Shen Zicheng

I never thought it was good to be alive -- or to help others be alive.

Whether in life or after death, I always seem to be as empty as a puppet.

Sometimes even I feel that I may lack some human emotion.

But after I walked out of the intensive care unit, I still asked: "What did the uncle see when he died? What did he go through?"

Shen Qiao sat on the bench in the corridor.I don't know when he arrived, but it looks like he just arrived.

The little boy's parents paced back and forth, anxious like polar bears on crushed ice.

Shen Qiao didn't answer.I know that he is also concerned about other people's gazes, but there is a kind of eagerness that makes me approach him, and repeat: "What did the uncle experience when he died? What will I experience when I die?"

Shen Qiao stood up, smoothed the wrinkled corners of her clothes wordlessly, turned around and walked towards the bathroom,

In the empty cubicle, Shen Qiao's voice was still calm: "You want to know?"

"Otherwise I wouldn't ask." For the first time, I found Shen Qiao's attitude very annoying to me, which made me realize that it was also the first time - the first time after my death - that I wanted to know something so urgently What.

"Then you..." Shen Qiao closed his mouth, maybe he wanted to say something, but he didn't say it after all.

He opened the door of the cubicle, walked to the sink, washed his hands, looked at where I should be in the mirror, and said lightly: "You will know when you have to experience it."

I admit that I was a little annoyed, and Shen Qiao had already reacted when I realized that I was angry.

The dark, cold, tentacle-like aura that made me sick radiated from his body, as if there were thousands of blades pointed at my throat, ready to tear me to pieces.

I was forced to step back a few steps, standing on the edge of the dangerous aura, all I could do was stare at Shen Qiao.

"Look," Shen Qiao turned off the faucet, and stretched out her pale and slender palms in front of her face, "Do you know that nothing has changed, you are still the same—you won't come near me."

The uncle's grandson was out of danger.As frustrating as this is, the truth is that once he woke up, he was unsurprisingly unable to communicate with me.

And what's even more frustrating is that this kid has completely forgotten about the incident I had communicated with him.

Even the doctors who tried to find out who he was talking to during the operation had no answers.

I'm the same, and I still don't know why that child knows my existence.

I even began to doubt whether the conversation with him was his hallucination or my hallucination.

Obviously, I am the kind of person who dies and no one cares.

However, since that day, my life has returned to the calmness of stagnant water again.

I was still a ghost, undetected and unable to communicate with others, and Shen Qiao, the only one who knew of my existence—naturally, he disappeared again after that day.

At least, to me he was missing.

I searched all the places where he had been, but couldn't find him. When I expanded my search to the whole city, I got to know the second ghost.

It was a ghost that was very successfully disguised, and I even said that I stayed by his side for a long time, but I didn't realize that he was my kind.

Finally, he said to me with the eyes of a fool: "Are you a new ghost?"

... I think that maybe new ghosts will have such an invisible title on their heads.

Lin Leyi, this is his name—it is engraved on the wrist, and the neat italics looks very beautiful.

And rigid.

He said that he was about to be one year old, and he fell ill a year ago, before he could go to the operating table, he became what he is now.

He is different from the uncle, there is too much difference between twenty and one.

He said that he was not reconciled, and he was in great pain now, as if he was out of touch with the whole world, watching everything that happened there in another dimension.

He could even just watch his lover fall in love with someone else—while he was saying this, he was looking at a young couple sitting by the pool.

"Tell me, what's the point of this? Why do we have to suffer like this after we're all dead?" Lin Le said resentfully, and only then did I detect the same kind of breath in him.

A cold, slippery and cold breath like a poisonous snake.

Maybe that breath also has the color of a poisonous snake.

This made me subconsciously think whether I also have this kind of aura in my body - just like the black thing on Shen Qiao's body, will my aura also be of that color?

Who knows.

I didn't answer.

