Big Sis’s hands were dripping wet, as if she had just come out of the restroom.
The moment our eyes met, Big Sis who had originally been wearing a smile froze for a moment.
“What happened? Zhi Nian, why do you have that kind of expression?”
“…”
I subconsciously opened my mouth, thinking of explaining something, but the nauseating feeling in my throat turned the words that reached the edge of my mouth into a dry heave.
Big Sis seemed startled by me and hurriedly ran over to support me.
“Feeling unwell? Or did the ice pop just now freeze you? You’re not on your period today, are you?”
Unable to speak, I could only try my best to shake my head, wanting Big Sis not to continue worrying about me.
Big Sis seemed unable to rest assured and supported me as if about to walk out of the plaza.
In the chaos of my thoughts, I forced myself to look again toward the entrance of the commercial street.
Gu Fan stood in front of the accessories stall, holding a blue hair clip and handing it to the young girl by his side.
Shiratori took the hair clip with a face full of happiness. Clearly it was a bright and peerless smile like the sun, yet I only felt my whole body turn cold.
Father’s face suddenly floated up, occupying everything in my consciousness.
The back of that man on the day he left, Mother’s heart-rending crying, and me myself hiding in the quilt.
Standing in place covering my ears, the little girl whose whole body was trembling.
I had become that little girl again.
And could do nothing at all.
Watching him being snatched away by someone else.
Standing in place, able to do nothing, only able to watch.
Watching him walk toward someone else.
Watching him smile at someone else.
Watching someone else smile at him.
And I did not even have the courage to walk forward.
Right now I was as wretched as a lifeless sick cat.
What was I?
What right did I have to feel I could tie him down?
I did not even have the qualifications to stand in front of him.
Tears swirled in my eye sockets.
I finally could not support myself, lowered my head, and covered my mouth with my hand.
Nauseating.
So nauseating.
Not toward Shiratori, not toward Gu Fan.
Toward myself.
Toward that self standing in place, able to do nothing, only able to tremble.
Truly hopeless…
Ugh.
“Zhi Nian, how do you view falling in love?”
I bit the wooden stick at the top of the ice pop. My teeth unconsciously rubbed back and forth, not answering.
When Big Sis asked me this, we were squatting in the cool shade of the intangible cultural heritage exhibition area gnawing on ice pops. In front of us was a small fish pond.
Hers was lychee flavor. Mine was red bean flavor.
The ice pop was a bit too sweet. A layer of greasy saccharin taste stuck on the tip of my tongue. I did not like it very much.
Behind us was a row of sheds selling tie-dye cloth and paper-cuts. The wind blew those blue-and-white cloths up and down, like someone breathing in big mouthfuls.
Big Sis bit into the ice pop with a crisp ka cha, her eyes slanting over to look at me.
“The kind of casually playing around, or the kind aimed at marriage and living a lifetime?”
My fingertips suddenly felt a trace of coolness.
My ice pop had melted.
The red-bean-flavored syrup flowed down along the wooden stick, sliding onto the back of my hand, sticky and pasty.
I did not lower my head to wipe. My mind felt as if blocked by something. Consciousness was like plastic trash drifting on the sea surface, swaying with the waves.
Marriage.
A lifetime.
These two words were too heavy, heavy to the point I could not hold them steady, yet was unwilling to put them down, only able to stubbornly tightly grasp them, the muscles of my whole body trembling from exhaustion.
I did not understand feelings. When encountering matters that made the heart surge, I would only use the most intense methods to vent them out. Usually I would only use a cold expression to disguise myself, because I could not perform the posture of a normal girl.
I could see how girls of the same age lived and socialized, yet I could never thoroughly comprehend the principles within.
It was as if I had been missing this piece of talent from birth. Even if someone taught me hand-by-hand how to become human, I would only clumsily try my best to imitate.
From childhood to now, the people who could develop into a ‘friend’ relationship with me could be counted on one hand.
Mm… wrong. Carefully reviewing, it seemed only Big Sis and Gu Fan could be said to be friends. The manager of the maid café should also count as a friend.
Even with Mother, I did not know how to communicate with her. Nowadays aside from the blood relation, we already had not much difference from strangers, right?
My world was only this big, like a shallow pond. Drop a pebble in, and the ripples could sway for a long time.
I had no experience of linking arms with friends to go to the restroom, no experience of chatting in the classroom with female classmates about the boys I liked, no experience of being confessed to, and no experience of confessing to others.
I did not understand these.
But I could confirm one thing.
To me, Gu Fan was like… like the main axis that strung together everything in life.
Without him, days were still days, but everything became wrong.
Like a clock missing one gear, the whole thing spinning empty. Looking at it still operating, yet the system had already long collapsed and malfunctioned.
