That year, I was 21 years old, a year after graduating from college, and my life felt like a stagnant pond. I worked at a small company, repeating monotonous tasks from nine to six, sometimes staying up until 10:30 PM. After work, I would return to my empty rental apartment, play video games, or just mindlessly scroll through my phone.
One day, my phone rang with the familiar "ding ding ding" sound of QQ. For us kids from the 90s, QQ was our playground, and we were the OGs of this platform. But as we grew up, it seemed everyone had left. Still, I couldn't bring myself to uninstall it—it held too many memories of my teenage years. I bet many of my peers felt the same way. I thought it might be an old friend reaching out.
I messaged her, "Who are you? How did you add me?" Her reply was, "Expand my circle, expand my circle!!" I casually checked her QQ space and found it belonged to a little girl I didn't know. Her QQ space was filled with colorful emojis and posts, bursting with a girl's personality, quirky and vibrant.
During our chat, I learned her name was Zhang Shiyu, 13 years old, a second-year middle school student. However, chatting with her made me feel relaxed and entertained; after all, kids have no guile, and any expression is the most genuine, as if I had returned to middle school, where everyone was just a middle schooler.
Slowly, our chats evolved from her initial "expand my circle" to messaging each other daily. She would share stories from school—like how the cafeteria lady gave her an extra piece of braised pork, or how a classmate sleepwalked and wore his slippers backward. I would tell her about my mundane life—like how my boss revised my PowerPoint five times, or how a colleague was caught slacking off by the boss.
Her world was pure and bright, like a canvas untouched by the grime of reality, while my world was already covered in the dust of adulthood. We were like two people from different dimensions, yet our paths crossed in this virtual world of QQ. She studied in a big city in the north, while I worked in a small city in the south.
One night, she sent me a voice message, her voice crisp and playful, with a hint of trendiness: "Hey, uncle, what do you do? Your life can't be that boring, right?" I chuckled and replied with a smile, "Uncle? Call me big brother! Yes, I'm just watching shows, scrolling on my phone, maybe playing some games."
She immediately responded, "Wow, that's so boring! You need to get out more! How about I take you to our school's night market for some snacks?" I stared at the screen, imagining for a moment, even though I knew it was impossible. To not dampen her enthusiasm, I replied, "Of course, when the opportunity arises, you'll take me around!"
During that time, our chats became the highlight of my day. No matter how exhausting work was, her messages—like the simple "It's so hot today, I had three cups of milk tea"—made the day feel less tiring. At first, she always typed, but as we became more familiar, she mostly sent voice messages. Whenever I had time, I would listen to her 99+ voice messages.
Gradually, I learned more about her: she liked strawberry lollipops, was obsessed with Jay Chou's songs, and hated rainy days because they soaked her canvas shoes. Her joys and frustrations were deeply etched in my mind.
She shared all the gossip from her life. Her parents divorced due to a broken relationship, and when we first connected, she was living with her dad, who wasn't the most attentive. Her most common complaints were about him—like why he didn't make her a midnight snack when she was hungry because she couldn't cook. Once, she secretly recorded a voice message of her arguing with her dad, where he said, "You're too fat, eat less midnight snacks, or you'll have trouble getting married later." This shocked me.
I thought her dad was harsh, so I joked with her in our chats, "I wish I were your dad." She curiously asked, "Why would you want to be my dad?" I replied, "Because it seems... your dad isn't nice to you." She confidently said, "Oh, actually, my dad is very good to me. We just 'pia' each other, but I love him, and he loves me too!"
Later, even if I only replied to her with an emoji, she would send 99+ messages in our chat.
This continued for more than half a year. Then one day, she told me her mom picked her up, and she would be living with her mom from then on. I guessed her parents might have gone through a custody battle, and the court awarded her to her mom. This change indirectly led to us losing contact.
Weeks later, I couldn't find her in my QQ contacts—I mistakenly thought she had deleted me, after all, she was just an online friend... But, half a month later, she added me back.
She explained that her mom controlled her phone, QQ, her time... everything. A few days later, her mom deleted me from her contacts again, and our communication ended like that.
I thought her mom might be a very controlling person, not giving her much freedom. When she lived with her dad, they would argue, but he didn't impose too many restrictions on her life.
Years later, she suddenly added me back on QQ, asking if I had forgotten her. I teased her like before: "Who are you? How did you add me?"...
But I was surprised: "How does she still remember me? I've always been someone easy to forget."
At that time, she was already in high school. She told me she rented a place near the school because the high school was too far from her mom's house, although her mom would often come over every week.
During this time, she would occasionally send me a few messages each month—but not the endless chatter like before.
I could feel that she was under a lot of pressure, no longer the carefree girl she used to be. The pressure of high school studies, combined with her mom's strict control, changed her.
In our time, although studying was tough, we at least had weekends to rest and didn't have too many tutoring classes—I don't know if it's because I grew up in the countryside, but I studied in a small town from elementary to high school.
Although I wanted to comfort her, I really didn't know what to say...
Nowadays, many schools in mainland China compress students' weekends through extra courses and tutoring, increasing the pressure on many students. Last year, I saw news online about more than a dozen students in Jiangsu jumping off buildings due to academic pressure. It wasn't until then that the Jiangsu Provincial Education Department promised to restore normal rest times for students.
Two months later, she disappeared from my QQ list again, and I knew her mom had deleted me once more...
The story temporarily ends in June 2021.