The humidity in Hong Kong in the summer of 1942 was a physical presence, a thick, wet blanket that smelled of salt, decay, and fear. It clung to the crumbling, soot-stained buildings of Wan Chai, seeped through the paper-thin walls of the cramped apartments, and filled the lungs with the heavy promise of rain that never quite came. For Clover Ho, it was the air of her new, shrunken world.
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The war had not come with a single, cataclysmic bang, but with a slow, strangulating squeeze. The roar of Japanese Zeros had given way to the chilling, orderly click of boots on cobblestones. The vibrant, chaotic symphony of the city—the hawkers’ cries, the clatter of trams, the laughter from open tea houses—had been replaced by a watchful, suffocating silence, punctuated by the sharp barks of commands in an alien tongue.
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Clover’s world had shrunk to a few rooms above her father’s shuttered herbal medicine shop. Dr. Ho, a man whose hands had once been steady enough to measure ginseng to the milligram, now found them trembling with a helpless rage. Her mother’s face, once animated by the gossip of neighbours, was now a carefully neutral mask, her eyes holding a deep, unspoken grief. Their resistance was not one of bullets or bombs—those were for fools and martyrs. Theirs was a resistance of silence. It was a weapon of the powerless, a way to withhold the one thing the occupiers could not truly command: their acknowledgement.
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Clover’s rebellion was her music. In the corner of their main room stood a Rose Morris upright piano, its dark wood scarred and its tone slightly dulled by the humid air. Before the occupation, she had taught neighbourhood children their scales, filling the apartment with halting versions of “Für Elise” and “The Blue Danube.” Now, the piano was her sanctuary. Late at night, when the curfew-enforced quiet was deepest, she would play Chopin’s nocturnes, her touch on the keys so light the music was little more than a ghost, a whispered secret against the oppression outside.
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The requisition notice came on a Tuesday. A young Japanese corporal, his face impassive, handed Dr. Ho a crisp piece of paper. An officer required lodging. The Hos were to vacate the largest bedroom and make themselves scarce. The officer would be moving in the following day.
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The silence in the apartment after the corporal left was heavier than any that had come before. Dr. Ho stared at the notice, his jaw working soundlessly. Mrs. Ho began, mechanically, to clear her best porcelain from the cabinet in the main room, her movements stiff with a suppressed fury. Clover felt a cold knot of dread tighten in her stomach. Their home, their last refuge, was being invaded.
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He arrived at dusk. First Lieutenant Kaito Kobayashi was not what they had expected. He was young, perhaps in his mid-twenties, with a slender, almost delicate build. He did not swagger or bark orders. He moved with a quiet, precise grace, bowing slightly as he entered. His uniform was immaculate, but his eyes, behind wire-rimmed glasses, held a faint weariness that seemed out of place on a conqueror’s face. He introduced himself in politely formal, heavily accented Cantonese. Behind him, two privates carried a small trunk and a surprisingly large case that looked like it might hold a musical instrument.
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“I apologise for the intrusion,” he said, his words measured. “I will endeavour to be no disturbance.”
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The Ho family offered him nothing but their perfected, frigid silence. Dr. Ho gave a curt nod and turned away. Mrs. Ho stared at a point on the wall somewhere past his left ear. Clover, her heart hammering, busied herself at the piano, arranging already-neat sheet music.
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He took the silence in stride, as if it were the expected reception. He was given the room that had belonged to Clover’s elder brother, a student who had fled to the mainland to join the resistance and had not been heard from in over a year. His presence there felt like a particular desecration.
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Clover resolved to hate him. She resolved to ignore him completely. He was the enemy. He was the reason for the hollow look in her mother’s eyes, the tremble in her father’s hands. He was the embodiment of the boots on the street, the fear in the market, the silent, screaming injustice of it all.
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His name, she learned from the mail the corporal brought, was Kaito. But in the privacy of her mind, where her rebellion took root, she called him Leaf. It was a quiet, fragile thing, a piece of nature that was here today and could be swept away by the wind tomorrow. It suited him.
