He stood there rigid again, motionless. Then he turned his head, searching urgently for Jiang Du.

The gifts in his hand fell to the ground with a clatter. Jiang Du saw that something was wrong. She picked up the gifts and asked him, “Are you feeling unwell?”

Wei Qingyue seized her by the arm with a grip so tight it was nearly enough to make Jiang Du’s brow furrow. But she bore it — bore his sudden, incomprehensible strangeness — and simply called his name with great gentleness: “Wei Qingyue, what’s wrong?”

His question, too, came out strangely. His eyes didn’t blink. “You’re real, aren’t you? You’re not going to leave?”

And so Jiang Du put the gifts down and let them be. Her fingers found his arm quite naturally, rising to rest there. Beneath the dim streetlamps that had just flickered on, she said to him, “I’m right here, Wei Qingyue. I haven’t left. I won’t leave.”

Wei Qingyue nodded. He said, “Why does the security guard at your complex look exactly like the one at your old complex used to?”

Jiang Du turned to look. She seemed to understand the nameless fear that had overtaken his face a moment ago. She smiled, stroking his arm steadily. “You’re mistaken. Security guards all tend to look alike.”

“Really?” For just a moment, something fragile crossed Wei Qingyue’s face.

Jiang Du looked at him with a quiet sorrow. She said, “Really.” Her fingers slid down and closed around his hand. “Wei Qingyue, you’re not well right now. Will you let me take you to see a doctor?”

“Yes,” he answered, without a moment’s hesitation.

Together, they picked up the gifts again and went inside.

The moment the door opened — the old light, the old scent, the old… two elderly people, their faces almost unchanged with time. Wei Qingyue’s breath seized in his chest; for a long moment, he couldn’t breathe at all.

He concealed his emotions, finished his greetings, and then turned his gaze back to Jiang Du.

Those eyes. That face. He suddenly realized that Jiang Du looked exactly as she had at sixteen — only her hair was different now, long and softly waved. That was all. She was fair and clean, her gaze clear, her brows dark. Only the hairstyle had changed, nothing more.

Wei Qingyue, without quite knowing why, closed his fingers around the charm on his car key — the Tweety Bird.

The little charm pressed a deep mark into the skin of his palm. He looked down at it, then lifted his eyes again. Jiang Du now looked like a grown woman, and the elderly couple’s temples were fully silvered, their faces lined with deep wrinkles. Wei Qingyue let out a slow, quiet breath. He blinked, and then introduced himself at ease:

“Hello, Grandmother, Grandfather — I’m Wei Qingyue. I wonder if you still remember me.”

“Of course we remember, how could we not?” The grandmother said happily, looking him over with undisguised delight. “You came to our home before — the young man who ranked first in his class, isn’t that right?”

First place — that was from an exceedingly distant past, a grand ambition now faded like a dream. The corners of Wei Qingyue’s mouth turned up in a quiet smile, and he nodded. “Yes. You still remember.”

“Old man, you remember too, don’t you?” Grandmother gave Grandfather a nudge. Grandfather was still wearing his apron. He broke into a broad, resonant laugh — just as Wei Qingyue remembered it. “How could I forget — the young fellow who was going abroad to study! You’re back! Come in, come in, sit down. You’re in luck today, my friend — I’ve made a proper spread.”

Jiang Du gently nudged her grandfather toward the kitchen: “We’re all starving — are you done yet?”

Grandmother took the gifts and said, “You came all this way for a simple meal, and you’ve brought all of this — next time, you mustn’t spend like this.” Wei Qingyue replied, “It’s nothing, just a small token of goodwill.” He delivered the pleasantries a little stiffly, and glanced over at Jiang Du — who was pressing her lips together, stifling a laugh.

At dinner, Grandfather poured a small glass of liquor and offered it to Wei Qingyue. Wei Qingyue promptly stood up, bent slightly at the waist, and accepted the glass with both hands. He tipped it back and drained it in one go, without even a flinch:

“I’ll drain it — feel free to take yours at your own pace.”

Jiang Du was still pressed-lips laughing.

Wei Qingyue accepted glass after glass. The cups were small, fortunately. Grandmother stopped Grandfather: “You silly old man — you’ll get the poor boy drunk, and then he’ll be miserable. What’s the point?”

“What do you old women know? I’m happy today. Come on, young Wei — Wei what, exactly?” Grandfather waved his hand expansively, his face flushed to a blooming red.

