A White Room

By Qiwen

“According to the National Bureau of Statistics, the youth unemployment rate for individuals aged 16-24 was recorded at 14.9% in November, the highest…” The TV channel switched.

“...The cheapest dim-sum buffet in Guangzhou.” “…For presbyopia, choose Zhongde Glasses.”

6pm’s TV program is plainer than white rice. Qing gave up and dropped the controller, shoveling rice into her mouth. In front of her were two dishes and a soup—soy sauce chicken, fried lotus root with pork, and carrot pork bone soup. All of them were Qing’s favorite local delicacies, but they were not appealing today.

“You don’t like the food? Is it too oily?” Shan, asked.

“No, I like it,” Qing replied. She picked up a piece of chicken and placed it in her bowl, just to stop her mother from talking. 

Since Qing’s father passed away from cancer a few years ago, her mother, Shan, had been living alone in Guangzhou, in southern China, while her daughter attended university in Beijing.

“I know it’s not easy. I will ask Secretary Wang tomorrow if there are any job openings at the street office for you.” 

Having grown up during China’s Cultural Revolution, Shan learned to adapt to uncertainty, including her husband’s layoff and, later, his death.

She never hid her gratitude for the government’s support as she was assigned an apartment 20 years ago as a perk, and received a lump sum as an early retirement payment.

Shan believed she was lucky enough, though sometimes she had to endure–her distracted daughter couldn't even finish her soup without her phone at hand.

Shan sighed and looked around at the apartment: a basic two-bedroom unit, built in the 1990s in downtown Guangzhou. It has no elevator and little greenery, just one building after another. Originally, it served as dormitory housing for government staff.

Living on the second floor, Shan has to keep the lights on all day, as it’s always a bit too dark. The bathroom is cramped and positioned awkwardly next to the kitchen. But she never complained.

A man with a serious face popped up on her daughter's screen. She felt herself drawn into his words. “To surpass 99% of people within six months, you need to follow this…” Embarrassed, Qing woke up and quickly scrolled three times in a row, trying to train the algorithm to show more appropriate content under her mother’s watchful eye.

A cat video appeared.

“Are you listening?” Shan asked.

Qing felt a rush to leave the house. But she couldn’t tell whether it was the weight of her mother’s sigh or the words “street office” that stung.

A street office is the lowest level of government units in China. Every street and local community has one to help residents handle trivial issues like disputes, pipe leaks, and noise complaints. It used to be the last place any young person wanted to work. But now, with the high unemployment rate, even graduate students are fighting to get into the government system for job stability.

Just imagining working in a street office made Qing shudder. Dealing with endless trivial tasks for 8 hours, then living 5 minutes from home, felt like hell to her. 

Qing grew up wanting to be a knowledgeable and well-respected person, unlike her parents. 

She had complicated feelings about her father, who was laid off during the economic reforms of the late 1990s and never found the skill or courage to work again. At first, she despised his cowardice, but when he was diagnosed with cancer, she started feeling pity for him.

Qing didn’t feel proud of Shan either, they had never truly connected or understood one another, despite the fact that Shan managed to make life bearable to her. 

In her grand plan, Qing would study hard, get into a reputable university in Beijing, and pursue a career in publishing or the high-tech industry. She had always dreamed of doing something significant and prestigious—something that would take her out of this old apartment and place her among the great minds of her time. 

Now, here she was, back at her mother’s house, eating a piece of plain chicken, 2,000 kilometers away from the ideal life she had imagined in the capital of China. She kept her desire to herself and acted cool and carefree, afraid she might not make it.

“I have things to do, Mum,” Qing argued, scrolling to another video. “I’m freelancing.”

“Freelancing on what?”

“Something better than a street office’s work?” Qing stood up and left the house, bringing her phone with her, of course.

The white room

After five minutes of circling the community building, Qing was out of breath. 

Winter in Guangzhou is perfect for wandering. The temperature usually hovers around 20 degrees, with a pleasant, cool breeze. But Qing didn’t feel any of it. Her mind was a tangled web, so knotted she couldn't decide what to feel. 

She had to stop at a cool stone bench to rest . When her body settled down, her gaze shifted: a boring tree, an old lamp, an uneventful evening. Before long, a craving for novelty surfaced.

