This opening line is abrupt and disjointed.
It was like a stone thrown into a deep well.
There was no echo, which only sent a chill down one's spine.
Fei Yuncheng's fingers, which were unscrewing the thermos, froze for a moment.
The rising steam wafted onto his glasses, but he forgot to wipe it.
He just stared blankly at the stage through the white mist.
The middle-aged Director Hu, with his gray hair, leaned back slightly.
The body, which had been leaning back in the chair, slowly straightened up.
The person accompanying him was about to explain something when he gently pressed his hand down.
On stage, Lin Que adjusted the height of the microphone.
"The biology textbook tells us that..."
When the heart stops beating, brain waves disappear, and breathing ceases, that is death.
His voice was flat and uninspiring.
Yet the sound was clearly transmitted to every corner of the auditorium.
"This is the first time."
The LED screen behind me lit up silently.
There were no dazzling special effects, only a black and white negative magnified countless times.
The rough noise dances on the screen, like fragments of memory worn down by time.
The picture shows a middle-aged man wearing a polyester shirt, holding half a piece of chalk in his hand, writing on a blackboard.
Sunlight streamed through the old-fashioned wooden window lattices, illuminating his thinning head.
The students who had been whispering among themselves were stunned.
The third row of teaching and research groups
An older teacher instinctively covered her mouth, her voice trembling:
"My God... is that Teacher Yan Song?"
The older physics group leader next to him adjusted his glasses, his voice suddenly becoming hoarse:
"It was Teacher Yan... who passed away three years ago from lung cancer."
It was already in its late stages when it was discovered…
...
Lin Que didn't turn around to look at the photo, as if that person was standing right behind him.
"The second death is the funeral."
"Relatives and friends, dressed in black, bowed in the funeral home."
Some cried, some remained silent.
At this point, his social status was revoked.
The corner of the ID card was cut off, and the name was removed from the household registration book.
The photo on the screen has changed.
This time, it's a yellowish color photograph.
The background is the old campus of Jiangcheng No.1 Middle School, which has already been demolished.
An elderly man with gray hair sat at the entrance of the gatehouse, holding an enamel mug in his hand, his face full of wrinkles from smiling.
A big yellow dog was lying at his feet.
Jiang Changfeng, sitting in the audience, felt a twitch in his eyelids.
He recognized the enamel mug; it had the word "award" printed on it in red.
Thirty years ago, when he was first assigned to the No. 1 Middle School,
This is the old man, Mr. Wang, who insisted on giving him an oil-paper umbrella during the torrential rain.
That enamel mug was always filled with the lowest quality tree root tea.
Lin Que's voice continued to flow, and background music quietly began to play.
It was a guitar solo with arpeggios, and the tone was clean.
The melody is not complicated; it's like a nursery rhyme.
A few notes go back and forth, each repetition carrying a deeper longing and a fear of impending loss.
"However, neither of these deaths counted as actual deaths."
Lin Que stood up from the bar stool.
He didn't even hold the microphone; instead, he simply gripped the stand.
"Because there are still people who remember them."
"I only heard that when Teacher Yan talked about 'The Back View', my eyes welled up with tears."
I also heard that on rainy days, Grandpa Wang would hand each student who didn't bring an umbrella a piece of cardboard.
"But as long as there are people who remember them, they are still alive."
They live in our minds, in the topics of conversation over tea or dinner.
"Living in these faded photographs."
The photos on the screen began to switch at a faster pace.
There was a sports committee member who, ten years ago at the sports meet, fell and bled all over his face while doing a relay race, but was still smiling.
There was a chemistry teacher who, twenty years ago, collapsed from overwork in the laboratory and had to be carried out.
There's even a picture of the lead singer of the school band called Flying, standing here five years ago.
In the photo, he has a flamboyant, tousled hairstyle and bright eyes.
A teacher in the audience let out a suppressed sob.
This student died in an accident in his second year after graduation, forever frozen at the age of twenty.
Some of them graduated many years ago, and some... are no longer alive.
Each photograph corresponds to a piece of Jiangcheng No.1 Middle School's history.
A warmth that has been forgotten by most, yet truly existed.
Several older teachers sitting in the front row took off their glasses and began to secretly wipe the corners of their eyes.
Fei Yuncheng finally put down his thermos.
He stared intently at a photo of a young female teacher on the screen.
That was his partner when he first joined the company; he died in a car accident.
"but……"
Lin Que's voice suddenly lowered, and the music shifted to a minor key.
"One day, the person who remembers Teacher Yan's blackboard writing will grow old, forget, or pass away."
“There will come a day when no one will know what the old gatekeeper’s name was, or who he handed the cardboard to.”
"This is the third death."
"Ultimate death."
The surrounding light sources receded like the tide, and darkness once again swallowed the stage.
Only a single, pale beam of light remained, enveloping Lin Que and the deathly gray screen behind him.
All those vibrant faces from just moments ago have vanished.
"When the last person in this world who remembers you forgets you."
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