Evanescent Dreams

22. Blood on their hands

"Back in eighth grade, I left the country for the first time to attend this international physics bowl. I was soo really excited. I prepared all my luggage a week before the trip, and boasted about it to all my friends. Guess what happened?"

"I cried every night  in the hotel bed!" Weng Bai laughed ruefully. 

"The bed was hard and cold, and the two high school roommates were staying up, frantically flipping through their textbooks and notes one last time, then another one last time. All I could smell was bitter coffee. It was the taste in my mouth, and the circulating air in the hotel room. Nothing was beautiful that night."

"I think, the countless nights like that, and the countless days like that, gradually wore away the passion. Sometimes...I look into the mirror and see my laid back self and the past passion and ambition all seems so ancient...like a dream."

Weng Bai and Chen Siyun were at the "old place" in the park where they could see the whole city view. This time, Chen Siyun offered to listen to Kdrama osts together. 

"Sorry, I ruined the mood right?" Weng Bai bent down his head over the wooden fences. He was a small golden retriever trapped in mud, waiting for his owner to come back for him. 

"I need to get rid of those stupid books-"

To his surprise, Chen Siyun put her hand over his mouth. 

The soothing and emotional ost playing in their ears seemed to reach the towering buildings that stretched across the night sky. 

She countered the urge to evade his soulful stare but eventually dropped her hand.

"Why?" 

"I just...I thought you shouldn't call them stupid. I believe that no one can lie to themselves. You don't like the memories, and the pressure of loving them, but you had kept them in your room for so long. Subconsciously, perhaps, you still love them. "

Weng Bai contemplated the idea, "then what am I doing now? I can't do what I love, and I can't stay true to myself when I pursue what I love."

"But you are still pursuing. Not pursuing your dream the same way and the same pace as others doesn't mean anything. Some are able to walk faster and turn around the corner sooner. Some are slower and have not yet reached their turning point. What we can do is just continue walking, slowly but steadily. Perhaps...what finds us is something unforeseen...like a next stop crafted just for people like us."

Weng Bai's eyes reddened hearing her soft and mellow words. She believed in the words he had always sought to believe in. 

"Look," he pointed at the old couple quietly reading a book together on a bench, undisturbed by the hustles of the city, a few hundred meters away.

 "Look how happy they are."

We can still be happy, too. 

No more words were exchanged between them that night. What expressed their inexpressible, long repressed emotions was the music, the vast night sky, the vivid city lights, and the presence of one another.

---

"Xiao Yu! Xiao Yu!" 

Lin Xingren raised her voice as high as she could when she spotted Xiao Yu at the school gate the next morning.

Xiao Yu narrowed her eyebrow. She had a bright colored scrunchy around her high pony tail like all the girls in Liu Gujing's friend group. Her newly ironed school skirt swayed like that of an arrogant princess as she turned around. 

"What is it?" her voice was sharp, as if Lin Xingren was a restless audience that had to interrupt her performance.

"Did you see my wechat?" Lin Xingren hurried towards her. She was very unlike her usual school self right now, but she had to continue.