Last night, while taking a walk, I passed the stall that sold egg pancakes. The uncle who ran it kindly told me something had come up at home and that he would not be open the next day, saving me a wasted trip. My stomach happened to miss my mother’s breakfast too, so I set an alarm and got up at seven sharp, determined to snatch a bowl of porridge from the mouths of those ravenous art students. My mother had specially stewed the rice porridge thick and fragrant with lily bulbs.
Even in early summer, the mornings here held a thread of cold. The little inn was like an enormous perfume bottle wrapped in beautiful paper, filled with molecules of wildflowers, damp earth, and the young people’s laughter from the courtyard. I pulled a coarse-knit cardigan over my long dress and tiptoed downstairs to the kitchen in search of breakfast, but my mother still spotted me. From a distance she called, “Night owl, come say hello to the guests.”
The courtyard, neither large nor small, was thick with grass. Drops of night dew still clung to the fragile leaves. I walked over smiling and glanced at the table, where cups and plates already lay in disorder. “Hey, you have to save me at least one bun.”
Laughter rose at once. Someone hurried to move a chair for me. Wood scraped over stone with an old, creaking sound.
In truth, all through high school, university, and even the end of senior year, I had never been very good with people. Yet my first job after graduation happened to be in the sales department, handling VIP clients. Day by day, it forced me into someone skilled at socializing. People often say society changes a person beyond recognition. Sometimes I think it is more like a charitable clinic, especially good at treating the ailments of the heart and defects of personality.
Amid that burst of laughter, beneath the xiangsi tree not far away, someone who had just finished a phone call turned around. A blue-striped shirt. Beige casual trousers. An exceptionally tall figure.
I think he saw me at once. Surprise flickered across his too-handsome face.
My heart began to pound.
After a long moment, he called my name uncertainly. “Qin Ran?”
At the dining table, a girl in a white dress raised her head. Her curls were soft, her makeup gentle and natural. She looked from him to me in confusion. “You know each other?”
The sunlight seemed not fully awake yet. It hid silently behind the clouds, letting only a pale violet mist fall over the little courtyard.
Of course we knew each other. Fate is strange like that.
I raised my hand and smiled. “Long time no see, Ren Fei.”
My hand was trembling. Perhaps my smile was stiff too. Fortunately, there was some distance between us. A light wind passed, bringing the breath of summer against my face.
He still looked as he had in my memory, as if nothing had changed. Yet between those two tables lay six entire years.
The girl beside him was Mi Xue. She had grown even gentler and more beautiful, and she was now his wife. For a moment, I could not sort through what I felt. There is a saying: some people should never meet again in this life; once they do, it becomes a tragedy stripped of all punctuation. I had not understood that sentence before. Now, dimly, I understood a little.
An old photograph treasured in memory—the one that had stood for those carefree, radiant years—was torn apart with a sharp rip.