It started with a piece of chalk and an assignment.
"'The Sound of Silence,'" Mr. Ha announced, writing the phrase on the board in firm strokes. "That's your literature project theme this semester. You'll form teams of two or three and submit a creative interpretation. It can be prose, poetry, art—anything meaningful."
Lin Keqing glanced up from her notebook. The classroom buzzed with excitement and mild panic. Group projects always had a way of turning even the quietest students restless.
When Mr. Ha began calling out pairs, her name was the fourth one on the list.
"Lin Keqing and... Gu Yuyan."
A few snickers echoed from the back. Someone whispered, "The paper-note partners again."
Keqing bit the inside of her cheek. She didn't look back. She didn't have to.
They met that afternoon in the library.
The table they chose was tucked beside a tall window, with light filtering through in soft waves. Keqing had her sketchbook, a pencil case, and a quiet nervousness. Yuyan had only a notepad and a single black pen.
"We could write something," she suggested, unsure.
"Or draw," he replied.
They looked at each other and almost smiled.
"Both?" she said.
He nodded.
So began a strange kind of collaboration—few words spoken, but ideas exchanged through pencil strokes and unfinished sentences.
Keqing drew a silhouette of a person standing alone in the rain. Yuyan wrote beneath it: Some silences come with storms.
She added a window. He wrote: And some are just shelter.
The page slowly filled with more than drawings and lines. It carried weight. Meaning. Echoes of things neither of them knew how to say aloud.
Meanwhile, across the library, Le Yahan was not having the same luck.
"Seriously? You and me?" she said, arms crossed as she faced Chen Yuke.
The boy blinked, unfazed. "Apparently fate likes opposites."
She narrowed her eyes. "You better not ghost this project."
"I won't."
"Good." A pause. "What do you want to do then?"
Chen Yuke tapped a pen against his notebook. "Friendship. As a kind of silence."
Yahan tilted her head. "That's… not bad."
"I know."
She rolled her eyes. "You're lucky I like clever themes."
"I know that too."
She stared at him, trying to decide if he was being arrogant or charming. Maybe both.
Back at the window, the sun had dipped lower.
Keqing rested her cheek on her hand as Yuyan scribbled something on a fresh sheet. She watched his fingers, graceful and methodical. It was like he was tracing thoughts, not words.
Then he paused.
"Do you believe silence always hides something?" he asked, voice quiet.
She looked out the window. "Not always. Sometimes it holds things in place. Like… a thread. Keeping something from unraveling."
He seemed to consider that.
"My brother used to say that," he said. "Before he..."
A silence fell—not the awkward kind, but a fragile one. Heavy and light at the same time.
Keqing didn't ask. She simply turned a page and drew a single paper airplane floating above clouds.
He watched.
Then wrote: Some silences learn how to fly.
Downstairs, the art room door creaked open.
Tran Vuka poked his head in and grinned. "Anyone using this place?"
"No," Fang Zichen replied from inside, flipping through a sketchbook.
Vuka stepped in. "Thought I'd check. I'm working on something for Mr. Ha's theme."
Fang raised an eyebrow. "You do art?"
"I do ideas," Vuka said, winking.
Fang chuckled. "Then bring your ideas to life. That wall's empty."
As Vuka started unpacking pencils and colored chalk, he thought about asking Keqing to help. But then paused. Maybe not yet.
Maybe silence, too, had its timing.
That night, Keqing sat by her window, flipping through the pages she and Yuyan had filled. There were raindrops, window panes, hands reaching toward each other but not quite touching.
At the bottom of one page was a line she hadn't seen him write:
"I used to hate silence. But I met someone who made it feel… safe."
Her fingers rested on the sentence.
She didn't smile.
But her heart did.
Later that evening, Keqing stepped out into the living room, where her grandmother sat knitting under the warm lamplight.
"Still drawing?" her grandmother asked, eyes never leaving her yarn.
"Mmm," Keqing replied, curling up beside her on the couch. "It's a group project."
"With the boy who writes you notes?"
Keqing blinked. "You knew?"
Her grandmother chuckled softly. "A grandmother knows. You've been smiling with your eyes lately."
Keqing leaned her head on her shoulder. "I don't know what it means yet. But… being quiet around him doesn't feel lonely."
The old woman patted her hand gently. "That's how you know it matters. When even the silence feels full."
They stayed like that for a while. The kind of quiet only two people who understood each other could share. Then, as the clock softly ticked in the corner, Keqing whispered,
"I think... I want to learn more about his silences."
Her grandmother smiled, tucking a stray lock of Keqing's hair behind her ear.
"Then do it gently, child. Some hearts unfold slowly."
Outside, the wind rustled the trees. Inside, warmth filled the room—not from words, but from presence.