Thirsty Fish

[Stealing someone's partner / skin hunger / distant in public, crossing boundaries in private]

1.

Xu Zhiyu is alluringly beautiful, with snow-white skin. But she's easygoing, low-key, gentle, and kind. The one thing everyone knows about her is that she's dating the roguishly handsome campus heartthrob.

Ying Wuqi is her boyfriend's aloof roommate, and another campus heartthrob. He's the aloof beauty at F University, high above everyone else, with a prominent family and a string of honors. In four years of college, he's never had a single rumor about him.

No one thinks the two of them would ever cross paths.

Xu Zhiyu thinks so too, especially since he dislikes her. Until she's dumped and heartbroken, and gets drunk at a bar while traveling. By mistake, in an unfamiliar place, she gets her hands on this icy academic star who wants nothing to do with women.

Afterward, when she's come to her senses and is running away with a sore waist and weak legs,

the man's bony fingers catch her ankle, mottled with kiss marks. His warm breath draws near. "Want to get back at him... Try being with me."

Possessed by some strange impulse, she looks at him with red-rimmed eyes and softly asks, "Why... would you?"

The man is silent for a moment.

He lowers his cold gaze and rubs her slender, trembling ankle. "Have you heard of skin hunger?"

Xu Zhiyu accepts his presence in her life.

2.

Later, Ying Wuqi grows more and more brazen.

The classroom, cafeteria, stairwells... all become places where he can cling to her and kiss her, until Xu Zhiyu can barely handle it. Then, on the night of their graduation ceremony, they kiss backstage in an empty hall, and her ex, flowers in hand and asking to get back together, catches them.

The good friends turn into bitter enemies over her.

The whole school is in an uproar.

The most easygoing good girl in the medical school has managed to win both campus heartthrobs.

Xu Zhiyu is forced into the spotlight. What began as revenge has long since changed into something else. For the first time, she goes looking for Ying Wuqi, who's addicted to sex but has no feelings for her, intending to put an end to this absurd affair.

But she can't find him.

Instead, she breaks into the top floor of a villa whose doors have always been locked.

Without warning, she sees her own photos covering all four walls, and mirror after mirror across the floor, each densely engraved with her name. They seem to radiate an almost overwhelming obsession and madness.

Xu Zhiyu turns around, trembling with fear and weak in the knees, only to run into a pair of burning black eyes, dark and unfathomable.

The man, usually cold and taciturn, leans against the doorframe, the corner of his lips curling into an eerie smile that seems completely at odds with him. "So you found out... Fishy."

Xu Zhiyu: "..." Help.

-

"Somewhere no one can see, someone is always loving you in their own way."

Easygoing Chinese medicine student x cold, skin-hungry ghost of a man

**Reader's guide:

1. One-on-one, first-time couple, happy ending. Starts on a college campus and later moves to the city.

2. The heroine has an ex, so hand-holding, hugs, and kisses are inevitable. The hero is chaste, so jump right in. He's a skin-hungry ghost with an overwhelming desire to cling to her and possess her, ovo.

3. Love-triangle rivalry with hair-pulling drama, plus a big difference in build and status ^q^

4. Later there is a tiny bit of coercive romance. Read with care if that's not for you~

First version of the blurb captured on May 16, 2025.

Please add my next book, Married Life Sparks, to your reading list~

Marriage first, love later | He has a secret crush on her | Size difference

"In the eleventh year of his unrequited love, the moon came down to him."

Lin Qiao starts dating the crush she had back in high school.

After two months of caring messages, all she gets is, "She's going abroad. I'll go with her." She was just a stand-in for a short-term fling.

Heartbroken and disillusioned, Lin Qiao returns to her hometown. When she's pressured into a blind date, she runs into He Xiao, her quiet, taciturn desk mate from her first year of high school.

After all these years, he's grown into a rugged, untamed fire station chief. He spots her on a blind date with a group of men and drawls, "Well, look at that. I'm single too."

"Lin Qiao, we're old classmates. Won't you let me be your husband?"

Lin Qiao remembers the earthquake during evening study hall in her final year of high school, He Xiao making his way upstream from the science building, and the White Rabbit candy he gave her.

After thinking for two seconds, she asks seriously, "...Can we get married right now?"

They elope and register their marriage that Christmas.

-

Not long after their wedding, their high school celebrates its centennial.

Her crush, back in the country alone, corners her in a classroom and gently, earnestly begs her to divorce and get back together with him.

"..." Lin Qiao is unmoved. The burly, tough He Xiao walks over with a cold expression, puts an arm around her shoulder, and looks just like a husband catching his wife cheating. "Wife, are you divorcing me?"

Her ex tries to steal her away right in front of He Xiao, leaving Lin Qiao mortified. At home, she tries to save face. "Who takes a high school crush seriously? I've forgotten all about him..."

He Xiao says nothing. That night, he makes her try every possible way to fulfill their marital duties, which they've never quite managed to do before.

Lin Qiao groans, holding her back. Had he never had a crush on a girl in high school? Hadn't he given someone a gift?

Time has dulled the past. Surely everyone forgets their old loves eventually.

-

Then, one Christmas, heavy snow closes the roads.

He Xiao is sent on an emergency call. That night, she braves the wind and snow to pick him up. The man, carrying the smell of smoke and gunpowder, silently takes her to the station dormitory. As soon as they enter, he kisses her fiercely, impatiently and greedily.

As Lin Qiao stumbles, her legs going weak, she accidentally knocks over an unlocked red pearwood box

Her hands shaking, she reaches to pick it up.

And catches sight of a letter, its pages yellowed with age.

And... more than a dozen short but heartbreaking farewell letters.

Every page is covered with Lin Qiao's name, written in a frantic, urgent hand, the ink pressed deep into the paper.

It turns out...

There really is someone who can love one person faithfully for more than a decade.

Avoidant type x bold, break-in-and-steal-your-heart type (?)

Gentle, conflicted sweetheart x rugged, untamed fire station chief

Theme: Love is the resonance of souls