"You..." I started to say that Xiao Shu was the man with the flowing long hair just now, but I pulled the words back mid-sentence.

Impossible. Xiao Shu couldn't possibly be that man. He’s the same age as me, seventeen this year. The man just now, while not ancient, carried the air of someone who had seen and understood everything in the world; he completely lacked the impulsive expression of a teenager. If someone like us, young and green, were embraced by an ethereal beauty like that fairy, we’d have been so utterly overwhelmed we’d have lost our souls, certainly not calmly removing her arm from our neck to sit off to the side and leisurely play a stringed instrument. The only thing without doubt was that his face bore a striking resemblance to Xiao Shu’s.

With that thought, I gently patted Xiao Shu’s shoulder and said lightly, "Don't tell me you were that man just now. Looking at you, I feel you lack his presence."

That stopped Xiao Shu’s sobbing. He wiped his nose with his hand, looked up with watering eyes, and asked with a hint of doubt, "Really? Am I that different from him?"

I nodded. "He felt like he’d been through a great deal, whereas you, like me, are still young and inexperienced. Your heart doesn't hold as much as his does."

"Sigh," Xiao Shu let out a sigh, sounding somewhat dejected.

"Being so remarkably similar in appearance to him, you must be Li Xiaohao, right?" Only when he calmed down did I get to the point, slowly trying to coax the story of what just happened out of him.

However, he didn't answer my question directly. "I don't know who that woman was. But she strongly resembles a playmate I grew up with. My playmate was named Yingzi. When we were little, we played house every day; she was the wife, and I was the husband. Every time I came back from kindergarten, she would open the door for me, help me take off my coat, hand me my slippers, and finally lead me to a table already laden with all sorts of delicious food. We would feast to our hearts' content. Until the day she vanished, we were inseparable companions," Xiao Shu said mournfully, sniffling.

So, it was a story from kindergarten. I let out a long breath, finding it somewhat amusing that such an old memory could bring on such a flood of tears. Still, I had to give him face, so I adopted a very serious expression outwardly and continued to ask, "Did your families live next door to each other?"

Xiao Shu nodded, replying, "Her house was right next to mine. We were childhood sweethearts until two years ago when she suddenly moved away without a word, and I could never find her again. I felt like my entire world had collapsed; I was sick for a whole month."

"Oh," only after hearing that did I begin to understand the intensity of his earlier downpour of tears. If I had a girl I’d been close with for over a decade, someone whose bond was as deep as a spouse’s, and she suddenly vanished without a trace—gone from sight, sound, and presence—I would probably be just as inexpressibly heartbroken as Xiao Shu. "You never saw her again after that? After being friends for so many years, she wouldn't even leave a forwarding address or phone number when she moved?"

Hearing my question, tears began to circle in Xiao Shu's eyes again. He had no choice but to lower his head, hiding his eyes from me, letting the tears drop one by one onto the stone. "I searched the entire city and couldn't find her. The house was empty, the phone line disconnected. Her parents' workplace only said they had resigned, nothing more. The entire family seemed to have evaporated—no farewell, no warning, gone overnight. All that remained was an empty house with the main door ajar, and a scattered mess of things left behind after moving."