Beneath the Moonless Sky

Wei Ying sat at the back of the classroom, fingers fumbling clumsily with the corner of his frayed notebook. The lines on the page blurred, jumbled letters staring back at him like a foreign language. His hand trembled as he tried to grip his pencil, the familiar twitch starting up in his fingers again. Every letter he wrote came out shaky, uneven, and wrong. He didn't understand what the teacher was saying, but he didn't need to. The feeling was always the same.

He was sixteen years old, sitting in a room full of twelve-year-olds. Kids who laughed too loud, who whispered behind their hands, who nudged one another and pointed whenever his body betrayed him—like it was now. His legs bounced uncontrollably beneath his desk, the tremors worsening by the minute.

No one helped him. No one ever did.

The orphanage had stopped sending aides to school years ago. It wasn't like they cared. He was just another kid nobody wanted. Even the teachers had stopped bothering with him. No IEP, no extra time for reading or writing—nothing. They didn't see the point, not for someone like him. Wei Ying didn't need anyone to explain why.

"Why don't you try harder?" a teacher had once asked, shaking her head at his failed tests. It was always the same: rows of red marks, answers that didn't match the questions, sentences that made no sense. He couldn't make them make sense.

His vision swam as he struggled to focus on the board, where Ms. Lin had written something he couldn't read. Letters blurred and twisted, and his head began to throb.

"Hey, Wei Ying." A voice whispered nearby. He turned, catching the familiar glint in the boy's eyes. Wei Ying knew what was coming next. "What's two plus two?"

Laughter rippled through the row, but Wei Ying didn't answer. He couldn't. His throat closed up, the familiar panic rising as his breath quickened. The numbers, the words—they all floated out of reach, beyond him, like everything else. He tried to push the noise out, but his balance wavered, his legs shaking harder.

"Look at him," someone snickered. "Can't even hold a pencil."

The tremor became worse, spreading through his hands now, making him drop the pencil with a loud clatter. His breath hitched, and he slumped forward, clutching at his head as the sharp pain lanced through his temples. His body, already fragile from neglect, couldn't handle the stress.

A seizure was coming. He knew the feeling well, but no one else did. No one ever noticed until it was too late.

Wei Ying stumbled out of his seat, his legs barely working beneath him. The teacher glanced his way but said nothing as he half-ran, half-fell toward the door. His hand grazed the cool metal of the doorknob, but then his legs gave way entirely.

He collapsed to the floor, his world spinning, and darkening. His last coherent thought was that no one would help him.

No one ever did.

Hours later, Wei Ying lay on the thin, uncomfortable cot in the nurse's office, staring at the ceiling. His body felt heavy like it didn't belong to him anymore, and his head ached with the kind of dull, lingering pain that would last for days. The nurse had let him sleep through the rest of the day, not even bothering to wake him. Maybe she thought it was better for him to miss the classes—after all, he couldn't keep up with them anyway.

As the final bell rang, signaling the end of another day, Wei Ying pulled himself up, wincing at the stiffness in his muscles. His legs were unsteady, but that wasn't new. With slow, practiced movements, he gathered his few belongings—a worn backpack, the notebook filled with scribbles, and the pencil he could never hold properly—and headed for the door.

The hallway was empty now, just the soft hum of the lights overhead and the echo of his footsteps. Wei Ying shuffled through the corridors, making his way out of the school. He didn't have far to go; the orphanage was only a few blocks away. It wasn't home. It never had been. But it was all he had.

The night air was cool as he stepped outside, a breeze tugging at his too-thin jacket. He paused for a moment, tilting his head up to look at the sky. It was dark now, no stars, no moon—just endless black.

In the distance, he could hear the faint sounds of laughter, of people moving on with their lives. For a moment, a fleeting second, Wei Ying wondered what it would be like if someone noticed him. If someone cared.

But that was a dream. And Wei Ying didn't dream anymore.

With a sigh, he lowered his head and began the long walk back to the orphanage, just another shadow beneath the moonless sky.