Chapter 60: Cosmic Latte (12) But that is very little after all...

Before coming to Shenzhen, Lin Xia asked Song Ci where he wanted to go. Song Ci said that he had applied for a Hong Kong and Macau Pass and wanted to visit Hong Kong and Macau on the way.

Lin Xia was silent for a moment and replied yes.

So early in the morning on the 22nd, Lin Xia and Song Ci set off for Hong Kong.

Take the Luobao Line to the terminus, exit the subway, pass through Luohu Port, and clear immigration, and you're in Hong Kong. The entire journey takes less than two hours. For Lin Xia, the place she once dreamed of, thousands of miles away, was now easily and simply reached.

Lin Xia had long forgotten whether it was rainy or sunny during the Mid-Autumn Festival this year, but it was cloudy in Hong Kong on the winter solstice.

Since Song Ci didn't want to go to Disneyland or Ocean Park and just wanted to wander the streets, they didn't plan to stay overnight and would return the same day. Their itinerary was similar to Lin Xia's last visit: from the New Territories to Kowloon, from Mong Kok to Yau Ma Tei, and from Tsim Sha Tsui to Hong Kong Island. They took the Star Ferry and the tram, and enjoyed a beef brisket pot and wonton noodles.

Lin Xia originally thought that by revisiting the old place, perhaps she could go back to the past and find the things she had lost over the years, and find the passion and excitement of her youth. Unfortunately, things did not go as she wished, and she always felt that everything was wrong.

Hong Kong remained virtually unchanged: Chungking Mansions, the Mid-Levels escalator, taxis and buses. Except for the Avenue of Stars renovations, where celebrity handprints moved from the ground to the fences, the only thing that had changed was Lin Xia's mood. Perhaps it was because she had spent too much time in Beijing and Shenzhen these past few years; the skyscrapers and bustling city life had become commonplace to her, no longer surprising. She had experienced the life of the white-collar beauties in Central office buildings she had once longed for, and it was nothing more than that. On weekends and holidays, the streets were packed with tourists from all over the world, littering the ground with no time to clean up. Filipino maids gathered in tents on the ground in Tianqiao Park, making a cacophony of noise. QR codes and electronic payments were not widely available, making everything inconvenient. Even the once-astonishingly high prices seemed less outrageous after years of mainland China's inflation.

Perhaps memories always have filters, and people will intentionally or unintentionally beautify the path they have taken in their minds. However, once they really encounter old people and old things, they fall from fantasy to reality and are all disappointed without exception. Even the precious and beautiful memories they once had are no longer there.

Eating Regal ice cream, sitting on the Central Ferris wheel, overlooking the entire Victoria night scene, Lin Xia had never so clearly and cruelly understood those four words: things have changed and people have changed.

.

They visited Hong Kong on the 22nd and went to Macau on the 23rd. They ran wildly for two days in a row, and the number of steps counted on the bracelet broke the historical high. On the third day, Lin Xia and Song Ci were completely paralyzed at home and didn't want to move.

After the age of 25, the body's various functions begin to weaken. How could someone who sits in an office all year and doesn't exercise withstand such sudden stress? Lin Xia lay in bed, questioning her life. She couldn't understand how she and He Chuan had managed to spend a week in Hong Kong, visiting Disneyland and then visiting the Chinese University of Hong Kong and hiking the next day. She couldn't even remember how she, at 17 or 18, had managed to train intensively for exams while chatting and dating He Chuan every day.

I was full of energy at that time, in my prime, and in the heyday of my life. When I think about it now, I can't help but feel a palpitation in my heart.

It was Christmas Eve. After lying at home all day, Lin Xia and Song Ci struggled to get up at night and ordered a takeout. Then Lin Xia bought a few bottles of red wine and a bunch of fruits online, preparing to cook red wine after dinner, to create some festive atmosphere.

The warm and mellow wine met the sweet and sour fruits, and was paired with the exotic flavors of cinnamon, cardamom and other spices. The two people were drunk and sat on the blanket under the sofa in the living room, chatting about all sorts of things.

Talk about childhood, the past, life, and love.

Song Ci wasn't a sociable person, but she was still in her hometown, so she knew a thing or two about her former classmates' current situations—at least better than Lin Xia. They'd only been in the same high school class, but they'd gone to the same elementary and middle schools. Plus, with so few English classes available for cram schools in Wangchun City, there were always some overlaps. Song Ci told Lin Xia a lot of things she didn't know, like how someone in her high school class was dating someone else, how someone she met at the art studio had once pursued someone from elementary school, and how her English teacher and her middle school homeroom teacher were related, but now they were divorced because the woman had cheated on them.

Lin Xia was stunned and felt that she had missed the whole world over the years.

They were in the liberal arts class in their senior year of high school, with more girls than boys, only a few and a half boys in total, and they were all fat and thin, with strange shapes. Unexpectedly, after so many years, each of them had dated several girls in the class on average, and some of them were even two people who seemed completely unrelated when they were in school.

So many people go to big cities to make a living, and after going around in circles, they end up being with their old classmates and acquaintances from the same hometown. Perhaps this is not a coincidence.