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Leaf’s routine was perplexing. He left early each morning and returned each evening. He never brought other soldiers home. He never drank or raised his voice. His invasion was not one of violence, but of eerie, unsettling quiet.
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And then, he began to talk.
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It started one evening. He emerged from his room holding a small, leather-bound book. It was a collection of Tang dynasty poetry, its pages tissue-thin. He stood near where Dr. Ho was pretending to read a weeks-old newspaper.
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“The work of Li Bai,” Leaf said, his voice soft, almost reverent. “His understanding of wine, nature, and solitude… it is timeless. ‘We sit together, the mountain and I, until only the mountain remains.’ The sentiment is profoundly Zen, do you not think?”
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Dr. Ho turned a page of his newspaper with a sharp, rustling snap. The silence that followed was louder than any shout.
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Leaf did not seem offended. He merely nodded, as if the silence were a thoughtful, if negative, response to his critique. He retreated to his room.
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The next night, it was a commentary on the philosophy of Confucius. Another evening, he spoke of the architectural brilliance of the Song dynasty. He shared his ideals not with the arrogance of a teacher, but with the passion of a devoted student. He spoke of the wa—the harmony—he found in Chinese art, the deep spiritual resonance of its landscape paintings, the complex, beautiful order he perceived in its history.
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“It is a culture of immense depth and subtlety,” he said one night, his gaze taking in the entire silent family, his eyes alight with a sincere fervour. “It is a tragedy that our nations are at war. We should be sharing this beauty, learning from one another.”
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Clover, stitching a tear in a dress by the window, felt a hot spike of anger. How dare he? How dare he sit in their home, stolen by his army’s guns, and speak of sharing and beauty? His words felt like a grotesque parody. She stabbed the needle into the fabric, her knuckles white.
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Yet, against her will, she listened. His passion was undeniable. It was the passion of a scholar, not a soldier. He was a man out of place, a delicate leaf stuck on the brutal, grinding wheel of war.
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The true crack in her defences came because of the music.
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One night, unable to sleep, Clover went to the main room for a glass of water. The apartment was dark and still. Moonlight streamed through the window, illuminating the piano like a ghostly altar. And there, sitting at the keyboard, was Leaf.
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He was not playing. He was just sitting there, his back to her, his head bowed, one hand resting gently on the closed fallboard. It was a posture of such profound longing and sadness that it stopped her breath. He looked like a man visiting the grave of a beloved friend. After a long moment, he sighed, stood up, and silently returned to his room.
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The next evening, he finally opened the large case. It contained a shakuhachi, a Japanese bamboo flute. He took it out and, without ceremony, began to play. The sound was unlike anything Clover had heard—breathy, melancholic, and deeply human. It was a sound that spoke of lonely mountains, wind through empty valleys, and a quiet, unassuageable sorrow. The mournful melody wove through the silent apartment, and for the first time, the Ho family’s resistance felt not like a mighty wall, but a fragile shell against a tide of shared, inexplicable grief.
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He finished. The last note faded into the humidity. The silence that followed was different. It was no longer just hostile; it was charged, confused.
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Then, he turned to Clover. “Do you play?” he asked in his quiet, formal way.
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She wanted to refuse. She wanted to maintain the wall. But the memory of his lonely vigil at the piano the night before compelled her. She gave a single, sharp nod.
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“Would you play something?” he asked. “Please.”
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Her parents’ eyes were on her, their silent disapproval a physical weight. But something in her, some deep, musical core, responded to the plea in his voice. It was not the plea of an officer, but of a fellow musician. She moved to the piano, sat down, and without looking at him, began to play Debussy’s “Clair de Lune.”
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Her fingers, usually so sure, trembled at first. But soon the music took over. She played for the lost peace, for her missing brother, for the fear that coated everything. She played the loneliness she saw reflected in him. When she finished, the apartment was utterly silent.
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“Thank you,” he whispered. His voice was thick with emotion. “Claude Debussy was greatly influenced by the East. You can hear it in the pentatonic scales, the sense of space… It is a bridge.”
