When The Snow Falls In Autumn Chapter 22

Chapter 22

On the inside page of the notebook, that piece of cardboard with childish handwriting was like a soldering iron, burning Ling Xueqing’s ribs across the page and canvas.She walked out of the library and stepped into the campus night, which was cut by street lights. She walked a little faster than usual, as if she wanted to use the wind brought by her body to blow away the unfamiliar, hot and dull feeling in her chest.

Those two lines – “Xueqing said that this river used to be called ‘Qingrui’, but now it’s gone on the map. But the water is still flowing. What we see is the same.” – automatically circulated in my mind, and every stroke was clearly identifiable.It’s not a memory, it’s a reenactment of this moment.She could even imagine many years ago, Ye Qiulan holding a pen, lying in front of the desk in the afternoon sun, writing these words carefully.His eyelashes were drooped, his lips were slightly pursed, and he may have unconsciously poked his cheek with the end of his pen.

Why?Why write down such a sentence and put it in a book that may not be opened again for a long time?Just record a place name?Or… is it confirming some more important connection about “joint seeing”?

The halo of streetlights passed by in circles, lengthening and shortening her shadow.The evening breeze carried the faint fragrance of flowers and the hustle and bustle of youthful excitement from the basketball court in the distance.These background sounds, which were usually ignored, now made her feel out of place and disturbed.The order she is accustomed to is clear: the steps of restoration, the proportion of materials, the classification of information, and the restraint of emotions.And this old bookmark suddenly appeared, like a grain of dust thrown into a precision instrument, disrupting all the scales.

She subconsciously reached for the phone in her pocket.The screen was dark, reflecting her expressionless face.Her fingertips hovered over Ye Qiulan’s name, and the touch of cold glass suddenly woke her up.What can be said?Ask her if she remembers the bookmark?Ask her why she wrote that sentence back then?Or should he tell her that he is feeling uneasy because of these words at the moment?

Either one is over the line.They all pointed to the unnameable and unspeakable things that she kept firmly under the water.

She retracted her hand and stuffed the phone back into her pocket, a little too hard.The pace slowed down unconsciously.The cold white light of the graduate student apartment in the East District was already far away, like a beacon, marking the end of her lonely and self-disciplined voyage.But tonight, the light seemed particularly cold and…repellent.

She stopped in the shadow of the camphor tree below the apartment building.The leaves rustled in the night wind.Not far away, a couple walked by holding hands. The girl smiled and said something, and the boy lowered his head to listen. His profile looked particularly gentle under the streetlight.Ling Xueqing looked away, her jawline tightening slightly.

She stood under the tree for a long time, until the couple’s laughter disappeared completely into the night, until the night wind blew a chill on her skin.Then, she suddenly turned around and turned back along the way she came.

Not back to the library.The library is closed.She was walking towards the corner of the small self-study area behind the library, where there were several old locust trees and a bamboo forest.There were several stone tables and benches there, and it was usually quiet at night, with only a few floor lamps emitting dim light.

She needed a little space, a little space away from the four walls of the dormitory and surrounded by the campus night, to digest the silent tsunami brought by this bookmark.

The stone bench was cold.She sat down and placed the notebook on her lap, but did not open it.Just looking at the bamboo shadow not far away swaying slightly in the night wind.The moonlight was very faint, the starlight was sparse, and the halo of the floor lamp outlined the vague shapes of vegetation on the ground.

In my mind, the handwriting on the bookmark gradually overlapped with Ye Qiulan’s pale profile in front of the window of the campus hospital this afternoon.It overlapped with her focused brows and eyes when the ancient books were being repaired yesterday.It overlaps with countless fragments of them walking side by side across campus, sitting in the library, and sharing the same bag of snacks from a long time ago.

“What we see is the same.”

Really?Ling Xueqing asked silently in her heart.Are what I see and what you see really the same?Did you see the turmoil in my heart when I saw you?I see those heavy obstacles between us, do you see them too?Or do you always see only the river named “Qingrui” that has long since disappeared but is still flowing, and the “childhood sweethearts” who can share ancient place names, can rely on, and can work side by side?

The sourness came up without warning, stuck in the throat, and fell heavily into the stomach.Clearer and more concrete than ever before.Not only because of the heavy pressure of reality, but also because of the dislocation and loneliness of “seeing” that is so close yet so far away.

She thought of her Alpha status, of the pheromones that needed to be strictly controlled, of her family responsibilities, of Ye Qiulan’s Beta’s slowness, and of the equally heavy burden on her family.These are all thick frosted glass between the “same seeing”.She was here, looking at the fuzzy but warm figure opposite, trying her best to protect it, but she was not sure whether the other party could really see the burning, cold flame in her eyes.

