Male unrequited love | Friends to lovers | Second chance romance | Companion piece to "Tough Talk"
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They say Jima Temple blesses people with true love, so Fang Rong, single her whole life at twenty-three, dragged her friends along for a visit.
The rumor proved true. She had barely turned around after setting down her incense when she ran into the boy who had secretly loved her in high school.
For three years straight, there had always been a bottle of milk on her desk. She didn't find out who left it until just before the college entrance exams. Unfortunately, they went to different universities, and their connection faded away.
Years later, they met again, and he started pursuing her once more. Fang Rong took it as fate blessing her with true love and didn't turn him down. But the night before their first official date, things went wrong.
Xu Zhiqing, her friend of eight years, came down with a fever late at night. She went over to take care of him. When he called her on video, a disheveled man with a hoarse voice accidentally answered.
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Fang Rong had been friends with Xu Zhiqing for eight years, and never imagined they would end up together.
Only after they started dating did she realize that his aloof, distant, untouchable persona was all an act. He was clingy, stubborn, and incredibly suspicious, constantly checking up on her.
Unable to stand his excessive possessiveness, she finally broke up with him.
Three months after breaking up with Xu Zhiqing, he was still haunting her every step of the way. Fang Rong went back to Jima Temple, this time just to sever their ill-fated bond.
But just after she posted on her social media, the very source of that ill fate messaged her: [Were you there to cut ties with me?]
Fang Rong sneered and blocked him, deciding that out of sight meant out of mind.
Perhaps Buddha really had answered her prayers. After she blocked him, Xu Zhiqing stopped bothering her and said they could just be friends again.
After all, they had known each other for years, so Fang Rong agreed.
Life returned to normal. They got along as they always had, and the man seemed to have regained his old sense of boundaries. Fang Rong breathed a sigh of relief.
Until one time, after a night of drinking, she woke to find the man's breath warm against her neck. She turned stiffly and saw a familiar, handsome face.
Her whole body froze as she remembered the reckless events of the night before. In a hoarse voice, he had whispered in her ear again and again, "Am I still your ill-fated bond?"
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Xu Zhiqing had been secretly in love with Fang Rong for eight years. He had planned everything, waiting for her to realize her feelings.
From a short distance away, he watched the girl pray devoutly with incense in hand, waiting for her to turn around. But he hadn't expected someone to suddenly show up and get there first.
He hadn't expected her to think that someone else had left the bottles of milk that appeared on her desk like clockwork during those three years of high school.
Synopsis written on 2025.12.18
Theme: Friends are friends, my friend. Friends can't become lovers.
