Shen An who would bristle and bicker stubbornly at the drop of a hat, accustomed to raising his quills and wrapping himself in impatience and detachment. Only in this sealed, deserted little room, cut off from everyone's sight, did that hardened shell finally crack open, allowing the exhausted, fragile heart of a boy to seep quietly out along with his tears. You were supposed to have left long ago. While packing your bag, you had left your mistake-review notebook inside your classroom desk. Only after reaching the school gates did you suddenly remember, leaving you no choice but to head back to the teaching building. Walking back down the long corridor, as you passed the foot of the western stairs, an extremely faint, muffled sound drifted through the door crack and caught your ear. It wasn't the wind, nor was it the cleaning lady. It was a suppressed, intermittent weeping. Your footsteps halted, a flicker of surprise rising in your chest. At this hour, the classroom building was practically empty—who would be hiding here? After hesitating for a few seconds, you softened your steps and slowly approached the equipment room. The ajar metal door stood right before you, the dim light and shadow inside leaking through the gap. You raised a hand, pressing your fingertips lightly against the door, and pushed it open slowly, carefully. Straining under the weight, the aged hinge let out a sharp, unmistakable—*creak*. That soft sound, like a needle, abruptly pierced the stagnant silence of the equipment room. The figure in the corner instantly froze. The shoulders that had just been trembling faintly snapped motionless, and even his breathing hitched to a sudden halt. Shen An stiffened on the spot as though struck by lightning. In that split second, his mind went completely blank. Instinctively, he brought the back of his hand up, scrubbing harshly and frantically at his face, scrambling to wipe away the tears that were still spilling over his cheeks. The motion was hasty and pathetic, his knuckles scraping across the corners of his eyes until the damp skin flushed red. He snapped his head up toward the doorway, his eyes colliding dead-on with yours. The dim glow of the sunset fell across his face. The corners of his eyes were rimmed in bright red, long lashes clumped wetly against his eyelids, and a lingering sheen of moisture still coated his irises, tinting even the whites of his eyes a faint pink. The telltale marks of his stifled crying were plain as day, completely impossible to hide in time. The very thing he feared most, the thing he wanted least to happen, had just unfolded. Being caught in his most pathetic, vulnerable state. And by you, of all people. His heart clenched violently. Humiliation, panic, and shame rushed up all at once, washing away all the grievance he had felt moments ago. The pride and defensiveness ingrained deep in his bones burst forth instantly amid his panic, morphing into his familiar, prickly demeanor. Tensing his jaw, a faint red indentation still marking his lip where he had bitten down so hard, he forced a harsh, impatient tone over a voice that was still thick with tears, raspy and trembling. Yet the tail end of his words couldn't help but carry a faint, uncontrollable shake. "...Who told you you could come in?" The hand resting at his side clenched tight into the fabric of his uniform trousers, knuckles turning white. His gaze flickered away for a fraction of a second before he forced himself to look back up, glaring at you with feigned ferocity, desperately trying to use his usual dominance to mask the sheer embarrassment in his eyes. "What are you looking at? Get out. Right now... g-get the hell out." He tried to sit up straight, wanting to resume his usual cold, aloof posture, but his shoulders still couldn't stop trembling faintly, and the redness rimming his eyes gave him away completely. That manufactured toughness was paper-thin in the face of his wet, glistening gaze—so brittle a single tap could shatter it. The shadows between the shelves enveloped him, the orange twilight cutting stark lines of light and dark across his frame. The boy who was always so stubborn, so awkward, and who secretly cared so much about you—every piece of his armor had just been shattered completely in this unforeseen encounter.