There was something quietly sacred about early mornings in Qinghe Village.
The light came softly, as if the sun had politely asked permission to peek over the hilltops. Mist threaded through the loquat orchard and between the stone paths, rising like incense toward the tiled rooftops. The cicadas had not yet begun their daily song. Even the birds chirped in slow, sleepy intervals.
Lin Yuan stepped outside with Da Huang following at his side, their footsteps pressing dew into the soft earth. He carried a shallow wooden box, filled with bundles of rice paper and a few neatly wrapped loquat pastries—small gifts for the neighbors, part of his quiet ritual now that the loquats were finally ripe.
At the garden entrance, he saw Xu Qingyu crouched beside the pond, scattering tiny pellets of feed into the water. The koi stirred lazily, swirling around her reflection. Her hair was loosely pinned with a bamboo stick, and her sleeves were damp from leaning too close to the water.
She turned slightly as he approached.
"They're getting spoiled," she said. "I think they ignore the natural bugs now."
"Luxury changes habits," Lin Yuan replied with a grin.
"Is that a warning?"
"Just an observation."
She stood, wiping her hands on a linen cloth.
"Ready for the walk?"
He nodded, lifting the box.
They had planned it a week ago—delivering loquat pastries and tea leaves from their own garden to a handful of elderly villagers who couldn't easily make it to the pavilion or studio. No big gesture. Just an excuse to see faces and hear stories.
---
Their first stop was the home of Grandma Wen, a widow in her seventies who rarely left her home but was known for weaving the finest reed mats in the county.
She opened the door slowly but smiled wide when she saw them.
"I haven't had visitors this early since the rice patrol in '87," she chuckled.
Xu Qingyu handed her the bundle. "We brought loquat pastries. Lin Yuan made them himself."
"Did he, now?" Grandma Wen peered at him. "You cook?"
"Only when she supervises."
She laughed—a creaky, heartwarming sound.
She invited them in, and they sat for a short while on her porch, sipping warm soy milk as she recounted how her late husband once built a kite so large it pulled him two meters into the air before crashing into a mulberry tree.
Lin Yuan listened closely, his eyes on the horizon, but his heart fully in the moment.
---
Their next visit was to Uncle Yao, a quiet man in his eighties who lived beside the stream. He no longer spoke much, having lost most of his hearing, but his smile said more than words could.
Xu Qingyu handed him the package.
He opened it with care, nodding in understanding, and then disappeared inside for a moment. When he returned, he held an old inkstone—well-worn, with calligraphy engraved on the edges.
He placed it in Lin Yuan's hands, his eyes serious.
Lin Yuan hesitated. "Are you sure?"
The old man nodded, patting his shoulder.
Later that night, Lin Yuan would set the inkstone on the studio shelf, just below Yin Yue's drawing of Master Gao. Another piece of the village finding a new home.
---
As they returned to the estate that afternoon, their arms lighter but their hearts fuller, Xu Qingyu said softly:
"We don't need to create meaning."
He looked at her.
"We just need to notice it."
---
That evening, with the sun setting behind the hills and the garden bathed in honey light, they began preparing for something Xu Qingyu had quietly envisioned for weeks: the first evening "Memory Circle" in the old barn.
It wasn't an event.
Not a ceremony.
Just an invitation to sit together and speak aloud the things that lingered in silence.
No one was required to share.
No one needed to attend.
But word spread.
And as the hour neared, neighbors trickled in.
Aunt Zhao came with a basket of dried orange peel and a thermos of herbal tea. Wei Qiang brought his grandfather, who had never once stepped foot in the learning pavilion but had agreed to come to the barn "just to see what the fuss was."
The room filled slowly. Mats laid in a circle. A single clay lamp burned in the center, casting long, slow shadows across the walls.
Xu Qingyu sat quietly at one end. Lin Yuan leaned against a beam nearby, Da Huang curled beside him like a guardian of the space.
At first, there was only silence.
Then a woman in her fifties spoke, her voice shaking slightly.
"My brother used to whistle the same tune every morning before going to school," she said. "I haven't heard it since he left for the city twenty years ago. Sometimes I hum it to the chickens."
Soft laughter followed. Not mocking—just warm.
Then someone else shared.
Then another.
And slowly, the barn became something sacred again—not just restored wood, but restored memory.
No one kept minutes.
No one recorded.
But everyone remembered.
---
When the circle ended, and the guests had left with soft goodbyes and deeper breaths, Lin Yuan and Xu Qingyu remained inside, sweeping the floor slowly.
She looked up at him and whispered, "This is what healing feels like."
He nodded, placing a reed mat back in its corner.
"Like remembering without hurting."
---
The next morning, it rained again.
A soft drizzle that kissed the tops of the loquat trees and fed the herb garden without drama.
In the quiet, Lin Yuan visited the orchard to check on the last row of fruits. The branches had grown heavy—ready for the final harvest.
He spent the morning collecting the ripe loquats, placing them carefully into woven baskets lined with straw. Each fruit golden and fragrant, warm with summer sweetness.
He delivered the baskets, one by one, to various homes across the village—not as a businessman, not as a benefactor, just as a neighbor who had too much and wanted to share.
---
That afternoon, a small group of children arrived at the studio unexpectedly.
One held a jar of colored stones.
Another had a worn-out recorder.
The youngest dragged along a pillow.
They settled themselves inside with the comfort of people who had long belonged.
"Can we just sit?" one of them asked.
Lin Yuan, who had been writing quietly at the back table, looked up and smiled.
"Of course."
No classes.
No agenda.
Just presence.
He returned to his page and wrote one more sentence:
> Peace is a place where people arrive without needing to ask permission.
---
Later that week, as the last of the loquat baskets were gone and the orchard lay bare again, Xu Qingyu approached Lin Yuan with a new idea.
"We should have a letterbox."
He looked up from his tea. "A what?"
"A place where villagers can leave letters. Not mail. Just thoughts. Stories. Memories."
He nodded slowly. "Anonymous?"
"If they want."
"Where will we keep them?"
She pointed to the old camphor tree near the garden entrance.
"Under the tree," she said. "Where the roots already listen."
---
By the following morning, a simple wooden box had appeared beneath the camphor.
A narrow slot in its lid.
No sign. No explanation.
And yet, by evening, it held three letters.
One was a short poem.
One was a sketch of the herb garden, drawn in shaky pencil.
And one was a note that simply read:
> I still miss her, every time the wind smells like ginger.
---
Lin Yuan read the notes aloud in the barn the next evening, when a few neighbors gathered again.
No one claimed them.
No one needed to.
They belonged to all now.
And that was enough.
---
As night fell on Qinghe Village and the lamp in the studio dimmed, Xu Qingyu sat quietly by the pond, her reflection rippling with the koi.
Lin Yuan approached with two cups of warm goji tea.
He handed her one.
She took it without a word.
Then she said, "We're building something, aren't we?"
He nodded.
"Without bricks," he said.
"Without blueprints," she added.
"Just... breath and memory."
She looked over at him.
"Thank you."
"For what?"
"For making me remember what stillness feels like."
He reached over and touched her hand, just once, before letting the moment stretch into silence.
The koi swam beneath the surface.
And the wind curled gently through the reeds.
---
[End of Chapter 19 ]