Forced into a romantic relationship

Chapter 415 Disappeared in the Summer

The night is getting darker.

The inky black night and the bright lights of the city are intertwined, with no clear dividing line in between. It is unclear whether the night swallows up the light or the light melts the night.

On the balcony where light and darkness interweave, the petite girl hugged her knees and looked into the distance, her cheeks pale, her hair fluttering in the night wind, and no one knew what she was thinking.

There were footsteps behind her. Zhou Ting, who had just returned to the dormitory to wash up, walked into the balcony and saw Xiao Xiaoxiao sitting on the chair. She was stunned for a moment, then asked with concern: "Xiaoxiao, what's wrong with you?"

"Nothing." Xiao Xiaoxiao didn't even turn her head, "I just suddenly wanted to look at the stars."

Look at the stars...

Zhou Ting looked up at the dark night sky and said with a wry smile: "Where can I see the stars now?"

"I heard that you can see them at the North and South Poles, and each one of them can be seen very clearly." Xiao Xiaoxiao said.

"That's too far."

Zhou Ting moved a chair to sit next to her, feeling the coolness of the night breeze, and suddenly smiled, "But I also want to go to the North and South Poles. My uncle went there once before and said the aurora was beautiful. How about we go and see it together when we graduate?"

After a pause, she tentatively added, "Call Han Zhou as well."

I heard from many seniors who have already graduated that for most people, graduation is actually equivalent to separation. In that summer mixed with sweat and tears, even the scorching hot wind will be a little gentler, temporarily driving away the cicadas that always make annoying chirping, just to give everyone more time to say goodbye.

During the four years of college, there are often two people that many people can't let go of. One is the best friend who is always by their side in school, and the other is the person they obviously like but didn't dare to confess until they left school.

The former is the passion and emotion of youth, while the latter is the end and regret of youth.

Zhou Ting has always suspected that Xiaoxiao likes Han Zhou, but she has no evidence, so she plans to take this opportunity to test her feelings.

If Xiaoxiao doesn't like Han Zhou and only regards him as a good friend, she will definitely wonder why he is suddenly mentioned. If Xiaoxiao really likes Han Zhou, she will most likely agree with this proposal, and may even be happy about it, or feel embarrassed not to answer.

However, to Zhou Ting's disappointment, Xiao Xiao's reaction was not what she had expected.

“I’m not going to the North Pole, nor the South Pole.”

"Why?" she couldn't help asking, "Don't you like the South Pole and the North Pole?"

"I like it, but I don't want to go." Xiao Xiaoxiao held her face and said with a sad face, "It must cost a lot of money to go to such a far place."

Zhou Ting smiled and said, "We can talk about money after graduation. Since you like it, you shouldn't leave any regrets for your youth. Just treat it as setting a goal in life."

My roommate joked in the dormitory: "When we graduate, we will all be in our twenties, and will soon be in our thirties. How can we still be young?"

"Yeah, she's already an old girl." sighed another roommate.

"You two should stop interrupting and stop spreading anxiety." Zhou Ting scolded with a smile.

The roommate said with a smile: "If you two can really call Han Zhou, then I am willing to go to the North Pole with you."

"Me too, take me one," another roommate echoed.

Zhou Ting ignored the two people who were talking nonsense, and looked at Xiao Xiaoxiao who was a little absent-minded, and asked in a low voice: "What's wrong with you, Xiaoxiao, are you worried about something?"

"No." Xiao Xiaoxiao shook her head.

"We are good friends. You don't have to hide things from me." Zhou Ting was not down. She believed that she had nothing on her mind, but she didn't push her. She said softly, "Even if you really don't want to tell me, let me give you some advice."

She suspected that Xiaoxiao might have encountered difficulties in love. Today, the fact that Han Zhou was surrounded by a group of beautiful girls was on the school news. These girls were all outstanding, including senior sisters Zhong Ling and Wang Lengqiu, who were both famous people in Lin University. Xiaoxiao said that maybe she felt the pressure, so she felt so lonely.

But she guessed wrong again.

Xiao Xiaoxiao was silent for a long time, and then hesitantly asked: "If... I mean if, if you are going to die soon, what will be your wish?"

The night wind suddenly became violent. The trees outside the balcony rustled, and the shadows on the ground swayed constantly, climbing up the dormitory wall with their fangs and claws.

Zhou Ting was stunned. The words of encouragement, "It's okay, you're cute too," were stuck on her lips and condensed into one word in an instant -

"what?"