The night wind blew through the bamboo forest, bringing a louder rustling sound, like countless small sighs.

Ling Xueqing slowly curled up her fingers and pressed her fingertips against the cold hard shell of the notebook.Underneath, pressed the hot piece of cardboard.After all, she didn’t take it out and look at it again.There are some things that, once you see them, you can no longer pretend you haven’t seen them.Some temperatures, once touched once, can never return to pure coldness.

She sat on the stone bench, letting the night wind penetrate her thin shirt and take away the temperature on the surface of her skin, but it could not take away the slowly spreading wild fire in her heart that was ignited by the old bookmark.She didn’t know how long it took, until the bell that signaled the end of evening self-study was faintly heard, and until the sound of scattered returning footsteps sounded on the path beyond the bamboo forest, she slowly stood up.

The knees are a little stiff.She picked up the notebook, took one last look at the dark bamboo forest in the night, turned around, and walked towards the apartment building.

This time, the steps were slow and heavy.

Return to the neat and cold single dormitory and turn on the ceiling light.The light instantly filled the space, but it could not illuminate the dark corner that had just been dug out in my heart.She put the notebook on the desk and did not wash up immediately. Instead, she sat down in front of the desk and turned on the lamp.

The warm yellow halo opened up a small area.She took out the half-written research notes on the geographical changes in her mother’s family’s homeland.Spread out, the pen is held in his hand, but he can’t put it down.Those rigorous research on the history of place names and changes in waterways seem extremely pale and distant at the moment.

Her eyes drifted to the window involuntarily.Opposite is another graduate student apartment, with a few lights on here and there.Further away, there is the vague outline of the old dormitory building in the West District, submerged in the night light of the city.What is Ye Qiulan doing now?Are you taking care of your father, or reading under the lamp?Are you still wearing that cardigan on your shoulders?

The thought made her throat tighten.She forced herself to look away, and the pen tip landed hard on the paper, making a sharp ink mark.She started writing, not to verify the content, but with unconscious and messy lines, which quickly filled up half of the paper.

Stop writing.Looking at the meaningless black ink ball, she closed her eyes.

After a long time, she spread out a new piece of paper.This time, she wrote slowly and seriously.What I wrote down was neither academic nor diary, but a list of place names.The names of the ancient rivers, mountains, and villages in her mother’s hometown that she had verified had long been lost on contemporary maps.One, and another.Neat regular script, neatly arranged.

It seems that through this repetitive and concrete writing, a certain “existence” is confirmed.Just like Ye Qiulan wrote “Qingru” to confirm what they “saw”.

The tip of the pen rustled until the list filled a whole page.She put down her pen and looked at the names whose ink was still wet, glowing moistly under the desk lamp.Behind these names are the broken memories that my mother muttered when she was in a trance, the hidden pain of the family being separated, and a part of the burden that she herself cannot shed.It’s equally heavy, and it’s also impossible to talk to others. I can only bear it by myself, verify it by myself, and remember it by myself.

And Ye Qiulan chose to use a bookmark to remember a river and “us”.

Ling Xueqing raised her hand and lightly brushed the hard cover of the notebook with her fingertips, which contained the tiny voucher from Ye Qiulan about “seeing together”.Then, her fingertips moved to the page that had just been filled with ancient place names.

Cold paper, warm fingertips.On one side are the heavy, private family secrets, and on the other side are the light, shared marks of youth.Under her fingers, separated by the thickness of a layer of notebooks, the two faced each other in silence and blended together strangely.

The night is getting deeper.A few more lights outside the window went out.Ling Xueqing finally stood up, walked to the window, and closed the curtains to block out the distracting night.She returned to the desk, carefully folded the paper full of place names in half, and inserted it into another page of the notebook, far away from the bookmark.

Then she started to clear the table and prepare to wash up.His movements returned to his usual orderliness and calmness. Only the darkness deep in his eyes that had not been completely gone away in the future, soaked by the night and old bookmarks, reminded that this night was, after all, a little different from the past.

Tomorrow, the sun will rise as usual.They may meet again at the long oak table in the library, continue to repair the ancient book, and continue to advance their respective lives in silence and tacit understanding.But some things, like that old rediscovered bookmark, once exposed to the light, can never be completely put back into the darkness.It became a brand new coordinate on the memory map that only the two of them knew, marking a river named “Qingrui” that had long since disappeared but still seemed to be flowing secretly somewhere in the heart, as well as the lonely and gentle reflections of the two people on both sides of the river who were trying to “see” each other.