Once Upon a Future

(First person, youth, school life, coming of age, romance, everyday life.) In the winter of 2023, I saw someone I hadn't seen in seven years on a street in Lanzhou. She called out to me across the traffic. I recognized her, but I turned and walked away. Later, I learned that she wasn't the only one who had run after me that day. There are many moments like that in life. As children, we think our deskmates will always sit beside us. In middle school, we think our friends will never drift apart. When we're in love, we think we'll go on loving someone forever. Before our mothers fall ill, we always assume our parents will never grow old. But life kept moving forward. From 2008 to 2026, we went from paper comics and QQ to smartphones and AI. It wasn't until many years later, when I sorted through old photos, chat logs, and unfinished stories, that I realized... Everyone who later became part of the past had once stood beside me, sincerely imagining a future.