Grating [School Life]

Second chance romance | Healing | From high school to college

[Complete. Updates are for revisions and typos; I am only responsible for the official version.]

[Pre-release: A Color Too Rich, stealing someone's partner | love triangle | obsessive love]

Blurb

Swan x stray dog

Cool x passionate

*

The year Chu Li turned seventeen, she transferred to No. 2 High School in the remote county of Ning.

She had an exceptionally beautiful face, a cool personality, and outstanding grades.

An air of superiority ran through her very bones.

Everyone knew there was another notable student at No. 2 High School.

Wen Yuze was pursued by countless girls. Arrogant and unruly, he was a notorious bad boy who played around.

He was also the one person no one at the school dared to provoke.

One was cool and aloof, the other wild and haughty.

They were in the same year but different classes, worlds apart and with nothing in common.

Until one day, during classroom cleanup, someone saw Wen Yuze pick Chu Li up and carry her to the infirmary.

Chu Li struggled over his shoulder and cursed him the whole way.

"You're crazy! You're a lunatic! Put me down!"

Wen Yuze ignored her and got some alcohol to treat her wound.

The injury stung as it was dabbed with alcohol. Chu Li squeezed her eyes shut and called him a dog, but someone gripped her chin hard, forcing her to tilt her head back.

The boy's pupils were black, his jaw tense, his prominent knuckles holding her in place. "Try calling me that again."

Everyone realized that their relationship had long since become something more.

When Wen Yuze played basketball, Chu Li would wait beneath a streetlamp so they could walk home together.

After the sports meet, Chu Li wore Wen Yuze's oversized black T-shirt, flaunting their intimacy for all to see.

So the school tyrant could be tamed after all.

Some people sighed that the darling of heaven had fallen into the mortal world, entangled with a rebellious, pleasure-seeking delinquent.

*

Later, on the day Chu Li left,

their relationship was in a terrible state.

She left Ning County in the season of spring blossoms and new growth, setting out to meet a brighter future and a new beginning.

That night, Wen Yuze leaned against the sofa, alcohol fogging his mind.

His friend asked, "You're really not going after her?"

"No."

"Can you really let her go?"

"Anyone who goes after her is a dog."

Wen Yuze meant what he said.

He endured one cold night after another and quit Chu Li like a smoking habit.

Until three years later, at the welcome gala at Beicheng University.

The stage lights swept past the dimly lit seats, and Chu Li caught sight of a familiar face.

She still remembered how cold and heartless he had been, how he had never tried to win her back. They had long since lost touch.

Chu Li assumed she'd mistaken him for someone else.

After the performance, as she stepped offstage, a young man came up to her.

He wore a crisp black shirt, his hair shaved short at the temples, and a pair of metal-framed glasses on his nose.

He was wild and unruly, the very picture of a polished cad.

"Senior."

Wen Yuze smiled gently, looking completely harmless. "Long time no see."

*

I wanted to drag you into the abyss, but in the end, I was the one who sent you away with my own hands.

*

Reading Guide [Bolded and Enlarged Version]:

1. Healing, bittersweet and sweet. There will be heartbreak in the middle and later parts.

2. Boarding school trope. The male lead isn't poor. All place names in the story are entirely fictional and aren't based on real places.

3. Both leads are each other's first and only love. Happy ending.

Blurb rewritten on November 28, 2023.

Theme: Go where the light is.