Dust and Light on Liuli Street

“The candy fate gives everyone is wrapped in a bitter shell. You have to bite through it first to find out what kind of sweetness is hidden inside, or whether there’s an even thicker shell beneath it.”

The grudges and tangled histories of the previous generation stretched across decades like a long, deep shadow, still hanging over the next generation and shaping their choices and fates.

As she looked at Shen Meijuan sobbing in her hospital bed, then at the cold bronze seal engraved with a snowflake in her palm, she finally understood what her father had meant by “candy wrapped in a bitter shell.”

The truth, as it turned out, was another shell, thicker and harder than the first.

Biting through it brought no sweetness, only a nearly cruel clarity and a crushing burden.

Her mother didn’t look back. She simply pried open her fingers, her fingertips cool to the touch. “Be good, Weixi. Wait for Mommy at home.” Her voice drifted away like a dandelion on the wind.

“How long do I have to wait?” She tugged at her mother’s sleeve. The fabric carried the unfamiliar scent of perfume.

“When the pagoda trees bloom, Mommy will come back.”

After that, the flowers bloomed again and again, and their petals fell like snow, time after time.