Amber was idly fiddling with her fingers. She was sitting on the stone stairs across the soccer field during lunch time alone. Krystal had gone to the competition with Kris at Sukji High School and she couldn’t help but wonder what had happened.

Did she meet Hyeju and Yonghwa there? Will she be okay?

Her worries were endless. Even in her morning classes, she couldn’t concentrate. Her thoughts were on the possibilities of her cousin having another panic attack, and that’s the least thing she wanted to happen. Somehow, she was beginning to regret why she didn’t skip school to come there with Krystal but even before she could think about it, a man’s voice interrupted her solitude.

“Why aren’t you eating?” Luhan sat beside Amber, leaving a comfortable and platonic distance between them. He looked at her with his doe eyes. “Are you worried?”

The girl smiled a little as she brought her gaze back to her shoes. “Yeah,” she muttered.

Luhan reached out and gave her shoulder a tap. “Don’t worry,” he smiled. “Kris is with her so I doubt anything will go wrong.”

Amber looked at him, hope flashing clear in her brown orbs. She was thinking that too, and hopefully, Luhan was right. She wished Kris’ presence would really be strong enough when her cousin encounters people from her past. As she was reminded of what happened in the principal’s office, she breathed a smile of relief.

“Alright,” she told the young man.

Luhan grinned and for a few moments, no one was speaking. However, the deer boy could no longer hold it in. So without taking his stares off the soccer field, he carefully formed the words to express his intense curiosity.

“What exactly happened then?” He asked.

Amber pouted and thought if it’s okay to tell her cousin’s secret away. But Luhan doesn’t like the crazy guy who would spill secrets. If anything, he seems to be the funny yet mature person who just really wanted to know what happened.

A deep sigh escaped the lady’s lips. “Well the story actually roots from when we were still in middle school,” she began. Luhan nodded, signaling he’s listening well.

“Soojung transferred to GSIS when she was 3rd year in middle school. Although she’s really nice, she had always been the ice princess so it was difficult for her to find friends then. People talk to her and she tries to be nice, but it always ended up like she’s being backstabbed. It hurt her that her classmates were thinking that way about her but being the strong girl that she had always been, she just let it go and decided to live her school life according to how she wanted it. But just before the winter break, one popular guy came to her and introduced himself as Jung Yonghwa. Making the story short, they got together,” Amber related.

Hesitation flashed through the girl’s face and Luhan just stared at her urging her that it’s okay to continue. So after another set of sighs, Amber did continue. “They were just 14 back then and everything was just so fast. And you know how young minds could be. Soojung was hated because she was in a relationship with a popular kid but there was this girl named Hye Ju who befriended her and defended her from all the detractors.

“Soon enough, Hye Ju got Yonghwa’s trust and Soojung felt uncomfortable with the sudden closeness. She always catches the two together during weekends when that guy would bail out on her,” the girl stated in gritted teeth.

Luhan felt the need to somehow compromise the situation. “Maybe they were together just by coincidence?”

Amber shrugged. “Krystal thought of that too. She had always been the forgiving one, trying always to look at the positive sides of things. At first, she decided not to mind but her instincts had gone so strong about the unusual closeness of her boyfriend. But still, she chose not to let those thoughts linger even though other people could also notice that there’s something really between Hye Ju and Yonghwa.”

This time, Luhan couldn’t speak and so Amber continued relaying the story. “I admit my cousin’s too nice but she just wanted to save the relationship. Yonghwa meant a lot to her considering he’s her first love; but apparently, that wasn’t the case for that guy. Around two months after issues of Hye Ju and him were spread around the school, he took it to the next level and actually decided to display his affection towards that .

“He would hold her hand and leave my cousin alone in despair. I told Krystal to speak up but she was too afraid that he would leave him so she just absorbed it all in. She was too much of a martyr but I realized that that’s how she falls in love – all out,” she said.

Amber’s fist clenched tight together as she heaved deep sighs. Luhan stared at her, wondering what’s happening but finally deducing that maybe remembering the past was really making her blood boil. Well, he had heard the first part yet he knew he’ll be too damn annoyed too if that happens to a person he values. So not wanting to make it any harder for the girl, he smiled and tapped her shoulder once again.

“You know, it’s okay if you stop—“

Amber shook her head as she breathed deeply, cutting the guy’s sentence off. “It’s okay,” she muttered. “I need to let it out anyway.”

Luhan smiled encouragingly.

“Krystal realized that she really should do something about the situation but since she was too attached to the idea of preserving the relationship, she opted to do some reverse psychology. She pretended like everything’s okay and that she’s convinced that Yonghwa and Hye Ju were just friends – because that’s what the two were saying – although it was destroying her inside.

“That guy must have found a good timing in the set-up and you know what he did?” Luhan shrugged as Amber continued, fuming again. “He ing told Krystal about her capades with Hye Ju. He told her even about how she’s so good in bed that he really just couldn’t get enough of her.”

The usually beautiful eyes of Luhan widened in horror. “,” he muttered as he took in the intensity of what the queenka had to go through. “I haven’t met that guy yet but I hate him already.”

Amber nodded. “I know right,” she commented.

“What did Krystal do then?” Luhan inquired.

The young woman pouted her lips as her gaze fall onto her lap once more. “She go