1
Your food delivery was on its way, estimated to arrive at 23:57. Please keep your phone line open.
“Hello, this is delivery. I arrived at the 8th floor, where are you?”
She carefully cracked open the door, struggling to adjust from the glaring light of her phone screen to the dim ceiling lights of the stairwell. “Here—“
The delivery guy’s heavy breathing approached from the side of the stairwell: “Oh my gosh, you scared me! Why are all your lights off?”
She quickly lowered her head, apologizing while taking the hot steaming soy milk and fried dough sticks. She carefully shut the door. Sitting on the floor of her room, she hurriedly took a bite of the fried dough sticks, then sucked up the soy milk through the straw. Crispy and delicious. The slightly sweet hot soy milk in the cold winter night made her feel much more at ease.
She took another big bite of the fried dough sticks. Another sip of soy milk. And of course, the most important part - leaning back against the wall for a nice, comfortable stretch.
2
Despite the closed doors and windows, the winter wind always found its way in. She recalled there were only 100 days left until the final exam. Her classmates shivered through all self-study periods, burying themselves in piles of books on and under their desks. The prolonged silence made the classroom drowsy, and many struggled to keep their pens moving, eventually succumbing to sleep.
Before drifting off, she vaguely saw her deskmate staring at her: “My hands are so cold.” She had long forgotten what that look was like, though at least some faint traces of the feeling remained in her memory.
They secretly reached out and grasped each other’s hands under the desk, greedily soaking up the other’s warmth and chill. Of course, it wasn’t the most comfortable position, arguably quite awkward. Above the desk, she turned her head away, pretending to gaze thoughtfully out the window at the trees below. These trees never lost their leaves, neither in autumn nor winter.
3
The pale, trembling city lights seemed to leak in as the door to her room cracked open. At 2:30am on a December night, the Siberian winds were at their peak that year. The dark room was suddenly pierced by a draft. She didn’t have time to finish her text before quickly flipping her phone facedown, shoving it deep into her blankets.
She didn’t dare move a muscle, allowing the figure to enter from outside the door, allowing it to silently sweep past her desk, meticulously searching every drawer and corner. Seemingly unsuccessful in finding anything suspicious, it floated back out the door. The crack closed up again.
She rubbed and soothed the endless pain in her hands, clumsily sending the unfinished text.
At 3:40, she decided to surrender to her fatigue, plunging into the thick, pure darkness like a returning fog, no longer struggling.