It was the third year since Lu Huai left. All their friends thought Cheng Yu had moved on, but only he knew the truth: he was still waiting for him, waiting for him to come back and say that he missed him, too.
But three years had passed, more than a thousand days and nights, and he hadn’t come back once, not even in a dream.
Over those three years, Cheng Yu visited the places they used to go, sampled the food they both loved, traveled to the places they had planned to visit, and took in the beautiful scenery he had seen online. But he never said a word, as if keeping silent would make Lu Huai stay by his side forever.
Countless times, Cheng Yu had asked Lu Huai in his dreams, “Could you really bear to leave me all alone?” But no one answered, because Lu Huai had never come to him in a dream.
The one thing that never changed was that every year, on this day, no matter where Cheng Yu had been the day before, he would visit Lu Huai and tell him about all the interesting things that had happened that year.
Sometimes Cheng Yu wondered why Lu Huai had never come to see him.
Maybe he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to leave once he came. Maybe he was afraid it would hurt to see Cheng Yu doing badly. Maybe…
