Someone taught him what it meant to like someone. Someone taught him that liking someone took courage. And someone taught him that courage alone was not enough to call it love.
The boy didn't understand why things between them had ended so abruptly, as though neither of them cared about the friendship they'd once shared.
The boy was overflowing with affection. He thought he could give her the whole world. He would fix all his flaws and work hard to become a good partner. The girl listened quietly to his fantasies. When they parted, her goodbye was calm. As it reached his heart, it felt like a gentle pat on the head. All that remained in the boy's memory was the girl's retreating figure.
The boy didn't know how to describe the bewilderment of having all his heartfelt feelings vanish in an instant, followed by anger, and then regret over that anger. It took him a long time to understand the words hidden in the girl's wave as she turned away. The boy was still childish and immature, while the girl had already settled on her goals. She had her own understanding of love and the future. She didn't meet the boy's burning gaze, but she gave him a firm answer.
Much later, amid the crowd leaving class, the boy's smile suddenly froze. He had imagined all kinds of things about the girl, but never this: the girl bent quietly over her desk, the midday sun and an open umbrella casting shadows. The pen in her hand wavered as she wrote in silence at a cramped little desk, each stroke a mark of her pursuit of the future, and of the single-minded determination the boy had never considered.
Someone nudged the boy. He turned around and smiled again. He felt awful, but he kept smiling.
Live well. We won't meet again.
"Yesterday Was Summer" is a short narrative that uses delicate brushwork to carve out the hidden sorrows of youth, like a long plum rain, moist and heavy. The novel takes Xu Qing's three emotional bonds as the axis - the unfinished agreement with Xu Yi when he was a boy, the silent gaze on Yan Wan in high school, and the gentle and misplaced approach to Ye Wancheng after college - and unfolds the individual's struggle between love and inferiority layer by layer. The author makes good use of imagery and synaesthesia: chirping cicadas, daisies, blue jacarandas, sunrise on the western mountains... Every scene becomes a metaphor for the mood, making regret concrete as tangible moisture. The words flow with the introspection and sensitivity unique to INFP. Sometimes they are as light as prose poems, and sometimes they fall into the stagnant whirlpool of memories. The story does not pursue a sudden turn in the plot, but uses immersive psychological description to capture those moments of "one step away from perfection" - it is these steps that have not yet landed that constitute the most authentic vibrato of ordinary people's youth. In Xu Qing, we see our own cowardice, persistence, and those unspoken confessions. "Yesterday Was Summer" is a text message written to all those who "have long lost it but never had it". It does not provide redemption, but uses sincere sadness to allow people to reconcile with themselves in the silent resonance.
This is a very nice youth campus themed novel. On campus, love stories inevitably happen. In such stories, someone teaches us what it means to like and how to fall in love.
Just like the title of the last picture, this is just a story about an ordinary person. Although many of the words seem awkward, it does not hinder the expression of emotions when writing the story. I liked it three times, and ended up leaving three times. I regret it, but not regret it. The story is very short, but it suddenly reveals more than just youth. The author has opened another book and retells the story. Obviously the new one is much more detailed [I almost cried]
There is a sense of combing that I can't stop talking about... It seems like drinking a cup of bitter tea... There is a slight sweetness in it, but overall it is bitter.