“Secret Crush”

Bai Miaoqing lifted her head. The sky was dazzlingly bright—so bright it seemed like it might catch fire.

She felt like a statue, frozen in place.

Bai Miaoqing murmured over and over: I… I never loved her…

Ah, yes. An Ruxin was right. Her thoughts drifted hazily—Chen Anran, I admired her, felt grateful to her, envied her, later feared her, resented her… but I never loved her… Ghosts aren’t real…? Chen Anran liked me…? What a joke… how could that be possible… what a ridiculous thought…

She wanted to laugh out loud, but the sound caught in her throat, lodged deep, unable to come out. How strange. Did Chen Anran appear? Did she hurt her? No, right? Then why did it feel so painful, like she was being torn apart? Ridiculous. It couldn’t be. There’s no way. How could Chen Anran have liked her? How could that be?

She wanted to close her eyes—because the sun was spinning, the sky was spinning, the whole world was melting away. The dizziness overwhelmed her. Bai Miaoqing just wanted to close her eyes. But the world hadn’t changed—she knew it was just herself trembling, drained of all strength. If I close my eyes, I won’t see. If I cover my ears, I won’t hear. But the words on that note burrowed into her mind, and An Ruxin’s voice echoed over and over in her head. Every single word is right. Every line is so convincing…

This isn’t real.

But deep inside, a voice said: It is real. You already believe it. You’ve believed it for a long time. You just never dared face it. You’ve always been this cowardly.

This isn’t real. Bai Miaoqing was about to collapse. She hugged herself tightly, seeking a shred of warmth: How could I have killed Chen Anran? I don’t have that kind of strength or courage. I never even hated her…

She wished, desperately, that a god would appear to condemn her—so she could kneel and cry out in protest: Impossible, impossible, impossible… Chen Anran was my only friend. My only… I couldn’t have killed her. I couldn’t have done such a thing… Chen Anran, Chen Anran! No… because I cherished her too much, I—

But it no longer worked. The fear inside her had never been so immense. Bai Miaoqing couldn’t lie to herself anymore. She was afraid—truly afraid. She wanted to cry out to the one she loved, to An Ruxin, to her best friend Chen Anran: I’m really, really scared…

Bai Miaoqing feared ghosts. But now she understood—she was the ghost. The one she feared was herself. The unfamiliar, terrifying self within… she was afraid—

But Chen Anran was already dead. Killed by Bai Miaoqing. And An Ruxin, even now, wouldn’t comfort her, would she?

So, does that mean… her whole life had been taken from her, and all her pain was self-inflicted? Was that it?

There never was a ghost.

…What a joke.

The truth.

Bai Miaoqing wanted to laugh—and she did. Not at the truth, but at herself. She had never seen anyone so pitiful, so shameful, so laughable… as herself.

Her laughter cut through the trees on the mountain. Birds took flight. The sky dotted with distant black specks. The wind shredded her laughter into pieces, echoing through the woods like wailing ghosts. It was the kind of sound that could make even the staunchest atheist believe, just for a second, in punishment from the underworld, in karma and fate.

The feeling beneath her feet grew more and more unstable. Bai Miaoqing staggered back a few steps, trying to lean on the railing. She did. And then—suddenly—the railing behind her vanished.

She lost her balance and fell backward. Bai Miaoqing knew she was about to fall into the water, just like Chen Anran had. But what did it matter? Her mind was full of cotton, numb to everything… She had no reason to exist. No value left at all.

“—Watch out!”

Bai Miaoqing’s eyes flew open. By the time she realized what had happened, she and An Ruxin had collapsed together onto the platform. The section of railing she had leaned on was gone. She stared at everything before her, confused. The world felt so far away, impossible to comprehend.

She didn’t know how long had passed—maybe five minutes, maybe ten, maybe just seconds. Then An Ruxin spoke.

“Probably just old and worn out,” she said calmly, her face betraying no panic. “The railing was all rusty… it just gave way. Good thing I caught you in time. Miaoqing, are you okay?”

But Bai Miaoqing didn’t seem to hear her. None of it mattered anymore. She quietly looked at the girl in front of her—An Ruxin, the one she loved most. Maybe she was just imagining things… An Ruxin was always so composed, even when overwhelmed by the supernatural power that amplified negative emotions. She still spoke with logic and clarity—she’d even shouted less than Bai Miaoqing had. Looking back, even in high school, An Ruxin had never shown much emotion.

