Stumbling Upon Midsummer

[The full text has been revised, so it differs from versions online. The reading experience on Jinjiang will be even better~]

[Signed for publication, @He Zhihe]

The day Yun Xi was brought into the Lu family home, she saw for the first time the expensive upright piano displayed in the living room, and the unruly-looking young man beside it.

Uncle Lu introduced them. "This is my son. He's a year older than you."

She obediently called him "Gege."

The boy nodded coolly and turned to head upstairs.

*

When you're living under someone else's roof, you have to know your place. Yun Xi didn't dare ask for anything from the Lu family.

Even at a banquet, when someone brazenly yanked the bracelet off her wrist and sneered, "You think you deserve to wear that? Look in the mirror and learn your place," she didn't argue back.

But after the guests had left, Lu Zhiyun barged into her room, the stolen star bracelet dangling from his fingers.

His brows furrowed with impatience, and his tone was commanding. "Do you know how to complain? If anyone bullies you again, tell me right away."

Then, with awkward movements, he fastened the bracelet around her wrist.

Later, someone joked about Yun Xi. "Your little sister's pretty cute, Brother Lu. Why don't you introduce us?"

Lu Zhiyun kicked the guy on the spot and asked expressionlessly, "Have you come to your senses yet?"

*

Yun Xi used to dislike summer because it meant oppressive heat, scorching sun, and the clatter of a cheap electric fan in a rented apartment.

But later, beneath the blazing sun, when the air itself seemed about to evaporate, someone handed her a bottle of orange soda.

He said, "Xixi, come home with me."

-Summer may end, but my love for you won't.

A quick plug for my new novel, A Book for the Roses~

Xu Hui secretly loved someone in high school, but their story ended in heartbreak before it could even begin.

She never imagined she'd get another chance to see him, let alone at a matchmaking event.

When she heard his family was pressuring him to marry, and that he was looking for someone to enter a marriage of convenience with, Xu Hui was like a gambler, staking all her courage on a single desperate question: "If you're going to get married, could it be me?"

The man raised his brows, his carefree smile fading a little. "This isn't a small matter. Think it through."

Xu Hui nodded. She had thought it through.

All along, she had known he was a sea whose depths were impossible to fathom, yet she still wanted to leap in without hesitation.

_

Xu Hui and Wen Yuye got married.

At first, their friends didn't approve. They thought someone as gentle and reserved as her could never keep Young Master Wen, who was used to losing himself in a world of wine and song, in check.

And yet she was the one who could make Wen Yuye abandon a roomful of guests and head straight home with just one phone call.

In the hazy darkness, the man leaned against the doorway, unaware of the snow and wind covering him.

It had been exactly twenty minutes since she made that call.

Xu Hui was a little surprised. "How did you get back so quickly?"

Remembering the teasing he'd received when he left, Wen Yuye raised his thin lips in a smile and admitted without hesitation, "I came back to make it up to you, Mrs. Wen."

-Amid the clamor of wine and revelry, he finally understood that the only one who had ever captured his heart was this white rose.

-No matter how gentle the evening breeze, it can't compare to how much I miss you.

Both leads are faithful | Her secret crush comes true

Theme: Even in hardship, keep believing in hope