Phone in hand, Qing felt the urge to dive into new information right away. 

In one video, a 74-year-old celebrity was doing a perfect plank; Another showed a young woman intensely pursued and adored by a rich billionaire. Yet another motivative video claimed that people should disappear for six months and work hard in secrecy… She let her attention soaking in a swamp of information, knowing she wouldn't remember any of it.

Some videos were far from enjoyable, but Qing had hope for the next one— and there would always be something more. It seemed the algorithm knew her well — all her preferences, or was it her vulnerabilities? At least she felt understood.

Time slipped away. As a soreness emerged between her eyes, Qing used one hand to rub them, while the other kept gripping her phone as she continued scrolling.

When she reopened her eyes, she found herself in an entirely white space.

It was a spacious, bright white room, but with no walls or boundaries. The stone benches, buildings, and people were all gone.

Qing couldn’t believe what she was seeing. She bent down to inspect the floor, looking for details, but found no cracks or signs of tiles or bricks — only white.

Before fear or confusion could settle in, her instinct kicked in: take a selfie. But when she realized her phone was missing, she started to panic.

Without GPS on her phone, how could she possibly know where she was? She walked around the space, her hand reaching out to find a wall or a door. But the space seemed endless.

“Hey, is anybody here?” Qing yelled. No response. No echo.

She jumped and landed heavily on the floor, trying to make some noise, but there was no sound. 

“This can’t be real!” she yelled again. “Who did this to me?”

It must be a dream. Her mind raced. I must have fallen asleep while scrolling on my phone, she thought. I need to wake up. How do I do that?

What about falling asleep and waking up again? she thought. Good idea. She closed her eyes. Still awake. Time passed, but she lost track of it. Had it been an hour? Or two minutes? Qing had no clue. Every time she opened her eyes, she was still standing in the white space.

Qing shivered as she remembered the rule from the movie Inception: death is the quickest way to wake up from a dream. But it felt impossible to end her life here. There was absolutely nothing—no weapons, and no courage within her to follow through.

Qing decided to start small. She pinched her arm—and felt a sharp pain. 

She gave up.

The Roommate

Qing tried to recall what happened just before she got trapped. She sat down to breathe but her mind kept racing, drifting to the plain chicken she had eaten some time before. Furrowed her brow, she was pissed that she missed it, too. 

Why couldn't she think of something useful at a moment as critical as this? Tears streamed down her cheeks.

“You can’t even kill yourself. Loser” A judgmental voice rose to the surface.

“Who is that?” Qing looked around.  “Who are you?” 

No answer. 

“You've always been aiming too high without staying grounded. You are going nowhere.” The voice said.

“Are you the one who pranked me?”

No answer. Qing kept breathing and noticed where the sound was from. She closed her eyes, seeking a dark reprieve. But instead she saw lights, orange colors. 

The words "going nowhere" hovered in this orange space, pulling her back to the dark little house where she and her mother lived. She saw her mother’s drawer full of plastic and paper bags — Shan was very precious with any resources she had, so she collected reused wrapping bags. She didn’t mind free umbrellas with company logos, either.

“What a beige human being,” the voice commented again.

“HEY!” Qing was surprised that this voice knew her and Shan so well.

It became even more absurd.

“Hand,” Qing heard the voice say as she stared at her hand.

“What’s your point?” Qing asked.

“Orange. Want orange juice,” the voice whispered in her head when she closed her eyes.

“No orange juice here. You’re not making any sense!” Qing replied.

“Alone. You’re alone. You lose.”

“Enough! Stop!” Qing yelled.

The voice never stopped, only varied in volume. Some comments were whispered recognitions, while other, harsher observations, sounded like they were coming from a speaker.

“In a small house, a small place, doing small things. All your life,” the voice made itself clear.

Anger surged in Qing. She hit the floor with her fist — the only concrete thing she could strike to make her strength feel useful.

The pain brought her a moment of peace.

Calm down. This is either a dream or a game, Qing told herself. Either way, it has an end — peeing will wake me up if I can’t kill myself. And if it’s a game, it must have something set up — some hint to help me get through. An idea struck her.

“You are the key NPC,” Qing shouted to the void. “You must be. There is no one here except me and you.” 

