We are all prisoners of our own identity, locked up in a prison of our own construction, and we build high walls and enclose ourselves in it, looking at the scenery through the narrow window, looking like a king.

I sat on a park bench with a ring box in my hand, looking at Lu Xue beside me very strangely, she was holding her cheeks and smiling at the canal not far away, her eyes unblinking, disfocused, as if thinking about something. I followed her gaze, and a dead leaf fell to the surface of the water with the wind, creating a circle of ripples. Simple, regular concentric circles, pushing in circles towards the shore, crashing into the embankment, and then disappearing as if it had never existed.

"Ripples." I whispered softly.

"The ripples push the waves, and the breeze caresses them." Luxue whispered.

I looked at Luxue, and she was still smiling, looking at the water, as if to say to me, but not at all.

I sighed and whispered in a voice that only I could hear, "Ripples, spread out in the form of concentric circles, and the shape of the concentric circles changes depending on the amount of external resistance encountered. ”

"Oh?"

"Nothing." I shook my head slightly.

"Chaos theory?" Lu Xue turned her head, looked at me, smiled and asked softly, she was still holding her cheeks, and her eyes seemed to be shining.

"Well, things always develop in unpredictable directions due to the intervention of external factors, that is, predetermined directions but not the same."

Lu Xue looked at me and smiled, "People are moving in their own direction, even if it is difficult to move forward, few people think that they are going in the wrong direction. ”

"Maybe." I shook my head slightly.

"If you don't want to change, don't change, I like people who persevere." Lu Xue muttered softly, turned her head again, and looked at the water, the focus in her eyes dissipated again, as if she was thinking about something again.

Change? What to change? Thinking? Cognition? How do you do things? I shook my head, or not change, okay, whether we surround ourselves in prison or in the kingdom, whether we are prisoners or kings, at least in our cognition, in our thinking, we can at least calmly face change, whether it is inside or outside, even if it is false calm.

I looked at the ring box in my hand, hesitated, and handed it over.

"Sent to me?" Lu Xue glanced at the ring box and said.

"Sort of, I saw that you liked it very much, so I bought it."

"Sort of? Well, I can't ask for it. ”

"Oh." I nodded, and withdrew my hand. Also, I can't let Ruxue wear it only in front of me, women dress up rooms or accessories for the sake of beauty and comfort, and if a man does the same, it will give people the feeling of being subsumed into his personal belongings, and I understand this.

"Huh." Lu Xue suddenly laughed, her eyebrows and eyes were crooked, the corners of her mouth were slightly curled, and her crystal white teeth were exposed, which was very amazing.

"I like this ring so much, why don't we exchange it." Lu Xue said as she untied her necklace, removed the pendant, and then hung the ring lightly.

Swap, well, I nodded, although the price is different, it is still equal in terms of value.

"Brother Xiaoshan, can you bring it for me?" Lu Xue shook her necklace and said.

I took the necklace, looked at Lu Xue's pink neck, took a deep breath, forced myself to compose, and trembled around her neck, and finally completed this difficult task after several twists and turns.

"Why don't you wear the ring on your hand?" I asked.

"Brother Xiaoshan doesn't know? A woman wears only one ring on her hand in her life. Lu Xue turned her back to me and turned her head to me.

"Oh." I nodded. "I don't know much about rings." I replied in a haphazard manner, frantically withdrawing back the hand that had been swept by her hair.

"If, I mean if, if, little brother, I ask you to help me put the ring on my hand, will you?"

Luxue didn't turn around, just turned her head, and I felt as if she was looking at the water again, her voice was soft, and it didn't sound like she was asking me, but more like asking herself.

The breeze rose suddenly, blowing up the dead leaves, and ruffling her hair, and rippling circles on the water.

"I, oh, don't know." I didn't look at her, I looked at the water like she did, and said softly, as if answering her, but more like answering myself.

"Hehe, I'm joking, then, the exchange that was said to be good, put it away." Ruscher handed me the jewelry box containing her dolphin pendant, and I nodded and took it. Exchanged, just exchanged. I told myself.

"Brother Xiaoshan, let's go back." Lu Xue stood up, straightened her wind-blown hair, and looked at the water with a hint of loneliness in her eyes.

"Yes." I answered and stood up.

"Look, it's dying, isn't it?"

"Well, it should be dying, just look at its miserable appearance and know that it is a loser."

Suddenly, there were several children's cries from the bench next to them.

"It's dying anyway, so why don't we bury it and throw it with a stone?" One child excitedly proposed.

