Let us begin by admitting a peculiar truth: this tale exists in multiple versions, each told and retold with different names, different beginnings, and different endings. Perhaps you’ve already glimpsed some of them—the heartbreak in Kowloon Park, the hushed confessions in a busy Mong Kok café, the fervent discussions about Oxford under the neon glow of Temple Street, the final, lingering embrace at the Star Ferry terminal. Each iteration circles the same core: a Chinese Hong Kong boy, an expat British girl, and the decision that threatens to tear them apart.
For the sake of a single narrative, let’s call him Wai, though he has also been Li Wei, Kai, Wei, or Leo. And let’s name her Alice, though she has been Emma, Ellie, Mei. They are stand-ins, placeholders—fragments of the same longing. And the story, no matter how often we rewrite it, remains heartbreakingly the same.
One: In a Café Called Possibility
In one version, we find them at a corner table of a bustling Hong Kong café. The air is thick with the aroma of milk tea and pineapple buns. Neon signs flicker just beyond the window, hinting at the perpetual motion of the city outside.
Wai’s hands tremble slightly as he slides an acceptance letter across the tabletop. Oxford University: Mathematics Degree. A scholarship that could open worlds of possibility.
“I wanted this,” he says, voice subdued. “I worked so hard. But now I’m not sure…”
Across from him, Alice—fresh-faced, originally from Brighton, but long since at home in the rhythms of Hong Kong—runs her thumb over the letterhead. “Your parents must be thrilled.”
He nods, exhaling shakily. “They’re not just thrilled. They’re moving to the UK with me. They—well—they say Hong Kong is changing. They think it’s better for everyone if I go.”
She presses her hand gently over his. A foreign comfort, local heartbreak. “Wai,” she murmurs, “I’m proud of you. But are you sure it’s what you really want?”
What he really wants is her. He wants to stay. But the weight of familial expectation and the swirl of uncertainties in Hong Kong blur the lines between desire and duty.
The café hums. Teacups clink. The letter glows with both promise and dread. Outside, neon lights flicker, as though they, too, sense an approaching storm.
Two: When Characters Rebel
Sometimes the story shifts abruptly, like a camera angle changing mid-scene. The boy turns to the invisible writer, protesting the inevitability of heartbreak.
“I don’t want to leave,” Wai says. “I don’t want to become another cliché: the dutiful son, bound by culture, forced to chase a future I’m not certain is mine.”
Alice blinks, momentarily confused. She was not expecting the fourth wall to crack. “Wai?” she whispers, glancing around. “Who are you talking to?”
He continues, undeterred. “The writer. The one putting words in my mouth. They’re about to make me board a plane. You and I will be separated, because apparently that’s more dramatic.”
Alice’s expression slips from confusion to heartbreak. “But isn’t that… our story?”
In that uncertain hush, the writer hesitates. Could they let him resist? If he defies his parents, the story changes: no flights, no final heartbreak at the gate. But then, the tension collapses. No friction, no tears. Love triumphant—but the cost is the end of the drama.
The writer’s fingers waver above the keyboard, uncertain. Is the heartbreak a cheap device, or an honest reflection of two people torn by forces larger than themselves?
Three: A Stroll by Victoria Harbour
In another telling, Wai and Alice walk side by side along Victoria Harbour. The skyscrapers glimmer, painting the waters in stripes of electric color.
He kicks a pebble aimlessly. “They won’t let me stay behind. They keep reminding me how much they’ve sacrificed: the tutoring, the cramped apartment, all for this dream—my dream. Yet it doesn’t feel like mine anymore.”
“Then what is your dream?” Alice asks quietly.
He glances at her, wanting to say, You. But he can’t. That single syllable feels too heavy.
In the distance, a Star Ferry glides across the harbor, its horn echoing through the humid night. An odd pang hits Wai’s chest. He sees the ferry as a metaphor for his own journey: crossing from one shore to another, no guarantee of returning the same.
