Chapter 39
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Time: Late autumn, three years after Qiu Yayu left.
Lü Xiaoyan didn't leave the city, but he moved away from the school area. He rented a top-floor apartment with an attic in an old residential area, converting the attic into a darkroom and workshop. The downstairs was piled high with his "achievements" over the past three years.
Those results are no longer concise expressions about "emptiness" and "absence," but rather a kind of obsessive, complex, and detailed record.
He traveled to every place in the city they had visited together, taking photos repeatedly in different seasons, under different lights, and in different weather. He captured the tender new buds of the sycamore trees in spring, the rainbow on the lake after a sudden rain in summer, the golden rain of fallen leaves on the ginkgo avenue in autumn, and the silent benches covered in snow in winter.
He not only photographed landscapes, but also began photographing people.
He photographed vendors hawking their wares at the morning market, elderly people walking hand in hand in the park, children chasing and playing on their way home from school, and couples snuggling together and dozing in the subway.
He captures every vibrant, dynamic, and fluid moment.
His photographic style has undergone a dramatic transformation. From his previous pursuit of ultimate calmness, composition, and "silent epics," it has become full of everyday life, even somewhat...rambling. It's as if he's eager to greedily capture all the light, shadow, color, and rhythm of life in the world into his lens.
Critics have been divided on his recent work. Some believe he has lost the inspiration and depth of his earlier works, becoming mediocre and simplistic. Others have astutely observed that behind these seemingly chaotic images lies a deeper, more complex, and even tragic power—a gaze that is almost atoning, a gaze upon the world on behalf of someone else.
Only Lü Xiaoyan himself knows what he is doing.
He is fulfilling a promise.
A promise to the message on the back of that Polaroid photo.
"I will carry my share and continue to love light and shadow, and love this world."
He used his camera to see, in place of her eyes, every spring, every summer, every autumn, every winter she missed. He wanted to see landscapes she had never seen and experience lives she had never lived.
This was an awkward, almost self-torturing way of fulfilling his duty. Each press of the shutter was a clear confirmation—confirmation that she was gone, confirmation that he was watching all this alone. Was the joy halved, and the sorrow doubled? No, it was that all emotions were shrouded in an inescapable grayness because of her absence.
But he didn't stop.
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It was a beautiful late autumn afternoon. The sunlight was golden, carrying just the right amount of warmth, and the sky was a vibrant blue, as if it had been washed clean. Lü Xiaoyan, carrying her camera, returned to University A.
The Ginkgo Avenue has reached its most glorious moment of the year. The dense, golden leaves almost completely obscure the sky. When the wind blows, the leaves flutter down like a grand, silent golden rain. A thick layer has been laid on the ground, rustling softly underfoot.
Many students and tourists took photos, laughed, and enjoyed this limited-edition moment. The laughter of children, the whispers of couples, and the clicks of camera shutters blended together, creating a vibrant atmosphere.
Lu Xiaoyan stood at one end of the avenue, looking at the familiar yet strangely unfamiliar golden hall that had become so different with the people who had passed away. He didn't immediately raise his camera, but simply stood there quietly, feeling the warmth of the sunlight on his face and listening to the noisy voices around him.
He remembered their first autumn together, also here. She twirled among the fallen leaves like a joyful butterfly, asking him to take her picture. She picked up a perfectly fan-shaped leaf, excitedly handing it to him, saying she'd make a bookmark. She even playfully grabbed a handful of leaves, scattered them at him, and then ran away laughing…
Those scenes, like a replay of an old movie, are both clear and distant.
He took a deep breath and raised his camera. Instead of photographing grand, iconic scenes, he focused his lens on subtle, vivid moments.
He photographed a little girl with pigtails, trying to catch a swirling leaf as it fell, her face filled with innocent focus.
He photographed an elderly professor with white hair walking slowly side by side, occasionally exchanging a few words in hushed tones, their feet treading on thick fallen leaves, as if time itself had slowed down for them.
He photographed a group of freshmen, clearly just enrolled, wearing military training uniforms, excitedly taking a group photo under a tree; their youthful energy almost overflowed from the picture.
He photographed an orange cat, lazily lying on a "bed" made of fallen leaves, squinting its eyes and enjoying the warm autumn sun.
He captured the dappled, shimmering light that filtered through the leaves and cast on the ground.
He took a picture of a small, red, unattended plastic toy car, half-hidden by fallen leaves.
His shutter clicks were soft and rapid, like a silent narration. He was no longer the calm observer and recorder; he was like a greedy collector, desperately trying to gather all the evidence of "life" before him.
Just then, a figure entered his field of vision.
A girl in a beige sweater and long skirt stood with her back to him amidst the swirling leaves, her head slightly tilted back, gazing at the golden sky above. Sunlight outlined her slender figure, and her long hair was gently stirred by the wind. Her posture, that quiet acceptance of beauty, struck Lü Xiaoyan like a bolt of lightning.
