Friends Anran and Yongyuan are separated as children and meet again years later in Beijing in the early 1990s when Anran is a university student and Yongyuan is a hawker. They rediscover their childhood friendship. Yongyuan helps her raise funds to study abroad. They fall in love but try to hide it.
But Always
Yongyuan and Anran who develop an instant bond after meeting as children in Beijing. In the first instance of a pattern that would recur in their relationship, the youngsters are pulled apart when Yongyuan is forced to move away. A brief reunion during their teenage years ends in a similar way as Anran moves to New York to study. As young adults, they find each other again in New York, and this time, the two ignite a heated love affair, which ends abruptly after a bout of miscommunication. Will Anran and Yongyuan find each other again? Will they, at last, be able to break the pattern that has defined their relationship for the larger part of their lives?