[Mutual Unrequited Love, Tragic Ending]
I spent the warmth of my entire youth hoping for just one moment when he would lower his head toward me.
Only in the end did I realize that the sun never pauses for any star.
Everyone thought Lin Che was my light. He was, but not entirely.
He was the kind of boy who naturally became the center of attention wherever he went: a star player on the basketball team, always in the top three academically, with a smile as pure as sunlight. And I, Su Xinghe, was the quietest shadow at the edge of his radiance. Everyone said, "Su Xinghe, you and Lin Che are so close."
They were right. I was his dependable deskmate, the first person he thought of when he had a question, and the friend he could confide in when he was down.
But that was all.
In this long, silent gaze of admiration, the most painful thing was never the distance.
It was realizing, when you were close enough to the light, that
you were just one of countless things it illuminated, never special, never the only one.
Until that out-of-control party on the eve of graduation.
Drunk, he leaned against my shoulder, his warm breath brushing my ear:
"Xinghe, do you know... you're kind of like a star."
The world fell silent in an instant.
I heard my own heart pounding deafeningly, mingling with the faint scent of soap on him.
It seemed that, under the influence of alcohol, the secret I'd kept throughout my youth was about to become a earth-shattering confession.
But he only smiled, his voice tinged with a sigh:
"...So close to me, yet so far away. No matter how hard I try, I can't see who you really are."
At that moment, I suddenly understood everything.
All the light I had desperately tried to shine, in his eyes, was just a hazy, distant patch of brightness.
The sun never gazes at any one particular star. What he loved was the illusion of an entire galaxy sparkling.
-
"You are the greatest regret of my youth, and the silent ceremony with which I crowned myself."
If falling in love with you was only a dream, how can I go back to sleep after waking?
Quoted from the song "Stars in the Sunlight"
Theme: Unrequited love
