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Chapter 35 - Chapter : 35 "What The Moon Refused To Witness"

George did not ask again.

He simply crouched by Shu Yao's side, the night painting shadows beneath his eyes, and waited. Waited until the boy's trembling began to soften into something almost human again. Waited until the sobs had quieted to breath. Waited until a whisper—frayed and raw—brushed the air.

"You won't tell anyone."

George paused.

"You mustn't," Shu Yao continued, quieter now. "Even if I vanish. Even if they ask. You mustn't open your mouth. This never happened."

It was not a plea. It was a contract.

George's throat tightened.

He wanted to scream. He wanted to tell him that none of this was right, that the world should've bent to save him, that someone should be held responsible.

But Shu Yao wasn't asking for justice.

He was asking for silence.

A silence born of shame, not safety. Of survival, not peace.

George swallowed it whole.

He nodded.

The wind, still hushed with the breathlessness of what had just unfolded, barely stirred Shu Yao's torn sleeves as George stepped forward—not to lift him, not to clutch him close, but to offer. The gesture was quiet, reverent. He didn't say a word. Instead, he undid the clasp of his long, dark coat—an heirloom of wool and whispered winters—and draped it gently over Shu Yao's trembling shoulders.

It fell like night itself. Like a veil meant to hide not only the shame, but sorrow itself too.

And for a moment, Shu Yao didn't move.

Then—he flinched.

Hard.

As George's gloved hand barely touched the small of his back, Shu Yao jerked as though scorched by fire, his wide eyes snapping toward George in pure reflex—glistening and hollow, like glass soaked in rain.

George froze. His breath caught.

"I'm sorry," he murmured, almost inaudibly. "I won't touch you again."

His hand dropped as if it had betrayed him. And Shu Yao, breath ragged and uneven, didn't answer—just clutched the edge of the coat tighter, burying his fingers in it like a lifeline.

The silence between them wasn't awkward—it was sacred. Fragile. The air pulsed with something unsaid, as if the night itself was holding its breath.

A cab rolled up the street, tires sighing against the curb. Not George's car. Not a driver in his employ. Just a stranger behind the wheel, confused by the scene unfolding but wise enough not to ask.

George opened the back door. His movements were slow, measured—as if to say you can still run.

Shu Yao didn't.

With trembling legs and a heart folded in too many places, he stepped forward. The coat swallowed his frame like sanctuary, like a cathedral of wool wrapped around splintered porcelain. His fingers clutched the lapels tight, knuckles pale beneath blood-washed cuffs.

As he paused before entering the car, George—voice low—asked, "Where do you live?"

It took a long moment before Shu Yao responded.

His voice was soft.

So soft, it might have been mistaken for wind brushing across a field of dying grass.

"...Twenty-seven Sheng Street."

George nodded, lips a grim line. Then he leaned to the window and spoke to the driver—not in whispers, but in that sharpened German edge that came when his soul was thrumming with fire.

"You heard him. Sheng Street. Don't stop. Don't speak. Don't be late."

The driver, a man twice George's age, flinched as though he'd been slapped by the force of command. He nodded once, rigidly. "Y-Yes, sir."

And George—his golden hair haloed in the moonlight like an avenging angel carved from flame—closed the door.

The cab pulled away slowly, tires parting shadows as it carried its broken passenger home. George stood beneath the streetlamp, hands in fists at his sides, watching the red tail lights fade like coals dying at the edge of dawn.

He didn't call out.

He didn't wave.

He just watched.

Because sometimes watching is the only act of reverence left.

And as the car disappeared into the throat of the night, Shu Yao sat inside it—not as a boy escaping danger, but as a soul trying to remember if it had ever felt safe.

Wrapped in a coat that didn't belong to him.

Wrapped in silence that said more than any words could.

Wrapped in the ghost of a kindness he wasn't sure he deserved.

Inside the cab, the world felt far away. Sealed behind the windows, the sounds of the city blurred into something distant and unreal—like a memory already beginning to fade, though it hadn't even finished scarring yet.

Shu Yao sat still, spine barely touching the seatback, hands clutched tightly at George's coat like a child gripping the corner of a blanket during a storm. His breathing had steadied, but not in peace—rather in that fragile way a person learns to survive when tears are no longer permitted.

He wanted to cry again.

Oh, how his chest ached for it. His ribs were splintered with the weight of it, his throat raw from holding in the flood. But crying now—crying here—would make it too real. It would reduce him to something people point at from behind curtains.

He couldn't bear that.

He would not be seen as a coward.

Not again.

His eyes were glistening, sharp with unfallen stars, but no tears broke free. His body sat coiled, rigid, like a statue carved from salt—fragile and waiting for rain.

The shame sat in his lap like a sleeping animal: still, but always breathing.

He could feel it in his bitten lips, in the dull throb where fingers had once pressed too hard, where voices had torn through him like broken glass. And yet—he sat. Upright. Composed, almost. As if he were made of stone and could endure anything.

Even this.

And then—

The car slowed.

The driver, whose silence had been a faithful companion the entire way, hesitated. George's voice still echoed in his memory like a curse: Don't stop. Don't speak. Don't be late.

But now, as they reached a quiet lane blooming with familiar lamplight and the comforting hum of home, the man risked a glance into the rearview mirror. His voice was dry, unsure.

"We've arrived."

Shu Yao blinked.

His gaze drifted beyond the window, to the house he'd known all his life—27 Sheng Street. Its porch light still glowed warmly. The windows were open, lace curtains fluttering gently in the breeze.

