Old Friends Are Hard to Find

“The life I thought I’d built, the life I thought was finally on the right track, was turned into a pile of mud by your sudden appearance.”

[Two male leads + tangled youth + intense push and pull]

*Note up front: This is a scumbag’s memoir told primarily from Lin Jian’s perspective, and it includes content about a gay man married to a woman. Readers with low blood pressure may want to take care.

Zhou Shu, Lin Jian’s ex-boyfriend, who had been missing for eight years, suddenly showed up at a parent-teacher meeting for Lin Jian’s son. When they met again, Zhou Shu wept as he told Lin Jian how hard his life had been over the past eight years, and what an unspeakable reason he’d had for leaving without a word back then.

One meeting brings back a third of the old affection. Lin Jian, moreover, still had eight-tenths of his feelings for Zhou Shu.

Lin Jian believed Zhou Shu couldn’t possibly be as bad as he’d imagined, and found it easy to trust him. But that all came to an abrupt end when he received the photos Zhou Shu sent him.

Once again, Zhou Shu dragged him into hell.

And yet, little by little, Lin Jian came to relish it.