There is a maple grove in front of the courtyard of my house.

There is an old house on the right side of the maple grove, probably... Already... No one has been here for ten years......

This maple grove was never obscure, and at the time I noticed it, it was an ordinary autumn.

The soil has been paved with a layer of golden red maple leaves, and the maple leaves on the trees are like fireworks in the falling blue.

Since I was a child, my body has been weaker than that of children of the same age, and my family is a bit remote, and almost no children come to play with me, but like all children, I have a deep curiosity about nature and new things. But it's a very quiet character.

That day, as usual, when I got home from school, I walked the path diagonally through the maple forest to go home, and the soil had been paved with thick maple leaves, and I stepped on it softly and made a rustling sound, humming and striding forward all the way, without paying attention to the ...... under my feet

"Ahh

"Ahh

The exclamations of different sound qualities sounded, I felt the air go up, and I felt like I had fallen - my body rolled on the ground and fell on my heels.

The schoolbag hung from the back to the chest, and it also covered the view of the part of the eyes, so I couldn't find the east, west, north and south, I don't know how funny.

"Haha... You're so funny too... Haha..."

As I searched for the source of my laughter, I was greeted by a girl I had never seen before.

She sat half-curled on the floor, dressed in white pantyhose, her slender chestnut shoulder-length hair with a soft sheen, and a cute orange hairpin in her hair, she smiled, her expression was like a painting, I couldn't put into words, as if something was shining in the sun and the wind, running in my eyes.

The laughter was soft and soft, it was a girl, a girl my age. She propped up the ground with one hand, half-covered her mouth with the other, and let out a crisp laugh of silver bells.

"Who are you?"

Instead of having some inner turmoil, my questions were simple and rude.

The girl in her eyes calmly and elegantly patted the dust off her body, then slowly stood up and said slowly

"Is it me?"

"I... It's the elves who have broken into this territory!"

"Hmm! Although new to the ... But don't you think it's beautiful?"

"The maple trees in this place are the most beautiful I've ever seen... As soon as I lay down on these leaves, I fell asleep."

"The birds keep singing, do you know why the birds are so happy today?"

"Because I'm here today, and they've got new companions, and they're welcoming me."

The girl didn't answer my questions at all, she was asking and talking to herself.

It was the first strange and interesting person I met in my childhood memory.

"So who the hell are you," I asked again with a puzzled look in my eyes and an emphatic tone

「……」

"Kid, huh...?"

"Didn't the teacher teach you to use honorifics when asking someone's name?"

When she asked me that, I felt my face turn crimson and my head steamed...

"You... Aren't you a kid too—" I pouted and muttered something quiet.

But the girl didn't care at all, and said generously and heartily

"Alright, alright, it's okay if you don't use honorifics, I'll tell you my name!"

"Aoko, Natsumiya Aoko"

"That's my name."

"Summer Palace...... Aoko..."

When I heard Xia Gong, my first reaction was that this surname was so familiar......

"Summer Palace......! You're Grandma Yun Yao's..."

It occurred to me that I had it.

Aoko interrupted me, pointed to my head, and laughed with both hands

"You think you're serious... Talk to me... Is it really good... Haha, are the indigenous ninjas, haha......"

My expression instantly became embarrassed, and I hurriedly put my schoolbag on my back and patted the leaves off my hair.

"Dementia... What a child..."

Aoko looked at me with a kind of gaze from the past, and the corners of her mouth were slightly upturned, this kind of smile made me feel like resisting, but I didn't know what it was to resist, after all, I had never seen her before today.

I looked at her with immature and unconvinced eyes, puffing out my cheeks, showing a look of not underestimating people, but her smile grew.

"Summer Palace, Yun Yao is my grandmother," Aoko said

"My parents and I just returned home from Kyoto."

"I'm going to live with my grandmother from now on."

And I don't think, "What about your dad and mom?"

"Hmm... They, Kyoto is very busy with work, and they don't have time to spend with their wayward daughter," Aoko still smiled.

"That's right..."

I didn't ask much.

"Then we live very close."

"Really..."

Qingzi's beautiful and bright eyes looked at my eyes, and the sights met very naturally, and I stretched out my finger and pointed to Qingzi's home, and then to my home, and the distance between the eyes was only a dozen steps.

"That's your house, it's really close!"

"Then we can hang out together more often in the future, right?"

Qingzi looked at me with a smile, it was the first time that a peer had sent me an invitation, excited, overwhelmed, and panicked,

「... Ah, if you don't mind... I'll follow..."

"Haha, that's it."

It was Aoko's invitation that broke my childhood situation of playing alone and brought endless beautiful things to my later childhood.

……

"Hey! Aoko"

On the other side of the woods, a young man and woman beckoned.

"My parents called me, I think I have to go first, see you next time."

Aoko said goodbye to me, and I waved.

"Okay, see you next time"

After Qingzi turned around and ran away, I suddenly thought of something, and chased after me all of a sudden, panting.

"That, that... I... My name is Kirikawa, Kiyono Kirikawa!"

I slowly stopped, and Aoko turned around and showed her white teeth in response, giving me a smile that bloomed like a lotus flower.

"I know, I'll remember!"

……

Aoko and her grandmother live in the house to the right of the maple grove in front of my yard.

It's just that there hasn't been a resident for ten years now......

That was when I first met her...

I was eight years old and she was ten years old

This maple grove is our paradise home, building a secret base in the trees and building a swing with the help of adults......

Over time, you can also appreciate the changes of the maple trees throughout the year......

They give up their foliage and flourish in spring, dense in summer, rich in autumn and sparse in winter...... Confidently showing his various postures, in a peaceful night, in the black cry under the leaves, under the small moon of the flat boat, a gust of wind leisurely walked by, stroking the maple leaves, the friendship between the maple leaves, sending out the dream of "sand" and "sand......

Later, as I grew older, I realized that the maple tree had already told me something with its own changes a long time ago.

Everything has its own changes, and it changes all the time, and the world works like this, maybe sometimes it's just that you're too happy to notice it.

We spent two years of childhood together, which may not be a long time, but for me, it was better than all the time I spent playing alone, and these two years were precious to me.

Think about when Aoko left, I was in the fourth grade and she was in the sixth grade.