Archive of Our Own ^beta

The music is blasting, thunderous, beating the room to pieces, the walls and the floor and the ceiling are shaking... And she is standing there, unmoved. And really, she is moved - but by the noise inside of her.

She's gripping her hair with trembling hands and looking around the room seeking help. Something to keep her head outside of the water. Someone to catch her before the fall... But she's already falling.

Down, down, down, with every beat of the noise inside of her. And nothing to catch and stop the void swallowing her.

She pulls on Léo's shoulder and shouts words at him, he shrugs hem off his ears and goes back to the beat of the music. She tries to catch Amina, but Amina is dancing and wants to have fun. She turns to Camille, but they don't hear her. They're too busy moving, dancing with the beating sounds just like everyone else.

Is Feng the only one who's inner thunder is louder than the one shaking the walls?

She thinks she is. She thinks she's going to explode. That her ribcage is going to crush her with all its weight. That she's going to break down, here, in the middle of the dance floor with everyone else dancing, laughing, flirting.

Maybe Feng is being dramatic. Maybe she's just overreacting. But the thoughts won't go away, and she doesn't know what to do. She wants to scream. She wants to burst open, tell someone, cry over all the nothing in the world. This world who keeps crushing her ribcage with the weight of a million questions unanswered.

But she can't explode here. Not when everyone just wants to have fun. Not when no one would understand. She needs to get out. Breathe some fresh air. Find some peace and quiet. Some room to think.

She struggles to make her way out of the room, bodies surrounding her, music too loud and the acrid smell of sweat everywhere. She needs to look at the sky and breathe, alone with her thoughts. Just her, and the quiet of the night.

When she finally manages to reach the door, she's almost out of breath. Why did she think coming to this party would be a good idea? She doesn't remember. It doesn't matter anyway. Nothing matters. Everything does. Why do humans like this kind of gathering?

She can finally breathe. It's March and it's cold outside. The garden is empty.

Humans are social animals. Parties are a way of bonding. Strengthening the group's unity. But what if you don't feel like you belong? Does that mean you're not part of the group? Does that mean you're not social?

Feng doesn't want people from the party seeing her out here, so she goes to sit on the grass behind a bush.

She has friends. She likes to talk. She likes to see her friends. She's a human too, a social animal. She's part of a group of friends... But she doesn't feel like she's a part of this group's group.

She looks up. Light pollution masks most of the stars, but she can still spot the shinier ones. She feels calmer here, alone, with the subdued buzzing of the party behind her. It's a bit cold, sure, but she likes the cold. It grounds her. It makes her feel alive.

Alive... What is life? No, that's not the right question. What is her life? What does alive feel like for her? Who is she really? What is the most important thing for her? How would others describe her?

Her name is Feng Qian. Her parents were both born in China, but she was born in the South of France, where she still lives. She's a high schooler. She will be 18 in two months. She still doesn't know what she wants to do with her future. She's confused about-

Steps coming towards her. She turns around and sees someone's silhouette. "Hey," says the silhouette before sitting next to her. It's a girl from her class, lean and heair cropped short, skin a golden brown in the light shed from the window. Feng doesn't remember her name. She's never been good with names.

"Hey."

The girl is wearing a black jumper with a batman logo on the front, jeans, and sneakers. Feng looks back to the sky. She wonders if the girl saw her from the window, if maybe she's here to drag her back to the party.

"Why are you here?" the girl asks. Feng looks down to her own shoes. She's wearing her favorite converses, the yellow ones.

"Why are you here?"

The girl hums. "It's too loud inside. I needed to breathe."

Feng hugs her legs closer to her chest. "I... I don't really like parties."

The girl hums again. It's a soothing sound.

"We're in the same class, right? What's your name?"

"Feng." She rests her head on her knees and looks at the girl. "What's yours?"

"Samantha. It's long for Sam."

Sam then looks up at the sky, and Feng does too. They stay silent for a handful of seconds.

"Do you ever feel like you don't know who you are?" Feng ends up whispering. She needs to get it out somehow, or she's going to explode, even here where everything is quiet.

"What do you mean?"

"Sometimes I can't tell if I'm really being myself, or if I'm being who I think others want me to be, believe me to be, and... it scares me." Sam is looking at her now, and Feng has to look away or she will start stuttering. She tries to gather her thoughts, speaking slowly to give herself the time to shape words out of feelings. "A lot. And when there are so many people, like in there, at parties, or in school sometimes, I feel... It feels like it's a trap sometimes. Too many people are expecting me to be a certain way, and I start feeling as if I'm loosing myself. As if I can't hear myself think or... or even feel myself be, and I start feeling erased, and broken... It's scary."

Sam is still looking at her, right into her eyes. It's a grounding point. It's a mooring line. It's a lighthouse in the dark sea if her mind. Sam's eyes are wide and she whispers a quiet "wow" before trying to come up with something to say of her own.

"I think... I understand where that comes from. People judge others so easily, with only a glimpse of them, without even trying to understand... It makes me so angry."

Sam's voice is soft, but frank - and strong. Confident. It makes Feng want to trust her. She feels safe here, away from the others. She wants to scream at the sky and above, show what she's made of, what she has within. She wants to punch a tree and break glass. Her voice grows louder and the shadows of her words begin to shake.