“Wei Qingyue — the character for clear water, and the character for to surpass.” Wei Qingyue explained patiently.

The conversation meandered pleasantly. Grandfather, as it turned out, couldn’t hold his liquor at all — one drink and his face turned red; a bit more and he was tipsy. Once tipsy, he became very talkative.

“You and Jiang Du were classmates in high school?”

“Yes.”

“What did you study abroad?”

“Computer science.”

“Oh, you work with computers. How many people are in your family?” Grandfather had already forgotten Jiang Du’s earlier warnings, and now, missing the looks she kept desperately sending in his direction, he interrogated Wei Qingyue with pleasantly bleary eyes.

Wei Qingyue smiled. “My parents are divorced. They’ve each started new families.”

Grandfather gave a small sound of understanding and said to himself, “Divorced, divorced — divorce is fine.”

Grandmother rapped the table with her chopsticks. “What on earth are you saying, you foolish old man —” She turned, smiling apologetically. “Child, don’t mind him — he’s talking nonsense.”

Wei Qingyue shook his head. “It’s fine. I think so too.”

The grandmother looked visibly uncomfortable for a few seconds. She immediately urged Wei Qingyue to eat more, piling food onto his plate. Jiang Du said nothing — only, when Grandmother went to refill a bowl of rice and Grandfather was sitting in a pleasant daze, reached over and quietly touched Wei Qingyue’s hand.

Wei Qingyue smiled at her.

“Actually, I came today not only to see both of you, but because there’s something else.” The moment Wei Qingyue began, both women at the table went still. Grandmother looked at Jiang Du; Jiang Du looked at Wei Qingyue — her expression a silent reproach: You didn’t discuss this with me. I thought we were just coming to have dinner.

“What I had in mind was — we might as well look at the calendar soon and get the wedding done.” Wei Qingyue continued at his own unhurried pace, his gaze moving between the two elders and deliberately avoiding Jiang Du. “I expect Jiang Du has already told you something of my situation. If you’re both agreeable, we could start with an engagement.”

Jiang Du’s face had gone as red as a ripe tomato. She couldn’t help herself — she stretched out her foot and pressed down on his, hard. Wei Qingyue took no notice whatsoever. He cleared his throat quickly and said, “As for a bride price — if there’s anything you’d like, please tell me directly. I tend to be on the straightforward side. If what I’ve just said is too abrupt, I hope you’ll both forgive me — put it down to my being young, and not always thinking things through.”

Bride price — how had they suddenly arrived at bride price? Jiang Du felt dizzy, the whole world tilting upward; she felt she might float all the way to the moon. Her heart wouldn’t stop racing. She stared at Wei Qingyue, tense and unsettled, deeply flustered.

Throughout all of it, he had been speaking only to the two elders.

Grandmother wore the same expression of bewilderment. She sat in a daze — looking at Grandfather, who still hadn’t quite grasped the situation, then at Jiang Du — and stammered: “You young people’s matters, you decide for yourselves. We… ” She elbowed Grandfather vigorously. “Right, old man?”

Grandfather seemed to startle awake from a dream, his face entirely red. “You’re saying you want to marry our Jiang Du?”

Loud enough for half the housing complex to hear, Jiang Du was fairly certain. She jumped up quickly, went to close the screen window. A faintly cool current of air swept across her face. She touched her burning cheeks, breathed in deeply, then turned quickly back — and in the warm light of the lamp, her eyes met Wei Qingyue’s dark gaze.

“Yes. I want to marry Jiang Du. But I need to ask for your blessing first.” Wei Qingyue’s heartbeat had grown increasingly urgent. He had no choice but to reach for his glass again, sipping a few more mouthfuls of the clear liquor.

The world tipped into a mild and hazy warmth — bitter and sharp, yet flooded with light. Golden osmanthus blossoms hung from deep green leaves. Their thick, rich fragrance kept spreading, spreading, until it enveloped the whole world like a dense and gentle fog.

This time, he was nearly there. Yes, nearly there — and he would make it.

Inside his mind, a spinning top whirled at high speed. He would carry no more regrets. He would no longer drift through the world lost and untethered. It was he who had been selfish — who had left in too great a hurry for the sake of his future, without staying to keep her from loneliness. He knew everything. He knew her misfortunes. He knew her heart. He had simply not known himself well enough — he had been slow to understand.

Forgive him. Forgive me.

Wei Qingyue’s other hand was nearly crushing the Tweety Bird charm.