Bai Miaoqing knew she had a crush on her—or maybe on Chen Anran. The anonymous love letters, the way she always looked at her. An Ruxin’s gaze always seemed so calm… An Ruxin was smart, no doubt. Her mind was sharp. She thought fast… Ah, come to think of it, how could someone like An Ruxin remain so ordinary? Never standing out in a crowd…? No, maybe even An Ruxin herself thought she was just average… Bai Miaoqing had never considered these things before.

Now she understood a little. An Ruxin had said—what each person believes is only their own version of truth. Even between the closest people, true understanding is rare. And feelings don’t always come from understanding. How many parents don’t truly understand their children’s thoughts and feelings, yet still love them deeply? And how many children can honestly say they understand their parents? Yet familial love is still sung of as something eternal.

Bai Miaoqing thought about all this, and stayed silent.

Why did she love An Ruxin? Because Ruxin was gentle—or at least, Bai Miaoqing felt she was. She comforted her when she cried, confessed her feelings… In Bai Miaoqing’s life, besides Chen Anran, only An Ruxin had ever been so gentle with her.

But Bai Miaoqing didn’t love Chen Anran. She loved An Ruxin. Why? Because Chen Anran was too perfect, too brilliant—so much so that Bai Miaoqing could never bring herself to like her. The “average” An Ruxin was just right—she didn’t trigger envy or fear, but was enough to foster a romantic longing. But did Bai Miaoqing really know An Ruxin? Ever since they reunited, Bai Miaoqing had never seen her show a single emotional slip. Maybe she felt things, but never showed it… Speaking of which—how had she even gotten hold of Chen Anran’s diary? Had she gone to her parents? Then she must have lied to them, right?

It was only when Bai Miaoqing told her “I like you too”, and when An Ruxin confronted her, that she saw something different in her expression.

Bai Miaoqing thought: She probably doesn’t know what her own face looked like then… Like it cracked in the middle, and something unfamiliar crawled out from deep inside her—something fanatical, twisted. Whether it was joy or disgust, it scared Bai Miaoqing… But Ruxin quickly returned to normal, so she didn’t stay scared for long.

Maybe Bai Miaoqing never really understood An Ruxin at all.

But even so—

Bai Miaoqing still loved her.

“…I love you, I love you so much,” Bai Miaoqing said numbly, not thinking about anything at all. Her voice was low, soft. “I love you so much…! It’s over, Ruxin, it’s all over… Ah, you never understood me, and I never understood myself, nor did I ever understand you… It’s over. But I love you so much, my… my favorite… Ruxin… It’s over. I beg you, please, just once before it ends, kiss me. Please kiss me… Ah, it’s all over…”

She loved her too much!

After being tormented by the ghost of Chen Anran to the point of dropping out of college and returning to her hometown, she moved away from her parents, who were always arguing, and from the Chen family, eternally trapped in the tragedy of the past. Chen Anran wouldn’t allow her to start a new life—at least, not a good one. So Bai Miaoqing didn’t dare seek a better, more stable job. She could only rent the cheapest, most remote, oldest apartments, living off occasional allowances from her parents—whenever they remembered her—and a patchwork of odd jobs. In that kind of life, she unexpectedly discovered that An Ruxin was also working in their hometown, not far from her. Bai Miaoqing knew what she was doing was crazy, but she couldn’t help stalking An Ruxin, secretly taking photos of her daily life. How long had it gone on like that? She couldn’t remember anymore. When she came to her senses, her phone album was filled with blurry images of An Ruxin. On those fear-filled nights, it was these blurry images that gave Bai Miaoqing the will to live.

An Ruxin seemed a bit surprised, but she always had that same expression—it was hard to read.

“Miaoqing, are you okay?” she asked.

“You should know… You must have seen it,” Bai Miaoqing smiled with despair. “Anran meant to kill me. Now everything is clear… I was just… such a fool… Let her see my despair… I deserved all this. Even if I feel sorry, feel guilty, feel regretful, even if I want to kill myself, it’s meaningless now… I know Anran must want me dead. The railing broke—you should just let her do it. It’s what she deserves…”

“…I don’t think so,” An Ruxin replied with her usual measured tone, her words strangely convincing. “Was Chen Anran taking revenge on you all this time? I think so. But I don’t believe she wanted to kill you… Maybe the railing was just old and worn out. Blaming everything on a ghost might be part of your problem…”

“Ah…”

“First of all, you’re still alive today, aren’t you?” she said. “And I remember when we reunited, you said the only way to escape her was to live as miserably as possible. When she showed up at your place, you panicked and ran out. You said, ‘How could she be back? I already…’ So I’m guessing that before we met again, it had been a long time since she last appeared, right?”

