Taking What Isn't Mine

Age gap / romance with a classmate's mom / forbidden love / both are each other's first and only / daughter is adopted / melodrama

18 x 33, 15-year age gap. This blurb is tentative and may be revised when the novel officially begins.

Everyone at Sixth High knew that Lu Ye was the most obedient dog by Miss Chu's side.

But no one knew that Lu Ye had never coveted Miss Chu. The one she wanted was her adoptive mother.

The first time Lu Ye visited the Chu family, she stood awkwardly in the middle of the living room with a shabby backpack on her shoulders, her palms slick with sweat.

Chu Wangnian came downstairs in a long, strappy dress, like a beam of light shining into the sunless gutter where Lu Ye lived.

All summer, Lu Ye tutored Chu Yao during the day. At night, she gazed at the warm light coming through Chu Wangnian's bedroom window, as forbidden thoughts took root in her heart.

For more than thirty years, Chu Wangnian had been cold and aloof. The first person she ever desired turned out to be her adopted daughter's classmate.

One night, she opened the door and let the girl into her room.

She told herself it would only happen once. Later, it happened again and again.

The young girl's burning body held her as if she meant to devour her whole. On countless nights, the heat left Chu Wangnian's body and soul trembling.

Chu Yao had always thought Lu Ye liked her. That was until one rainy night, when she opened the door and saw her own elegant, moonlike mother pinned against the sofa by Lu Ye, her mother's hands clasped behind Lu Ye's neck.

"You two..."

Breathless, Chu Wangnian patted Lu Ye on the back of the head and sat up. "Yaoyao, you're still young. You'll have plenty of chances later. If Mommy doesn't start dating now, it'll be too late."

Thesis: The author expresses her homesickness.