Chapter 4

Autumn at University A became increasingly vibrant after several drizzling nights of rain. Large swaths of sycamore leaves turned golden, and with a gust of wind, they rustled down, carpeting the ground with a thick layer that rustled underfoot.

Qiu Yayu's life gradually returned to normal. Classes, club activities, late-night talks in the dormitory—everything was new and full of vitality. But in her heart, there was a hidden coordinate—that darkroom in the corner of the old laboratory building, always filled with the faint smell of chemicals.

She truly remembered Lü Xiaoyan's words, "Anytime is fine."

On her first visit, she brought two cups of hot milk tea, saying it was a "visiting fee." Lü Xiaoyan glanced at the sweet drink with the pink straw, her brow furrowing almost imperceptibly, but she still took it and placed it in the corner of the workbench furthest from the medicine bottle, not touching it until it cooled completely. Qiu Yayu didn't seem to mind, holding her cup and sipping it slowly, asking innocent yet insightful questions while he developed the photos.

Why are there so many layers in this sky?

"Because you used different concentrations of developer to process different areas?" she guessed.

Lu Xiaoyan glanced at her with some surprise and then acquiesced.

The second time she visited, she brought a small bag of washed pomegranates from her own yard, their bright red seeds like sparkling gems. "Autumn is the season for pomegranates," she said with a smile, handing him half without a word. At that moment, he was enlarging a photograph. Under the dim red light of a security lamp, she had broken open a pomegranate, her fingertips accidentally stained red with juice. She casually sucked on it; the vibrant color and her natural movement were like a picture more vivid than any photograph on the wall, etched into his mind.

He began to get used to her "intrusion".

She would sit quietly on a high stool beside him while he focused on mixing the medicine, flipping through the photography magazines he had left there; she would share interesting stories from the School of Journalism and Communication with him while he waited for the development to complete, or trivial matters like Shen Yuqi playing games all night in the dormitory or Su Xiaoxiao buying the Nth hoodie of the same style but a different color.

Her voice was soft, with a sweet, youthful quality, like a warm autumn stream gently flowing into his overly quiet world. He remained a man of few words, mostly just humming or uttering "hmm" or "oh," but she could sense from his occasional slight upturn of the corners of his mouth or his focused gaze that he wasn't averse to it.

Sometimes, she would also become his "model" when he needed to test the light or new film.

"Senior, is this angle okay?"

"Lower your head a little more."

"Isn't the light too harsh?"

"Don't move, just stay like this."

In those small spaces illuminated by safe lights, he gazed at her through the viewfinder. She sat or stood, pondered or smiled, striking natural poses at his command. He knew the curve of her eyes when she smiled, knew that she would unconsciously twirl her hair with her fingertips when thinking, and knew which side of her face looked most beautiful under the 45-degree angle of light.

The woman in his lens is no longer the symbolic "autumn" from their first encounter, but a concrete, vibrant girl named Qiu Yayu.

That afternoon, when Qiu Yayu came again, Lü Xiaoyan was preparing to try a classic cyanotype process. He was applying a photosensitive agent to the paper, his movements slow and precise.

"What is this? It's the color of the sky." Qiu Yayu leaned closer to take a look.

“Ferric ammonium citrate and ferric ammonium chloride,” he announced the chemical names. Seeing her blank expression, he added, “It will turn blue when exposed to sunlight.”

"Like the blue of the sky?"

"Um."

She stopped bothering him and quietly watched him apply the medicine evenly with a brush, then set the coated paper aside to dry. The only sounds in the darkroom were the soft rustling of the brush across the paper and their gentle breathing.

The wait for the paper to dry was rather long. Lü Xiaoyan leaned against the workbench, looking down at her fingers. Qiu Yayu, on the other hand, idly swung her legs, her gaze sweeping over the photos hanging on the wall.

“Lü Xiaoyan,” she suddenly spoke, her voice exceptionally clear in the silence, “Why do you love photography so much?”

He looked up, meeting her curious and earnest gaze. Many people had asked him this question, and he usually brushed it off with just "I like you." But now, under her clear gaze, he paused for a few seconds, then gave a different answer.

“Because…some things can’t be kept.” His voice was low. “Light, shadow, fleeting emotions, and…time. A camera can.”

Like that moment under the sycamore tree, if he hadn't pressed the shutter, it might have just been a blurry, fading image in his memory. But now, it has been captured and become "The Way Autumn Lives."

Qiu Yayu nodded thoughtfully. "So, you're racing against time?"

This statement was novel, yet also quite accurate. Lü Xiaoyan paused for a moment, then slowly nodded. "You could say that."

"Then..." She tilted her head, a hint of cunning and probing in her smile, "By leaving me in the photo, are you also racing against time to save me?"

The air seemed to freeze.

Lü Xiaoyan's heart skipped a beat, as if something had clenched it tightly. The red light of the darkroom blurred part of her expression, but the light in her eyes was crystal clear, filled with expectation and unwavering courage.

He looked at her, his throat feeling dry. He wanted to say "yes," but the word felt too heavy; he wanted to say "no," but it was clearly a lie.

Finally, he avoided her gaze and turned to the several sheets of cyanotype paper that had already dried, his voice carrying a barely perceptible tension: "The paper is dry, we can begin."

A barely perceptible hint of disappointment flashed across Qiu Yayu's eyes, but it was quickly replaced by a smile. She didn't press for details, but simply replied obediently, "Sure, do you need my help?"

He didn't answer "yes" or "no," but she knew that her words, like a pebble thrown into the center of a lake, had already stirred up ripples in his calm heart that could not be ignored.

And she is willing to wait for the day when the ripples spread to the other side.

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