When Bright Moon Encounter the Dark Clouds

Tan Jiao and I looked at each other, and I saw a look of disappointment in her eyes. She then asked, “The second question: do you know Wu Yu and Zhuang Yu… No, I mean Zhou Xiaoyu. Do you know them?”

After a brief moment of silence, Shen Shiyan replied, “I also have no idea who these two people are. Tan Jiao, did you...encounter some troubles?”

Tan Jiao interrupted him and said, “Last question: did the two of us meet after I rejected you? Or did we ever call each other?”

This time, Shen Shiyan’s silence was longer, yet his answer was also very clear. “No.”

Tan Jiao’s voice softened as she thanked him and ended the call.

Shen Shiyan called back almost immediately. Tan Jiao took a glance at her phone but did not answer it.

She seemed reluctant and said, “I’ll call Zhuang Yu again.”

The result of the call was similar to Shen Shiyan’s. Zhuang Yu was still taking her finals. She had not met Shen Shiyan nor me, and she knew nothing about Yan Yuan’s case. As for Xiao Hao, he was naturally still safe with his grandparents and had not encountered the birds or any danger.

After the two calls, Tan Jiao sat on the bed in a daze, an expression which I seldom saw. I poured her a cup of water, and she thanked me for it. I sat at the end of the bed, just a foot away from her, looking at her silently.

She recovered soon and asked after a while, “Wu Yu, we… what do we do? No one would believe what we say. Would the two of us become kids?... Damn it, I don’t want that. I still have so many things I need to experience…”

Falling into a lull as well, I also could not accept the bleak future she painted for us. “We’ll decide when it comes to it. I’ll protect you so just stick with me.”

I looked at her and her slightly bloodshot and watery eyes, but she quickly looked away to somewhere else and muttered, “So… it’s only the two of us that are going back in time? Everyone else has forgotten about everything, so they are moving forward in time?”

What she said was right on point.

“It seems so. I wonder what would happen to the other people on the ship?”

“But…” She looked particularly smart and alert when she was back to herself again. “This reverse of time is not day by day. We went from the 16th to the 30th, then from the 1st to the 15th. It jumps in segments, almost feels like it’s segments of a video edited together.”

“That’s true. One cycle is half a month.”

Looking slightly shocked, Tan Jiao asked, “Cycle? You mean…”

I was somewhat excited and put out my bold assumption. “Tan Jiao. The flow of time changed half a month after we met each other. That’s when we first returned to the ship. Now it’s almost half a month again.”

With a cracked voice, she asked, “You mean… we’ll return to that ship tonight again?!”

I was sure now that what I made was the correct decision.

Our lives had become such a twisted mess that no one would believe us even if we told them. If I had disregarded everything and fallen in love with her, then if I lose her in the future, if time goes back to a point where the two of us forget each other. Then what would happen to us? Tan Jiao was a good girl, and I should not bring her down with me.

I did not want to lose anyone dear to me anymore.

Even though I could not control my heart from falling for her, I could not let my inner urges go wild. What’s more, I had not saved Wu Miao or my mother yet. Why would I have the right to fall in love with someone? It was even possible that I would die in order to save my family.

I knew I could not be with Tan Jiao.