Kiss in Winter

[The print edition is now available on all platforms. Follow @ShiTaoZhizhiYa for details.] [The full novel is complete. Please leave a five-star review! My next novel about a younger brother is available to preorder in my profile. Please add it to your collection -v-] Blurb: 1. Ever since the hospital hired Qi Xiajing as a specialist consultant, people had never stopped coming to the department to ask about his relationship status. The young, promising associate professor always looked languid, yet he and Li Dong, who worked in the same department, simply could not get along. Whenever the two were in the same room, the temperature seemed to drop ten degrees. No one knew why. Until one day, the department held a dinner party. Qi Xiajing lounged against the sofa, his striking features appearing and disappearing beneath the spotlights. He looked languid and aloof, radiating an icy “keep your distance” aura. Someone suggested playing Truth or Dare, and Li Dong was unlucky enough to be picked. As everyone racked their brains for a question, Qi Xiajing suddenly spoke. “What was your first love like?” Amid the excited commotion, Li Dong replied expressionlessly, “I can’t remember.” Later, after the dinner party, in a deserted corner, someone saw Qi Xiajing pin Li Dong against the wall, his fingers clasped around her wrist. With a teasing smile, he asked, “You can’t remember?” “Want me to help you remember?” 2. No one knew that Li Dong had been in love with Qi Xiajing for all three years of high school. Her unrequited love was like a silent play, with Li Dong as its sole performer. Again and again, she drew the boy surrounded by a crowd in her sketchbook, even if all she could ever depict was his back. The night she learned Qi Xiajing was going abroad, she wrote on the last page of her sketchbook: “Like midsummer and the depths of winter, some people are destined never to cross paths.” She never imagined that ten years later, someone would cherish that sketchbook like a treasure, adding her figure beside the boy in every drawing. [Like midsummer and the depths of winter, some people are destined never to cross paths.] [But we met in early spring and ran away together in late autumn. We spent all the winters and summers that followed passionately in love.] · Two doctors: a sharp-tongued, stubborn one + X + a sensitive overthinker · Primarily set in the city, with school flashbacks; mutual unrequited love / rekindled romance; each other’s first love; happy ending Here’s another novel I hope to write, Dream Beneath the Locust Tree [Mutual Redemption]. If you like it, please add it to your collection! Blurb: In the sweltering summer heat, the blazing sun beats down on the city. After being beaten, Nan Li runs away from home. Inside a shabby, cramped clinic, she stares blankly as Chen Beisi tosses the last bottle of bruise medicine in front of her, then turns and walks away. The tall, thin boy is pale and sharp-featured, his oversized school uniform billowing in the wind. His hands are in his pockets, and blood keeps seeping through the bandages hidden beneath his sleeves. She hurries after him and calls softly to his back, “Thank you.” They have been classmates for two years, and this is the first time they have spoken. Later, Nan Li tries several times to bring him medicine and thank him, but is repeatedly rebuffed. In a corner of the hallway, Chen Beisi looks down at the slender girl, his expression sullen and hostile. Exasperated, he says, “Good girl, stay away from me.” “But you’re hurt,” Nan Li says, looking up at him calmly. “You feel pain too, don’t you?” Everyone around her tells Nan Li to stay away from Chen Beisi. A murderer’s blood runs in the boy’s veins, and the little scar on his brow, no bigger than a fingernail, is the clearest proof of his violent, volatile nature. Unfortunately, Nan Li is more stubborn than anyone. One evening, torrential rain pours down. On the deserted sports field, someone sees Nan Li approach Chen Zhisi, who stands alone, holding an umbrella. In the rain and mist, the slender, handsome boy is soaked through. He places the pale yellow umbrella in her hand, but stubbornly keeps it over the girl. He repeats the same thing: “Stop worrying about me. We’re not cut from the same cloth.” “Chen Beisi,” Nan Li says calmly. “Say that again.” “I said…” The boy leans closer, wet hair hiding his dark eyes. His fingers tighten around the umbrella handle until his knuckles turn white. In a hoarse voice, he says, “, Don’t leave me behind.” - Chen Beisi thinks his life is destined to be an endless abyss, a bottomless mire. He never imagined that one day the girl would stand beneath the bright white moonlight in a white dress, turn back to him with a radiant smile, and say: “Chen Beisi.” “If no one in this world loves you, then let me be the one who loves you above all others.” A seemingly sweet, secretly tough girl + X + a genuinely rebellious boy Here’s another upcoming novel, For You, Spring Light. I hope you’ll add it to your collection 0v0 Blurb: On her twenty-seventh birthday, Sheng Sui decides to marry a man she has met only three times. The first time was at school. When students got into a fight, Sheng Sui called their parents and discovered that the father was Zhou Shiyu, the celebrated heartthrob from her own high school days. The man is gentle and courteous, with an air of effortless elegance. All the female teachers in the staff room sigh over how he married so young. Sheng Sui introduces herself: “Hello, I’m your child’s homeroom teacher.” Zhou Shiyu is taken aback, then smiles and plays along. Before leaving, he asks her, “Ms. Sheng, would you mind exchanging contact information?” The second time is at an upscale restaurant. Sheng Sui is being pestered by her blind date and is about to call the police when a warm hand suddenly closes around her wrist. She hears the man she was meeting cry out as he falls to the ground. Zhou Shiyu steps in front of her, then offers her a handkerchief. His voice is gentle: “Ms. Sheng, are you considering any other candidates?” Only then does Sheng Sui realize Zhou Shiyu is currently single. The third time is at the hospital. In the middle of the night, she rushes over to care for her sick niece, only to find Zhou Shiyu receiving an IV in a corner of the emergency room. There is no one to look after him. His normally pale skin is flushed red with fever, and his breathing is weak. He takes Sheng Sui’s hand with his burning one and asks faintly, “Ms. Sheng, could you stay with me?” - One day after they are married, Sheng Sui gets up in the middle of the night, unable to sleep, and goes to the study. She picks up a poetry collection her husband often reads. When she opens it, a photo slips out, its edges yellowed with age. Sheng Sui sees herself and Zhou Shiyu as teenagers, smiling carefree at the camera. She turns to Zhou Shiyu, who has been silent for a long time, and asks, “But I don’t remember any of it.” “That’s all right.” He kisses away the tears at the corners of her eyes, his voice still gentle. “We have a long future ahead. I can tell you everything, little by little.” He has remembered every single thing about the two of them for her. - Ever since he was sixteen, Zhou Shiyu has kept a secret buried deep in his heart. On the night Sheng Sui gave him a good-luck charm, he wanted to do to her what people do beneath a cherry tree in spring. Special education teacher + X + venture capital tycoon Marriage first, love later / unrequited love comes true / long-planned romance / each other’s first love / happy ending Important note: The child is the male lead’s younger brother. Theme: Study hard and keep striving for a better future.