After senior year finals, guys across the school finally let loose, eagerly handing out love letters to the girls they admired. But the biggest buzz was about Ryder Hayes, the school’s heartthrob, who was finally going to confess to me, Hazel, his childhood sweetheart. I stood by the classroom door, my cheeks flushed, my fingertips just about to touch that powder-blue love letter, when a man in a crisp suit suddenly burst in and tore the letter to shreds. He claimed to be twenty-eight-year-old Ryder, time-traveled from ten years in the future. “Don’t confess to Hazel, she’s not your true love.” He dragged his eighteen-year-old self, pointing to the girl in a faded school uniform in the corner. “See Serena Brooks? Ten years from now, you’ll love her madly, fiercely. Since you’re destined to be with her, why waste these ten years?” Eighteen-year-old Ryder thought it was utterly ridiculous, shaking off his hand. “You’re crazy! I’ll only ever love Hazel!” But that confession, in the end, never happened. Twenty-eight-year-old Ryder seized the opportunity to stay, claiming he was there to help his younger self see his true feelings sooner. Gradually, I noticed Ryder had changed. When Serena Brooks fell, he would immediately rush over, pick her up, and take her to the hospital, completely forgetting that I had waited for him for a full hour at the amusement park. At gatherings, he’d naturally remember Serena didn’t like peanuts, picking them out of the spicy chicken before offering it to me, forgetting that I was allergic to peanuts. On rainy days, his umbrella was always over Serena’s head first, even if I was standing right beside him, getting drenched. Each small shift felt like a slow, agonizing erosion, my heart sinking lower and lower. Until the day we had to choose our universities. “Hazel, I’m sorry,” Ryder’s eyes flickered, unable to meet mine directly. “I can’t go to Northwood University with you anymore. Riverdale University’s new AI program is a better fit for me.” My heart instantly turned to ice. I knew it all too well. Riverdale University was the only school Serena Brooks’ barely-passing grades would get her into. He squeezed my hand, his voice softening into that familiar, persuasive plea: “Come to Riverdale University with me? That way we can still be together. I always listened to you before, just this once, let me have my way, okay? I’ll listen to you forever after this.” His words pierced my heart like a thousand tiny needles. I silently pulled my hand away and nodded. But then, behind his back, I quickly prepared all my documents and applied for an offer from a top university overseas. Ryder, if your love isn’t solely for me anymore, then I don’t want it. … The day my acceptance letter arrived, my heart felt strangely calm. I found the large storage box, filled with everything Ryder had given me over the years. Childish crayon drawings, limited edition sneakers, a necklace engraved with our initials, a thick stack of movie ticket stubs, notes he’d stayed up all night to organize for me… Once, I cherished them like treasures. Now, I carried the box to the dumpster downstairs, without a moment’s hesitation, and threw everything inside. As I turned, I saw two figures arguing in the distance. Twenty-eight-year-old Ryder, in a crisp suit, was gripping eighteen-year-old Ryder’s wrist tightly. The younger Ryder, tall and lean, his white shirt billowing in the wind, his handsome face that made all the girls at school scream, was filled with fury. “Let go!” “Why are you still looking for her?” Older Ryder’s voice was strained. “What you should be doing right now is going to be with Serena! She’s the one you truly love!” “Nonsense!” The younger Ryder violently shook off his hand, his brows furrowed in defiance. “The only person I love is Hazel. Can’t you just disappear, you lunatic?” “Oh really?” Older Ryder sneered, his voice sharp. “Then why are you giving up your future and Northwood University for Serena?!” Younger Ryder’s face stiffened, his voice growing colder. “Who said it was for her!” I didn’t want to watch their absurd argument anymore and turned to leave, but Ryder spotted me instantly. He rushed over, grabbing my wrist, his voice softening in a flash. “Hazel, didn’t you say you wanted to see that new romance movie last time? I’ve bought tickets, let’s go together, okay?” “No.” My voice was devoid of any emotion. Ryder’s smile froze for a second, then he softened his voice again. “Are you still mad about me changing my university choice? You already agreed to go to Riverdale University with me, didn’t you? That program really has great prospects, just this once, please, agree to me, okay?” As he spoke, the corners of his eyes drooped slightly, that vulnerable expression I could never resist. In the