2017101at 3 o'clock in the morning on October 8, the man who grew up with me left me forever. "Grandpa, I'm back!" I've been saying this for almost 30 years, and no one across the street listens.
He doesn't know where my home in Beijing is yet. He doesn't know that my child has recently learned a new skill. He loved me all his life, but in the end he didn't even have a chance to say goodbye to him.
I remember you told me in a trembling voice on the phone not long ago.
"Star, if you are free, please call grandpa more often."
I haven't called you for a long time.
And when I opened the bag, your mobile phone was in my carry-on bag.
Every time you used to get sick, it seemed as if I would be fine as soon as I came back. I got married, and you were in bed with diabetes for half a month, and miraculously recovered. I know, you don't want to miss seeing me in my wedding dress.
Some time ago, you didn't eat or drink. Dad said you might be unhealthy. I immediately asked for leave to go home and forced you to go to the hospital for a few days. When I leave again, you can eat more jiaozi every meal, be lifted up by your aunt and father, and occasionally walk back and forth in the corridor of the hospital.
You asked me when I would come back next time, and I said National Day.
Say, how long is it before National Day?
I said a month or two,
You have a good meal, grandpa, get up and exercise more, and wait for me to go home.
This National Day, I came back. You look thin, but you can't eat or drink like last time. This reminds me that even if I come back during the Spring Festival, you will still be like this.
I think you can stay with me a little longer.
What I don't know is that your health has been getting worse since you left the hospital last time. Every joint in your body is getting more and more painful, and every organ is getting more and more tired.
In order to take care of you, dad changed your bed into a hospital camp bed. I was stung by a picture in my mind the night I learned that you were in a coma and could never wake up. I seem to see that you are suffering from extreme pain every night, but you still hold the railing trembling and look out the window, lonely and desperate, waiting for my early return.
You fell into a coma at noon the day before I planned to return to Beijing and never woke up.
I was going to my aunt's house at noon that day, and I will continue to accompany you after dinner.
But when I came back,
You have slept like a child, and no one can wake you up.
Dad said that you had been calling your parents painfully last night.
But the nights you were in a coma,
I can only hear the sound of phlegm indicating that the old man is about to die.
Fortunately, the morning before you passed out, I accidentally downloaded the only small video with you on my mobile phone.
In the video, I asked you, Grandpa, who is your closest relative?
You deliberately said you didn't know,
Probably complaining that I didn't spend a long vacation with you at home.
I said, I don't know,
It's a star, grandpa. Please, your closest relative is a star.
You said, oh, I love stars best.
Let me ask you again, grandpa, when you say that,
Is it because I taught you to say it, or you want to say it yourself?
You said naughty. You taught me.
I've never said anything to anyone,
But I said that day, I said,
"My closest relative is also my grandfather."
Now that I think about it, you are willing to close your eyes because you heard what I said.
You in the video, your eyes, your breath, and the temperature of my favorite grandfather.
Outside the video, I stood in front of your mourning hall and looked at the eulogy written to you, my eyes blurred.
2
What saddens me most now is why I chose to study thousands of miles in the past.
I followed you every day when I was very young. Every step you take, I have to take two or three breathless steps.
Then our walking speed was reversed.
Later, you just sat there, watching me go further and further, quietly waiting for me to come back one day.
All these years when I went out to study and work, I always made you think I was busy.
Since you left,
I began to think about the significance of my efforts to survive in this city.
Many people who don't belong here, what is the significance of their staying here?
If you can't protect the person you love the most no matter how hard you try,
What's the point of going further?
Once, it was where you were that made me feel at ease the most.
After you left, I vaguely saw the next few decades for the first time.
The remaining distance and time between me and my lover.
I began to keep thinking about what I really wanted.
Suddenly I miss those days when you were still there,
I miss a bunch of candied haws you bought me,
I miss a poem you taught me to read.
My birthday is coming. This time, what I want most is for you to come back.
Seeing that you are about to be cremated, I want to hug you again, but the Feng Shui master said, don't get too close to your grandfather, because then he won't leave and can't cross over.
I told you a lot at the wake. Why couldn't I tell you earlier? Two days earlier, two months earlier, you can still reply to me early.
But I looked up and saw only your picture hanging in the middle of the mourning hall.
three
Because of your sudden departure, the official WeChat account that has been insisting on writing has stopped for a long time.
"I hope I can accompany you for a long time, and I hope we can meet for a long time." This is the first sentence I wrote in this number.
But the fact is that the future will not be long, and the future meeting may not be fixed.
We all think this is a long life,
Why did you live until later? Life is short. Life will not give every separation the sense of ritual we want. We never know which wave will be farewell.
In most cases,
Those feelings that you think are strong, eternal love, strong enough to attach all your feelings to them, will collapse in an instant. Never meet, never meet.
We'll talk too much,
"Let's have dinner together next time" "I'll go home to see you after the Spring Festival" …
But slowly, you will find that,
After this sentence after sentence of greetings, many will become deep regrets.
But I want to say,
If there is someone you really want to see, you might as well put down what you are doing and really go to see it. If you already know that one day he will leave, take the initiative to say goodbye.
If you are destined to be separated from the person you love one day, why not do what you usually want to do and should do as soon as possible while he is still around, and don't leave so many so-called regrets.
You really won't wait until he becomes a photo on the wall to remember that you still have a lot to say to him.
He won't tell you how long he waited for you before telling him how much you care about him.