sunset melting gold

is a dream.

A long but incoherent leaping dream.

Like fragments of a movie with a broken plot, Fang Shiqiu is a spectator sitting in the auditorium, watching the fast-playing images of his past on the screen in a dim room.

Unreal and unreal light and shadow enveloped him.

The beginning of the dream is a vast noise.

Fang Shiqiu saw himself, sitting in the school's newly built auditorium for ten thousand people, and the newly appointed president of the student union stood on the podium, speaking politely and officially to welcome the new students.

His voice was amplified by the microphone, and the deep voice was mixed with the noise of low-quality amplification products, like the tide of the waves, slowly rising and flooding the auditorium.

Fang Shiqiu heard people whispering around, discussing the appearance of the chairman of the student union, discussing his studies and work, and discussing everything that had nothing to do with the welcome ceremony.

The noisy voice lingered in the ear, and then escaped in a hurry before being burned into the brain, leaving behind an unrecognizable audio track.

From the beginning to the end, there were only a few shallow memories of that show-like welcome ceremony, and Fang Shiqiu could not remember the details.

The only thing he clearly remembers are two rising syllables——

"Liang Ming".

The dream began to jump again.

After a burst of blackness that continued to flicker, Fang Shiqiu's vision shifted from the high platform in the middle of the auditorium to the crowded seats.

Liang Ming stood in that familiar position, giving a boring speech as usual.

He answered the questions patiently, thanked him humbly, and thunderous applause rang out from the audience.

Everything harmonizes almost absurdly.

Fang Shiqiu stood in the corner behind the curtain, his once fractured wrist began to ache in rhythm with the applause.

He clutched his swollen joints and looked around at the crowd who were also applauding, trying to gather useful information from their faces, but he could only see a blurred face.

The surrounding area is clear, only Liang Min's straight back.

He turned around and showed Fang Shiqiu a flamboyant smile.

The heart fell heavily to the ground from a high altitude, and Fang Shiqiu let go of his hands covering his joints.

He remembered that this was his first memory of participating in an event after joining the student union.

At that time, Liang Ming had not yet graduated from school, had not established a company, and had not confessed to himself.

He is still approachable and approachable, personally managing the affairs of the student union, big and small, and rushing between various meetings and activities.

The president of the student union didn't hold up his airs, and the plans he had planned all succeeded as a matter of course.

"Smart and capable", "hard work and hard work", were the words that Fang Shiqiu heard most often during that period, and were used by others to describe Liang Ming.

The audience's applause ceased, and the slow-playing dream scene pressed the accelerator button, and the colorful light beams condensed by the color blocks shot straight from Fang Shiqiu's side, extending towards the endless white behind him.

The wind whistled in my ears, and the chaotic picture in front of me quickly retreated, occasionally leaking a few frames of gray images, and finally frozen in the smoky night sky.

The sound isolated by the wind gradually amplified, and Fang Shiqiu heard exaggerated shouts, the crisp sound of glass colliding, and the sizzling sound of food being roasted by the fire.

The smoke of charcoal fires and the aroma of barbecue surrounded him.

Fang Shiqiu lowered his head, holding a rough and cheap wine glass with oily fingers, and the pale yellow liquid in the glass was bubbling with tiny bubbles.

"Knowing autumn!"

Liang Ming sat on the other side of the long table, smiling and toasting.

"You have worked hard for the past two years, and I respect you for this cup."

Fang Shiqiu wanted to refuse, but his body moved unconsciously.

He raised his hand to clink glasses with Liang Ming, then raised his head and drank the bitter beer in one gulp.

Swallowing the beer, Fang Shiqiu's body became heavy, as if falling from a cliff, and the strong weightlessness squeezed his heart.

He landed in a patch of snow.

Thick snowflakes blindfolded his eyes, and there was burning pain from his fingertips and joints. The snow covering his body was melted by the rising body temperature, and the snow-soaked cloth stuck to his body wetly.

"Squeaky-"

The sound of the rubber soles stepping on the snow seeped into the gaps in the snowflakes, turning into a helpless "Qiuqiu".

Fang Shiqiu opened his eyes, and saw Liang Min, who was more mature than before, reaching out to him, pulling him out of the snow.

Liang Ming carried him back to the room, put him on the bed covered with blankets, held his cold hand, and whispered to him not to run around again.

"It's snowing outside, you'll catch a cold."

Fang Shiqiu leaned in his warm embrace, feeling like he was having a weird and absurd dream.

But it seems that this is indeed the only time between him and Liang Ming, which can barely be regarded as warmth.

Fang Shiqiu had a low fever and couldn't sleep well.

He curled up in a corner of the bed, his overlong hair was soaked in sweat, sticking to his face carelessly, and the quilt that Liang Ming had tucked in before he left was rolled into a messy ball as he tossed and moaned.

The fluctuating body temperature and ups and downs of dreams tore Fang Shiqiu's body and consciousness. His body was aching and heavy with repeated fevers, his bones and joints were swollen and painful, but his brain, which was ravaged by dreams, almost stopped functioning.

He was panting on the pillow with his mouth open, thin oxygen injected into the rib cage, and the long and narrow organs connected to the lungs felt an unbearable itching.

Buried in the quilt, Fang Shiqiu coughed a few times, warm liquid splashed out of his throat, and his hazy senses flowed out of his broken body along with the fishy and sweet hot liquid.

He began to tremble and struggled to wake up, when suddenly a hand touched him lightly while he was half asleep.

That hand was cold and soft, and there were thin calluses on the palm that brushed against the forehead, and the fingertips wrapped around the wet hair trembled slightly.

She stuffed a bitter candy into her mouth, fed a small amount of warm water, and gently lifted her chin, allowing the water to slide the sugar into her stomach.

Fang Shiqiu couldn't open his eyes, and couldn't see the owner of that hand clearly.

But he knew it wasn't Liang Ming.

That person would not treat him so tenderly.

That soft hand appeared many times in Fang Shiqiu's dreams, each time with bitter sugar and warm water.

Under her care and comfort, Fang Shiqiu clearly felt that his body temperature was dropping.

The swelling and soreness caused by the high fever gradually eased, his body stopped shaking, and those bizarre dreams returned to calm again.

Fang Shiqiu dreamed of himself.

He saw Fang Shiqiu, who was wearing a thin summer dress, walk through a circular archway full of flowers, and stop in front of a huge French window.

The setting sun paints a brilliant and magnificent sunset on the bright and transparent glass canvas, and unknown birds fly out of the colorful clouds and land on the white railings of the terrace.

The shadow of the flying bird was elongated, crossed the frame of the floor-to-ceiling window, and stopped beside the pale soles together with the light refracted by the glass.

Fang Shiqiu stretched out his hand, trying to touch the shadow at his feet, and the bird resting on the railing suddenly flapped its wings and flew up.

"boom--"

Fang Shiqiu was awakened by the loud impact.

He opened his eyes wide, and saw the dumb girl standing in the room holding a water glass, and also saw the wild pheasant falling on the window sill.

It's already spring.

It turned out to be a dumb girl.

Fang Shiqiu thought in a daze.