His body trembled very slightly.

The old man’s voice rang out clear and bright before him. Grandfather laughed — a great, open, wholehearted sound — and said, “Wonderful! If you hadn’t married her, Jiang Du would have grown old waiting. This is truly wonderful. My wife and I could close our eyes this very night and rest in peace!”

A sound like jade striking jade — clear and crystalline — rang out and echoed for a long, long time.

The string that had been pulled taut inside Wei Qingyue for twelve years broke, in that moment, at last. He felt as though every ounce of strength had been drained from his body.

He lost his composure — stood up, his throat working: “I truly don’t know how to express my gratitude to you both…”

“Dear child, what is there to thank us for — sit down, sit down.” Grandmother’s weathered, firm hand reached for the back of his, and it was so real: the touch of a distant, warm, familiar old woman’s skin.

He was permitted to stay that night.

Wei Qingyue’s steps were unsteady. He had drunk too much. The liquor moved through him, and his eyes grew hazy and tender. He looked around and saw a bunch of chrysanthemums arranged on the table in the sitting room — white as snow, though the blooms were already half-wilted, several petals fallen. They needed to be replaced with fresh ones. Wei Qingyue drifted, unsteadily, toward the flowers. In a daze he thought: he still hadn’t asked Jiang Du — yes, he still needed to ask Jiang Du. But the whole world was swaying badly, and he was calling her name, and in all that swaying, the clock on the wall had never moved.

“Why is your clock stopped?” Wei Qingyue pointed at the wall. “The day Huang Yingshi interviewed me, the clock in that room was stopped too. Tell me — I’m not dreaming, am I?”

Jiang Du looked at the wall. She was very nearly in tears. “The clock is running,” she said. “You’ve had too much to drink.”

“And those flowers?” Wei Qingyue pointed at the white chrysanthemums, sick to his stomach and fighting the urge. “Why are there white chrysanthemums in your home? And they’re starting to dry out. Jiang Du, doesn’t your home strike you as strange?”

Jiang Du steadied him. “Grandmother bought them. I’ll put the chrysanthemums in water — they’ll last a good while longer.”

She guided him into her small bedroom. Wei Qingyue could see it all. His soul left his body and hovered in the air, gazing down with tender devotion at everything happening in the room below.

He had become two parts.

Jiang Du held him by the waist; Wei Qingyue’s full weight pressed down onto her. He buried his face in the curve of her neck. Jiang Du could barely hold him up — she kept stepping back, back, until she found the desk behind her and borrowed its support.

“Marry me,” he murmured, low and muffled.

“Marry you. I’ll marry you.” Jiang Du stroked his back gently, as one soothes a child.

“I’m sorry. I know I’ve wronged you.” He began to cry. The world blurred fast. “I wrote you letters. Did you never see them? Why didn’t you read them? I said I would come back. That I would come back to find you.”

Jiang Du’s voice grew gentler and gentler. She held him, smiling: “Aren’t you back now?”

“But why didn’t you acknowledge me? We met twice afterward, and you wouldn’t look at me. Why?” Wei Qingyue asked, bewildered and hurt, like a child.

Jiang Du was not at all surprised. She was still soft-eyed and smiling: “Silly — I’m about to marry you. Let the past go. You’re going to have a good life.”

You’re going to have a good life.

Those words were identical — word for word — to what she had said to him in the rainy afternoon twelve years ago, during their brief, heartfelt exchange. That rain, Wei Qingyue thought, had actually lasted twelve years. And he told her so. He said, “Jiang Du, it has been raining for twelve years. Every single day.”

Jiang Du pulled back and looked at his face, laughter alive in her eyes: “Is that so? How remarkable — it can rain for twelve years without stopping? What kind of place could do that? The only place I know of where it rains without end is Macondo.”

“Right — and you’ve forgotten: I have a head full of useless and fascinating knowledge. Let me tell you exactly how this came to be — shall I?” He took her hand and pulled her down onto the bed.

Jiang Du’s face was flushed and bright, her eyes like vessels filled to the brim with the clearest water, as she watched him tip toward her and fall.

Wei Qingyue couldn’t help touching her face. The lamp was warm.

But rather than explaining, he grew stubborn again:

“I saw you twice. In 2009, and in 2015. Why didn’t you acknowledge me?”

