The Moon Runs to Me

The film Qin Sang had made when she first started out was called Letter from Afar. Its director, Lin Song, was Taiwanese—a famously eccentric auteur in the art-house circuit. But his subject matter was often bold, making it difficult to guarantee a mainland release. Letter from Afar told the story of a deaf-mute girl, Yu Sibe, and a Taiwanese exchange student, Xu Jiashu—the tender, innocent first love between a young boy and girl.

Set in high school, right at that age of being not quite ripe, it had brushed up against censorship red lines. The film never made it to the mainland, only getting a limited release in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Art-house films had a narrow audience, so it wasn’t a box-office hit—but it garnered strong reviews. Its Douban score had held steady at 8.2, with over eighty thousand ratings—a significant breakthrough for an art-house film.

The reviews were numerous, averaging around four stars. The top long-form review came from a user named “Off the Rails”:

[When I first watched this film, I was seventeen. Back then, I also had a boy I really liked. But through three years of being classmates, I never took that step. Now I’m twenty-seven, still single, and watching it again brings back so many emotions. Xu Jiashu only found the belated love letter tucked in a book ten years later—and I, ten years later, received a wedding invitation. Yes, the boy I once deeply loved is getting married.]

[You have to savor it carefully to feel the filmmakers’ sincerity. From scriptwriting to production to acting, Letter from Afar is more than just a story of youthful regret. It’s about the longing across the strait, the yearning of two hearts separated by distance. In the south, there is fine wood; in the north, there is longing. Xu Jiashu’s Xu, without the double-person radical, becomes Yu. And Yu Sibe’s Yu is a fish trapped in the deep sea after losing Xu Jiashu.]

[The director was clever—the film unfolds from Xu Jiashu’s perspective. Ten years later, he discovers that love letter tucked in a book, so he returns from Taiwan to the north. What the film gradually reveals isn’t just that bittersweet past—it’s what Yu Sibe never had the chance to say. Unable to speak was her greatest regret. She could only express herself through words. But fate played its cruel hand. After Xu Jiashu returned to Taipei and moved houses, the book containing her love was buried in the deepest, darkest corner. Time passed, and the girl’s unspoken love became the last trace she left in this world.]

[A decade later, returning to the old place brought no reunion, no happy ending—only irreparable regret. Yu Sibe came from a poor family, living with her grandmother. After her grandmother passed, she was forced to drop out and enter the workforce early. You’d think fate might finally gift the unfortunate—but no. On a rainy night, she died in a delivery accident. Ironically, her parents only came back after her death. Those two tears they shed were just for more compensation. No one loved her in life—and no one loved her in death.]

[Xu Jiashu was only a faint, flickering glow in her bleak existence. But even that light didn’t belong to her. Was it regrettable? It must have been. By the time Xu Jiashu finally sensed the surging love beneath her faint signals, he’d already lost the chance to respond. Ten years ago, he couldn’t hear her love. Ten years later, she never got to hear his answer.]

[I often wonder—if Xu Jiashu had understood Yu Sibe’s hand gesture before parting at the bus stop, would things have been different? If he’d realized she was saying “I like you” instead of what she’d told him when they first met—”You have a nice smile”—would it have been less regretful?]

[But then I think: isn’t youth the very embodiment of regret? Whether that hypothetical could have come true no longer matters. The answer lies in the bouquet of sunflowers Xu Jiashu left behind.]

As dusk settled, the projector cast a blue glow, its shifting light and shadow flickering across the man’s cool, clear features, making them seem even more aloof.

Jiang Mingyi sent a WeChat message: [After high school, she worked at that coffee shop. Later, I heard she retook the exams and got into the Central Academy of Drama through the arts track. Pretty good results—I think she ranked first in her year for the专业课.]

[You were both in the capital—the Central Academy’s in Dongcheng, Tsinghua’s in Haidian. Not that far—about half an hour by car. You’re telling me you never ran into each other all those years?]

The Central Academy was in Dongcheng District, Tsinghua in Haidian—not far, about thirty minutes by car. But crossing districts in Beijing was like crossing cities. Even in the same city, it felt like two different centuries.

Xie Yuncan glanced at the message and didn’t reply. His hand at his side idly rubbed the crinkled cellophane wrapper of a mint candy, making a soft rustling sound.

He had a mild smoking habit—couldn’t remember when it had started. Maybe it was from being worn down by arguments with Zhou Wanqing, or from hitting dead ends in his research that left him restless.

Maybe it was because the mint candies he used to like had disappeared, with no replacement. One night, he’d started smoking—the burning nicotine numbed his nerves.

Mint candies were different. That coolness spreading across the tongue, the sharp kick when you bit through to the center—followed by a faint, lingering bitterness.

Just like that night when she’d looked up at him with a smile and placed that tiny mint candy in his palm—that inexplicable tremor in his heart.

On that cold, clear night, the fireworks blooming in the sky reflected in her eyes. She smiled, more dazzling than the fireworks themselves.

