I evermore remember one afternoon at the year end of my age 11, the afternoon a flowerpot of orchid stood lonely against the biting wind in my balcony. In my home stepped Ting with her mother, my new governess. Ting was tall, thin, with a gentle smile and a long plait, about six-month younger than me, just likes a pretty orchid. We talked of our rag-dolls and goldenfish and got exhilarated. My mom smiled that we had gone to the same kindergarten when our mothers were colleagues. So the seed of a friendship must have been sown long.

Soon I found Ting not only beautiful without but also exquisite within. Her compositions were elegant; her math exercise-books were filled with red marks; her painting and handwriting were praised eternally by my parents. I felt ashamed and downcast in comparison with her. Nevertheless, I wasn’t jealous of her but instead tried to catch up with her. On the other hand, Ting, who was meticulous in preserving unspoiled each book since infancy, lent me story books as long as I liked and shared her notebooks when I tried to copycat her neat penmanship. Our companionship sprout was burgeoning.

Although we couldn’t meet frequently, every festival Ting sent me lovely toys or postcards, with her mom as the messenger; too poor to buy fancy gifts, I would also present her with humble bookmarks, plant specimens, craftworks, etc. via her mom. Those summer holidays rise easily before my eyes when we assisted our mothers making dumplings at the table, when she patiently taught me to knit plastic strings into bracelets, when we side by side appreciated one another’s greeting-cards.

 “What do these words mean?” I asked, pointing at “Happy New Year” written on a card, (There was no English class in grade school then.)

 “Not know. I copied them from a book and thought they mean well-wish anyway,” Ting giggled. Our laughter blended into the clamouring rain; I beheld my balcony orchid spreading its lush blades and fluttering its mini white blossoms in the drizzle and breeze.

According to local regulations, every primary-school graduate had to draw lots to decide which higher school to enter. Straight-A student as Ting is, she drew the shortest lot and went to a notorious middle school. After brief depression, she recovered to assiduity and jumped to No.1 in her grade,

My family moved to the other side of Yangtze River, leaving the orchid behind. My life-path diverted gradually from Ting’s; our two families also diverted farther and farther. We gathered for once when she succeeded into the best high school in this city. We reclined on the same bamboo bed-mat discussing our future: I would drop most subjects except Chinese and English study and she aimed at a doctor. On greeting-cards to each other we wrote: “Be best friends forever!” “No matter where I may go, I will go on with you forever!” In those days we believed in eternal friendship despite time or space or anybody; believed the friendship flower would be rooted in our hearts even if the branches stretch away.

The College Entrance Examination drew near. Concerned with Ting, I inhibited ringing up to disturb her until July. She sadly said she had been unfortunate again to fall ill ere the exam so that she was admitted to a common medical academy in Hubei Province instead of a famous university as expected.

“Remember that you entered a Z-class middle school but became a top student and won an A-class high school? People’s quality doesn’t rely on whether they have entered an outstanding university,” I comforted her.

She cheered up, “Yes, and I still stand a chance to upgrade from academy to university and even to graduate school. Backgrounds and circumstances may have influenced who we are, but we are responsible for who we become.”

Before leaving the hometown for college, Ting and her mom paid us a visit. Hard to believe nearly ten years had crept on since we made acquainted! And the two mothers were grey-haired women now. As before, it was mostly I who did the talking and Ting who listened smilingly. We chatted about music, internet and childhood memories; except that, we fell silent oft. By the afternoon, I heard she asked her mom when to take farewell. Her mother said it maybe improbable for us to allow them go without supper. Ting made a sigh. The sigh was slight, whereas it rest heavy upon my heart somehow.

In the college she took the initiative ringing me up and the earpiece brimmed over with her laughter. Later on she wrote me a long letter informing the campus news. I felt joyous all my heart that she was no longer the reserved shy girl, yet I had few exciting news in my life to tell her. Therefore, our correspondence last for two letters only.

On the eve of 2007 New Year I dialed her dormitory to give a best-wish.

“She’s absent,” answered one of her roommates.

“When will she come back?”

“She’s absent after all,” the girl chortled. “I can give you her cellphone number. Happy New Year to you!”

I wasn’t happy at all: Why did she alter her number again, again without notifying me? Well, perhaps she was too busy to remember such petty matters. The next day I called her up. She said having moved out of the stuffy dorm and nagged at the repair project of her academy, not listening to how awful I felt recently and why I felt awful. Watching on TV her city was struck by flood on June, I wanted to inquire after her. An artificial voice filtered through the receiver: “The number you dialed has transferred…”

I didn’t ask her mother for her new phone-number. I long for friendship, treasure friendship, but won’t tug at another’s sleeve to beg for friendship! At certain point, people “outgrow” each other and need a vaster sky. I must let Ting go free, which is also to let me go free.

The relationship’s root remains in my memory; my adolescence might have been duller without Ting’s company. Yet the flower has dried up into a specimen, lack of harmonious environment and mutual inspiration; I preserve that specimen along with her letters to me, her greeting-cards to me, the bracelets knitted by us together, and go ahead. I know even if friends go away, the friendships always stay.