Jiang Du corrected him gently: “Wei Qingyue, you’re not well. I know everything. You dreamed of me — you’ve confused the dreams with reality. Let me take you to the doctor. You have to listen to me about this. If you don’t see the doctor, I’ll worry myself sick.”

She reached out and traced her fingers across his face, soft and drifting as a cloud.

“I didn’t,” Wei Qingyue protested, even a little angry. “I didn’t confuse anything. Why won’t you believe me? I saw you twice. I really did see you.”

In 2009, he had chosen to come back during the summer holidays. He went to Mei Middle School.

The day the university entrance exams ended in China.

He knew everyone would be tearing up their books. Textbooks, papers, study materials — they would fall like a great snowstorm.

And there was Jiang Du, leaning against the railing. The teaching building blazed with light — so bright. He stood on the ground floor and looked up, and found her in the crowd in a single glance. Snow was falling from every direction. Youth was coming to its end.

He took the staircase. It felt endlessly long, as though it would never reach the top — until, at last, from the far end came the sound of classmates’ laughter. He took the steps two at a time, ran out into the corridor — and Jiang Du was surrounded by so many people, smiling faces blurred together, all turning at once to look at him.

Like a long-held shot in a film.

“It’s Wei Qingyue — Wei Qingyue has come back!”

Jiang Du saw him too. Hemmed in on all sides, the wave of cheering classmates surging toward him like a flood tide, gradually swallowing her. Her figure was obscured by the crowd — but she smiled at him, shyly, softly, and stood where she was without moving.

More and more people ran toward him. He wanted to see her clearly. So he pushed through the crowd with everything he had.

So many people — no matter how he pushed, it never seemed to end. The roar of voices swept past his ears like a current, and the air was full of whirling words. He heard nothing.

He wanted to tell her: he had missed her so much, all this time. He didn’t know if she was doing well. And also — and this, too:

“Jiang Du, what do you think you’re doing, not keeping in touch with me? Forget it — I understand, you’ve been busy with school. But we’re both going to university now. Why don’t we be together? What do you say — would you go out with me?”

No, too direct. He worried it might frighten her — she was so easily embarrassed.

“Jiang Du, it’s been a while. How did the exams go? Free this summer? Let’s go out sometime.”

No, too oblique. She didn’t always seem particularly quick on the uptake. She might not even catch on.

“Jiang Du, do you still like me? I’ve had a feeling all along — the past two years, I’ve kept on liking you quite steadily.”

“Jiang Du, leaving Mei Middle School — I only realized afterward how much I missed it. I used to say I didn’t mind leaving, but that was a lie. I’ve really missed you and the teachers and everyone.”

“Jiang Du, you’ve grown taller, haven’t you…”

How exactly should he say it? He had agonized over it for the entire length of the flight, thirty thousand feet in the air.

When he finally broke free of the crowd, Jiang Du was no longer where she had been.

No one knew where she had gone.

He couldn’t understand why she had smiled only faintly like that and then simply — disappeared. How could she not wait for him? Had she been angry? Angry that he had been busy greeting all the other classmates without noticing her first?

What a petty person. To vanish without a word.

Wei Qingyue searched everywhere — her dormitory, her housing complex. Until he was exhausted and had nothing to show for it. He went back to America in frustration and fury.

Perhaps — the moment he had appeared at the end of that corridor — he should have been brave and bold and without hesitation: the very first name he called out should have been hers.

He was tremendously regretful that he hadn’t done so. He had stood there dithering instead, deliberating over nothing. Stop deliberating — just call her name and that’s that.

And so he stayed in America for another six years.

Until 2015, when he came back to China. He was done with America.

He still hadn’t been with anyone. Because, Zhang Xiaoqiang had told him, Jiang Du had been testing him these past six years — could you come back? And could you come back having truly made something of yourself? Six years — six years — Wei Qingyue had fumed for every one of them. Who did she think she was, dangling him along and giving no clear sign? He must have lost his mind, falling for a girl like this. Was she really this crafty? He ought to be furious with himself for liking her — but she had said Wei Qingyue run — your father is going to hit you again, run, it’ll hurt so much, just run and don’t let him catch you. And Wei Qingyue decided he still preferred to go on liking the girl with the swollen, puffy face.

Besides — Zhang Xiaoqiang had told him Jiang Du would wait for him. As long as he didn’t come back empty-handed and having accomplished nothing.

But. When Zhang Xiaoqiang told him that the testing period was over, Jiang Du had again vanished without a trace.

