Winter's Grip

“Gu Nianbai, we’re even now, but I can’t love you anymore.”

Lin Shuning, who has asthma, suffers an attack on a plane and is rescued in time by Gu Donglin, a doctor she’s never met. Their chance encounter brings them together. Later, Lin Shuning discovers that Gu Donglin is her neighbor, and that he once saved her beloved kitten, too.

As they spend more time together, Lin Shuning gradually falls for Gu Donglin, a calm and professional doctor whose private life is carefree and unstructured. Their feelings deepen as they go from strangers to confidants. As a cardiothoracic surgeon, Gu Donglin often has to cancel plans because of work, and he frequently falls into despair over patients he couldn’t save. Lin Shuning is always there to comfort and encourage him.

But one time, when Gu Donglin is feverish and muttering in his sleep, Lin Shuning learns a shocking truth: Gu Donglin was once her mother’s attending physician, and her mother was ultimately not saved. She is thrown into a painful inner struggle. She loves him, but she can’t let go of the anguish and resentment of “him not saving her mother.”

In the end, their shared past drives them apart. After Gu Donglin dies, Lin Shuning receives from his mother a gift he had treasured, one connected to her: a snow-globe. Only then does she feel more deeply the depth of his love, a love that could never reach its happy ending.

Sometimes, the deepest love and the most painful wounds come from the same place.

Theme: Love without fear.