Fridays used to feel like an escape—like something was ending.
Now they felt more like a pause. A quiet held breath between things.
Lian didn't go to the library after school. He didn't need to. The room behind the last door was still there, still waiting, but it wasn't calling him. Not today.
Instead, he walked straight home, backpack light on his shoulders. No reason. No urgency. Just steps.
His mom was in the kitchen humming softly. Not a song—just a hum. She didn't notice him at first.
Lian stood by the doorway and watched.
She moved slower now, he realized. Not tired. Just careful. Her hands always precise, like every action mattered. He noticed the way she pressed her thumb into the rim of the rice bowl, checking its warmth. The way she set chopsticks beside the plate with the tips facing left—toward him, always toward him.
He didn't say anything. Just watched until she turned.
"Oh," she said, startled. Then, "You're early."
"I walked."
She nodded and went back to slicing green onions. "Good," she said.
They didn't say more. They didn't need to.
Later, after dinner, he lay on the floor of his room and stared at the ceiling. The bulb above buzzed faintly. Shadows moved across the walls as cars passed outside.
From under his bed, he pulled the small box where he kept his sketchbook and a few folded notes he hadn't looked at in weeks. He opened it, just to feel the weight.
The pages inside were full—animals layered on animals, thoughts scrawled in margins, half-sentences floating beside diagrams of wings and claws.
He smiled without meaning to.
Then he put the book back in the box and closed the lid.
In the hallway mirror, he caught a glimpse of himself as he passed.
Just a boy.
No animal flickered in the reflection. No ghostly shape following him like it used to. He paused and looked again, unsure if something was missing or if something had finally settled.
His reflection looked back.
Still him.
Still changing.
That night, as the house fell into silence, Lian sat by the window with the lights off. A moth fluttered against the screen for a moment, then disappeared.
He opened his notebook—not the sketchbook, the other one. The one Mr. Arman had given him, the one with all the strange, careful notes.
On the last page, he added one more line.
Not a drawing.
Just words:
Sometimes you don't need to see everything. Just enough to choose what kind of person you want to be.
He left the book open on his desk.
Outside, the wind shifted.
And somewhere, far away, something new began.