Repeating the same mistakes

Spring arrived unexpectedly in my second year of high school. The sycamore blossoms fell softly, turning the corridor into a pale purple sea. I was carrying the collected homework to the office when I bumped into Li Zichen at the stairwell.

He had lost a lot of weight; his school uniform hung loosely on him, and the bloodshot eyes looked like ink that hadn't been wiped clean. When he saw me, he stopped in his tracks, and the basketball in his hand slammed to the ground with a thud, bouncing off the ground and hitting his knee.

"Zhi Xia." His voice was hoarse, as if covered with a layer of dust.

I lowered my head, trying to walk around him, but he stopped me. "I have something to tell you."

"There's nothing to say." I hugged the notebook tightly, my fingertips digging into the pages.

"Just one sentence." He took a step forward, almost touching me, his breath carrying a faint scent of tobacco—something he would never have touched before. "Su Xiaoxiao...we broke up."

I didn't reply. This is none of my business anymore.

"I know I was wrong, Zhixia." He suddenly grabbed my wrist, his grip so tight it hurt. "I shouldn't have gotten so close to her, I shouldn't have lost my temper with you, I shouldn't have...forgotten our anniversary. Please give me another chance, okay?"

His eyes reddened, and a wave of panic and regret washed over him, mirroring the way he looked when he held my hand at the alley entrance. Paulownia blossoms fell into his hair like shattered stars.

"Let go." I struggled, and the old injury on my wrist was pulled, causing a dull pain.

"I really know I was wrong!" His voice trembled. "I've had a terrible two months. Every time I close my eyes, I think of you... I think of you crying in the hot pot restaurant, and when you said 'Let it go.' Zhixia, I can't live without you."

Some classmates passing by stopped and stared at me like needles. My face burned, and I tried to break free, but he held me even tighter.

"Li Zichen, haven't you made enough of a scene?" I whispered, my voice trembling with tears. "It's over!"

"It's not over yet!" he said stubbornly, pulling something out of his pocket and shoving it into my hand. "Look at this."

It was a silver ring with a crooked "Xia" character engraved on it. He bought it for my birthday last year with his savings, saying, "I'll get you a real diamond ring when you turn eighteen." Later, during an argument, I threw it back at him, saying, "Who cares?"

“I’ve been wearing it all along.” He pointed to his neck, where the pendant of the necklace was this ring. “Every day I think about how I should have kept quiet about it, how I should have given in to you more…”

His words were like slowly boiling a frog, gradually seeping into the newly scabbed wound in my heart. Those days when he hurt me deeply, those moments of weeping in the dead of night, all seemed to become blurred in his reddened eyes.

I remember his silhouette waiting for me in the snow until midnight, the warmth of the hand warmer he secretly slipped into my backpack, and the light in his eyes when he said, "I'll marry you when you get into university."

My heart started throbbing again, the pain making it hard to breathe. I should push him away, call him a hypocrite, and tell him it's too late. But looking at his dejected state, the harsh words stuck in my throat, and I couldn't say them.

"Let me think about it." I finally relented, my voice as soft as a sigh.

His eyes lit up with ecstasy, and he loosened his grip on my hand slightly, but still wouldn't let go. "Okay, you can think about it. I'll wait as long as it takes."

That afternoon, Zheng Yiming came to return my physics notes. Seeing the red mark on my wrist, he frowned: "What happened?"

"It's nothing, I just accidentally scratched myself." I avoided his gaze and handed him the notebook.

He didn't ask any more questions, but simply put the notes on the table, took a band-aid out of his pocket and handed it to me: "Be careful next time."

The band-aid had a strawberry pattern, exactly the same as the one Li Zichen gave me before. I held the band-aid, my fingertips trembling.

"Thanks."

He smiled, said nothing more, and turned to leave. Watching his figure disappear at the end of the corridor, I suddenly felt an emptiness in my heart, as if I had lost something important.

That evening, Li Zichen sent me a message with a song he sang while playing an instrument. It was terribly off-key, but the lyrics were very straightforward: "Chen Zhixia, I was wrong, please come back."

I listened to it over and over again with my headphones on, until tears soaked my pillow.

The next morning, I found breakfast in my desk—my favorite soy milk and fried dough sticks. My deskmate winked and said, "Li Zichen came early this morning, put his things down, and ran off like a thief."

I picked up the fried dough stick, took a bite, and it tasted familiar, but it was a little hard to swallow.

That day after school, Li Zichen was waiting for me at the alley entrance. He was holding a bouquet of gardenias, the white petals still glistening with water droplets. "I asked your deskmate, and she said you've been having trouble sleeping lately. I bought some calming tea; you can try it."

He carefully placed the tea bag into my hand, as if he were protecting a fragile treasure.

“Zhi Xia,” he looked at me, his eyes shining brighter than the stars, “Give me one more chance, just one more. I promise I will never let you suffer again.”

The paulownia blossoms are still falling, landing on us like a gentle rain. I look at the gardenia in his hand, remembering when we first met he said, "Your name is like a summer gardenia," and the pain in my heart starts again, but it doesn't seem so unbearable anymore.

"Okay," I heard myself say.

He froze for a moment, then hugged me with overwhelming joy, his grip so tight it felt like he wanted to meld me into his very bones. "Thank you, Zhixia! Thank you..."

I leaned against him, inhaling the scent of tobacco mixed with gardenias, and suddenly felt very tired. Perhaps it was because I craved love too much and feared loneliness too much that I forgot the knife he had once given me when he offered me a piece of candy.

The streetlights at the alley entrance came on, casting long shadows of us. I didn't see that behind a tree not far away, Zheng Yiming was standing there, clutching the physics workbook he had intended to lend me. Upon seeing this, he silently turned and left, his back looking particularly lonely in the twilight.

Back then, I didn't know that forgiving someone who has hurt you is like rubbing salt into a wound. It may seem to have healed, but at some unexpected moment, the pain will be so intense that you can hardly breathe.

This repeated mistake will inevitably push me into an even deeper abyss.