"It petrifies me. I wish I could just shrug it off, like the others, but- I just- I can't. No matter how hard I try to." Sam's gaze is so open, so focused, so there... she can't help but let the words flow. "Everytime I think I've grasped enough of myself to start figuring the turmoil happening in my head, everything blurs itself again and I end up just shouting questions in the void. And when I do get an answer? I overthink, and doubts take over, and... And I'm back to being as lost as I was."

There's a silence filled with stares, and a feeling of understanding growing bigger between them, making them lean unconsciously toward one another. Sam is the one who speaks first.

"Do you..." She opens her arms awkwardly, and Feng stares bewildered. "Do you want a- hm, an existential hug?"

Feng nods and scoots closer, and Sam puts her long arm around her shoulders, holding her close. Her sweater is soft and thick, and Feng scoots a bit closer, leans her head against Sam's chest. They both exhale a content sigh, and Sam starts stroking Feng's shoulder, tracing comforting patterns with her fingers.

"Sometimes," Sam starts, "I'm reminded of how big the world is... and the universe. How many people, sentient beings, are living right now. It makes me feel so small... And meaningless, in a way that I don't like at all."

She's drifting away, eyes gazing at the stars, and Feng huddles closer, tries to turn herself into an anchor. She knows that feeling of distance and aimlessness too well not to try to bring her back to earth.

"Sometimes I feel like everything is meaningless," she says with a voice so small Sam almost misses it. She doesn't, though, and gives Feng's shoulder a comforting squeeze.

There's a moment where none of them speaks, but both of them can hear the other's mind running in thick water, searching for a positive thread of thought. Sam is first to find one.

"If... Everything is meaningless, then nothing is."

"How so?"

"Well... I think for something to exist, its opposite has to exist too. So, if everything is meaningless, then meaninglessness doesn't exist."

There's a silence where Feng tries to wrap her mind around what Sam said, then:

"... That's- that's pretty dumb."

Sam nods. "Yep. It is."

They laugh for a short moment, feeling better and a bit dumb.

"Just..." Sam says when their laughters have eased off, "just forget I said that, alright?"

Feng looks up to her and smiles. "Okay."

The silence that follows is a comfortable one, quiet in its calming peace. It's without looking for an answer that Feng's mind trips over a thought, and she simply lets the words roll out of her lips as if they had always belonged here.

"Maybe everything only has the meaning you're willing to give it?" It comes out as a question by reflex, but both girls absorb it as it is, a simple thought, a statement. A positive thread of reflexion to cling to when everything seems to fall apart under your feet.

It sounds like a simple sentence, one that people toss at you after you just shared a piece of your doubts, something everybody says but nobody believes in. But the more Feng and Sam roll the thought in their heads, the more texture it takes. It gathers power and plants its roots in the dense soil of their doubts, and settles in. It doesn't grow everywhere, of course, nor does it grows deep, but it's here, and it's meaningful. And the more they think about it, the more meaningful it becomes.

They look at the sky.

There are stars here - so few in the sky, but so many in the universe.

"Are we really so small, or is it the universe that's so big?" Feng asks after a handful of seconds.

Sam hums. "Maybe it's both."

"Probably."

"It's likely."

"Might be it."

"Could be."

"Possibly."

"Eventually."

"It's a possibility."

"More likely than for the sky to fall."

"Who knows?"

A snicker and, soon, a second one. They share a look full of doubts. Full of fear, too. But also filled with interest. Curiosity. Excitement. A longing for living, slow and painful, stretching their ribcages as if struggling to open them, as if they were gates.

They are young and lost, they want to see what the world has to offer, they want to take risks. They want to find themselves.

They look away.

Sam is the first one to disturb the silence again.

"I'm not..." She pushes the words out as if it got stuck in her throat. "...straight." There's an instant relief in her muscles, and she sags a little. "I'm gay," she breathes. "And I know there's nothing wrong with that, but sometimes it's scary."

Feng feels her guts squirming. There's a fear in her, gripping her, paralyzing her. She swallows dry and clutches her own arms, curls up against- curls up against Sam. She curls up against Sam and breathes in her warmth, and Sam's body is the support she needs to say what she had never said out loud.

"I'm- I'm pan." She breathes. Again. It's fine. I can do it. It's fine. "And I think I might be demisexual."

There is a wave growing in her, and it washes her. It cleans her of her tension like the sea cleans rocks of their sharp edges, polishes them into pebbles. She feels like a pebble, and Sam hums again.

It's almost unsettling, how peaceful they both are. They're not used to it. They're used to screams in the backgrounds of their brains, used to doubts and fears and questions with no answers, used to the possibility of getting assaulted by fright at every corner.

They're not used to find comfort in silence as well as in conversation, not used to trust others to care, not used to feel grounded by the mere existence of one person.

They're not used to each other, but somehow they feel like they're already getting there.

When the party ends, they walk home, hand in hand, as far as they can, and when the moment comes to part ways, they pull on the fabric of time to stretch the simplicity of touching each other. They pull on it, and pull, and pull, and stare, and there are few stars in the sky, but so many in the universe.

They see each other in school, and they talk about erasure in society.

They hold hands in corridors, and they talk about the uncertainty of future, the regrets of the past, the vertigo of the present.

They walk home together, and they talk about the beauty of the sky.

They lie side by side on the floor, and they talk about dreams, hopes, goals, miracles, and the wonders of reality.

They steal glances at each other, and they tell the beauty of the world.

They hug each other, and they say trust, comfort, support.

They steal touches of each other, and they tell the mysteries of life.

They go on a date together, and they talk about adventures, and trying, and laughing.

They kiss, and their lips tell a story of love.