Reunion

As he idly recalled the past, three minutes slipped by before he knew it.

Looking up and seeing that the isolation door of the Imprisonment Room had yet to open, Ji Minghuan leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and continued reminiscing about the past.

Three years after he first met Kong Youling, Ji Minghuan, once quiet and withdrawn in the eyes of the other children, suddenly transformed into the most mischievous child in the Welfare Home.

He often got into trouble—talking back to the director, for instance, or deliberately driving away adults who wanted to adopt him. As punishment, the director would lock him alone in the small attic at the top of the Library to sleep. The Nurses would not only lock the door, but also cut off the Library's power before bed, leaving the attic lights impossible to turn on no matter how he pressed the switch.

As a result, all the children were terrified of that attic.

It was pitch-black at night, with no one beside them. In the moonlight, the crooked bookshelves looked like snarling monsters. Whenever they were shut in the attic, they would always cry and shout that they were sorry, begging the Nurses to let them out. Over time, no one dared to be naughty anymore.

But Ji Minghuan was different. He liked that attic.

Compared to sleeping with the other boys, he preferred being locked in there alone for the night. He also liked quietly listening in the darkness to the tick-tock of the wall clock.

He was the only person in the Welfare Home who dared spend the night in that gloomy attic without making a sound. As a result, he also became the only child who dared talk back to the director.

The Little Brats at the orphanage all admired Ji Minghuan. They believed he dared do the things they did not, and treated him as their leader. Probably no one in the entire orphanage knew how that previously inconspicuous boy had changed so drastically all of a sudden.

The Nurses only knew that, because Ji Minghuan was often with Kong Youling, none of the children dared bully that deaf-mute girl anymore.

That saved them some worry.

In truth, only Ji Minghuan himself knew that the reason he liked the attic so much was because every time he was locked in the Library attic, he got to see someone.

The Nurses locked the attic door, but they did not lock the skylight. He would read in the attic by moonlight, then wait until the Nurses and director had all gone to sleep. He would climb over the dust-covered piles of books in the corner, step onto the old bookshelves, leap for the skylight, and grab the roof with both hands to pull himself up.

Whenever he slipped out onto the roof like a fish, all he had to do was look up for moonlight, carried by the Evening Breeze, to fall across his face. It blew his hair high into the air, illuminated his clear eyes, and made it seem as if a window to the sky had been opened.

Turning his head, he could see the girls' dormitory directly across from the attic. It was very close, though slightly lower. At night, Kong Youling slept on the third floor of the dormitory. Her room had never changed.

And whenever Ji Minghuan was punished with spending the night alone in the attic, Kong Youling would silently count beneath her covers. In the dead of night, she would suddenly open her eyes, carefully avoid waking the others, and sneak out of the dormitory as cautiously as a kitten.

Barefoot, she would cross the hallway, climb through the window at the end of the corridor, and see Ji Minghuan sitting on the eaves of the attic opposite her.

He would always hold out his hand to her, silently moving his lips in the night wind.

"Jump. Trust me."

Every time she saw his face, she found the courage to leap from the windowsill toward the Library roof. Her figure was as light as a white deer beneath the moonlight, her snowy hair dancing in the night wind, and Ji Minghuan would always catch her hand without fail.

At that hour of the night, the entire orphanage was silent. In winter, snow would fall, blanketing the trees and rooftops in white; in summer, cicadas would chirp, fireflies would dance through the Night Sky, and sometimes fireworks would burst in the distance, dazzling sparks illuminating the Night Sky amid crackling pops.

No matter the season, the only thing that never changed was the brightly lit streets of the city. The Welfare Home's walls shut out those alluring lights. Only by climbing onto the roof could they glimpse the city's neon glow and know how vast the world was.

But they had no interest in that glittering red-light district. The two of them always lay on the attic roof, quietly watching the star-filled Night Sky.

That was time belonging only to the two of them.

