If you want to write about regret, you cannot simply write about regret. You must write about the tenderness and evasion of the first glance, the cautiousness and restlessness while sitting next to each other, the sheer joy and blushing cheeks of an accidental encounter, the playground at dusk and the lamps in the study hall, the countless tentative tests, the bravery that came too late, and the quiet drift into silence and distance.

If you want to write about regret, you cannot simply write about regret. You must write about the hand reached out and withdrawn countless times, the gaze fixed on her many times, the bewilderment of having no one to share with when encountering beautiful things, and the sorrow of over a dozen unsent letters gathering dust.

If you want to write about regret, you cannot simply write about regret. You must write about the pretense when first meeting, the day and night longing just to get closer to her, her sentimentality, your own love growing wild and unchecked like weeds, the all-night talks about love with the unloving, and the look on her face when she said she liked someone else—it was just like a long dream. Youth is a coward, and so am I!

The osmanthus flowers on the clear autumn mountain have bloomed, yet the reeds outside the tower never arrived, nor could they be exchanged for tonight's moon; the cherry blossoms at Jiming Temple never bloomed either. Later, on a certain winter morning, the heavy fog dispersed—not just the morning, and not just the fog.