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Written By Nur Zahirah Binti Abdul Rahman
in Selangor, Malaysia
The clock read 11:47 p.m., and the campus library was nearly empty. Most students had already packed up their laptops and trudged back to their rooms. The silence that followed them lingered like a fog, broken only by the faint hum of the air conditioner and the occasional creak of wooden chairs as students left one by one. I stayed. I stayed because my dorm was too noisy, too cramped, too distracting.
My roommate loved blasting music at odd hours, and even when she was asleep, the snoring and restless movements made it impossible to focus. Here in the library, though, silence wrapped itself around me like a blanket, even if it felt slightly suffocating.
This was my first semester at university. I had entered with excitement, imagining life as
something bright and thrilling. I pictured morning coffee runs between lectures, late-night conversations under starry skies, and inspiration flowing freely whenever I needed it.
The reality, however, was different. Reality meant sleepless nights, back-to-back assignments, and the gnawing feeling that no matter how much I studied, I was always behind.
My desk had turned into a battlefield of scattered notes, colour-coded highlighters, half-open textbooks, and a cup of tea that had gone cold hours ago. My eyes stung from hours of reading, my head ached from memorising endless definitions, and my hand cramped from scribbling paragraph after paragraph. At 12:15 a.m., I leaned back, staring at the ceiling, exhausted. My voice broke into the silence.
“Why am I even doing this?” I whispered.
That was when I heard a voice.
“Long night?”
I jolted upright, scanning the room. A young man was sitting a few tables away, someone I
hadn’t noticed before. His hair was messy, his shirt slightly wrinkled, but his posture was calm, almost steady. He had a thick book open in front of him, though I couldn’t see the title.
“Yeah,
” I said after a pause, trying to smile.
“Feels like the longest night of my life.
”
“What’s your course?” he asked.
“Foundation in English.
”
His smile widened knowingly.
“Same. Well, I was in that programme two years ago.
” He leaned back in his chair, eyes thoughtful.
“I remember nights like this. It always felt like I was trying to carry the weight of the entire library in my head.
”
I laughed quietly, though the laugh was tired.
“And how did you survive?”
He closed his book gently.
“I stopped thinking of passing as the finish line. I started thinking of learning as a way of becoming better than I was yesterday.
”
It sounded like something out of a motivational book, but the way he said it slow, certain, almost like he had lived it in his bones made it feel real. Something shifted in me.
We went back to studying, but his words stayed in my head. I began to look at my notes
differently. Instead of desperately memorising facts, I started trying to connect the words to my own life. A poem about loss reminded me of my grandmother, who used to encourage me to read aloud to her when I was small. A short story’s theme of courage made me think about my own quiet battles — the mornings I forced myself out of bed even when the weight of self-doubt pressed heavily against my chest.
The hours passed strangely. The world outside the library seemed to disappear, leaving only the dim fluorescent lights, the scratch of pens, and the steady turning of pages. At one point, I
noticed how unnaturally still the library was. Too still. The usual hum of late-night chatter, the rustling of bags, the soft beeping of laptops all gone. The air was heavier, but not in a way that frightened me. It felt almost comforting, as though I had entered a space suspended between dream and reality.
Around 2:00 a.m., restless, I wandered toward the far shelves. Dust tickled my nose as I
brushed past old volumes untouched for years. A row of creative writing books caught my
attention. One thin, worn volume seemed to call out: Letters to a Young Writer. I opened it.
Inside, the author wrote passionately about studying as more than preparation for exams; it was preparation for life itself. Every sentence struck me like a revelation.
When I looked up from the book, the young man was watching me with an almost knowing
expression. His eyes seemed to glimmer faintly in the dim light.
“You found something worth keeping,
” he said softly.
I nodded.
“Yeah. I think I did.
”
We worked side by side for hours. My pen moved faster, my thoughts flowed more clearly, and the heaviness that had sat in my chest earlier lifted slightly. Every so often, he offered quiet encouragement not too much, not overwhelming, just enough.
“Try connecting that idea to something you’ve lived through.
” “Don’t chase the grades; chase the growth.
” “Remember,
words have power only when you believe in them.
”
The night crept on. At one point, I glanced at the clock,3:30 a.m. The world was silent. At 4:45 a.m., my body was aching, but my mind was alive. The young man hummed softly to himself, some old tune I didn’t recognise, and the sound strangely calmed me.
Finally, the eastern windows began to glow faintly. It was 5:47 a.m. The horizon outside was
painted with strokes of gold and pink. The call to prayer from the nearby mosque floated gently
through the dawn air, echoing inside the stillness of the library.
I turned to tell him how much his advice had helped me, but he was gone. His chair was neatly
pushed in. There was no book, no bag, not even a pen left behind. For a moment, I thought he
had simply stepped away. I looked around, scanning each corner of the library, but it was empty.
Completely empty.
Confused, I walked to the front desk, where the night librarian was stamping a few returns.
“Excuse me… did you see the guy who was sitting over there?” I pointed toward the table.
She looked up, puzzled.
“What guy? You’ve been the only one here for hours.
”
My heart skipped a beat.
“No, I mean… he was right there. He talked to me. He said he was in Foundation in English before—
”
The librarian shook her head.
“I’ve been here all night. It’s just been you.
”
My mouth went dry. I wanted to argue, but the words died in my throat. I nodded weakly and
walked away.
Outside, the morning air was crisp and cool. The campus was slowly coming alive with students
shuffling to early classes, stretching and yawning, unaware of the strange night I had just lived through. Yet my mind kept replaying it, over and over and his voice cutting through my doubt, his calm expression as he spoke, the way his words had shifted something deep inside me.
Was he real? Or had I imagined him, a figure born out of exhaustion, summoned by my
desperate need for guidance?
I will never know. But in a way, it no longer mattered. Whether he had existed in flesh and blood or only in my mind, he had been exactly what I needed: a reminder that studying wasn’t about racing to some invisible finish line, but about becoming someone my past self would be proud of.
The library at dawn had given me two gifts: a new perspective, and the strange, unshakable
feeling that sometimes, help arrives in the quietest, most mysterious forms. And maybe just maybe, that’s enough.
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