Essay:《爱》Love by Zhang Ailing (Eileen Chang)

There was a village girl from a middle-class family, she was born a beauty, many people came to play matchmaker, but none [of the negotiations] succeeded. That year she wasn’t more than about 15 or 16 years old, and one spring evening, she stood at the back door, with her hand on the peach tree. She remembers she was wearing a moon-white shirt. [She had seen] the young man across the way but they had never greeted each other, but had never greeted each other, he walked over, no great distance, stood still, and in a soft voice said: “Oh, you’re here too?” She didn’t say anything, and he said nothing else, just stood there a moment, and then each went on their way.

It was over just like that.

Later, this girl was abducted by her relatives and sold as a concubine [to a man] in another county. She was resold again and again. After passing through countless dangers and storms, when she had grown old, she still remembered that one thing, and she often mentioned that spring night, under the peach tree at the back door, and the young man there.

Among all the thousands of people you meet, in all the thousands of years, in the boundless wilderness of time, there is no ‘behind’, and no ‘ahead’, there is only coincidental catching up, [and in such moments] there are no other words to say, only a gentle question: “Oh, you’re here too?”