Together Through Every Morning

[Youth and School Life] + [Growth and Perseverance] + [Mutual Healing] + [Reunion After Years Apart] In elementary school, she was sent back to her hometown. Faced with everything unfamiliar, she felt lost and helpless. He smiled and said they could sit together. They gave each other the secret nicknames “Little Island” and “Shushu,” and promised to be best friends. In middle school, he skipped class every day and was no longer the outstanding student he used to be. She gained sixty jin. He told her she had grown stronger, and she said he had become colorful. In high school, he helped her lose weight, while she kept him focused on studying. They promised to attend college in the same city. At last, they made it through the dark days and into the clear light of dawn. In college, they lost touch completely. At a gathering, a friend who knew them both teased, “Everyone thought you two would end up together after graduation.” She smiled. Her eyes gave nothing away. “We're not even friends anymore.” As a child, she was lonely, fragile, clumsy, and hard to like. Now, she was no longer the child everyone could leave behind. She was Xie Shushu, able to choose her own path. On the day she graduated from college, Xie Shushu received a call from an unknown number. The voice washed over her like a wave, carrying memories with it.