Legacy List

Old Wang's greatest joy after retirement was organizing his "legacy list." This wasn't a traditional will, but a detailed list of every small item in his life: a tea set used for thirty years, each cup with a different chip, like the irreparable regrets in his life; a pile of expired newspapers, recording the boring news of each day, like his monotonous life day after day; and a box of matchboxes he collected in his youth, the patterns on which always reminded him of those blurred past events.

He lived in a small bachelor apartment, the walls a mottled yellow, the window looking out at towering skyscrapers. Old Wang always sat by the window, sipping his strong tea, staring at his list in a daze. The list had been updated dozens of times, the writing becoming denser and denser, like his life, increasingly complicated yet increasingly empty.

Old Wang's "legacy list" wasn't really meant to be left to anyone; he didn't even know if he had any descendants. When he was young, he was busy with work and didn't have the time or energy to think about family. Now that he was old, he found that he seemed to have everything, yet he seemed to have nothing. Money? He had it, enough to live on for the rest of his life. A house? He also had one, although not big, at least it provided shelter from the wind and rain. It's just that these things seemed to have nothing to do with him, they were like items displayed in a showcase, waiting to be shown, but never truly belonging to him.

Today, Old Wang opened his list again. With trembling hands, he picked up his pen and added a line at the end of the list: "Also, a soul with nowhere to rest."

He smiled, a bit bitterly.

The next day, Old Wang was found dead in his apartment. His body lay stiff on the floor, his "legacy list" clutched tightly in his hand. The police came, the coroner came, and people from the neighborhood committee also came. They searched Old Wang's small apartment, finding no will and no clues about any relatives.

Old Wang's home was sealed off.

His "legacy list" was casually thrown into a corner, the words on it appearing particularly glaring in the dim light. The "legacies" on the list were still there, lying quietly, waiting for their next owner, just like Old Wang, waiting for their final destination.

After some time, a worker responsible for cleaning the house found the list. He curiously opened it, the items on the list of no value to him. He just thought the words were dense and a bit annoying. When he saw the last line, he paused, then shook his head with a smile, and muttered, "What age is this, still talking like this in an artsy way? A soul with nowhere to rest? Who doesn't have one?"

He crumpled the list into a ball and threw it in the trash can.

A few days later, Old Wang's apartment was rented out again. A young office worker moved in. He went out early and returned late every day, busy with work and life. He had no time to care about the story of the previous tenant, he just wanted to find a place of his own in this city.

One quiet night, the new tenant noticed the neon lights flashing on the buildings outside the window. He felt that the city was so noisy and he was so lonely. He inexplicably remembered a sentence that someone had told him a long time ago: "In big cities, everyone is an island." At that moment, he suddenly felt like he had seen this sentence somewhere. He picked up his phone, wanting to post the sentence to his WeChat Moments, but he couldn't find a suitable picture.

He looked up at the window, the dense lights still flashing, like a list that could never be completed, recording the loneliness of every urban dweller. He opened his phone, typed a line, and sent it out: "Tonight's overtime is also for working harder tomorrow."

The screen lit up for a moment and then went dark, like Old Wang's life, once existed, and then seemed like it had never happened.