Four: The Airport Scene (Or One of Many)
Time accelerates, as stories do. The day arrives too soon. They stand in Hong Kong International Airport, fluorescent lights buzzing overhead. Suitcases form a protective circle around Wai’s parents, who watch with polite reserve as their son says goodbye.
Alice stands close to him, wearing a scarf that seems out of place in the city’s summer heat—perhaps hoping a symbolic item might stave off the chill of parting.
He laces his fingers through hers, heart pounding. Outside the terminal windows, planes taxi in a meticulous dance of arrivals and departures. In the swirl of overhead announcements, everything feels surreal.
“I’ll call,” he says, voice cracking. “I’ll text you every day. We’ll figure out a way…”
She nods, tears brimming. There’s too much to say, and no time to say it.
His mother gently places a hand on his shoulder. They can’t delay. The flight is boarding.
They embrace. You, the reader, have seen this farewell in countless forms—yet it’s no less real for them. Their hearts pound with the finality of separation. Then Wai is gone, guided forward by parental hands, the Oxford acceptance letter folded in his pocket like an unwanted prophecy.
Alice is left behind the glass wall, tears sliding down her cheeks. She watches him vanish into the crowd, the last glimpse of his figure etched forever into her memory. The overhead announcement drones about final boarding calls.
Five: The Ferries of What-If
Yet sometimes, in a different version, we find them again at the Star Ferry terminal, a day before the flight. The humidity presses in, the sea air thick with longing. The ferry’s horn announces its departure—an oddly fitting soundtrack.
Alice grips the railing, as if the chipped paint and briny wind might anchor her to the moment. Wai stands beside her, tension thrumming through his body. They’re on the cusp of that same departure, but this time, she forces a smile.
“This doesn’t have to be the end,” she insists. “This is our story, isn’t it? We can write the next chapter.”
He almost laughs at her optimism. But behind his weary eyes, there’s a spark—a recognition that, indeed, they’re the protagonists of something bigger than this impending flight.
He leans closer, voice low, urgent. “What if I defy them? I stay here. My parents go without me. It’d be chaos, but at least we’d have each other—”
She shakes her head, swallowing tears. “I can’t let you give up Oxford. That’s your gift, your brilliance. I love you too much to watch you trade it for me.”
They stand there, the ferry departing without them, the waters churning a jade green reflection of their turmoil. The future feels like an unwritten page, both terrifying and full of hope.
Coda: How the Stories End (Or Don’t)
Now, dear reader, you hold the tangled strands of every version we have spun. Some endings show Wai on an airplane, leaving Alice behind, both of them clutching at fragile promises of phone calls and holiday visits. In other tellings, Alice follows him to England, forging her own path so they can discover the dreaming spires of Oxford together. Occasionally, Wai stays, defying convention for love, and their life in Hong Kong unfolds with uncertain consequences.
Which one is the “true” ending? There may be no single truth—only possibilities. Each variation is a reflection of real struggles: familial duty, cultural identity, the push-and-pull of modern migrations, and the exhilarating, painful undertow of first love.
The heartbreak is real in each telling; so is the promise that love might outlast an ocean’s worth of distance. Whether you picture them parting at the airport, or reuniting on that ferry one year later, or forging a path together on foreign shores, the essence remains: they are two souls bound by devotion, caught in a shifting tide of culture and expectation.
Sometimes, the best stories are the ones that refuse tidy conclusions. They echo beyond the final page, inviting you to wonder—does he come back? Does she follow him? Do they drift apart, only to meet again on some windswept university quad, or beneath the neon lights of Hong Kong, older and wiser yet still in love?
The truth is, we don’t know. Or rather, you choose. Much like Wai and Alice, you stand on the margin where the story writes itself.
If love prevails, so be it.
If distance wins, that, too, is a story told a thousand times.
What matters is that their hearts—like ours—still beat with possibility, even as the plane takes off, the ferry sets sail, and the city lights glow one last time in the distance.
