"Focus on your stars, Fei Fei," he said, his voice lower, almost gentle. He gestured to the laptop. "That is your world. Let me manage the shadows in mine."
He rose from his chair, a signal that the discussion was over. He walked to the window, turning his back to the room, a king dismissing a subject.
Tang Fei stared at his broad back for a long moment, the joyful buzz of the auditions now feeling distant and hollow. She turned back to the screens.
The dancer in Hall 3 was leaping, a picture of defiant freedom. But all Tang Fei could see were the invisible chains, the ones on the dancer's wrists in the performance, and the ones she was just beginning to feel around her own life.
Huo Wu, sensing the shift in atmosphere, quietly muted the laptop's audio, allowing a heavy silence to fill the room, broken only by the silent, frantic movements on the screen.
The hunt for talent continued, but in the heart of the hunter, a new, more personal struggle had just begun.