At first, Wei Qingyue received the news with perfect calm. He said simply, “I understand.” But not long after, something snapped. He called Zhang Xiaoqiang and tore into her over the phone — a display of temper he had never shown before, vicious and merciless. He said: Zhang Xiaoqiang, did you sabotage this? I’ve always known you have feelings for me. Did you do something to undermine this on purpose because you knew I liked Jiang Du? I completely misjudged you. How could you be so small?

Zhang Xiaoqiang was reduced to tears under his tirade — but she sobbed and never said a single word in her own defense.

By that time, he was working with a senior schoolmate to launch a startup, running after investors, frequenting universities in search of potential partners. By chance, one day on a campus, he ran into Jiang Du. Just one look was all it took — he knew her instantly.

In that split second, fury overwhelmed every other thought. He watched her clutch her books tight and hurry past — and he called out to stop her.

He watched the surprise on her face, savored it, and pressed down the wild leaping of his heart.

That feeling — wanting to be with her — was as strong as it had always been. But something absurd and wounded in him chose that moment to assert itself. He could clearly see her eyes reddening quickly, but the sound that came out of him was a cold laugh:

“Long time no see.”

She managed, shakily, to say it back: “Long time no see.”

“Studying for a postgraduate degree, are you? I wouldn’t have expected it. Your test scores were never anything remarkable. A humanities degree, I assume? Think you’ll manage to find work afterward?” His sarcasm could not have been clearer.

His words were cruel. And yet, in his mind, he had already calculated that she was likely enrolled as a graduate student at this university.

He still didn’t understand how those words had come out of his mouth.

Jiang Du’s expression changed visibly. She stumbled over her words, asking what had brought him here — deflecting from his unprovoked attack.

“Me? I have actual business here, an appointment I intend to keep, unlike certain people — who pretend to be innocent and gentle while stringing others along, making promises and then disappearing.” He knew his behavior was practically unhinged. The more he spoke the worse it got. The chance encounter’s joy had turned into a blade, and every blow he struck landed deep.

There was something intoxicating about watching her hurt while he hurt alongside her — a sick, grim thread of satisfaction. Wei Qingyue kept his face cold throughout. I must make her angry, he thought — though every last shred of dignity he had was gone. He was behaving like someone who had swallowed gunpowder.

Jiang Du looked at him with an ashen face, unable to speak.

His own heart broke in that moment. But he kept up the pretense, playing his calculated game of cat and mouse: “Since we’ve run into each other — let’s exchange numbers.”

He watched her nod in startled compliance. Wei Qingyue gave her his number, and saved hers.

He made himself appear indifferent and aloof: “I have other matters to attend to. Feel free to reach out.”

His original plan had been to keep her waiting a little — to make her come to him. He had been that confident, that arrogant; he assumed without question that she had no boyfriend, and even if she did, it wouldn’t matter — he would take her away. He genuinely couldn’t imagine that, if she had ever liked him, she could have fallen for anyone else.

But when he dialed that number, it no longer connected.

He searched the entire campus — the university had no such person. It was only then that Wei Qingyue understood: Jiang Du probably hadn’t been studying at that school at all. She had simply happened to be there.

Unable to find her, he was consumed at once by a hatred for himself.

God knows how desperately he had missed her — how could he still have wounded her in such a petty, childish way? Why couldn’t he communicate like a decent human being? Why couldn’t he have let her know, from the very beginning, that he had thought of her all along, and hoped for her all along?

Wei Qingyue felt as though he could have killed himself.

The thick scent of osmanthus drifted in through the window.

Time returned to the present — the year 2019. Wei Qingyue lay beside her, murmuring apology after apology, on and on. Jiang Du didn’t interrupt even once. His voice carried a faint quality of autumn — bare, and desolate.

Time grew soft. She listened to his confessions, and wished she could smooth away his every wound.

“Don’t apologize. I never once blamed you — not ever.” She looked into his eyes. “You were right to go abroad. You did nothing wrong. None of it was wrong. I was glad for you. The only thing I wished for, back then, was that you could live a better life.”

“But I didn’t,” Wei Qingyue said, with quiet sadness.

Jiang Du smiled at that. “You really are foolish, you know. You got away from your father. You were free from his violence. You became someone remarkable. You reached a wider world. Wasn’t that true?”

He shook his head. “But I wanted to live that life with you.”

