Borrowed Fire

In Ying Huan’s third year living in the old apartment block, a mysterious, elusive stranger moved in next door.

He had half his black hair tied back, pale skin, and a large tattoo covering his arm. Ying Huan was so frightened she ordered pepper spray overnight, afraid her new neighbor was some hardened criminal fresh out of prison.

Then one pitch-black night during a power outage, Ying Huan came home from work and ran into this “hardened criminal” in the narrow, dim stairwell.

The man leaned against the peeling wall and asked in a husky voice, “Got a light?”

After nervously observing him for half a month, Ying Huan came to a conclusion: Xie Yuduo wasn’t dangerous at all. He was just a broke guy whose dreams had fallen apart.

He worked as a bartender at a bar three streets away, giving off the air of someone who’d been abandoned by the world.

Ying Huan felt sorry for him, thinking they were both down on their luck.

She took Xie Yuduo to eat at a street stall and patted his shoulder encouragingly.

“Being handsome doesn’t get you anywhere. You have to live with dignity. Look at me: my client treats me like dirt, and I still have to rush to the hospital. That’s life!”

Xie Yuduo would silently gaze at her lively yet exhausted eyes.

After she met Xie Yuduo, Ying Huan’s world started to get strange:

A sharp-tongued chef who claimed to own several Michelin-starred restaurants but kept showing up to mooch late-night snacks, and a wild rich kid who insisted on getting Xie Yuduo’s band back together, both started orbiting little office worker Ying Huan instead.

Ying Huan sighed: Birds of a feather flock together. Sure enough, none of Xie Yuduo’s friends had a proper job.

Then one day, at the hospital, Ying Huan was surrounded by the relatives of a patient who were making trouble. In the middle of the shoving, a pair of long, strong hands steadied her by the shoulders.

The gloomy neighbor who spent all day shaking cocktail shakers behind a bar was now wearing a spotless white coat, his gaze as cold as ice.

He stepped in front of Ying Huan, his presence so powerful it was suffocating.

It was Xie Yuduo, the gifted surgeon hailed as “God’s Hands,” who had disappeared from the medical world two years ago.

Ying Huan’s brain short-circuited. She remembered all the grand things she’d said about how he should deliver takeout to make ends meet, and wished she could vanish on the spot.

In the car on a rainy night, Xie Yuduo held her close, lowering his head to breathe in the warmth of home in her hair.

His voice was husky, touched by a possessiveness she’d never heard before.

“Ying Huan, you told me people have to live with dignity. I’m back now.”

Gritting his teeth, he leaned close to her ear and began settling old scores with those “other men.”

“I burned the band tickets Shen Que gave you. You’re not allowed to eat the private meals Jiang Yan makes for you.”

“And that ‘gentle senior’ who held an umbrella for you in the downpour and made you feel so sorry for him, ”

“Ying Huan, look carefully. Who’s shielding you from the rain now?”

[1v1, both leads have no prior sexual partners, and the heroine is not your typical everyone-loves-her type]

Theme: Loving you when you’re at your lowest