The pagoda flowers in the courtyard bloomed and fell, then bloomed again. The boy who always kept Jiang Chunmian's favorite things tucked in his pockets was forever frozen at eighteen. The male lead started school a year late, while the female lead repeated a grade because of illness.
Fu Wennian was Jiang Chunmian's light. She was depressed and slow to react, a “wooden doll” in other people's eyes, so he became her Doraemon. Knowing she disliked drinking water, he searched for pretty cups. Knowing she was frail, he clumsily learned to make nourishing soup. He was willing to defy their teacher to help her study. On a winter night when she stood on the rooftop, he held out an orange lantern and said, “I like you. I want to spend my whole life with you.”
He pulled her out of the mire and promised her a garden of gardenias. He would take her to Beijing to watch the flag-raising ceremony. But a sudden accident turned every promise of a future together into one that could never be kept.
Fu Shinian said he would take care of her in his brother's place, but in the end, he could never recreate that tenderness that reached to the bone. His care was a routine obligation, not love. Later, the Fu family moved south and never came back.
Many years later, white-haired Jiang Chunmian still kept the faded rabbit cup. When the village children asked if she still missed him, she gazed toward the distant mountains and smiled with acceptance. “I'll spend my whole life carrying his memory with me.”
The wind turned the pages of her diary. The final line remained as clear as ever:
May my life be the price for my wife's safety. To my wife, Mianmian.
This is a childhood-sweetheart romance about two people saving each other, and a poignant story of spending a lifetime remembering the love of one's youth.