“And now you are with me,” Jiang Du said, certainty in her voice. “You’re exhausted. You need proper rest. Let’s sleep together.” She ran her fingers through his hair, and got up to make the bed. Wei Qingyue’s head felt heavy and light at once. He almost forgot — she still hadn’t explained why she had disappeared in 2009 and 2015. He reached for her again: “We met twice. Didn’t we? Are you saying you’ve forgotten?”

Jiang Du pretended to be cross, and pressed a finger to his chest: “Wei Qingyue, you say another word of this nonsense and I will genuinely get angry.” But her tone softened almost immediately: “I’ll take you to see a doctor. Do you still remember Zhu Yulong? He copied notes for me once, and you brought them over in the rain.”

Wei Qingyue had no interest in remembering anyone. But he played along: “I remember.”

“Zhu Yulong has become a truly remarkable doctor. I’ll take you to see him, and then you won’t get confused anymore.” Jiang Du put the pillow in place and began helping him undress. Bare-chested under the lamplight — Wei Qingyue had so many scars. Jiang Du felt the ache behind her eyes. She said, “I’ll sleep here with you.”

“I haven’t brushed my teeth,” Wei Qingyue struggled to get up, grumbling, “If I’m not bothered by myself, I should at least bother about it on my own.”

They brushed their teeth together. Both their mouths foamed with toothpaste, prickling and sharp.

The bathroom was very small — no wet-dry partition, only a curtain hung between the sink and the shower. Two people in it at once made it cramped. He frowned: how can you live in a place like this? Jiang Du said she’d once lived in an unfinished shell of a building after graduating — completely bare and ramshackle — but she and her roommates had made it work and had a good time of it.

Wei Qingyue asked if she’d really been happy.

Jiang Du said she really had — she was content with little, and could live however anyone else could live.

I won’t let you and your grandparents go on living somewhere this run-down, Wei Qingyue said. Then he was puzzled: Your grandparents have their pensions, and you’re working now — why haven’t you moved somewhere a little better?

Jiang Du smiled and said nothing. She didn’t tell him that all the money at home was long gone — her grandparents’ savings had run out. She said only: I’m saving up for nice clothes.

She gave him her own face wash to use and found him a set of her grandfather’s old loungewear. Wei Qingyue lay back down. He really was tired.

Body worn out, mind still restless.

Wei Qingyue said: I wrote you so many letters. Sent not a single one — because I never knew where you were.

Jiang Du’s face lit up with genuine delight. She lay against his chest, asking again and again: Really? You really did?

“Do you want to read them?” Wei Qingyue had come back to himself now, his words clear and precise. “They’re just small everyday things, though. All fragments.”

“I love fragments most of all.” Jiang Du pressed her face to his warm skin. “Send them to me.”

Wei Qingyue’s hand closed around her shoulder. Like grasping at nothing.

He sat up suddenly, with a look of profound alarm, staring at Jiang Du.

“I — I think I can’t feel you anymore.” Wei Qingyue was seized all at once by a terrible desolation. Jiang Du looked at him with worried eyes. She said nothing — but brought her lips up to his and kissed him.

She kissed him with shy ardor, a little breathless: “Are you better now?”

The kiss warmed slowly. Wei Qingyue began to feel, at last, her longing for him — but it wasn’t enough. He needed to feel a desire so complete it erased all thought.

He pressed her beneath him and asked her something shameful. Jiang Du’s face flushed beyond her control.

“My heart has only ever had you in it,” she confessed to him. “No matter when you came back, I would only ever marry you. If you never came back — then I would never marry anyone. I’m a strange creature, old-fashioned before my time, out of step with this era. But I knew you would still want me. Was I right?”

She was truly strange. No Alipay. Never sent him messages on WeChat — she seemed never to have seen WeChat, didn’t know how to use it.

“Tell me you love me.” Wei Qingyue’s voice caught. He didn’t want my heart has only ever had you. He wanted the most plain, the most direct, the most unambiguous, the most reassuring declaration of all.

Jiang Du wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down, bringing his ear to rest against her lips. Then the three words — I love you — were delivered, precisely and without error, into Wei Qingyue’s ear.

Wei Qingyue felt a satisfaction so immense it filled him completely.

“Tomorrow — take the day off. I’ll take mine too. I want to bring you somewhere.” She was still murmuring to him, there in the stillness of the night.

“Where?”

“My place.”

“Your place?”

“A place where I used to live.”

The next day, they both took the day off. Jiang Du drove his car, and told him to sleep in the back seat. Wei Qingyue did — and slept well.