They look so alike.
It's not about appearance, but about the feeling. That quiet yet vibrant sense of life, blending seamlessly with autumn.
His heart felt like it was being clenched tightly, and his breath caught in his throat for a moment. His finger instinctively pressed the shutter button.
"Click".
The crisp sound seemed particularly clear amidst the noisy background.
The girl seemed to hear her, and she slowly turned around.
It was a completely unfamiliar, young, and pretty face. When she saw Lü Xiaoyan holding the camera, she paused for a moment, then gave a somewhat puzzled but still polite smile.
It wasn't her.
How could it be her?
Lü Xiaoyan put down her camera and gave the girl a very slight, almost imperceptible nod, as a gesture of acknowledgment and apology. The girl smiled back, turned, and walked away.
At that moment, a tremendous sense of loss washed over him again, almost overwhelming him. He stood there, watching the unfamiliar figure disappear into the golden crowd, feeling like a ridiculous fool trying to grasp a ghost.
He looked down at the photo that had just been taken on the camera screen.
In the backlight, the girl's fleeting glance back reveals a soft silhouette outlined by light and shadow, with fluttering leaves forming a blurred, dreamlike backdrop. The composition, the lighting, and the capture of that moment are all perfectly executed. The girl in the photograph possesses a genuine and vibrant beauty, distinct from his memory.
This photo does not belong to "Qiu Yayu's Memory Archive".
It belongs to the present, to this real world that he is gazing upon for her.
Lü Xiaoyan stared at the photo for a very long time.
Then, he slowly raised his head and looked again at the golden ginkgo avenue. The noisy voices of people, the laughter of children, the rustling of the wind through the leaves, the warmth of the sunlight... everything once again clearly flooded into his senses.
He suddenly understood.
"Open your eyes and see the world you've missed."
It's not just about recording these landscapes.
More importantly, we need to truly "see".
Not through the filter of sadness, not with a comparative gaze, but like her, with a sincere, sensitive heart that loves life itself, to feel the light and shadow, to feel the colors, to feel the extraordinary hidden in every ordinary moment.
She wanted him to live, not as a walking corpse burdened with heavy memories, but as a truly living, complete "person" who could feel joy and sorrow and continue to love the world.
He raised his camera again. This time, his gaze was no longer fixated on finding shadows of the past, but rather truly and intently focused on the present.
He took a picture of the two elderly professors' hands clasped tightly together.
I captured the little girl's radiant smile, brighter than the sunshine, as she finally caught the fallen leaf.
Capture the trails of fallen leaves dancing in the wind.
Capture the textures of time depicted by light and shadow on ancient tree trunks.
His state of mind subtly shifted with each press of the shutter. The taut, almost self-destructive obsession seemed to slowly loosen, and a deeper, more inclusive peace began to grow from the depths of his heart.
In the evening, he returned to the darkroom in the attic with a full "harvest".
He didn't start developing immediately as usual. He sat down at the workbench, took out the brown paper envelope, and laid out all the Polaroid photos inside, one by one.
Her smiling face, her playful handwriting, the little things she secretly recorded about him... still pained him, but this time, something different seemed to be mixed in with the pain.
It's gratitude.
He was grateful that she had loved him so passionately, grateful that she had left him these precious "eyes," and grateful that even though she was no longer there, she was still guiding and redeeming him in her own way.
He picked up a pen and slowly and solemnly wrote a line on a blank card:
"The way autumn lives is the way you once gazed at the world, and it is also the reason why I continue to gaze at it."
Then he stood up and began developing the film he had shot that day.
Under the red safety light, the images gradually appeared. Those vibrant moments, those unfamiliar smiling faces, those landscapes interwoven with light and shadow... all unfolded on the photographic paper.
This time, as he looked at these images, he no longer saw them merely as reminders of her absence. He began to feel a broader beauty and power in these images, transcending personal grief.
Life will pass away, but life itself, and the beauty that life creates and experiences, will continue in another form.
He developed the photo of the girl looking back. Under the red light, the girl's figure was both gentle and resolute, as if symbolizing a reconciliation with the past and an opening to the possibility of the future.
He pinned the photograph and the card with the writing on it side by side to the wall.
Beside it were the blank sheets of paper that read "The first year I missed you" and "Take your eyes and see the world you missed".
They stand side by side, like a silent chronicle, recording despair, struggle, searching, and... a slow, arduous, but truly happening, rebirth.
Lü Xiaoyan stood in the darkroom, looking at the images and words on the wall for a long time.
Outside the window, the autumn night wind blew by, bringing with it the faint sound of traffic in the distance.
He knew that the sadness would not disappear; it would flow through his life forever, like blood.
But he also knew that he could carry this sorrow with him and move on.
With her eyes, we can discover more about "how autumn lives".
Perhaps this is the best gift she could give him.
That was the best response he could give her.
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