In fact, I don't feel too much pain about what Lin Leyi is struggling with - maybe because I don't have a crush, so I don't feel pain.

Lin Leyi said that he once thought that the other party would at least have a little liking for him, but this is obviously very ridiculous. Only the second week after his death, that person fell in love with someone else.

But he couldn't do anything, he followed that person day after day, and his soul was torn apart by the pain day after day.

The young couple by the pool got up and left.Lin Leyi also left. Before leaving, he said to me: "I envy you. You are not bound by anything and you can go anywhere."

He followed them, forced to keep a distance of ten meters for some reason.He couldn't even take a step closer, he said that might expose them to strange forces.

But his expression was terribly soft.

Even when looking at the man in the couple, it would be terribly sad.

After Lin Le left, I stayed where I was. He made me think a lot. I tried to get back my memories when I was alive. I wanted to get back my memories.

After I died, I suddenly wanted to analyze myself and find out what I was thinking.

But of course, I didn't get any results.

I may have emptied the recycle bin at the same time as deleting the memory.

……

I met Lin Le several times.

He still followed that man day after day, and I witnessed the growing tiredness in his expression.

I think he might be on the verge of reaching his peak, too.

Finally one day, when I met him again, he said to me: "What should I do, I really want to die again now."

The man was sitting in the coffee shop, in the back seat, and opposite was a woman—it was different from last time, and also different from last time.

It's amazing how often he changes girlfriends.

As if desperately seeking comfort.

I can see it.

Lin Leyi can too.

He stood outside, and the glass window was the dividing line between them.

I still haven't found Shen Qiao.He disappeared so thoroughly that I gradually began to forget the reason why I wanted to find him, and even began to forget his appearance and voice.

I was thinking, maybe in a short while, he will disappear completely in my world, just like my memory that disappeared completely.

It can never be found again.

Lin Leyi asked me seriously: "Can I cry?" Although tears are something that living people have.

He didn't care about my answer, and after asking, he hugged me and buried his head very low, as if he was really crying.

He was screaming, as if he could shout out the pain just like this.He said he did not understand why certain things could only be seen clearly after death, why certain things should only be made clear to him after death.

Lin Le scolded that man to me, and also told me that he loved that man.

When he said "I love you" in my arms so seriously, I actually felt the same pain and sorrow as him.

Having vented enough, Lin Leyi said to me again: "I really want to die again."

"Then you're going to die once, right?"

That's not what I said.I can't say that either.

When I raised my head, Shen Qiao was standing behind Lin Leyi, who stopped in the crowd and smiled softly.

He's wearing earphones, maybe to hide the fact that he's talking to someone who doesn't exist.

I confirmed the fact that I was beginning to forget him when a strange strangeness came over me.

So, I started to panic.

"Can you let me die?" Lin Leyi asked seriously, even though Shen Qiao's body was filled with the breath of our natural enemy.

Shen Qiao smiled and said nothing.

"He can't—" I said, thinking of Lin Leyi's age and Shen Qiao's identity.He is still very young, but he is very weak - what Shen Qiao said can be repeated right now.

"I can." Shen Qiao retorted.

"But you will die."

"What does it matter?" Shen Qiao laughed suddenly, "Don't you want me to die?"

"..." I took Lin Le away.To be precise, it was I who forcibly pulled him away, Lin Leyi asked me: "What do you want to do?"

"I don't know." I replied.

I just don't want to see Shen Qiao, even though I have been looking for him for nearly a month, but when I saw him again, I realized that I was so shaken.

I started to really, really, really desperately want to find my memory.

But I was also very terrified, and I always had a feeling that I shouldn't know those things, that I should stay where I am.

Now my position has changed.I was the one to avoid, and Shen Qiao was the one to look for.

But the difference is that he always finds my hiding place without any trouble, and sits around there like no one else until I'm forced to leave again, and then he finds me again.

Then, on that day, Shen Qiao told me not far away: "Lin Leyi is dead."