— Because only in that winter, someone still read him poetry
The mirror layer projection settled slowly.
Shawn and Les floated through the translucent data field, their consciousness wrapped in reconstructed memories—as if they had fallen into a dream stitched together from scattered fragments.
The light dimmed, tinted amber like an old film coated in dust.
In the distance, a village awoke beneath the morning mist.
Mud-brick homes with thatched roofs stood in disarray. A few bare poplar trees trembled in the wind. From a loudspeaker at the village head, a radio announcer's voice rang out:
"Heed the Party's call! Total mobilization! Melt steel in your backyard! Grow ten thousand pounds of grain from every inch of land!"
Three bold red characters—"Red Star Village"—were painted on the faded wall of the commune's assembly hall, the letters weathered by rain, like the scars of a struggling era.
"Where are we?" Les whispered.
Shawn didn't reply. His gaze had already locked on the village center.
---
A teenage boy, dressed in a patched gray-blue uniform, chewed on a raw sweet potato while tuning a broadcast dial.
His name was Eliya. At this moment, he was a trainee at the village radio station.
"Attention! Attention! Breakfast is served as usual. Highland barley porridge for all. One bowl per person. No seconds allowed..."
Eliya finished the script mechanically, his voice rough. When he set the microphone down, a flicker of emptiness crossed his face.
Sunlight spilled across his shoulder—a leftover warmth from another time.
The door behind him creaked open. A figure leaned in—Lin Xue.
She wore a slightly worn white blouse, sleeves crisp, and a red armband identifying her as a broadcaster. Her gaze was not exactly soft, like a lake on the verge of freezing, its surface piercingly clear.
"You forgot to swap the script."
She handed him a slip of paper with the day's official announcements.
Eliya blinked, flustered, and quickly looked down. "Sorry... I didn't sleep well."
Lin Xue didn't scold him. She simply nodded. "Just don't make the cafeteria aunties come yell at us again."
She turned to leave, but paused at the door and asked, "Do you like reading?"
Eliya instinctively nodded. "I used to. When I was little."
A glint sparked in her eyes. "I have some books. Hidden behind my firewood hut. If you're interested... you can take a look."
Then she left.
Her voice still seemed to linger in the air, like a snowflake fallen into memory—silent, but enough to stir a restless heart.
---
That night, Eliya went.
Behind the firewood shed, amid stacks of straw and old tarps, he found a small parcel wrapped in oil paper beneath a wooden box.
Inside were two books: a collection of Shakespeare, a volume of modern poetry, and several yellowed sheets of stationery.
On one, in elegant handwriting, a short poem:
"They say spring never comes here, But still I wish to leave for you A flower blooming after snow."
Unsigned.
Eliya sat among the hay, reading the lines. A foreign warmth rose slowly in his chest. In the distance, steel furnaces roared. Yet in that moment, all the hammers and slogans seemed to fall silent.
---
The next day, Lin Xue didn't show up at the station.
Rumors spread: her "background was complicated." She was reassigned for "reeducation."
Eliya said nothing. He quietly copied last night's poem onto the back of a new script.
That afternoon, he broadcasted as usual—but at the end, he added an unscheduled segment:
"To close today's program, we present a short anonymous poem."
He read 'The Post-Snow Flower,' his voice steady but trembling at the edges.
That night, Lin Xue knocked on the rear window of the station.
"Are you insane?"
She was angry—but her eyes sparkled with barely restrained emotion.
"You'll get in trouble."
Eliya lowered his head. "I just... didn't want those words to rot on paper."
Lin Xue stared at him, silent for a while. Then she reached into her blouse and handed him a folded note.
Her second poem:
"Spring shattered by hammers, / I saved a sliver of green, / and hid it in your eyes."
---
The commune began requiring weekly ideological reports.
The Great Leap Forward entered a frenzy.
All metal items—tools, pots, doorknobs—were melted down.
Eliya stood beside a furnace, watching familiar household objects reduced to scrap.
He asked Algernon beside him, "Do you think this is really worth it?"
Algernon puffed on his pipe and grinned. "Does it matter?"
"Why not?"
"Because everyone's doing it."
That night, the furnace collapsed.
Two sixteen-year-old boys fell near the blaze. No one knew if they had fainted from hunger or died from exhaustion.
The broadcast the next morning declared: "Two model youths sacrificed heroically for the collective."
Eliya refused to read it.
He was suspended and sent home to "reflect."
Lin Xue brought him a small parcel of dried sweet potatoes.
She sat at his door, whispering, "You know... the slogans we read now? Someday people will laugh at them."
Eliya said nothing. He only looked at the empty bowl in her hands, and realized that what the world lacked most wasn't faith—but humanity.
---
Winter came swiftly.
Rumors of famine spread.
Some villagers fled in secret.
Lin Xue's name appeared on a "watchlist of suspicious elements." Anonymous reports accused her of "backward thinking" and "too many complaints."
She was summoned to write a self-criticism. She didn't come back that night.
Eliya waited at the station until dawn.
He broadcasted a poem of his own for the first time:
"I lit a lamp for you in the wind, Not to light the world, But so you might find your way home."
The next day, snow covered the village.
Eliya saw Lin Xue step out of the assembly hall—her clothes thin, her eyes weary.
He walked to her, removed his coat, and draped it over her shoulders.
Lin Xue looked up. Her eyes held no tears, only the light of parting.
"Eliya, if you wake up tomorrow... will you still remember me?"
He met her gaze and nodded firmly.
But in that instant, he understood:
He didn't want to wake up.
Not from this dream etched with her shadow.
Because only in this famine year did she read him poetry. Only in this famine year did she leave him a flower after the snow.
---
Wind and snow swelled again. The mirror field trembled—as if the entire construct sensed his reluctance.
Shawn's face hardened. 'He's clinging to the dream,' he muttered to Les, as the mirror layer hissed like static. 'If we don't pull him out now—'
Les' face darkened. He watched the boy in tattered blue and murmured:
"He's no longer just a projection..."
"He's become part of the dream."
At that moment, distant drums echoed faintly from the mirror's edge.
Not an alarm—but the prelude of spring 1960.
A paper list of "potential hostile elements" was nailed to the commune office wall.
Lin Xue's name was on it.
The mirror storm intensified. Smoke snapped. Radio static surged. The world began to reverse and splinter.
But Eliya stood still in the snow.
He held the worn poem in his hand, whispering softly:
"Not to light the world... only for you... to find your way home."