The Substitute Lover

What is love?

Amid the surging crowd, a wave kissed her.

They met because of a mistaken kiss. After that kiss came a night too shameful to speak of.

That night was absurd, but it set the course for the rest of their lives.

Jun Wanshan believed in love, but she didn't trust Yu Qing. From the first time she saw her, she knew those peach-blossom eyes were bound to bring trouble.

She wouldn't fall too deep. She would only offer them a space to comfort each other.

Once a week.

She knew her place, and she knew the chasm between them.

Yet Yu Qing waited downstairs half the night on Valentine's Day, holding a bouquet of baby's breath as fireworks burst overhead, blossom after blossom.

She knew people always fell for beautiful things.

But the one thing Yu Qing should never have done was tell her, just when she had started believing in love, that she was only a substitute Yu Qing used for emotional comfort.

That "Big Sister" wasn't meant for her. It was for another woman.

When Yu Qing was very young, she lost a lover. The other woman married and had children, and Yu Qing respected her choice and wished her well.

But after finally moving on and pouring all her strength into loving someone else, this time she lost that person to death.

"She won't die."

Yu Qing stared at the black-and-white portrait, her eyes bloodshot.

"She loves me so much. How could she bear to leave me?"

Five years after rising dance star Jun Wanshan jumped into the sea to kill herself, a woman almost identical to her appeared at Jiangcheng Airport.

She had the same face, yet insisted she was Shu Hua, a classical dancer who had returned from overseas.

Everyone wondered if she was Jun Wanshan, back from the dead. Yu Qing most of all. Rumor had it she was indirectly responsible for Jun Wanshan's death. She should have been living happily ever after with her first love, but instead, she spent five years alone and waited outside Jun Wanshan's home for an entire night.

When Jun Wanshan opened the door the next day, Yu Qing was drenched in dew, her wet clothes clinging to her body, all her former glory gone.

"Shanshan, I've been waiting for you so long."

tips:

1. A groveling romance: she's awful at first, then spends the rest of the story chasing her. The universe always balances the scales.

2. Jun Wanshan is "Xiao Jun" from Miss by the Pillow, and a classmate of Shi Qing.

3. It combines the substitute, amnesia, and groveling tropes, with lots of melodrama. After Xiao Jun returns to China, she has an adopted daughter and a suitor. Don't read if that's not your thing.

Theme: None for now