Notes of Youth

Tuesday dawned brighter than the day before. Sunlight filtered through the classroom windows like threads of gold, and the usual buzz of Class 11A1 resumed its steady rhythm. Keqing sat at her desk, re-reading the poem she had rewritten the night before. Her handwriting was calm, almost meditative, the lines simple but sincere.

When Mr. Ha asked them to submit their literary pieces by the end of the day, Keqing hesitated only for a moment before slipping her folded poem into the submission folder.

Meanwhile, Le Yahan was hunched over her sketchpad during break, shading the edge of a paper lantern in a scene she'd dreamed the night before. Chen Yuke approached, offering a box of Pocky without a word. She took one, glanced up.

"You submitting?"

"Maybe."

He shrugged. "No pressure. Just... don't hide it forever."

Yahan bit the end of the Pocky, then smiled faintly. "Is that what you tell yourself when you draw fish in math class?"

"No," he said, smirking. "That's just joy."

After school, Keqing lingered near the art room. Her eyes caught a glimpse of someone new standing by the bulletin board: a girl with soft curls, delicate posture, and eyes that scanned the flyers like she was reading the lines between them.

Xu Yujin.

She had just transferred from the science stream, rumors said. Her arrival hadn't caused a stir like Tianxue's, but those who noticed her couldn't forget her easily.

Gu Yuyan emerged from the classroom and paused beside Keqing. He followed her gaze.

"You know her?"

Keqing shook her head. "Not yet."

"She draws well," Yuyan said. "Very still lines. Like she's memorized the shape of silence."

Keqing turned to look at him. "That sounds like something you'd write in the margin of your notebook."

"Maybe I did," he said with a smile.

Wednesday brought the first meeting for the interclass art-literature collaboration. Four names had been posted for the pilot group: Lin Keqing, Liu Tianxue, Chen Yuke, and Bai Andui.

To Keqing's surprise, they were tasked with creating a paired exhibit — one piece of writing to complement each visual artwork. Teams would be randomly assigned.

The slip she drew read:

Partner: Bai Andui.

She looked up and found him already looking at her. Bai Andui had always seemed more composed than cold, more observant than aloof. His watercolor series, displayed last term, had been full of skies that weren't blue and oceans without a single wave.

"Looks like we're partners," he said.

"Do you already have a painting in mind?"

"Sort of."

He led her to the art room, where he opened his sketchbook to a page of fragmented rooftops and long shadows.

"It's a memory," he said. "I just haven't figured out if it was a good one or not."

Keqing looked at it for a long time.

"Then maybe the words can help decide."

He didn't answer, but his expression softened.

Later, they sat at the back of the room, sharing ideas in quiet tones. Keqing asked about his color choices, and Bai explained in metaphors: loneliness in pale ochre, hope in blurred cyan. It was like deciphering poetry painted in watercolor.

For the first time, Keqing felt a connection that didn't require constant conversation—only shared silence and subtle understanding.

In another corner of the school, Liu Tianxue and Chen Yuke sat across from each other. Their dynamic was oddly formal — polite and distant.

"You prefer abstract or realist?" she asked.

"Depends on the day," he replied.

"And today?"

"Today I feel like everything is a little blurry."

She nodded. "Then maybe we draw from the edges."

He looked at her differently then.

They worked in silence after that, occasionally trading comments about spacing and structure. Their piece slowly formed, not from shared inspiration but from an unspoken agreement to meet halfway. Both were competitive, but neither seemed interested in winning against the other.

By week's end, the four pairs had begun sketching the outlines of their shared pieces. Keqing found herself not just writing, but listening — to brush strokes, to pauses, to the silence between.

One afternoon, as she left the art room alone, she found Xu Yujin sketching in the hallway.

"You're not in the group," Keqing said.

"Didn't want to be," Yujin replied softly. "Sometimes I prefer watching how others mix their colors. It says a lot about who they are."

Keqing paused. "And what do mine say?"

Yujin tilted her head. "That you're trying to find the quiet in the noise."

Keqing smiled, surprised.

She hadn't realized how much she needed to hear that.

Before leaving, Yujin added, "And you will find it. Maybe not in the words, or even the art. But somewhere between the two."

That evening, the schoolyard turned golden as the sun began its slow descent. Keqing didn't head straight home. Instead, she wandered through the garden behind the school library, where old stone benches lined the brick path. A breeze stirred the leaves, rustling them like pages turning on their own.

She sat down beneath the tall ginkgo tree, its yellow leaves fluttering quietly to the ground. It was here, years ago, that her mother had once brought her for an afterschool picnic. Keqing could almost smell the tangerines they had peeled together.

She closed her eyes.

Her fingers brushed the cover of her notebook. She pulled it open and started writing, this time not for the project, but for herself:

"To the silence I once feared, thank you for teaching me to listen."

It was a quiet moment. The kind that didn't need to be loud to echo.

That night, Keqing sat by her window, watching lights from neighboring apartments blink on and off. The world seemed quieter when observed from a distance.

She pulled out her notebook again, not to write the next part of her piece, but to sketch beside Andui's rooftops. Her lines were unsure at first but grew more confident with each stroke. The rooftops no longer looked fragmented; they were becoming familiar.

Maybe the art would find its meaning after all.