Sometimes, the world felt very small. They could only move about within the cramped Welfare Home, restricted at every turn;

But at times like this, they felt the world become vast—so vast... it was as though the entire Night Sky belonged to them.

Ji Minghuan rested one arm beneath his head and pointed at the sky with the other, introducing the stars to her one by one.

Kong Youling sat quietly beside him, hugging her sketchbook as she listened. Every now and then, she would write in it to ask how he knew all this. In Kong Youling's eyes, Ji Minghuan knew everything—more than many adults, even—as though he was not a child of their age.

At times like that, Ji Minghuan would say he had learned it from the books in the Library. With nothing to do while locked in the attic, he would spend his time reading through all the miscellaneous books piled there. Over time, he developed a reading habit, read faster and faster, and eventually even learned to skim ten lines at a glance. After finishing the attic's books, he would secretly bring up books from the Library before being confined. As time went on, he naturally came to know more than children his age.

Kong Youling nodded. From then on, whenever the other children played in the yard and Ji Minghuan read alone in the Library, there would always be another figure beside him.

One night, on the attic eaves, she told him about her mother.

She wrote in her notebook that her mother had been from Iceland and had moved to China for her father. But later, her father abandoned them because of his debts. Her mother raised her in an unfamiliar place, barely fluent in the language, and eventually died from overwork.

She said her mother had died because of her.

Ji Minghuan shook his head. He said it was not her fault, but her father's. He also said that her mother had been wrong too. If someone wanted to truly live in this world, they could only rely on themselves. Those who depended on others to survive could only gain a temporary chance to catch their breath.

She thought for a long time before asking, "Then can I rely on you?"

Ji Minghuan froze for a moment, then nodded. He coughed twice and took back what he had just said. "I'm different. Relying on me is a great deal, because I treat the people around me super well."

He paused. "Well, even though you're the only person around me, you're like family to me."

She said, "You're my family too."

As they talked, they brought up their first impressions of each other.

"First impression?" Ji Minghuan thought for a moment. "Oh, right. My first impression of you was... one of those little snowmen children build on the street when winter first arrives."

The girl asked, "A snowman?"

"That's right, a little snowman." He spoke seriously. "Not a big snowman, either. The kind that goes splat and falls apart if you so much as touch it with a tiny bit of force."

Kong Youling gave him an emotionless sidelong glance, her cheeks puffing up slightly as though she were angry.

"Alright, I was joking."

Kong Youling fell silent for a while, then wrote to ask him, "The Nurses said that when you were little, you liked locking yourself away. Why?"

Ji Minghuan stared blankly at the Night Sky for a long time before saying, "The last time I saw my Parents, they locked me in a wardrobe. They told me to wait for them there and not make a sound. They said they would be back soon."

The Corner of His Mouth lifted. "I was so stupid back then. I actually believed them. And even after I was sent to the Welfare Home, I still stupidly locked myself away, thinking... if I did that, would they come back for me?"

"But they never did. Then later..." He paused, and the smile on his face slowly faded. "Later, I grew up. I didn't need them to come looking for me anymore."

"I always feel like... I still don't understand you." Seeing the lost expression on his face, the girl blanked out for a moment before writing in her notebook.

Ji Minghuan remained silent for a long time before speaking softly. "Actually, I have a different personality in front of every person. I'm always pretending to be someone else. I'm terrified of being abandoned, just like my Parents abandoned me... I always cater to others and pretend to be what they like. Sometimes I really want to get close to people, but the moment I think of being abandoned, I cut off the relationship myself. I really don't want to... I don't want to be thrown away like trash."

"But you're different. I want you by my side. When I'm with you, I don't need to pretend. I don't need to cater to anyone. So I want to stay with you forever."

At that, he suddenly lowered his voice. "Kong Youling... will you abandon me like my Parents did?"

Kong Youling looked at him from the side and quietly watched him for a while.

