Evanescent Dreams

4. Add my wechat

 Did you know it was me since the beginning?

Lin Xingren's whole body tickled with awkwardness. She scanned the garden and settled her eyes on a bush across from her. 

After the stairwell encounter, Lin Xingren and Ye Zhen agreed to meet in the school garden during morning break. Lin Xingren found an area where there was less people, and the two sat on adjacent benches. 

"From the first day. "

"Huh?"

Is he talking to himself? Right, I remember now. He was an odd kid like me. 

"I knew it was you from the first day."

"Oh," Lin Xingren replied, still looking straight at the bush.

Can he read my mind or something? 

"It's all written in your expression, you know."

"Huh?"

He smiled and said nothing. 

The 9 year old Lin Xingren would never have imagined that she would one day have nothing she could say to this odd-but not really-odd, stranger-but-not-really-stranger guy. She had lost the desire to talk, and the energy to think. Her mind was more and more empty each day. 

Lin Xingren poked at her charm. 

"I didn't think you'd still keep that bag charm," he commented. 

Uhh, why not? You said this bag charm was very important. Should I throw it away? Why are you still keeping it then? 

"Don't throw it away."

"Okay. Me too."

Jesus, what am I even saying. What's the 'Me too' for? 

Ye Zhen felt and contemplated the blue charm on the back of his bag.  

"It's just there."

"Yeah, me too."

The awkwardness of Lin Xingren seemed to spread like a toxin. The whole garden was sunk in her cringe and lack of words by now. 

"You've turned less talkative, " his curious eyes glanced at her. 

Lin Xingren glanced back and winced. Hesitating, she turned her vision back on the bush.

Seeing that he stopped talking, Lin Xingren rose.

Should I say bye? Would that be enough? 

"Um, if someone sees the two charms-" Lin Xingren lost her words in the middle of her sentence. 

"Don't go yet. Let's be friends," Ye Zhen interrupted. 

"What?"

"Right, we've already been friends for a long time."

"What?"

"It's settled then," Ye Zhen grinned. He rose from the bench. Under his bangs, his handsome monolid eyes winked light-heartedly at Lin Xingren. One arm lifting his bag onto his lean back, he started walking back towards the school building. 

"Wait!"

Lin Xingren covered her mouth in shock of her loud voice. 

"Yeah?" Ye Zhen turned around.

Lin Xingren's palms were damp, and she could hear her heart contracting.

"I went to find you. Many times. 7 years ago."

Lin Xingren regretted starting this. She bit her lower lip. 

It's not like he would remember all of this.