Eating had no taste. Sleeping was not solid. When walking, I even felt these legs were not my own. What was I going to do? I also did not know, only advancing in a daze.
I was not even very certain what ‘falling in love’ actually meant.
Was it the heartbeat accelerating? Was it wanting to stay together?
I only knew that when seeing him speaking with other girls, my own chest would stuffily ache. A restless red mist would surge up all over my body, annoying the cat tail behind me into swinging nonstop.
But this kind of reaction could only count as my unilateral heart-stirring, right?
If it was only me alone worrying about Gu Fan, while in his heart he did not take me seriously at all, even indifferent to whether his future wife was me or not, then could it still count as falling in love?
At most it counted as me unilaterally having a crush on him, right?
It could even be said to be a nauseating and shameless woman. Clearly Gu Fan did not like me in his heart, was even not interested, yet I kept entangling with Gu Fan.
Relying on Gu Fan’s gentle social attitude and the beautiful memories of our childhood sweetheart days, continuously consuming.
But I did not want to let go.
This world was too big, big to the point that it made me feel afraid.
People were too tiny. Every time I raised my head looking at the vast and boundless sky, I only felt as if a gust of wind blowing over would blow me away.
If Gu Fan was not by my side holding me, I did not know where I would float to.
Perhaps float to a very, very far place, far to the point that even I myself could not find myself.
I did not want that. I wanted to stay by Gu Fan’s side.
I wanted that when I was lost, when I was lonely, he could always gently give me a hug, or a beautiful kiss that could let me exactly feel my own existence.
Not occasionally meeting once, making a phone call every few days to greet. What I wanted was at every moment. Perhaps I was too greedy, right?
But I just fantasized about being able to squeeze with Gu Fan in a small room, listening to the rain on rainy days, watching the snow on snowy days, not speaking for a whole day yet not feeling awkward.
Just leaning together, listening to his steady and regular breathing, feeling that youthful hot body temperature unique to him— that was enough.
I did not want to go out, and also did not want him to go out.
If it was hard to see snow in the south, then later we would go live in the north. That way we could have a whole winter quietly watching the flying snow fall.
When this thought emerged, even I myself felt a bit terrifying.
Gu Fan had his own life—he needed to work and earn money, needed to socialize, needed to do all kinds of things.
I could not lock him in a room, and also could not lock myself by his side.
But I really wanted to.
Really wanted to stick to him.
Really wanted to always stay in a place he could see.
I did not want this anymore.
This sticky, pulling-back-and-forth feeling made me unable to breathe.
Every separation was like someone extracting something from my body.
Every reunion, I again pretended nothing had happened, smiling as I walked over, as if those tossing-and-turning nights simply did not exist.
So tired.
So annoying.
Really wanted to immediately…
“Zhi Nian, the ice pop is going to melt, okay?”
Big Sis’s reminder pulled me out of my own thoughts and back into the real world.
The light red syrup had already flowed along the back of my hand toward the forearm. The fair skin was mercilessly scored with one obvious red trace after another.
I hurriedly put the remaining ice pop into my mouth, pi liu pi liu sucking a few mouthfuls, then tossed it into the trash can not far away.
“Here, wipe.”
Big Sis handed over two wet tissues. After receiving them I began carefully wiping.
“Do you feel… he is truly a good man you can entrust your whole life to?”
Big Sis intentionally guided back to that previous topic.
She held the almost-finished ice pop in her mouth, both hands hugging her knees, calmly looking at me.
“What is his family background like? How is his financial power? Does he have the ability to take care of you?”
I did not speak, only silently lowered my head and crumpled the wet tissues, picking at the red syrup marks embedded in my nails.
“Zhi Nian, marriage is not children’s playing house, and also not something that can obtain eternal happiness just from one-sided willingness.”
Big Sis took the ice pop out of her mouth and put the tip of the ice pop into the fish pond in front of her.
The small goldfish aimlessly wandering in the pond seemed to smell the sweetness of the lychee syrup. Their originally lazy bodies suddenly activated, xiu rushing over to the ice pop, tacitly forming a circle.
“Look, as long as you give a bit of sweetness, the fish will hook themselves.”
As the words fell, the ice pop was also slowly moved in the pond by the owner above. All kinds of small fish tightly wrapped around that wooden stick with a bit of ice remaining and would not let go.
“You cannot only look at whether the emotional value he provides you is enough. You also have to consider factors in every aspect. Otherwise… the days ahead will have you suffering.”
Just as Big Sis’s words reached halfway, the deep red ice that had originally been residual and precarious at the tip of the ice pop, under the dissolving action of the water and the carving of the fish, completely detached from the wooden stick.