It was the first time she had seen this arrogant, uninhibited person who always seemed so at ease reveal his vulnerable side—loneliness, fear, worry. Only then did she remember that, like her, he was merely a teenage child. A child who had been abandoned by his Parents since he was young, always hiding his unease, fear, and loneliness.

The girl lowered her eyes and stared at the roof tiles for a long, long time.

Unexpectedly, she did not write anything, nor did she use lip-reading. She simply set down the notebook in her arms, slowly, slowly leaned closer to him like a tentative kitten, then opened her arms and hugged him, her white hair pressing against his cheek.

Ji Minghuan had been looking down at the Welfare Home's roof. Feeling the faint chill from beside him, he had yet to react before the girl had already wrapped him in her arms.

He froze for a long time.

This girl, whom the other children often mocked for not being able to speak, neither wrote anything nor used her special ability. She simply used this straightforward way to show that she cared for him. It was clumsy, but sincere.

His eyes reddened slightly. After hesitating for a moment, he gently raised his hand and hugged her back.

The two embraced on the roof. It was the first time Ji Minghuan had ever been hugged since he could remember. Her skin was clearly cold, yet he felt warm as he gently buried his face in her snow-white hair.

The sky was filled with fish-scale clouds, rippling bands crowding the dark blue expanse, making even the moonlight seem dimmer.

After a long while, the girl suddenly lowered her eyes and carefully wrote in her notebook before turning it toward him.

Ji Minghuan glanced over.

"Let's run away." The words in the notebook were simple, yet they left Ji Minghuan completely confused.

Ji Minghuan asked curiously, "Run away? But where would we go?"

"Anywhere is fine."

"But... if I leave the orphanage, there's a good chance I won't survive. I don't have Parents, ID, education, a job, or even a place to live." Ji Minghuan paused. "But you're different."

"Why?" the girl asked.

"Because you're a superpowered person. The country treats superpowered people very well. As long as you tell them about it someday, some very impressive people will come pick you up in big fancy cars. They'll let you live in the best houses, eat good food, and sleep well." Ji Minghuan touched his nose. "As long as you use your ability well, you'll be welcome anywhere. But me..."

He looked up at the Night Sky, where the moon flickered in and out among the clouds. "Once I leave this orphanage, I'm nothing. Just an abandoned little homeless kid. No one would care whether I lived or died. The people outside might not even be as good as the director."

Kong Youling did not write anything. She merely lowered her head to think for a moment, then secretly glanced at him from the side, raised her right hand, and held out her little finger.

"Pinky promise." She set down her notebook and silently formed the words with her lips.

"Huh?"

"You and I will always be together. Then it won't be 'me,' but 'us'..."

At that, Kong Youling silently repeated what he had said before, only replacing every "I" with "we."

She said, "We don't have Parents or ID. If we leave the orphanage, maybe we won't be able to find work, maybe we won't have anywhere to live. But we... as long as we're together, we'll find a way. As long as we're together, we can survive."

The moonlight that day was clear and bright. Her hair was like ribbons woven from early winter snow, dancing in the Evening Breeze.

Her light-sensitive eyes were wide and serious, brighter than they had ever been. Clearly, no sound could come from this girl's mouth, but every word she spoke landed in Ji Minghuan's heart.

Ji Minghuan froze for a long time.

Then he let out a quiet laugh, reached out, touched her pale little finger, and hooked it with his.

"Mom said that once you make a pinky promise, you have to keep your word."

The Corner of Her Mouth curled upward as she silently said, "We'll always be together."

"Alright. Then we'll always be together."

Those words seemed to travel through memories veiled in moonlight, echoing softly in Ji Minghuan's ears.

In the pitch-black Imprisonment Room, he groggily raised his eyes and saw that the isolation door had opened. A figure entered through the doorway... a White-haired Girl wearing a coded Patient Gown, her figure as light as ever. When she saw Ji Minghuan, she stopped in her tracks and stood there in a daze.

Ji Minghuan froze for a moment, then blinked at her.

"Long time no see."