A Heart Flutter Like Honey

[1]

Freshman welcome party

Ning Zhi sets the campus forum ablaze with a single photo.

The girl has almond-shaped eyes and snow-white cheeks, with delicate features like a painting. Her whole presence is pure and innocent.

She's not just pretty and gentle, she's also a real heiress. A genuine little fairy!

And then...

Something that makes everyone's jaw drop happens:

She turns down every one of her many excellent suitors.

Instead, she picks a delinquent from some backwater town, a high school dropout with no money.

Everyone: ??!!!

The delinquent is handsome, sure. That face is unreal.

But he fixes cars, and I've heard he once slashed someone. Is there any future with a delinquent like him?

This hopeless pretty-boy-crazy fool is beyond saving!

[2]

At the class reunion after graduation, Ning Zhi shows up alone.

Every girl there looks at her with pity and mockery.

What's the point of being pretty? She wasted the best years of her life on a delinquent.

Her clothes and bag aren't designer labels either. Her life must be pretty rough.

After dinner, a light rain begins to fall.

Everyone waits for their rides at the entrance, when a black Porsche pulls up right in front of them.

The door opens. A man steps out in a sharp suit, broad-shouldered and slim-waisted, and walks over to Ning Zhi in just a few strides.

He lays his jacket over her shoulders.

As everyone stares in stunned silence, the two walk off under an umbrella.

"Didn't you go out of town to sign a contract? How come you're back today?"

The man smiles. His air is cool and stern, but his voice is low and unfailingly tender.

"I missed you, so I couldn't help coming back early."

Everyone: "..."

So much for that delinquent with no future.

What kind of delinquent can afford a Porsche?!!

Ouch. That really hurts my pride. :)

[3]

Chen Ye first met Ning Zhi at the entrance to a dusty old alley.

In a green dress, the girl had bright, sparkling eyes and smiled at him.

Sweet, gentle, and shy.

The seven-year-old boy barely paid it any mind, lowering his head to keep playing marbles with his friends.

Years later,

with the cold wind howling, seventeen-year-old Chen Ye stands on the balcony with a cigarette between his lips, remembering their first meeting as children.

That smile is still vivid and clear,

as if engraved into his bones.

*

"You are the light of my life, the fire of my desire."

Reader's guide:

The timeline runs from high school to college and beyond.

Both are each other's first love, childhood sweethearts, mutually devoted. A sweet romance.

My new novel, Craving Her, is now underway. Please add it to your reading list, cuties!

At the end of August, Ruan Zhen shows up at her new school with a face bruised purple from a fall, so badly injured that no one can make out what she really looks like.

At the far end of an asphalt road scorched by the sun,

a lazy-looking boy leans against a black sports car, surrounded by a crowd, while a girl rises on tiptoe to eagerly light his cigarette.

Zhou Bochen, beside her, kindly warns her,

"They're a bunch of spoiled rich kids who do nothing but fool around. Especially Pei Zhou, the one in front. He's a bad boy who loves trouble. Zhenzhen, don't be like the other girls and get bewitched by his face."

Ruan Zhen thinks back to the glance she just caught. She isn't impressed.

-

By the sports car, a few boys spot them too.

They all know Pei Zhou and Zhou Bochen don't get along, so none of them bother to hold back.

"Look, Zhou Bochen's even wiping sweat off that girl's face. Are they dating or what?"

"Ha! His taste must be really weird if he's into that disfigured face."

Amid all the laughter, no one notices

Pei Zhou's jaw tightening, ash falling from the cigarette between his fingers again and again while he stays perfectly still.

His dark eyes remain fixed on the slender figure that's almost disappeared from view,

with wild jealousy suppressed beneath them.

-

A little over a month later, Ruan Zhen's injuries heal.

Her original, breathtakingly beautiful face is revealed.

Passing by a room, she hears Pei Zhou's friend joke with him: "Ruan Zhen's so pretty now, and she's Zhou Bochen's childhood sweetheart. If you win her over, Pei Zhou, Zhou Bochen will be furious."

Ruan Zhen stops in her tracks.

Not long after, needing something from Pei Zhou, she takes the initiative and confesses to him.

Her eyes are clear and guileless, her expression anxious but disarmingly sincere. "I know you're only being nice to me because of Zhou Bochen, and that you want to pursue me. I can be your girlfriend."

The easygoing look drops from Pei Zhou's face. He gazes at her with dark eyes for a long time, then finally smiles, returning to his usual nonchalant self. "Sure."

They start dating, and the girls are jealous and confused.

"She's pretty, but she's so stiff and boring. Pei Zhou's just messing around with her."

Everyone thinks Pei Zhou will lose interest soon, including Ruan Zhen.

No one expects them to stay together until after the college entrance exams, when Ruan Zhen is the one who dumps him and goes abroad.

At a class reunion years later,

Pei Zhou, who hasn't shown up, is still the center of conversation. People talk about him without reservation in front of Ruan Zhen: successful, influential in business, and so rich no one can count his fortune.

No one thinks the two of them still have a chance, and neither does Ruan Zhen.

Until the man kisses her until her tongue goes numb and her breath and thoughts are completely muddled. She looks up at him with damp eyes, utterly confused. "I thought you were really angry with me."

"I'm furious."

Pei Zhou lightly bites her lip, taking advantage of the moment she parts them to press his tongue against hers again, kissing her even harder. "But that doesn't change how much I love you."

Theme: Stay by each other's side and become better together