He should feel safe.

But he didn't.

He hesitated—his hand hovering at the door handle, breath held tight. Because behind that door was someone who loved him. Someone who would see the cracks no matter how carefully he hid them.

And what would she think?

If she saw him like this—his shirt clinging to him like wilted parchment, his lips bitten and blood-dark, his pride shattered and trailing behind him like ash—what would that do to her?

He hadn't just lost his own dignity tonight.

He feared he'd ruined hers too.

No. She must never know.

He wouldn't show her the bite marks. Wouldn't let her glimpse the bruises hidden beneath the coat or the way his knees still trembled when the car idled too long. Those wounds, he could cover. Cloth could hide flesh.

But the lips—

They were too obvious.

Too telling.

So he'd lie.

He'd say he tripped.

Say he bit down hard when he fell. Say anything but the truth. Anything to preserve the image of a son she believed still untouched by the world's cruel hands.

Slowly, he reached for the door.

The driver remained silent this time, bowing his head as if sensing something sacred was breaking just behind the boy's eyes.

Shu Yao stepped out into the quiet, his feet landing softly on the path he had walked so many times before—though never like this.

Never this hollow.

Never this changed.

The coat slipped further down his shoulders as he walked, but he held it close, his fingers curled in its lining like they might unravel if he let go.

His house waited ahead, golden light spilling through the curtains like open arms.

But inside his chest?

Only silence.

And the echo of a scream he had locked deep inside himself, where no one—not even his mother—would ever hear it.

The gate creaked softly behind him, and Shu Yao stood on the familiar threshold like a ghost unsure of its welcome. The porchlight glowed like a distant lighthouse—warm, unassuming, too gentle to belong to the storm that now lived inside him. He looked at the bell.

Just a button.

A simple touch.

But to press it felt like asking the heavens to open, like inviting a judgment he wasn't ready to face.

His trembling finger reached forward—hovered—then tapped.

The soft chime rang out inside the house, far too innocent for the dread it summoned. Shu Yao stood there, spine taut, heart clanging in his chest like a war drum.

He was about to face her.

The one person who had always looked at him with pride in her eyes.

And now—

That pride was the thing he feared most.

Then—

Her voice.

Muffled through the door, hoarse with the sleep of late hours. "Who is it?"

He couldn't answer. His throat was a graveyard for words.

The lock turned. The door opened.

And there she was.

Framed by lamplight. Slippers on her feet. Sleep tugging gently at her features.

She blinked, then saw him faintly. "Oh, it's you."

A soft yawn escaping her, unaware. "I almost forgot—you were still at the function. "

She turned.

Turned her back to him.

That was all he needed.

A mercy.

An accident.

A miracle in disguise.

"I'm going to bed," she called over her shoulder as she stepped deeper into the hallway. "If Qing Yue comes later, open the door for her, alright?"

Shu Yao's throat burned as he answered with a hoarse, threadbare whisper: "Okay."

It scraped against his vocal cords like broken glass.

But she didn't hear the tremor.

Didn't see the way his shoulders collapsed inward the moment she looked away.

She vanished in her room, her shadow disappearing around the curve of the hallway—leaving him untouched, unquestioned, unseen.

He bolted up the stairs like a man fleeing the noose.

Each step was a breathless confession.

A silent plea.

By the time he reached his door, his hands were shaking again.

He opened it quickly, like someone pulling shut a curtain before the audience could see the bleeding.

And then—

He was alone.

In his room.

The door clicked behind him.

And the night swallowed him whole.

The door clicked shut like a quiet verdict.

Shu Yao leaned back against it, as though the wood could carry some part of his weight—what weight was left, after his soul had been stripped threadbare. The silence of his room greeted him not like an old friend, but like a witness too gentle to ask questions.

The coat slipped from his shoulder like a sigh.

One sleeve of his shirt hung in ribbons, as if it too had given up pretending. Torn lace and loose threads dangled like whispers of what he used to be—presentable, careful, untouched by the night.

His knees buckled.

He slid down the door like a wilted prayer, legs folding beneath him, arms cradling themselves. A trembling sculpture of grief.

And then the tears came—again.

Not loud. Not cinematic.

But slow, like melting wax, like rain sliding down the inside of a window where no one watches anymore. His sobs were small, frightened things, careful not to disturb the dark too much—as if the dark might answer.

"I'm not clean anymore," he whispered into the hollow between his knees.

Not in body.

Not in memory.

Not in the marrow of his name.

He wanted to peel off the past, to shed it like the coat he now unwrapped from his shoulders—slowly, reverently, as if it were a final kindness he no longer deserved.

George's coat—heavy, foreign, warm in a way he didn't feel worthy of—slid from his arms and onto the floor like snow falling from a roof after the thaw. The lining caught the moonlight for a moment, silver threading glinting like mercy.

Shu Yao stared at it.

At the way it lay there, unjudging.

It had covered him when no one else had.

But now even that felt like a lie he could not wear.

He curled into himself, small as a secret, and let the tears continue. Quietly. Not out of shame—but because he didn't know how to scream anymore.

He had screamed enough—inwardly, silently, beneath the skin.

His pride lay somewhere on the road behind him.

But here, in the hush of his room, in the fragile fold of night's wing, Shu Yao was only what was left:

A boy still breathing.

A heart still beating.

A soul not yet extinguished—only cracked.

And even cracked things could hold light.

Even splinters could glimmer.

Even this moment, terrible and trembling, was not the end.

Not yet.

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