The projector hummed as it ran, a gentle background score flowing through the quiet space. The drumbeat slowly grew restless, the music turning sorrowful as the plot took a dark turn.

Rain pattered down, traffic streamed by. The blurry, hypnotic lights of the rainy night felt like an inescapable cage.

A girl in a yellow delivery uniform rode her electric scooter through the rain, drenched as if by a waterfall. Her delicate face was soaked. Turning a corner, she swerved to avoid a stray cat and fell. Her hearing aid dropped into the bushes. She struggled to get up, rain pouring down, light and shadow crisscrossing. She fumbled around for a long time before finding the broken device. Putting it on, she tapped it hard—the chaotic background noise sharpened to a piercing whine, then the world seemed to mute. She couldn’t hear anything anymore.

Whether Qin Sang’s acting was good or not was debatable.

Watching her stand alone in the rainy night, mud-splattered, her face scraped—yet she seemed oblivious to the pain, frantically slapping at her ears like a lost traveler in this neon city. Panicked, helpless, it was impossible to tell if the water on her face was rain or tears. Her wet eyes were full of bewilderment.

Cars passed by, but no one noticed her plight. She was as insignificant as a grain of sand.

She struggled to right the scooter, limping along, leaning on it as she walked through the rain.

Distant headlights blazed in her eyes, too bright to bear.

She instinctively raised a hand to shield her face—but couldn’t hear the car horn speeding toward her.

A flash of white light—then nothing but wreckage. The scooter lay on its side, its wheel still spinning. Rain washed over the pavement, thin streams of water mingling with bright red blood.

The neon-drenched city formed a grotesquely beautiful tableau in the rainy night. The girl’s solitary body lay on the ground, blood pooling beneath her. She stared blankly at the sky, rain threading like beads, the night pitch-black. Her face was still, lifeless, her eyes slowly dimming, losing all light.

Yu Sibe died alone on that rainy night nine years ago. The day of her funeral was her birthday—but no one remembered. Her parents, who’d each started new families, came back crying and fighting, only for the compensation money.

When others spoke of it, they’d always sigh: “That youngest daughter of the Yu family was so pitiful—she’d just turned eighteen when she died.”

Her life had barely begun. She hadn’t even had a chance to properly see the world before dying alone that night.

Her death was like a pebble dropped into a still lake—barely a ripple.

In the distance, the city pulsed with glamour and excess, a world of dazzling strangeness. But the quarrels and noise before her—she could hear none of it.

In the film, the man held back his tears until he sat on the bus they’d once ridden together to school. Remembering their parting, the girl standing at the bus stop signing to him. He’d asked: “What does that mean?”

Yu Sibe had smiled and written in his palm.

She wrote: “You have a nice smile.”

He broke down, sobbing.

As a spectator, Xie Yuncan felt a sudden bitterness rise in his throat. His chest felt heavy, as if pricked by a sharp needle—a tingling, numbing ache.

Jiang Mingyi: [I heard she’s been struggling financially—apparently, she applied for both national student loans and need-based aid.]

Art imitates life. Qin Sang’s life trajectory had closely mirrored Yu Sibe’s—dropping out at eighteen, burdened with debt at a young age.

Jiang Mingyi: [Someone from her school told me she’s been working really hard—taking odd jobs after classes, barely making it back to the dorm before curfew. She doesn’t socialize much either. Kind of like you—pretty solitary.]

Like him?

Qin Sang had been struggling just to get by. How could someone fighting to survive have time for friends?

Jiang Mingyi: [But—]

Jiang Mingyi: [Funny coincidence—the ‘Light the Lamp’ program she applied for—that’s the aid program your family set up, isn’t it?]

Light the Lamp was an educational philanthropy project Old Master Xie had established to support drama, dance, and traditional arts. Its purpose was to preserve cultural heritage and help academically outstanding but financially struggling students complete their education, so they could one day become better actors and stage performers.

Xie Yuncan’s gaze flickered. The cool glow of the screen reflected in his eyes as the film reached its end. The man bent down, placing a bouquet of sunflowers before the grave. He said nothing, only stood in silence for a long time before turning and walking away.

The final frame lingered on that beautifully wrapped bouquet. Sunflowers symbolize vibrant life, the bright sun—radiant, brilliant, forever passionate.

The first time they’d met, Xu Jiashu, staying with Yu’s family as an exchange student, had brought sunflowers as a housewarming gift. Back then, they were just a blessing.

In Yu Sibe’s silent world, Xu Jiashu’s arrival had been like a faint beam of light.

Small as it was, it had once illuminated her dark world.

Xie Yuncan traced the edge of his phone, his gaze steady. His Adam’s apple moved slightly, suppressing a dry, bitter ache.

In her barren, shadowed life—it turned out—he too had once unwittingly lit a small lamp for her.

The language of sunflowers: “Silent love. Love that was never spoken.”