It has been proven that we can die from accidents at any time and repeat the same accident. The reason is probably that humans are always unable to learn from past accidents or that preventive measures taken to prevent such accidents would harm the interests of those capable of doing such work. After watching a video of the Zhengzhou flood for over an hour, Zhou Hao expressed his thoughts to me, and then he continued, "Accidents are all man-made. Look at the Zhengzhou government, what's the difference between them and the Wuhan government during the early stages of the pandemic? These things will continue to happen."
I nodded.
"Don't expect the government to save the people, just hope that the government won't interfere when the people are trying to save themselves," Zhou Hao put down his phone and rubbed his slightly red eyes. I knew he was feeling down because one of the scenes he hated the most was seeing the bodies of young people. He once said, "Dying in the prime of life is the greatest misfortune." No one wants to see misfortune.
"That's not entirely true," I said, trying to alleviate the despair that permeated this narrow space. "The government still plays a role in organizing society, otherwise society could descend into chaos."
"Sometimes I really wish I were a brainwashed fool like those Little Pinks!" he said angrily.
"Maybe in a couple of years, saying things like that will be punishable by law." The sense of despair in this space grew stronger, even causing me to feel a slight suffocation.
"Damn it!"
"Let's go out for a walk," I suggested.
Silently, we walked into the night that had already been polluted by streetlights, stepping on the shadows of one roadside tree after another.
After stepping on about forty shadows, Zhou Hao stopped and let out a long sigh. "I feel hopeless," he said.
I turned around and saw him staring at an old man with a hunched back, dragging a gray woven bag and rummaging through the trash cans. Then he raised his left hand and looked at the screen of his motion-activated bracelet.
"I'm powerless," he said.
He had said similar things more than once, which made me worried. "In my opinion, just live your own life well," I advised him.
"Ah~" he took another step, no longer looking at the old man, but after a few steps, he stopped again. "I have no dreams anymore," he looked into my eyes and said, "unlike you, who still wants to be a writer."
"How can you say that?" I couldn't help but recall the one-minute pre-class speech he gave in our college English class (it was a routine activity before each class):
The dream of making the world better.
When I was in high school, I fell in love with a song titled Heal The World which was sung by Michael Jackson. In its lyrics, you can see a beautiful dream of making the world better. I have the same dream too and I believe it can be shared among us. But how can we achieve that? First of all, we should make ourselves better. Then naturally, we will make a positive impact on people around us. Iteratively, a better world can be built. It sounds easy, but it is not, or the world would be perfect a long time ago. Now, based on science and technology, with modern statistics-based analysis and the massive Internet, we can make the dream of making the world better finally come true.
"No matter how hard I try, I can't change anything," he said.
"You don't necessarily have to change anything," I said, suddenly feeling the urge to sigh. "If humanity is destined to perish, let it perish."
He glanced at me and said, "Your nihilism is getting worse."
"Replace 'worse' with 'more profound' and it would be more appropriate," I made a joke, which eased the oppressive atmosphere between the two of us to some extent. After all, Zhou Hao finally managed to squeeze out a forced smile.
"Since we will die from accidents anyway, what kind of accident would you want to die from?"
"Me?" I was momentarily speechless. I have always been interested in hypothetical questions like this because they can be further expanded into interesting stories—at least I find them interesting. "Of course, I would want to die painlessly, like being poisoned and then slipping into a coma."
Zhou Hao nodded slightly, then fell into silence.
Seeing that he didn't speak, I asked, "What about you?"
"As for me, in the past, I would have wanted to die in a grand and meaningful way. But now, I just hope to avoid dying from preventable accidents, as that would be a complete waste."
We walked past more shadows.
"What about suicide?" he suddenly asked.
"Isn't suicide considered intentional rather than accidental?" I couldn't be sure.
"For others, it is accidental."
This reminded me of the shock I felt when I learned that a close classmate from high school had committed suicide.
"Suicide doesn't solve any problems, it only solves oneself." Somehow, he came to a conclusion. "I will never commit suicide," he continued, "unless I go insane."
"Ah." I suddenly became nihilistic again. "Whether it's suicide or homicide, death is just a change in the state of the physical body. When you think about it carefully, it's meaningless."
"If there are more people like you, humanity will have no hope at all," he said.
I didn't deny it.
"There are indeed more and more people like you, choosing to lie down and only struggle when the knife is cutting them," Zhou Hao's tone was a bit resentful, indicating that he had recovered somewhat and was not as despairing.
"Let's go back," I said. "It's getting hotter the more we walk."
We turned around and walked home, stepping on the shadows.