Caged Bird

"This story has no body-double trope! The heroine is not a stand-in!"

[Blurb]

On the eve of her wedding to Pei Duo, someone happens to find an old, dusty photograph in a cabinet.

With pleasant surprise, they say, "So you knew each other in high school?"

Sheng Jia glances over in silence.

The photo shows two young people in school uniforms, standing side by side, looking inseparable.

She doesn't answer.

Because the girl in the photo isn't her. It's her older sister.

Her sister died long before Sheng Jia left that small town. Her remains were buried somewhere he didn't know about.

*

[The hero's version]

On a rainy night when he was seventeen, someone stole Pei Duo's perfect-score math test from the school bulletin board. All that was left was a corner.

Ten years later, he sees that same test again in his wife's high school textbook.

It has been carefully preserved, with no trace of having been soaked by the heavy rain.

One day, Pei Duo comes home a little drunk and takes out the test.

Sitting alone in the empty house, he realizes his wife has become his ex-wife, and that the things she once treasured nearly ended up as waste paper.

He was the one who picked them out of the trash.

*

["Caged Bird": a bird in a cage, a bird held captive]

[A handsome guy with little patience and a short temper, who was forced to become nicer because his wife's temper was even worse, and who can be cutting-tongued at times] vs [A beautiful girl who's starved for affection, petty, has a great memory, and is extremely conflicted, sensitive, and melodramatic]

[Reading Guide]

1. The heroine's name is pronounced Jia, with a first tone.

2. The hero's name is pronounced Duo, with a second tone.

3. Happy ending, happy ending, happy ending. They divorce, then fall in love again.

Theme: Work hard to live, for yourself alone