“Shen Yao, do you dare to climb up here?”
Cheng Orange lay on top of the Overhead Bar, shouting at the little figure below.
Bars like these, three meters tall, were usually only attempted by the sports students.
She’d heard that a fifth grader once fell from the Overhead Bar and dislocated his chest.
Shen Yao stood below with his arms folded, face full of disdain: “I’m not climbing.”
Here we go again… Cheng Orange thought, Shen Yao always liked to act as if he didn’t care about anything, as if he wasn’t afraid of anything.
She hated this about Shen Yao and wanted to make him look foolish.
So she shouted, “Are you too scared to climb? Nya nya nya, coward, Shen Yao, coward, Shen Yao~”
Shen Yao grew anxious at her taunting, stomping his foot below: “I’m not a coward, stop shouting, someone will hear you!”
“Coward, Shen Yao, coward, Shen Yao~” Cheng Orange climbed down from the Overhead Bar, hopping around her childhood friend.
Children become aware of gender early; in fact, by third grade, the boys and girls in their class had started to avoid playing together.
To kids this age, playing with friends of the opposite sex meant losing face—especially if it looked like a boy and girl were always together, people would secretly gossip about the Prophecy of Early Love.
Even though they didn’t really understand what love was, they’d still mimic adults and say things like that.
Shen Yao and Cheng Orange were probably the exception.
From the rural kindergarten before the urban merger, to the current joint elementary school, they had never really been apart for long.
Shen Yao, teased to anger, rolled up his sleeves: “Fine, I’ll climb. What’s the big deal!”
With that, he began to climb up the Overhead Bar.
Cheng Orange, down below, started mimicking a monkey’s call, making Shen Yao’s little head buzz with frustration.
Finally reaching the top, Shen Yao gripped the highest crossbar tightly and called out, a little smug: “See? It’s nothing special.”
Just as he was about to lower his head to brag to Cheng Orange, he suddenly realized that Cheng Orange on the ground looked so small, so tiny, like an ant.
Even the yellow earth beneath seemed grainy and blurred, and the Coal Slag Track looked narrower and thinner, like the Cafeteria Noodles he hated.
It wasn’t that everything had shrunk—it was just that he had climbed too high.
Shen Yao suddenly felt his legs turn to jelly, unable to muster any strength.
He stared at Cheng Orange on the ground, but couldn’t stammer out a single word.
Too high… so high he felt like he could fall at any moment and shatter into pieces.
Cheng Orange noticed something was wrong. She called out, “Come down, quick, come down!”
Shen Yao’s voice trembled with a sob: “I… my legs won’t move.”
Shen Yao was afraid of heights.
Cheng Orange suddenly understood.
She didn’t bother to tease Shen Yao anymore, instead clambered up the Overhead Bar, wanting to help him down.
But she forgot she was just a sixth-grade girl herself—how could she possibly carry Shen Yao, whose legs had already turned to jelly?
Looking at Shen Yao’s flushed face, Cheng Orange suddenly felt a pang of regret.
She regretted making Shen Yao end up like this. If Shen Yao wasn’t happy, she couldn’t be happy either.
Cheng Orange flailed a bit, unsure what to do: “I’ll go get someone.”
Shen Yao shook his head desperately: “No… if a teacher catches us, we’ll lose points.”
They had snuck in from outside the school while the fifth graders were taking the Big Exam.
“Then—then what should we do?” Cheng Orange simply climbed up the Overhead Bar too. “I’ll stay with you. Will that make you feel better?”
“Let me get used to it a bit. Maybe I’ll be able to move soon,” Shen Yao said.
Cheng Orange answered with a hum, lying on another crossbar, pressing close to her childhood friend.
Their arms touched, and they could feel each other’s breath.
These two innocent children lay atop the Overhead Bar, staying there until the sun set, when the Security Guard on patrol finally found them.
Until then, they had leaned on each other, nestled high above, watching the clouds drift and the birds soar, watching the sunset glow red across the earth, as if this moment would last forever.
*
Cheng Orange gradually pulled herself out of her memories.
Looking at Shen Yao sitting beside her, she asked again, “Are you really alright? If you’re not feeling well, we can try something else… the Haunted House isn’t bad.”
Shen Yao checked the Roller Coaster’s safety bar, nodding seriously: “I’m fine. Fear can be overcome.” Avoiding it would only make the fear worse—a life lesson he’d learned from Cockroaches.
Speaking of which, Yaoguang City had been developing better and better these past two years; even an amusement park had opened.
The two of them boarded the Roller Coaster. Soon, a staff member came over and pressed down the safety harness firmly.
There were hardly any people in the amusement park; which made sense—who would come play on such a hot summer day?
On this ride, it was just the two of them, and a family of four in the very back.
The design of the Roller Coaster’s tracks was quite conservative; it wasn’t nearly as dramatic as Shen Yao had imagined.
That helped him breathe a sigh of relief.
Watching the seat slowly rise off the ground, Shen Yao took a few deep breaths.
He was a bit nervous, but nowhere near as afraid as before.
Cheng Orange, on the other hand, looked quite excited.
This was her second time on a Roller Coaster.
The first was when she was very little, and she’d gone with her older sisters.
Back then, her sisters had all screamed in fear—the more frightened they were, the harder Cheng Orange laughed.
Clang, clang.
The metal components made noises that were impossible to describe—maybe the usual clanging of machinery, or maybe the sound of something going wrong?
Shen Yao’s thoughts raced wildly, and every tiny noise made him imagine an entire horror movie.
After a while, Shen Yao gradually got used to the feeling of flying through the clouds and mist.
Only then did he realize that the fear he’d had as a child belonged to the past.
After all he’d been through, there wasn’t much left in the world that could scare him.
Turning his head to look at Cheng Orange’s smiling face, Shen Yao suddenly relaxed.
She was always so full of life, like she had endless energy and spirit.
Compared to Qiao Yunxue, Cheng Orange seemed to live in dazzling sunlight, like a radiant orange, brimming with vitality.
And Qiao Yunxue? She was more like a Birch Lily blooming quietly under the moonlight—beautiful, yet missing the vibrant energy she should have had.
Shen Yao suddenly thought, if Qiao Yunxue knew he was comparing her to a Birch Lily, she’d probably be happy, right?
After all, she really liked red things—red hearts, red hair, red flowers, everything red.
Just then, Cheng Orange said excitedly, “Shen Yao, the steepest Tunnel is coming up ahead, hold on tight.”
Tunnel?
Shen Yao instinctively gripped the safety bar. Suddenly, the Roller Coaster shot downward into a pitch-black opening.
Shen Yao’s vision went dark; when he opened his eyes again, all he could hear was the roar of the wheels on the track, and neon lights along the Tunnel’s walls flashed by in streams of color—breathtakingly beautiful.
Cheng Orange exclaimed, “It’s so pretty~”
But Shen Yao’s body tensed up. He hated tunnels, hated the darkness, because it reminded him of things lurking behind the world’s shadows.
They were eerie and unsettling, crawling with maggots and centipedes, born from extreme emotion, existing only because fear could spread.
Almost as if to confirm his worries, he suddenly heard a grating, groaning noise by his ear—the sound of metal under unbearable strain.
He hadn’t even had time to check what was wrong when he saw, at the Tunnel’s exit, a cross-shaped barrier.
A cross? …No…
It was a pair of Crossed Guillotines, stained with blood, as if they had already drunk their fill of it.