The reason why we are who we are here and now is due to all our past experiences: the city we were born in, the family we grew up in, the school we attended, the lilac-filled streets we walked on our way to and from school, the ice cream cake we longed for but never had on our birthdays, the childhood trauma left by reading a book about the world's unsolved mysteries, the laughter that broke out in the class when we answered a question incorrectly in Chinese class. These little moments make up who we are.

And the later you meet someone after adulthood, after graduation, after work, the more they'll miss out on your life. They won't know why you've become who you are today, why you have those unique preferences, why you insist on having those quirks that make you cry and laugh. Only those who walked with you for a while in your youth, even if it was only a short time, can look back on the past and you know me and I know you, without having to waste time explaining the past.

"Oh right," Song Ci suddenly remembered something, "Do you still remember the couple who were separated from the science class next door before the college entrance examination?"

Lin Xia nodded repeatedly as her long-lost memories came back to her. "I remember, I remember! I remember the school forced one of them to leave. The boy dropped out, but the girl stayed."

"That boy was my junior high school classmate. After he transferred to a regular high school, his grades plummeted. He only managed to get into a regular university. After graduation, he went to Shanghai to work. The girl went to Wuhan and studied abroad for her postgraduate degree."

"I see..."

Song Ci paused and said slowly, "Last month I looked at my friends' circle and found out that they got married."

Lin Xia was stunned for a moment, a little bit unbelievable: "Really?"

"Well, I was also surprised at the time. I didn't expect that after so many years and after going through so much, they could still be together. It's really not easy."

"Yeah, it's not easy."

Lin Xia was clearly not familiar with those two people, and had never even spoken to them. She had only occasionally heard bits and pieces of information about them that were difficult to tell true or false. However, at this moment, she suddenly felt an indescribable bitterness in her heart, joy or sadness, for them, and perhaps also for herself.

“That’s great.”

Her voice was slightly choked:

"But that is a very rare piece of luck after all..."

That night, the two of them drank a lot of wine and talked a lot. After the red wine was finished, they took out the plum wine from the cabinet and drank one glass after another until very late.

Lin Xia said, "Do you know how much I hate my current job? Outsiders who don't understand the industry are telling us what to do every day. I work overtime for some vague numbers. I do whatever's trending and jump on whatever's hot. The stuff I produce every day is so rubbish that I don't even want to look at it. Going to work is like being a zombie. This kind of work is completely meaningless. I'm almost sick of painting."

Song Ci said: "Ninety percent of the work in government agencies is formalism. The superiors just talk and the subordinates run around like crazy, demanding innovation, highlights, publicity and achievements. They set the stage, perform the show and applaud themselves, but no one does the real work. I gave up looking for meaning in my work a long time ago. Fame, money, time and meaning, there is always a trade-off. It's okay to be bored and poor now, at least I have time to do what I am interested in."

"I dare not give up fame and fortune. I dare not bang my head against the wall for my ideals. I always feel that I graduated from Qingmei. I can't go to a nameless company and live a miserable life. I'm afraid I will bring shame to Qingmei. I can no longer be the pride of my alma mater, but I can't become a burden to it. Besides, I have tasted the feeling of being broke. I don't want to live that kind of life again. I can't bear the hardship of poverty."

Song Ci shook her head. "No one wants you to suffer. No one likes to be poor. But for me, as long as my spiritual world is rich, I don't need to have high material demands. As for money, enough to spend is enough. You are a painter, and I am a poet. Only by dying of poverty and starvation can we have the chance to become famous."

"How's the progress on publishing your poetry collection?"

"Same old news, no progress."

“Was it rejected?”

"Having a manuscript rejected was the cruel romance of the paper book era. In the internet age, you face an endless wait after an email is sent and no response arrives. What about you? How is your collection of paintings going?"

"It's the same as always. I have no inspiration and can't draw anything."

Song Ci laughed. "When we were in school, we said we would make a poetry picture book together. I would write the poems and you would draw the illustrations. I never thought that after so many years, the world no longer needs poetry and paintings."

"Anything that does not bring absolute economic benefits has no place in this society."

Lin Xia murmured, "I feel like I've changed a lot over the years. I don't like who I am now. I don't like maturing, I don't like growing up. The adult world we longed for so long to finally enter, the adults we worked so hard to finally become, is meaningless. I miss the innocent, happy, carefree life we ​​used to have."

Song Ci threw the Strawberry Bear doll on the sofa over to him expressionlessly: "Are you mature? Look at this pillow, look at Stitch on the toothbrush, and look at Duffy Bear on the towel and say it again."

Lin Xia was furious: "That doesn't count!"

By the end of the conversation, he was already drunk and unconscious. He could not remember what he said or what the other person said.

"Do you still love him?"

"I don't know..."

"Then who have you been waiting for all these years?"

"I wasn't waiting for anyone, time just passed naturally, and many years went by in the blink of an eye."

"Do you still believe in love?"

"What about you?"

"A poet always believes in love."

"But why don't you fall in love?"

“I’m single.”

"What a contradiction..."

"I believe in love, but I don't believe I can ever meet it. The chances are extremely small, even rarer than seeing a ghost."

"You're sober."

"Don't be sober. Being sober is painful. Sometimes it's better to be confused in life. Don't be rational or calm. What you want is passion and impulse, especially when it comes to love..."