The Sound of Falling Ginkgo Leaves

In the dusk of his second year of high school, Su Nian's textbook fell on the ginkgo boulevard. The other hand was faster than hers - clean knuckles, white cuffs rolled up in two, and the silver watch on her wrist flashed. She didn't have time to see the man's face clearly, but only remembered his voice as clear as the first breath of autumn air when he said "your book." Later, she found a ginkgo leaf in the picked up book. Later, the window seat in the library became a secret between the two of them. He used his physics notes to teach her the word "preface" in classical Chinese, and she wrote on the leaf vein bookmark, "This is where my heart belongs, and I dare not forget it." He remembered her chewing the pen barrel like a cat, and she read for three years in his polished pen. From autumn to summer, from the first yellowing of ginkgo to the shade of green leaves, this is a long confession built with pencils, notes, code words and silence. There were no grand oaths, just a notebook filled with comments, a cup of ginger tea that was brought to hand when I had a fever, and a bouquet of flowers made of pressed and dried ginkgo leaves last autumn. When the midsummer wind blew through the avenue, he finally said those four words. And she has spent a whole year writing the answer in every falling ginkgo leaf.