The wind in Montmartre, carrying the heat of late July, swept past the white dome of the Sacré-Cœur Basilica and suddenly plunged into a light drizzle. Ah Yu clutched the sweat-soaked plane ticket, her fingertips repeatedly tracing the note tucked inside—"Go after the person who fills your phone's photo album." Lin Wanqing's handwriting, like the silk scarf she always wore, was soft yet held an undeniable certainty.
He saw the Paris Evening Post at customs. There was a picture in the corner of the front page: a woman in a khaki trench coat, standing on the steps of Montmartre, holding a camera and aiming it at the sunset, her hair shimmering with golden-red light. Even though it was only a profile shot, Ah Yu recognized Zhong Hua at a glance—the way she held the camera always had a stubborn air about her; her index finger would habitually hover above the shutter button for half a second, as if giving the scenery before her a final farewell.
At this moment, the rain slanted down, turning the distant Paris cityscape into a flowing gray-blue. Ah Yu walked up the winding stone steps, each step treading on fragments of memory: three years ago, Zhong Hua interviewed a street artist here, her white shirt splattered with paint, yet she smiled and said, "This is the stamp given by Montmartre"; even earlier, Gu Yanting's private cocktail party was held in a revolving restaurant on the edge of the hill, where Zhong Hua was still wearing a well-fitting business suit, like a carefully pruned white rose, but her eyes held a fire that could ignite at any moment.
The rain suddenly intensified, the sound of it hitting the camera lens startling the person in the viewfinder. Zhong Hua instinctively raised her hand to protect the camera, and as she turned, the hem of her trench coat swept across the puddles on the stone steps, splashing tiny droplets. Her movements froze the moment she saw who it was; the camera was still tilted upwards, and the sunset in the viewfinder was suddenly replaced by a familiar silhouette—Ah Yu stood in the rain, her black T-shirt half-soaked, her wet hair plastered to her forehead, clutching something tightly in her hand, her knuckles white from the force.
The man in the viewfinder was looking at her, raindrops clinging to his eyelashes reflecting shimmering light, like the bloodshot eyes of someone who had stayed by her side for seven days and seven nights outside the ICU that year. Zhong Hua's fingers trembled suddenly, and the shutter clicked softly, capturing this moment deep within the memory card.
"How could you..." Her voice was half-blown away by the wind, the remaining words damp with moisture, soft as if about to melt into the rain. The voice recorder in her trench coat pocket was digging into her side; it was the one Ah Yu had returned to her after the truth-revealing press conference, containing her panting breaths during her injured speech, and his words, "I believe you," which suddenly rang out from the audience.
Ah Yu took two steps forward and stopped at the bottom of the third step. Rain streamed down his jawline, dripping onto his collarbone and forming a thin trickle. "Lin Wanqing sent a plane ticket." He pulled the soaked paper from his pocket, noticing the frayed edges as he handed it over. "She said..."
"You said you'd go after the person who filled my phone's photo album?" Zhong Hua suddenly laughed, tears welling in her eyes and rolling down her cheeks. She turned to the side and opened her camera's photo album; the screen gleamed faintly in the rain—among the 327 most recent photos were a red rope tied beside a prayer wheel in Tibet, his back as he bent down to tie his shoelaces on the road to recovery in the snow-capped mountains, and his profile illuminated by the flash as he held up the voice recorder she had left behind backstage at the truth-clarification press conference.
The last picture was taken ten minutes ago at sunset. The fiery clouds were spreading over the church steeple, just like the light that suddenly lit up Ah Yu's eyes when Zhong Hua opened his eyes from his coma in the ICU that day.
“I thought you would stay in Tibet.” Zhong Hua lowered her head, wiping the camera lens with the hem of her trench coat; the metal frame was chillingly cold. On the morning she left the snow-capped mountains, she counted the red ropes beside the prayer wheel and found two identical ones tangled together, each with a small silver bell at the end. She should have known then that some farewells are just excuses, like how she always said she would come to Paris alone to photograph the sunset, yet she packed the ginkgo leaf specimen he had given her in her suitcase—it was from a mudslide, picked up from her hair, the veins still bearing traces of mountain mud.
The rain subsided, and the aroma of a nearby café wafted on the breeze. Ah Yu gazed at her wind-blown hair, suddenly recalling that moment in the ICU: when he read the "person she most wanted to thank" section of the interview transcript, Zhong Hua's eyelashes trembled like a dying butterfly, and the monitor's ripples suddenly faltered. Later, he learned that at the end of that unpublished article, she had written, "The sunset in Montmartre will remember all the unspoken words."
“The Gu family’s case is closed.” Ah Yu’s voice deepened, hoarse from traversing a long tunnel. “In Gu Yanting’s suicide note, the video evidence proved that his assistant committed the arson. Lin Wanqing… she sold her apartment in Paris, saying she was going to Africa to do charity work.”
Zhong Hua's fingers paused. She remembered the last time she saw Lin Wanqing was in the meeting room of the detention center. Separated by thick glass, the woman who always used Dior 999, with neatly trimmed nails, smiled and said, "Actually, I've known for a long time that the scenery in your camera is always brighter than the crystal chandeliers at our parties." At that time, Zhong Hua didn't understand, but only now, looking at Ah Yu's face in the viewfinder, did she realize that sometimes letting go isn't about retreating, but about giving way to someone who truly deserves to stand there.
“I booked a room at the guesthouse.” Ah Yu took another step forward, and the puddles on the steps reflected their overlapping shadows. “It’s right behind the Sacred Heart Cathedral. The owner said you can see the sunrise from the window.”
Zhong Hua looked up; the rain had stopped. The sunset in the west was exceptionally bright, and golden-red light spilled over Ah Yu's shoulders, paving a path behind him. She suddenly remembered the voice message Lin Wanqing had sent, with the Paris Metro announcements in the background: "Zhong Hua, you've photographed so many landscapes; it's time to add a regular guest to your shots."
With the camera still held to her chest, Zhong Hua gently pressed the playback button. On the screen, Ah Yu stood in the rain, looking at her, with the dome of the Sacred Heart Cathedral and the sunset glow in the background, like a painting blurred by raindrops. She turned the lens to let him fully enter the viewfinder, then turned to the side and handed the camera to him.
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