The Youth We Have Left: Dear Qianxi

“Qianxi, did you ever like me?” Gu Yue stared without blinking at the grown man before her, the boy she had once thought about constantly.

“You know, I've always liked you.” The young man's eyes had once been filled with a dazzling galaxy of stars, and they still shone just as brightly now.

“Gu Yue, after being by your side for so long, do I still mean less to you than Yi Yangqianxi, who was gone from your life for so many years?” The man held the petite girl in his arms, exhausted in both body and soul.

“Xiang Nan, Geometry says waiting means showing up in your finest clothes, while meeting someone is a chance in a million. I gave all my finest moments and that one-in-a-million chance to Yi Yangqianxi. I have nothing left to give you. Some affections are like a breeze that once lingered over a wheat field. Only the people involved know it happened, while the whole world pretends it never did.

“You always say the world is so big, yet it let me meet you, and time is so long, yet it let me see you again.

“Maybe nostalgia is a kind of attachment. No matter how hard we try, we can't untangle it, but there's no need to panic. Time won't preserve anything, yet nostalgia will warm your heart.

“Gu Yue was in love with her deskmate, Yi Yangqianxi, for all three years of high school. Their feelings didn't need anyone else's understanding. Gu Yue simply felt that the fact they had happened at all was already extraordinary.

[This is a nostalgic coming-of-age story about unrequited love. Qianxi is in the most beautiful years of his youth, while Gu Yue represents all of us who have enjoyed, or are still enjoying, our own youth.]

“This is a series of coming-of-age stories. The leads in parts two and three will be Wang Junkai and Wang Yuan. Everyone's youth is different, so stay tuned.”