Library

The ginkgo tree in the third row of Xinhua Bookstore always falls at 3:07 in the afternoon. When Lin Xiaoman counted to the seventh leaf and passed the cover of "The Little Prince", the man whose sleeves were stained with drops of water from the Everlasting Flower Shop pushed open the glass door. Lu Chenzhou's white shirt smelled of the faint fragrance of bergamot, and the rustling sound of his fingertips rubbing the pages of the book was like spring silkworms eating time. In a leaky warehouse during the rainy season, they worked side by side to rescue damp Song Dynasty books. Lu Chenzhou dried every inch of rice paper with his body temperature, and Lin Xiaoman smelled the warmth of paste and bergamot on the back of his neck. When he covered the remnants of Ming Dynasty tapestry with organza, the red rope on her wrist was entangled with mulberry silk to form a lotus pattern. Lu Chenzhou's flower house is filled with blue snowflakes and hydrangeas all year round. The dried osmanthus specimens in the tool box are wrapped with the broken pages of the "Lin Family's Ancestral Residence". When repairing the tapestry on the night of the winter solstice, his frostbitten fingertips scratched her wrist, and the mulberry silk rippled under the lamp. The morning light penetrated the repaired fabric, and the gold powder fell from the tip of the knife, condensing into frost flowers between the two people's breaths. The corners of the pages crumpled by time and the ink marks blurred by rain eventually became annotations in ancient books that will never fade. When the tenth ginkgo leaf covered the steps of Xinhua Bookstore, Lin Xiaoman finally understood: Some love is like repairing ancient books, it takes a lifetime of morning and evening to smooth out those unexpected creases.

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Come to China Literature's website to read more of my works!