"Okay." The other child chimed in.

"It's not fun, why don't we throw it into the air and see who throws it high?" Another child suggested.

"It's not good, look at him dirty, I'm too lazy to catch it."

Ruxue frowned and looked at them, then at me, as if asking for my opinion. I frowned and thought about it, but walked over to the group of children.

A few children, about ** years old, they were discussing something excitedly around a cardboard box, maybe the discussion was too intense, they didn't notice me when I walked over, I looked into the box, only to see a kitten in the box, was screaming sadly, one of its front paws seemed to have been bitten off by another animal, only half of one ear was left, there were clear tear marks on it, and one eye was gray, obviously blind.

"Alright, then let's bury it." The children had clearly made an agreement, and their faces were full of excitement.

"You all go away, don't touch it." I groaned, raised my voice, pushed them away, picked up the cardboard box, and turned to walk towards Luxue.

The children were stunned for a moment, looking at me in amazement.

"Brother Xiaoshan, it will also scare people." Lu Xue said with a smile, and reached out to touch the kitten again, "It's so pitiful, how did it happen?" ”

"Maybe it's a bite from a nearby wild cat."

"It's so pathetic."

I nodded slightly, shook my head again, and leaned over to gently put the carton down as I passed by a bin.

"Brother Xiaoshan, you are"

"It's not going to live."

"But it's not dead yet?"

"Well, I'm going to die soon, maybe it's going to cause some trouble for the sanitation workers." I said lightly.

"Brother Xiaoshan, why are you like this," Lu Xue said very seriously, her face was as cold as frost, and the unchanging smile suddenly disappeared, looking at me like a stranger, "How can you be so cruel." With that, she turned around sharply, walked briskly forward, and soon disappeared without a trace.

A breeze blew, and a dead leaf swirled and fell into the cardboard box, and the kitten, as if frightened, shrank into the corner, shivering.

I sat back on the bench, leaning back on the back of the chair, as if I didn't have any strength in my body.

Cruel? No, it's cold-blooded.

I don't know when I got used to dealing with problems calmly and making the most rational judgments, thinking that in this way I could avoid harm, avoid mistakes, and avoid those troubles that I thought were unnecessary. Maybe I'm wrong, and maybe reason isn't the best way to deal with life and life.

"What are you going to do with it?" A few children came over again at some point and asked cautiously.

Disposed, I shook my head and did not answer them.

"It's going to die soon, that's how the loser should be."

"Loser?"

"Well, survival of the fittest, this is the law of nature." One of the children, bold, said eloquently.

Survival of the fittest, the law of nature, I shook my head with a wry smile, "It may or may not die." ”

The children shrugged their shoulders and disagreed with my statement, "It's crippled now, what's the point of being alive?" ”

"It's like, you might as well give it to us, we can play for a while." Another child chimed in.

"Meaning? No one is qualified to define the meaning of someone else's life, even if it is just a cat. ”

"If you don't give it, forget it." The children got a little impatient and turned to leave.

"No," I stopped, "we can do something more meaningful, something more difficult." You see, it may be dying, but it still has hope of surviving, and if we revive it, wouldn't it be more meaningful, more difficult, more fulfilling, and if it still died, then that's it, and we have nothing to lose, right? ”

The children looked at each other and whispered for a while, and the bold one looked up and asked, "Doesn't that seem boring?" ”

"Whoever said, like, well, you go to the playground and if you have a choice, you can only play one of your favorite games and then you have to leave, or, get rid of your favorite game and then you can play all the other games you want, you will choose that one."

"Later, of course."

"yes, that's why it's the greatest pleasure to revive it." I smiled and nodded.

"It seems to make sense, so what should we do."

"Well, go buy some milk and sausages and come back," I thought for a moment, and took out the money and handed it to them.

The children took the money and ran away, and after a while they ran back with sausages and milk.

"What do you do after that?" The children asked with interest.

I opened a carton of milk and put it in a cardboard box, broke the sausages, and put them in the same box. "After that, you're going to feed it several times a day."

"Will it survive if you do that?"

"Yes." I picked up the cardboard box, placed it under the bench, patted the box and whispered, "I'll come to see you more often in the future." ”

Will it survive? Can you? I do not know.

I stood up and shook my head with a wry smile, and a fallen leaf fell on the water not far away, causing ripples in circles.

If I had done this in the first place, Luxue wouldn't have hated me. I thought.

We are all prisoners of our own identity, locked up in a prison of our own construction, we are all praying for happiness, we are for salvation, deep down.