When The Maple Leaves Freeze (Danmarch)

🍁🌸 Chapter One 🍁🌸

My name is Dan Heng, and I have a secret.

It's a secret I cannot tell anyone.

I am strange.

Unnatural.

Everyone would be too disgusted to remain around me if they were to find out.

The pencil led snaps on the paper and Dan Heng drops the pencil onto said paper.

He runs his hands through his black hair and sighs.

"This is so stupid...it sounds like I have middle school main character syndrome." He mutters to himself.

The assignment he was given for the weekend was to write a paper on one of three topics.

1. A time you had to keep a secret.

2. A time you were scared but persevered.

3. A time you found an unexpected family.

They all sounded like first grade questions, but he had a straight-A-studious-student image to keep up.

He couldn't slack on this assignment.

Seems like the first option was a bust too...he couldn't exactly word his secret like that, the teacher wasn't expecting him to outright say the secret, nor could he imply that he was currently keeping a secret, as that would draw attention to himself.

The last option was a bust too, as he'd never consider the black haired woman, his current legal guardian, family.

His father had left when he was just a baby, and his mother....well, no one would tell him what happened her. Even the black haired woman wouldn't tell him.

There was no 'you'll know when you're older', there was no 'you're better off not knowing.'

There was only everyone he asked always shutting down his questions.

So, no secret spilling, no family....

All that's really left is a time he was scared but persevered.

He throws his broken pencil into the garbage can next to his desk and pulls out a new one.

As he sharpens the pencil, he begins to think.

There's never really been a time he was scared.

He'd chosen to stop registering strong emotions when he was seven as a defense mechanism, after all.

Well....if he made up something for the assignment, no one would ever know.

He finally returns his pencil to a new sheet of paper when a knock suddenly sounds on his door.

He suppresses a sigh and leans back in his chair.

"What is it?" He asks.

The door creaks open just enough so he could hear whatever message he's being given.

"Dan Heng, it's getting late. Go wash up and come down for dinner. You need to eat." The black haired woman says.

"I need to finish this assignment. I finally figured out what to write." He says.

"You need to eat. You have all weekend to do that assignment, you won't simultaneously fail all your classes if you don't get it done tonight." The black haired woman says.

Well....she has a point.

He sighs and places the pencil in his desk drawer.

"Oh, and how about you take a bath tonight rather than a shower? Maybe you'll actually take a longer time." The black haired woman says.