I Missed Your Summer

[Cool, possessive, jealous genius × gentle, sweet girl · direct pursuit · heartbreaking BE · mutual redemption]

I picked up a leaf from midsummer, but all I heard was the cicadas’ sigh.

Jiang Yu

At sixteen

He said he’d become a police officer to protect the people. She said she’d become a doctor to save lives.

Amid the cicadas’ song, their dreams beat in time with their hearts.

That summer, at seventeen

Ginkgo trees swayed outside the library window. He held a golden leaf between his fingers, his eyes reflecting only her.

“Xiao Yu, let’s listen to the cicadas through many, many summers together… Keep this leaf safe for me.”

The cold-faced top student showed only her his tenderness and jealousy.

At twenty-four

His badge shone as he protected millions.

But beneath her surgical knife, she couldn’t save him.

A bloodstained uniform. A piercing siren drowned out every cicada.

Another summer came.

The ginkgo leaf in the book had long since withered and turned yellow.

The cicadas’ song roared on, but there was no one left to hear it with her.

The man who promised to listen to the cicadas through many, many summers with her, carrying an unfallen ginkgo leaf, was forever lost in midsummer.