She suddenly became nervous and said in panic, "Xiao Xiao, you..."

"Don't think too much. I don't mean to die."

Xiao Xiaoxiao interrupted her with a smile and said casually, "I was just thinking, if a person is about to die, should she say goodbye to everyone solemnly and sternly warn everyone not to forget her, or should she leave quietly and erase other people's memories of her."

She spoke in a relaxed tone, stretching lazily as she spoke, as if she had just suddenly thought of such an interesting question. "You scared me to death, I thought... ugh."

Zhou Ting patted her chest. At one point just now, she almost thought Xiao Xiao was talking about her. It was not until this moment that she breathed a sigh of relief. After thinking carefully, she replied, "If it were me... I would probably leave quietly."

"Why?" Xiao Xiaoxiao looked at her.

Zhou Ting smiled a little embarrassedly: "Because I don't have many friends, they are all very important to me, but I'm actually... I'm actually not sure if I'm that important in their hearts. Instead of having a potentially awkward farewell, it's better to leave alone."

After a pause, she continued, "But I won't erase everyone's memory of me, because many people throughout history have only 'lived' more vividly after they died. If I could hear someone say something like 'What a pity, Zhou Ting was such a good person, I wish I could have seen her for the last time', I would be so moved that I would cry even if I died."

"Pfft!"

Xiao Xiaoxiao was amused and laughed out loud. She rubbed the tears from her eyes and said, "But when a person dies, he or she can no longer hear other people's voices. Even if someone really said that, you wouldn't know it."

"Who said that? You've never died. What if people become ghosts after they die?"

Xiao Xiaoxiao was stunned for a moment, then shook her head, still smiling: "Dead is dead, there is nothing left."

Zhou Ting sighed: "What about you? If you were in a situation like this, what would you choose? Would you like to be remembered by everyone or be forgotten by everyone?"

"this problem……"

Xiao Xiaoxiao held her chin with both hands, stared at the distant night sky, and said softly, "I haven't thought about it yet."

“It’s too early for us to think about that now.”

Zhou Ting tightened her coat to protect herself from the increasingly cold wind. "You seemed to have asked another question just now. If I were about to die, what would I wish for, right?"

"Well, this question is too early for you."

"It's not early."

Zhou Ting didn't notice anything wrong with Xiao Xiaoxiao's words, and smiled and said, "Of course my last wish before I die is to do all the things I wanted to do but didn't have the courage to do before. Life is about leaving no regrets. If I don't dare to do anything before I die, it will be too late."

"What do you want to do but don't dare to do?"

"There are many things. For example, I would find the people who bullied me in the past and find ways to get revenge on them. I would also contact friends who I parted ways with because of a small matter and express my apologies to them. I would say no loudly when someone cuts me in line. I would ride a roller coaster, go bungee jumping, play a trick on the staff in a haunted house, muster up the courage to confess my love to the person I like, and then run away while covering my ears without waiting for their answer..."

Zhou Ting counted on her fingers, counting one by one the things she wanted to accomplish "before she died".

"Why do you run away without waiting for the other party to answer?" Xiao Xiaoxiao asked curiously.

Zhou Ting was happy: "Because I'm about to die. No matter what the other party says, I won't have the chance to respond. I might as well not listen. I confessed just to express my feelings and not leave any regrets for myself."

"Isn't this too selfish..." Xiao Xiaoxiao hesitated.

Zhou Ting was stunned for a moment, thought for a moment and said hesitantly: "I'm about to die, it's okay to be a little selfish, right?"

The two looked at each other and suddenly laughed at the same time.

Zhou Ting seemed very interested in the topic of hypothetical death. She asked with a smile, "Xiao Xiao, if you were going to die, which season would you like to die in?"

"summer."

Zhou Ting was stunned. The other party answered too quickly, as if he had not thought about it at all, or... she had thought about this question a long time ago.

"what happened?"

"No...nothing, just why is it summer?"

Xiao Xiaoxiao smiled without thinking: "Because the temperature is high in the summer, the tears will evaporate as soon as they fall to the ground. In this way, even if we cry, we won't be sad on our faces."

Zhou Ting opened her mouth, as if she had never expected that the other party would choose Xia Tian for such a reason, and asked tentatively: "Does this 'everyone' include you?"

"Of course not."

Xiao Xiaoxiao shook her head firmly, "I won't cry."

After a few seconds of silence, she added in a low voice that only she could hear:

"Besides...I can't die in the summer."

(End of this chapter)