I have grown accustomed to gazing upward at this city. They say those who look up at Ferris wheels are blessed with happiness, so I gaze upward, hoping to find the happiness meant for me. Yet amid the city’s glittering lights, I could never find it — until she appeared…

In the quiet of the night, the darkness keeps me company, the empty room echoes around me. At times like these, what else can I do but think of her? Only when I think of her do the corners of my mouth curl up in an involuntary smile.

Whenever I see her, a nameless feeling washes over me — excitement, nervousness, exhilaration — all attacking at once. My words stumble, my sentences unravel, yet there’s a sweetness in my heart. I adore this feeling.

But most of the time, I am lonely. Lonely people always etch into memory every soul who crosses their path, and so I think of you, again and again, never quite finished.

I think your mother must be an angel who fell from heaven. She stole the stars and fashioned them into your eyes, making you so captivating, making me so utterly enchanted. So many times I wanted to rush up to you and pour out my heart. But then I’d think of your beauty, and my ordinariness, and I’d quietly walk away once more. Let me watch you from the farthest distance, for I know I have no right. I know I cannot give you what you deserve — so let me just secretly admire you, silently care for you.

Unrequited love is a process. To love someone in secret is to be like a seed waiting to sprout inside a bottle — you can never be sure whether the future will be beautiful, yet you wait with a sincere and stubborn heart. Those who love in secret are the easiest to satisfy. Unrequited love is a dream.

So often I can indulge in fantasy — memorizing every word she says to me, imagining there might be hidden meanings, pretending her smile is meant for me alone. Even such simple fantasies are enough to fill my heart to the brim, to make my cheeks flush, to make my breath quicken.

Dave Wang’s song “I Truly Love You” captures my innermost feelings perfectly. Listening to it, my mind fills with her flickering image, appearing and disappearing before my eyes, more vivid than a mirage.

The sky grows not old, nor can love be severed,
The heart, like a tangled net, holds a thousand knots within.

——Zhang Sheng, “A Thousand Autumns”

Among ten thousand people I met you; across ten thousand years, in the boundless wilderness of time, neither a step too early nor a step too late — we happened to meet. That is fate. One casual gesture of yours unlocked this heart that had been sealed away so long, leaving me unable to let go.

A moth flies into the flame and perishes — yet in that final moment, it knows the purest joy.

I hope you find happiness — that would be my greatest joy.

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