“But… these past few days since we met, I’ve felt that she wants to kill me… I can feel it—she really wants to kill me. If she had the chance, I think she absolutely would,” Bai Miaoqing said.

“I think… she still likes you,” An Ruxin answered. “So I showed up. At first, I thought the person I had a crush on was you. And you liked me too—or at least, it seemed mutual… But rather than letting you be with me for no good reason, maybe Chen Anran would rather see you dead.”

Bai Miaoqing couldn’t even guess what expression she had on her face now.

“And… I just saw her,” An Ruxin added. “What she wanted most was probably to make you realize: it wasn’t a ghost that killed her—it was you. After I said everything, I couldn’t see her anymore.”

“Ah…” Bai Miaoqing murmured. Her despair wasn’t lessened in the slightest by these words. The only comforting thought she had was that maybe her despair could bring Chen Anran peace. “What are you planning to do now?”

An Ruxin hesitated for a moment, then gave her answer: “I’m going to call the police.”

“That… fits what I originally thought of you…”

An average person. A rule-following person. A face in the crowd.

Bai Miaoqing didn’t see her that way anymore.

“I think Chen Anran’s body must be like I guessed—caught on something underwater, stuck there all this time… In any case, she should be laid to rest. Her parents shouldn’t have to keep waiting.” An Ruxin’s eyes fixed on her—those pitch-black eyes. “I’m not sure what’ll happen to you. So many years have passed, and you were only fifteen then—not even an adult. And you…”

She suddenly stopped. Bai Miaoqing figured she was about to say she had a mental illness. An Ruxin shifted her words and continued, “…I think maybe this is the only way both you and Chen Anran can be at peace.”

“No matter what happens, I… don’t care anymore,” Bai Miaoqing said. She didn’t feel like she was alive at all—she felt already dead. “Ruxin, I don’t think you’ll kiss me.”

A flicker of hesitation passed over An Ruxin’s face, as if she were deciding whether to speak. Bai Miaoqing simply sat there, gazing dazedly downward… at the dark green, still surface of the water…

“I won’t kiss you,” An Ruxin finally said. “Because you’re not the one I’ve been in love with.”

“Mm… It’s Anran, isn’t it?”

“Ah, I don’t think so either,” she replied quite seriously. “If I thought it was Chen Anran, I wouldn’t have called the police.”

An Ruxin spoke calmly: “I’d kill you. I’d drown you in the reservoir, or push you down the stairs, stab you to death, strangle you, maybe even cut off your head. Maybe I’d stab you a few times and watch you bleed out… I’m not sure exactly how I’d do it. But if I liked Chen Anran, I’d definitely kill you.”

…Bai Miaoqing didn’t know if she was supposed to feel a chill. Right now, she felt nothing at all—only stared blankly, hollow and dazed, at the other woman. An Ruxin’s expression was normal, as usual, but Bai Miaoqing could sense she was completely serious.

“Then… who is it, really?”

“I’ve thought about it for a long time,” An Ruxin said, clearly troubled, “and I realized in the end, the one I liked was both of you, and also neither of you—some fusion of you and Chen Anran. But the person I liked was only one person. So that girl… the one I liked most, the one I was secretly in love with… she was no one. Not you. And definitely not Chen Anran. She never killed anyone. No one ever killed her. She never changed. She was perfect.”

“So… she doesn’t exist…?”

An Ruxin looked a little surprised. “Ah, Miaoqing, you still don’t get it?”

Get what… Bai Miaoqing didn’t even have the energy to think. She was just going along with her words.

An Ruxin suddenly smiled. Her face lit up with a strange radiance. Anyone seeing that expression would say this: she was deeply in love with someone. In that moment, Bai Miaoqing numbly thought—I love her too much. I don’t understand anything. I just love her too much. Why couldn’t she love Chen Anran? Bai Miaoqing didn’t know… She just loved An Ruxin too much. Seeing her expression now, Bai Miaoqing still felt a trace of pain. But she also understood that she didn’t even have the right to feel pain. Maybe Chen Anran still liked her, but Bai Miaoqing believed that this situation—this now—was probably Anran’s final revenge. A prison. A cage. A trap through time. Bai Miaoqing was a hateful, shameful, ridiculous person—a coward. But she wasn’t inhuman. If she were, she wouldn’t have lied to herself with the “ghost” story all these years. If she were, she wouldn’t feel this utter, hopeless despair now… A cage. A prison spanning across time…

An Ruxin smiled and said, “I told you, I like her. Whether I’m rejected or accepted, whether she likes me or not, none of that matters to me. Being together would be best, but if not, it doesn’t change how I feel… Likewise, I don’t care whether she exists or not. My feelings remain the same. She is the most beautiful, the most perfect, the one I love the most—the girl I’ve always had a crush on.”