Time moved into deep autumn. The mountains of deep autumn, the roads of deep autumn; halfway up the slope, amid the lush green, a winding band of gold marked where the leaves were about to fall.

Roosters crowed, dogs barked, smoke rose in thin threads from kitchen chimneys. The air was like fresh floral water.

The wind was light, and so the clouds moved without hurry.

The village was scattered with houses, though not many people remained.

Jiang Du glanced back at Wei Qingyue, eyes closed. She didn’t wake him — not until the car stopped, when she called him out to see the view.

The distant mountains were wrapped in haze, green threaded through with the yellow of ginkgo leaves and the red of maple groves.

They began in an ox cart — Wei Qingyue had no idea how Jiang Du had managed to flag down a man driving a cart, but there was a bell hanging from the ox’s neck that rang softly with each slow, unhurried step. The ox moved at a plodding pace, but its eyes were large, ancient in their calm.

Later, they went on foot, walking into the sparse and withered grass. Jiang Du pointed to a middle-aged man in the distance, carrying a ladder on his back: “Look — it’s time to pick the persimmons.”

Wei Qingyue couldn’t quite follow. He walked beside her, asking, “This is where you used to live?”

“Yes — my grandfather’s hometown. I lived here for a while. Not as many people as there used to be — most have left.” Jiang Du said. “The people who remain here all feel a little old-fashioned.”

Wei Qingyue laughed at last — the way he used to. “Jiang Du, the way you talk is genuinely something else. Old-fashioned — I’ve never once heard anyone use that word to describe a person.”

Jiang Du kicked a pebble by her feet, a little shy: “But they really are old-fashioned — everyone has gone to the city, and this place can’t hold on to people. The ones who are left are the old ones, the ones who stayed behind.”

Eventually they fell into conversation with the persimmon-picker. They followed him to watch.

How the persimmons were picked.

They were red. A whole tree full of them, proud and brilliant in the vast open sky.

The ground was deep in fallen leaves. Jiang Du and Wei Qingyue sat on a nearby stone slab. The picker moved with the agility of a monkey up the ladder, a bamboo basket strapped to his back.

Wild flowers had withered. White dew had turned to frost.

“That tool can also catch dragonflies,” Jiang Du said, pointing to the bamboo prongs, unhurried. Wei Qingyue smiled. He didn’t know what Jiang Du had brought him here to see — only that she had said she wanted to come, and so he had come. He could follow her to any place in the world.

Picking persimmons was laborious. Peeling them was laborious. Stringing them to dry was laborious. The whole process, from the first frost onward, Jiang Du explained at her unhurried pace, and Wei Qingyue nodded along at intervals.

The persimmon-picker told them: one season’s worth, all picked, and it wouldn’t fetch much. These things weren’t worth much.

“I want to photograph the disappearing villages — the persimmon trees. I’m afraid that someday, I won’t be able to see this kind of scene anymore.” Jiang Du picked at a stem of grass. She bent her head, hugging her knees, and reached out to prod a small insect by her foot.

“But it existed. In my memory, it will always be beautiful. That’s enough. Nothing in this world — no thing, no person — is immune to disappearing. What matters most is that it existed.” She took a stalk of foxtail grass and turned to brush it gently across the top of Wei Qingyue’s shoe, where droplets of dew and traces of mud had settled.

Wei Qingyue gave a quiet laugh and bowed his head as well, turning to look at her: “You want to document this? It’s not hard, actually — put together a team, find the right music, write the copy. If you really want to do it, I can help you.”

Jiang Du turned to face him too: “Actually, that’s not really what I’m trying to say.”

“Then what are you saying?”

“I’m saying — all things return to their roots, sooner or later. It’s only a matter of when. What matters most is having been here. Like —” she stretched out a foot and touched the wilted wild flower beside her — “like a flower. Since it blooms, it will always wither. But it has felt the wind and frost and rain, it has seen the sunlight. That is what matters.”

“Why so suddenly moved?” Wei Qingyue couldn’t resist teasing her once more. His mood had lifted, inexplicably, without his knowing why. “I was about to call you an artistic and literary soul — but these days, that phrase is about as flattering as an insult.”

Jiang Du only looked at him — with that deep, fathomless tenderness — and said, “I need you to understand this, Wei Qingyue. You came looking for me, and I have seen you. I know you love me. And now you know I love you just as much. I said my blessing over you would never stop, and would go on forever. I keep my word.”

