Uncontrollable Crush: A Hundred Thousand Heartbeats Across the Screen
[Mutual pining + campus angst + bittersweet healing + online romance from start to finish]
One late-night matchmaking session in the Rift brought me, drowning under the pressure of the college entrance exams, face-to-face with Gu Xun, a college student gentle to his very core.
He was the confidant who stayed up late organizing my wrong answers into a study guide. When I couldn’t raise enough money for my dad’s surgery, he transferred a hundred thousand yuan without a second thought. Hundreds of kilometers away, he made every little part of my daily life feel cherished and cared for.
I sank into that tender, careful sweetness, watching Lin Xiao and Chen Yang cling fiercely to each other through their fights and arguments. I envied how, even when they were red-faced with anger, they could be certain the other wouldn’t leave. But between him and me lay a chasm of reality, and the insecurity I couldn’t bring myself to confess.
When it came time to submit my university choices, I couldn’t bring myself to gamble on a chance at crossing mountains and seas. In secret, I chose a local university. Later, full of fear, I ran off on a trip to Hangzhou. I was afraid that this screen-separated crush wouldn’t stand up to the scrutiny of real life, and that the weight of his generosity would make even chatting with each other feel awkward and guarded.
We had never met in person. All we had were the little joys and anxieties we sent through our screens. He said he would wait for me. I said I was sorry. The feelings that began in the Rift became my most secret heartache, hidden beneath the cicadas’ song in the height of summer.
Then, amid the rain in Hangzhou, his message lit up my phone screen, every word burning hot: “You don’t have to be afraid to meet me or worry about the distance between us. If you’re willing, I can wait for you for a very, very long time.”