Bai Miaoqing stared at her, then turned her gaze downward toward the platform.

The water was still and smooth, like a pane of dark green glass. Beneath it, Bai Miaoqing saw Chen Anran’s face.

Chen Anran was just there, quietly watching her. Sunlight shimmered on the surface, casting a tranquil glow. Bai Miaoqing suddenly remembered a day many, many years ago, when she was just a sensitive young girl, stepping out of her house to go to school, and she saw Chen Anran waiting for her downstairs—not knowing how long she’d been there. There was a tiny bead of sweat on Chen Anran’s nose, glistening in the sun. When she saw Bai Miaoqing, she gave her a wide, brilliant smile. Bai Miaoqing felt as though a needle had pierced her heart, making her dizzy. She thought: Her smile is more dazzling than the sun.

Why didn’t I love her?

Now, beneath the water, Chen Anran was looking up at her. Bai Miaoqing had forgotten what she looked like back then—but now she remembered. Bai Miaoqing looked back at her. The world was shrouded in despair, and Bai Miaoqing wanted to scream, to cry out, to throw herself in. She thought, If I jumped, Chen Anran would catch me in the water.

In the end, Bai Miaoqing didn’t do anything. She only murmured, like in a dream:

“How absurd… Ruxin, I don’t even understand you, and yet I like you. Anran was killed by me, and yet she liked me. You believe the girl you love doesn’t even exist, and yet you still love her. None of us ever confessed our feelings to the ones we loved—unless we were forced to, unless it was already too late… Ah, in truth, I think none of us ever truly understood the ones we loved. But nothing has changed—it’s all the same… Why is that? I never imagined things would turn out like this. Youth… beautiful youth… cruel youth…”

An Ruxin’s voice was calm, as if she were stating a truth as clear as day. How deeply, deeply she loved her. There were moments when Bai Miaoqing hated herself for loving her and not Chen Anran, but still, she loved her so deeply. Bai Miaoqing thought she would never forget the way Chen Anran looked up at her from beneath the water at this moment, nor would she forget An Ruxin’s terrifyingly ordinary tone—so normal it was almost chilling. It was as if, once An Ruxin figured out the one thing most important to her, everything else—fear, pity—no longer mattered to her. Bai Miaoqing loved her so much… Yes, yes—it’s already too late…

Bai Miaoqing and Chen Anran’s eyes met.

An Ruxin said, “Ah, Secret Crush is just like this, after all.”

—

Author’s Note

The End!

Thank you all so much for reading this far!

The story Secret Crush was originally created for a little RPG game I played on Weibo. Since I personally love cool/mystery/crime/yuri elements, I naturally leaned in that direction. And by the way, I also love twisted yuri love triangles (lol).

The initial inspiration came from the thought: What would happen if you suddenly saw your school crush walking down the street years later? If it were something ordinary, like the girl who used to be popular is still doing well, or the unique one back then has turned into a boring adult… there’s no drama in that! Only young people carry that “king of the world” energy! So I created a stark contrast: “used to be perfect and even got into a top university” vs. “so down-and-out she’s nearly homeless.” The protagonist (An Ruxin) would naturally feel curious! Then came the outline of the truth—while it’s a dual-protagonist story, both of them hide things about themselves: An Ruxin presents herself as average and unremarkable, while Bai Miaoqing says nothing at first and later insists it was a ghost who did the killing.

I did consider adding a main perspective for Chen Anran, but felt that three POVs would be too messy—and more importantly… there are no perfect people in the real world! Perfection only exists in others’ imaginations. So I left Chen Anran to be observed from the outside…

After finishing the outline, I built the characters—An Ruxin, Bai Miaoqing, and Chen Anran—and once that was done, I started writing. The logic and clues naturally came together as I wrote, and having the outline ensured everything stayed on track!

Writing this was so much fun! I especially enjoyed switching the RPG-style second-person narration to third person. In this piece, I tried more in-depth psychological portrayal, used emotional threads as key mystery elements, and hid important clues in those psychological layers. I hope it wasn’t too fragmented… All clues were given before the reveal. A summary post with the timeline and clues will on next update.