past, whenever he looked at me like that, I’d agree to anything. But now, I just felt numb. Before I could answer, Ryder half-forced me into his newly bought sports car. Older Ryder, his face gloomy, followed and sat in the back, still in his sharp suit. The car started, and the cramped space was filled with a heavy atmosphere. Older Ryder glanced around the car and suddenly spoke. “This car is new, isn’t it? You should change Hazel’s favorite starry night air freshener. Serena can’t stand it, she likes fruity scents. Also, switch out the strawberry milk in the glove compartment. Serena is lactose intolerant, keep some plain crackers instead.” Ryder’s fingers tightened on the steering wheel, his knuckles turning white. “Are you done yet? I’m telling you one last time, I only love Hazel, I could never, ever like Serena Brooks!” But Older Ryder seemed not to hear his outburst. “Oh really? Because you’re clearly going to love her to your very core, drink yourself to the ER for her, wait outside her house all night, even…” He listed one crazy thing after another that his future self would do for Serena Brooks. I sat in the passenger seat, each word like an ice pick stabbing into my heart, making it almost impossible to breathe. I looked through the car window at the rapidly receding streetlights outside, everything blurring into a painful haze. At the movie theater, Ryder bought a large bucket of popcorn and handed it to me—my favorite caramel flavor. During the movie, he’d instinctively lean over to whisper and complain about the plot to me. The screen light illuminated his handsome profile, his eyelashes unbelievably long. As I watched him, I felt a wave of daze. Memories flooded back uncontrollably. When he was three, he’d wobble into my room, hugging a small pillow, and say in a baby voice, “Mommy says boys should sleep with their wives.” When he was seven, he fought a chubby kid from the next class to get back my hair clip, coming back with a bruised and swollen face, then carefully tucked the broken clip, recovered from the fight, into his pocket like a treasure. When I was twelve, I was hospitalized with a fever. He skipped school, ran to my side, and, with red eyes, leaned over my bed, whispering, “Hazel, don’t scare me.” When we were fifteen, and love first blossomed, he clumsily wrote me a love letter, full of mistakes, but solemnly drew a whole page of hearts. I couldn’t understand how a boy who had carved me into his very life could, as that man said, fall in love with an ordinary Serena Brooks ten years later, and love her with such a tragic, subservient intensity. But everything that had happened recently made it impossible for me to disbelieve it. Just then, Ryder’s phone vibrated wildly. The name flashing on the screen was “Serena Brooks.” He glanced at it and hung up immediately. The phone rang again relentlessly. He hung up again. This repeated countless times. Then, Older Ryder, who had been silent in the back seat, suddenly grabbed his hand and urgently asked, “What’s the date today?” “The tenth, why?” Ryder replied impatiently. “Answer the phone! Hurry!” Older Ryder’s voice was filled with an unprecedented urgency. “It’s today! Serena is going to be harassed by some delinquents. To escape them, she’ll jump from a second-story window, break her leg, and be hospitalized for a month! Go now!” Ryder’s brows furrowed. “What are you talking about? Even if something happens, it has nothing to do with me. We’re just classmates at best!” “You’ll regret it if you don’t go! You’ll hate yourself to death!” Older Ryder was practically yelling. Ryder scoffed, his voice resolute. “I’d regret it more if I left Hazel here alone!” After saying that, he muted his phone and flipped it face down on the seat. Older Ryder stared at him for a few seconds, his eyes complex, then finally turned and left. “You won’t go? I will!” With that, he strode out, disappearing through the cinema entrance. The movie continued, but I could clearly feel that Ryder’s mind was completely elsewhere. He grew restless and anxious, his fingers unconsciously tapping the armrest, his eyes frequently darting towards the flipped phone, its screen lighting up silently again and again. Finally, after the screen lit up one more time, he suddenly stood up, hurriedly lying to me, “Hazel, I… I forgot to buy you a soda. Wait here, I’ll be right back!” He didn’t even dare to look me in the eye as he grabbed his phone and hurried out of the screening room. I watched his almost-running back disappear, my heart sinking little by little, down to the icy seabed. I had a strong premonition that he wouldn’t come back. Sure enough, a few minutes later, my phone vibrated. It was a video from “Twenty-eight-year-old Ryder.”
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