“Promise me — you will come to understand this. A flower, since it blooms, will also fade. Only some flowers are luckier than others, and bloom for longer. Some are not so lucky, and their bloom is brief. But the fact that they bloomed — that is everything.” She took his hand suddenly and pulled him to his feet — made him look at the mountains, at the grass and trees, at the beautiful persimmon tree before them, then down at the fallen leaves beneath their feet.

“The leaves have withered, but they have returned to the earth. In the end, we all return to dust. Do you hear what I am saying? This is the order of the world. There is no right or wrong in it. It is simply the order of things.”

Jiang Du’s eyes were more beautiful than the persimmon tree. And slowly — slowly — they filled with crystalline tears.

“Wei Qingyue. You wanted to be with me, wanted me to marry you, wanted us to hold hands, kiss, make love — you know how I feel. It has never changed. You know all of this now, don’t you?”

The autumn wind blew cool and gentle. But in the mountains, all of a sudden, a mist began to rise. Wei Qingyue found that the persimmon-picker had vanished — he didn’t know when. The ladder was gone. He looked out across the full reach of what he could see, and the village that had lined the road on the way here — it was gone too.

He reached for her hand on instinct, urgency rising in his voice: “I understand. Jiang Du — let’s go home. The mist is coming in.”

Jiang Du smiled and shook her head, slipping her hand free gently: “I’m not going back. This is my home.”

Wei Qingyue stared at her in disbelief. “What are you saying? This place is —”

This place was without a soul. This place had only grass that had once grown lush, and headstones.

But how could that be? There had been bright-red persimmon trees here. There had been someone laboring to harvest them.

He reached for her hand again. Jiang Du shook her head: “Go find Zhu Yulong. See the doctor. Wei Qingyue — don’t be sick anymore.”

Wind swept the mist in. The figure before him wavered, appearing and disappearing.

Wei Qingyue stumbled toward her. She was right there — and yet impossibly far away. He could not accept it.

“Come home with me.” Tears suddenly rolled down his face. “We’ll buy wedding rings. We’ll hold the ceremony right away. Trust me — I’ll be good to you. Always. I’ll always be good to you. Can you please stop speaking to me in words I can’t understand?”

“I am already your wife. I am yours. Your wish has been granted. Now you must go find Zhu Yulong. If you don’t, I will be angry — and I won’t speak to you anymore.” Jiang Du released the foxtail grass from her hand. It rose on the wind, and its seeds scattered through the air. Come next year, there would be new green shoots again.

The whole world would bloom with life again. Only her leaves had already fallen.

“I won’t go to anyone. I only want you.” Wei Qingyue was nearly swallowed by the sudden, overwhelming pain. He began to run — across the uneven mountainside, the howling wind lifting his hair and letting it fall — and she remained before him, always, only ever one step beyond his reach.

“You can’t go — don’t go —” Wei Qingyue ran with tears on his face, without stopping. He refused to believe it. He had made it. He had said long time no see, he had said let’s get dinner together, he had said be with me, he had said marry me — he had done all of it. Wei Qingyue’s head was splitting with pain. The scene from 2009 could not be repeated. The story of 2015 could not happen again. He had to hold on to her.

He wept, and he begged her. The great mist closed in around them. He said: you can’t leave me, you can’t do this to me, you can’t.

Jiang Du’s expression remained gentle.

Her slender white arms were bare. On them, two or three small red marks.

He had once told her why mosquito bites raised bumps on the skin.

“I am not leaving you. Go find Zhu Yulong. If you love me, Wei Qingyue — go find Zhu Yulong.”

Wei Qingyue would not listen. He knew only to chase her shadow, spending every last measure of strength he had, running — the mist soaked through his brow and eyes, tears washed clean his face, and still the wind blew.

Ahead, her figure faded slowly into the depths of the mist.

He would not stop. He kept on running — with that same posture, that same reaching — until he was utterly spent, until his lungs felt as though they were bursting, until the very last thread of strength gave out and the sky and earth lost all distance between them. He fell, and could not rise again. At the edge of the world, rain began to fall. That rain had, in truth, been falling for twelve years without pause. And if it had ever stopped — that must have been his imagination.

He had once walked out of her home and into the wind and rain. No wave goodbye. Not a word spoken. Only a single glance back over his shoulder.

That was the last time he ever turned back to look at her.

If only he had known.