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That was the beginning of their silent dialogue. Words were treacherous, laden with the politics and pain that stood between them. But music was a neutral country. He would play a complex, modern piece on the flute, something of his own composition, full of dissonance and searching. The next day, she would answer with a Chopin étude, all fiery passion and technical precision. He responded with a ancient, serene Gagaku court melody. She countered with a haunting, melancholic Cantonese folk song, “Jasmine Flower,” her arrangement making it sound both timeless and utterly new.
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They were speaking a language only they understood. Clover’s infatuation grew like a vine in the dark, twisting around her heart. She found herself listening for the sound of his door opening, the cadence of his footsteps. She stole glances at him during his evening monologues, noting the way his eyes lit up when he spoke of a Ming vase’s glaze, the delicate shape of his hands as he held a book of poetry. She hated herself for it. It felt like the deepest betrayal of her family, of her city, of herself. Yet, the connection felt more real, more honest, than any patriotic slogan or gesture of defiance. In a world stripped of all truth, the truth of the music felt like the only thing left to hold onto.
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One afternoon, she found a sheet of music on the piano stand. It was a composition for piano, titled “ fallen leaf 落葉 (Rakuyō).” It was for her. The melody was built on the Cantonese folk scale she had used for “Jasmine Flower,” but woven through with the complex, haunting harmonies of his Western-trained classical tradition. It was a conversation, a fusion, a perfect, heartbreaking expression of everything they could not say. It was a love letter from the enemy, and she committed every note to memory.
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The end came with the suddenness of a slamming door. Leaf’s commanding officer, a gruff, older man with a scarred face, arrived one evening. They spoke in rapid, sharp Japanese in Leaf’s room. Clover, straining to hear, caught only a few words: “...wasted here…”, “...gift to the Empire…”, “...conservatory in Berlin…”
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When the officer left, Leaf emerged. He looked pale, his usual composure gone. He stood before the Ho family, who were frozen in their usual positions of silent resistance.
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“I have been recalled,” he said, his voice flat. “I am to be transferred. I leave tonight.”
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Dr. Ho’s face showed nothing. Mrs. Ho’s eyes flickered for a fraction of a second toward Clover before fixing back on the middle distance.
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Leaf’s gaze found Clover. The mask of the cultured officer fell away completely. In his eyes, she saw a reflection of her own anguish, her own confusion. He was just a young man, caught in the same terrible current as she was.
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“I…” he began, then stopped. He bowed deeply, lower than he ever had before. “Thank you for your… hospitality.”
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He went to his room and came out with his suitcase and flute case. He walked to the door, then paused. He turned back, walked to the piano, and placed the handwritten sheet music for “Rakuyō” on the stand.
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Then he was gone. The sound of a military truck starting up outside grumbled through the silence, faded, and was gone.
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The apartment was preternaturally quiet. The weight of his absence was somehow heavier than the weight of his presence had ever been. The Ho family did not move. They had won. The invader was gone. Their silent resistance had endured.
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Clover stood up. Her legs carried her on numb, unfeeling limbs to the piano. She sat down on the bench. The apartment, the city, the war, her parents’ silent victory—it all receded into a distant haze. There was only the music on the stand.
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She began to play “Rakuyō.”
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Her fingers, perfectly trained, found every note. The piece was even more beautiful than she had imagined, a perfect, seamless blend of their two worlds, a fragile dream of what could have been in a world not torn apart. It was the sound of his apology, his regret, his admiration, and his farewell.
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As she played, the dam inside her finally broke. The infatuation she had hidden, the guilt of her betrayal, the stolen moments of connection, the profound, devastating loss—it all surged up, a torrent with no voice. Her shoulders began to shake. Tears welled in her eyes, spilling over and tracing hot paths down her cheeks, falling onto the ivory keys, making them slick under her trembling fingers.
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But she made no sound. Not a sob, not a gasp. The only sound in the room was the music he had written for her, a beautiful, haunting elegy for an impossible connection. She played for him, for herself, for the dream of harmony that his presence had represented and his nation’s war had destroyed. She played until the last note faded into the heavy, humid air, and then she sat in the overwhelming, victorious silence of her family, her body wracked with a grief that could express itself only as a perfect, terrible, soundless cry.
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and then Add to home screen.