No answer means yes. Qing thought.

First things first, she needed a name to differentiate her real self from the voice, since it came from her head without any form.

"Roommate," Qing called it, thinking of her annoying college roommate, who was so chatty and always on the phone.

"Now, tell me more clues," Qing said.

The Fight

A line from her favorite philosopher popped into her mind, flashing like a neon sign.

“Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.”

“You’re a failure,” the roommate said. “You didn’t accomplish anything.”

Focus on the clues, don’t ignite. Breathe, Qing told herself. Keep going.

But when she closed her eyes, a format like TikTok appeared. A video about Simone Weil, the philosopher she had just remembered, played in a loop. She watched Simone’s entire life in her mind’s eye, joining battlefields and factories to experience other people’s suffering firsthand. Qing had read her biography and works before.

“This is true heroism,” the roommate commented. “Not like you.” 

Was the roommate sending her these images too?  

Qing decided to work with the manipulation. 

Simone Weil might be a good lead, Qing thought. She remembered feeling deeply touched when she first read her work at age 16. She admired the French philosopher for her courage to pursue the truth herself, not through textbooks or doctrines. Someone who had never spoken Chinese, who died years ago, someone so far away, understood exactly what Qing was craving.

She tried to focus on that younger, innocent version of herself. The girl who wanted to be far away, to seek understanding from someone like Simone Weil — 

“But you can’t even control your own attention,” the roommate interrupted.

Another collection of videos appeared. 

She saw a 10-meter bedroom in a 1980s Bauhaus building, which has a single bed, a weardore and a desk–the one she rented in Beijing.

After graduating with an economics degree but no hard skills, she briefly worked for a small e-commerce company as a marketing staff member. Suddenly a flash of images appeared before her eyes. 

She saw herself in the middle of the China-US trade war, standing outside of her building the day she was fired. 

She had become a freelancer for the company, writing social media content and editing short videos. Until generative AI took that job too.

Freelancers are not free, the roommate said.

Qing watched her past self lying on the bed, looking for a new job opportunity on her phone, only to fall into endless scrolling of cat videos and motivational speeches. She watched herself fall asleep, remembering the hateful thoughts and regret in her head, then saw herself wake up and immediately start scrolling.

“Useless. No one can fight the wave,” the roommate mocked.

“Nice try. But I’m not in Beijing now.” On the verge of sadness and pain, Qing pulled herself back.

“Focus on the clues,” Shivering, Qing felt she had used up all her strength just to calm herself from the flashback. “I need to remember what happened before I got here.” 

Without even speaking, she made another request to the roommate.

Rainbow Tears

Another video began.

This time, she saw a stone bench beneath her. The contrast of the bright screen made her surroundings seem dark, like being in the middle of a deep ocean.

Here we are. The key must lie in the last few videos, Qing thought.

Her finger kept scrolling, like a fisherman trying to reel in a fish. Strangely, there was no image on the screen—only bright white light.

“How could you even remember the videos since they are pure nonsense?” The roommate laughed.

Think, think, think. Qing squeezed her eyebrow to fully concentrate.

“Don’t you dare to go back,” the roommate warned.

Feelings began to pour out of the screen light. She felt as though she was being drenched in thick grey paint—a sensation of numbness spreading from her head. It was so sticky and foul-smelling that Qing screamed.

She ran away in space, trying desperately to wipe it off. But it was useless.

She almost begged for it to stop, but then changed her mind. "Breathe!" she screamed. She took a deep breath, then another.

Instead of trying to escape, she sat with it. She even tasted it. It turned out the paint wasn’t just grey, nor merely numbing; it was a mixture—a rotten-tasting green regret, a chill-like red anxiety, a sour orange fear, and a purple, poisonous shame. She nearly vomited.

So that’s the feeling I had before I entered, Qing thought to herself.

The taste of the paint reminded her of a scene from years ago.

“They’re not just boring, they’re bad,” the roommate said.

A short video appeared in her mind. She watched as a 12-year old Qing was accompanied by her math teacher, Miss Zhu, and her parents.

"73 in math," Miss Zhu said, furrowing her brow. "I called you all here for a reason. I’m concerned that if this trend continues, Qing won’t make it into the best high school. As you know, the competition is fierce, and that could mean one step further from a good college."

