2:07 a.m.
Di's phone buzzed beside his pillow. The screen lit up with a name that made his half-dreaming mind snap awake.
Jie.
He stared at the name for a second before swiping to answer.
"Hello?"
"…You awake?" Jie's voice was low, rough—like he hadn't spoken for hours but was trying to sound normal.
"You called. I'm awake now."
It was a plain answer, but Di's heart had already picked up speed.
There was a pause. Then Jie gave a half-laugh. "Sorry for bothering you. I just… couldn't sleep."
Di turned on his side, one hand pressing against his temple. He didn't respond—just listened.
Jie kept talking, like silence made him nervous.
"I watched this video just now. Some guy camped out at four thousand meters above sea level, caught the Milky Way at 5 a.m. Made me think of you. Didn't you once say you wanted to see stars without any light pollution? I called you cheesy for that."
A faint smile tugged at Di's lips.
"There's also a new food cart by the school's back gate," Jie continued. "Spicy as hell, but good. I saved you a portion. Thought I'd bring it tomorrow…"
His words flowed like a river—smooth, meandering, never quite landing.
But underneath, Di heard it.
This wasn't small talk.
This was avoidance.
The friend he knew—so bright, so confident—was flailing in the dark, clinging to anything that felt familiar.
Eventually, Di asked, "Are you… really okay about today?"
Jie froze. Then, with a breath that crackled through the receiver, he muttered, "You always see through me."
"When you talk this much nonsense, it's obvious."
Another pause. Then Jie said quietly, "I really thought I had a chance. I'd planned that confession for so long. I believed—if I was honest, if I just… said it—maybe she'd look at me the way I looked at her."
His voice wavered.
"But when she said no, Di… when she looked me in the eye and said I'm not the one— I swear it felt like something inside me just… folded."
Something twisted in Di's chest.
He knew that look too well.
That quiet kind of rejection—the kind where the person isn't cruel, just certain.
Jie kept talking. "I remember this one time in middle school—she helped me carry my kite up the hill and teased me for being scared of getting a tan. I remember thinking: yeah, she must like me too."
He let out a laugh, but it didn't reach his eyes. "Guess I was just deluding myself."
There was a long silence.
Then Jie said, softer now, "I don't want to give up."
And after a breath:
"Di… will you help me?"
The question landed like a stone.
Di gripped his phone harder. His knuckles whitened. Heat from the device spread across his skin, but it couldn't thaw the cold blooming inside his chest.
He saw Lan's eyes, the way she lowered them during the confession.
He remembered the card—the one she found near the water dispenser after crying alone.
He remembered what she told him in the alley.
"I didn't want to hurt him."
And he remembered everything he never dared say out loud.
He closed his eyes.
"…Yeah," he whispered.
That single word cost him something. Something invisible but heavy.
"Thanks, man," Jie breathed out, relief flooding his voice. "I knew I could count on you."
He was still speaking, but Di didn't register the rest.
He lay there, staring at the ceiling, phone glowing dimly beside him.
There was no sound in the room.
Only the quiet knowing that somewhere along the way, he'd stepped away from his own heart.
Some people were born to stand in the light.
And some… were meant to walk in shadow.
Even if no one ever knew they were there.