8 september, 2000
Something was different today.
Not loud. Not obvious. But it was there—the kind of shift you couldn't see, only feel. Like the tension before thunder.
Wang Zixuan hadn't said a single word since the first bell rang. No smirks. No offhand comments. Not even the usual lazy swagger in his walk. He sat two rows behind Su Nian, and the silence around him felt like a warning wrapped in stillness.
Su Nian didn't dare turn around. Her pen hovered above her notebook, unmoving. Words danced across the blackboard, but none of them made it to her brain. Not with that weight behind her—the weight of someone who'd been exposed.
And beside her, calm as ever, sat Jiang Moxi.
Legs stretched out. One hand tucked in her pocket. Eyes half-lidded like she was bored out of her mind. But her presence was anything but casual. She hadn't said anything since yesterday—not even to Su Nian. She didn't need to.
She'd already done what no one else dared—spoken the truth.
And truth had teeth.
It had bitten Wang Zixuan where it hurt most—his pride. His mask. The image he worked so hard to maintain.
He could pretend all he wanted. But everyone in class had heard it. Everyone knew now.
He was the one who wrote in Su Nian's notebook.
A truth Jiang Moxi dragged into the light without raising her voice or lifting a finger.
Now, all he could do was sit there, boiling in silence.
But it wouldn't last.
Whispers had already started weaving through the classroom like smoke.
> "Did Jiang Moxi really say that?"
"So it was him all along?"
"She's insane. Doesn't she know who Zixuan is?"
Zixuan finally moved.
Slowly. Deliberately. He stood from his seat like someone rising from still water—controlled, calm, dangerous.
He walked past Su Nian's desk.
Past Jiang Moxi's.
His shoulder brushed her desk. Not hard enough to draw attention. But just enough.
Just enough to say: I haven't forgotten.
Jiang Moxi didn't even blink.
But her eyes followed him. Sharp. Unapologetic.
Their gazes clashed in silence—steel against ice.
Su Nian didn't breathe.
This wasn't just tension.
This was war.
---
After Class – Stairwell
Wang Zixuan leaned against the rusting stair rail, one foot tapping lazily like he had all the time in the world. The golden afternoon light danced across his collar, but that smirk on his face? It was already there—sharp, smug, and utterly punchable.
He didn't bother turning around.
"You followed me?" His voice was laced with mockery. "Didn't know tomboys were into stalking. Is this your confession?"
Jiang Moxi didn't blink.
Hands shoved in her pockets, back straight, expression unreadable. Her eyes—cool, cutting—looked straight through him like he was transparent.
"I wasn't following you," she said flatly. "I was looking for trash."
A pause.
"Guess I found it."
Zixuan chuckled and finally turned to face her, eyebrows raised like he was impressed.
"Ouch. That was cute. Practiced that line in front of a mirror?"
Moxi stepped forward, unhurried. Her tone dropped a degree colder.
"You think it's funny? What you did to her?"
His smirk stayed, but the flicker in his jaw betrayed him.
"Su Nian?" he said carelessly. "Please. I just helped her face the truth. The world isn't kind to people like her. Sooner she learns that, the better."
Moxi didn't move. Didn't blink. But her voice sliced through the heat like steel.
"She doesn't need your version of the truth. And she definitely doesn't need your games."
Zixuan tilted his head.
"And what, she needs you? You gonna save her now? What are you—her knight in shining sneakers?"
"I'm someone who doesn't like cowards," she said. "Especially the kind who hide behind money and act like it gives them power."
His grin faltered—just for a heartbeat—but it was enough.
"Big words from someone who just showed up," he muttered. "You act like you know me."
"I know enough," Moxi replied, stepping in until there was barely space between them. Her eyes didn't waver.
"I know you humiliate people for fun. I know Su Nian didn't deserve any of it. And I know one thing you won't admit even to yourself—"
She leaned in just slightly.
"—you're scared. Scared that the day she stops looking at you... is the day you stop mattering."
The smirk was gone.
His laugh came late, forced, like he needed it to cover the way her words landed.
"You talk too much," he said, eyes darkening.
Moxi's lips curled into a smirk of her own.
"Then stop listening."
The tension between them was thick enough to cut.
One step. Two.
Zixuan brushed past her, shoulder grazing hers.
"Don't get in my way again, Jiang Moxi," he muttered. "I don't like being watched."
She didn't turn.
"And I don't like garbage near my friends," she said calmly. "So let's both be careful."
He didn't reply.
Didn't need to.
But as he walked away, hands clenched in his pockets, he knew something had shifted.
Someone had finally looked him in the eye...
And didn't flinch.
---
Later – Classroom
The classroom air was thick with chalk dust and the faint hum of overhead fans. Sunlight slanted through the barred windows, casting angled stripes across the floor where Su Nian's feet rested.
She sat at her desk, shoulders drawn in, scribbling notes with mechanical precision as the teacher droned on about linear equations.
All around her, desks buzzed with quiet murmurs and occasional giggles. Notes were passed. Erasers flicked. Wang Zixuan yawned dramatically from three rows away, his legs sprawled out like he owned the floor beneath him.
Even when he wasn't looking her way, Su Nian felt the tension that knotted between them—ever since Jiang Moxi had revealed the truth yesterday.
Jiang Moxi, now beside her, was a steady presence. She didn't speak unless necessary. But her calm was a buffer, an invisible wall that kept some of the whispers at bay.
When someone behind them snickered something sharp—too soft for the teacher to catch but loud enough for Su Nian to hear—Moxi turned her head just slightly, a flick of warning in her eyes.
The snickering stopped.
During lunch, Su Nian stayed back at her desk, quietly chewing through a cold bun and flipping through her textbooks. She told herself she was just studying.
But really, she didn't want to sit with a crowd that never truly welcomed her.
Zixuan passed by once. Their eyes met. His glance was unreadable—some mix of annoyance, curiosity, or regret. Then he was gone, surrounded by classmates who always moved like planets around his sun.
The rest of the day dragged on. Time crawled in between the ticking of the clock and the scraping of chalk. By the time the final bell rang, Su Nian's spine ached and her eyes burned.
She packed her bag slowly.
Jiang Moxi left without a word—but tapped her desk once. Quiet, but deliberate.
Su Nian blinked. A gesture of… acknowledgment? Support?
She didn't know.
Outside, the sky was already bruising with dusk. Su Nian walked home with her bag heavy on her back and the weight of the day heavier still.
---
Evening – Su Nian's Home
The apartment was small, nestled between two rusting buildings that had seen better decades. Paint peeled from the outer walls, and a lone potted plant sat bravely on the windowsill.
Su Nian slipped off her shoes at the door.
"Mama, I'm back."
Her mother looked up from the sewing machine, a smile flickering across her tired face.
"You're late."
"Extra class."
Her father sat at the small table, flipping through a dog-eared newspaper. He looked up, glasses sliding down his nose.
"Eat something first. Then homework."
Her younger brother ran into the room, holding a drawing in crayon.
"Jiejie, look! I drew a rocket!"
Su Nian crouched to see. "It's amazing," she said softly, ruffling his hair.
She washed her hands, ate quietly, then helped her mother fold laundry while her brother chattered about space and robots.
No one asked about school.
No one asked why her eyes seemed just a little too tired for a seventeen-year-old.
And maybe that was a kindness.
---
That night, she lay in bed staring at the cracked ceiling, wondering—
Was the silence at home safer than the noise at school?
Or was it just another kind of loneliness?