Miss Zhu’s words ignited Qing’s father’s anger.

"What have you done?! Do you even understand what’s gone wrong?" he yelled. "I told you, you always aim too high and never stay grounded. You’ll be nothing if you can’t get into a good college."

Qing’s mother, Shan, stood there in silent agreement. Of course, she’d never defend me from harsh words. Qing thought.

“See,” the roommate echoed. “You’re nothing out there.”

As a 25-year-old, the now-observing Qing gained a third-person perspective from the audience seat: an out-of-work father, fueled by his own frustration with his child, not just once or twice, but on a daily basis; a mother who always adapted to "authority," managing only resources while keeping silent in the face of emotional abuse; and anxious teachers who believed in meritocracy, so afraid that their top student might not keep up, and all they knew was to apply more pressure.

Little Qing screamed and cried. The space was twisting through her high pitch.

“Don’t! You! Dare! Leave!” The roommate’s voice joined the scream. “It’s a jungle!”

The room was distorted, and the shape of her parents were melting.

Qing ran towards the little version of herself and gave her a firm hug. "Poor kid," She wiped the child's tears, and they were colorful.

"Blame them. It’s all their fault!" the roommate shouted.

At that moment it felt like the pieces clinked together. Qing figured it out.

“You’ve always been protecting me, haven’t you?” Qing asked the roommate.  Like all the harsh words from her father, they came from love, but they were expressed like a sword.

There was no answer.

The mixed colors of her childhood tears receded like the tide. Only the originally blank, bright room remained.

“You sound like my parents, my teachers, and all the criticism I’ve ever encountered,” Qing said, walking through the white space.

“You mean to protect me from being hurt, don’t you? But it’s just your way—harsh words, disastrous images… that’s the only way you learned to protect me.”

There came a long silence.

“I appreciate it,” Qing said. 

“I’m just repeating our parents’ path, feeling hurt and pain. Every human does,” The roommate whispered. “If life’s journey is meant to suffer, and death is the end, why can’t I just get off the train now?”

“I don’t know,” Qing said. “But you have tears like a rainbow. Worth posting a Tiktok video.” She shrugged.

A crack appeared on one of the white walls.

 Clear and Bright

Before Qing could react, the space turned dark. 

“Roommate?” she shouted.

“Risk assessment: pass. Relaxation level: 6. Focus level: 7. Training complete. Holograph closing. Thanks for participating in Clear and Bright mindfulness training.” An AI voice hovered in the air.

She felt a pleasant, cool sensation. As she opened her eyes, Qing found herself sitting on the edge of the stone bench with her phone in hand.

She took a few minutes to confirm she had landed back in reality: the phone was back, and there were cracks on the wall. She let out a hiccup, and the smell of soy sauce chicken wafted up. 

“I’m back!” Qing trembled with excitement. “It really was just a game!”

Her phone buzzed. A notification reminded her to check the “transcript.” It evaluated Qing's mental "performance": focus improved by 48%, self-criticism decreased by 32%. At the bottom of the report was a large “Congratulations!” — Qing had outperformed 68% of participants.

“For more information, please follow our WeChat official account. May you cherish life and stay away from digital addiction (珍惜生命，远离数字毒瘾).”

“So I was in rehab?” Qing scanned the QR code and entered the introduction page:

“In response to the national efforts of ‘Winning the Third Digital Opium War,’ and to protect the health of young people, the Communist Youth League and TikTok have launched an online series titled the Clear and Bright Campaign, which focuses on combating digital addiction. This initiative offers free, voluntary, and immersive mindfulness courses to young people struggling with depression and excessive screen time.”

TikTok will use browsing data to identify users in need of support and provide them with the mindfulness experience. The initiative is currently recruiting participants with smartphones that support holographic projection.”

As Qing read this, she saw thousands of bright white cubes forming a massive space, each containing a mind like hers. But who started all this? Qing mocked.

It was still a mystery how she had “voluntarily” joined the training, and how healthy she was now under the algorithm's eye? Qing wondered.

“See? The power used you.” A voice said.

Qing recognized that. “I know. And you're not going to leave, are you? You mean little character,” she said.

“Through thick and thin,” the roommate answered.