2009 . 10 . 28 – 1:13AM

The recording room fell still as exhaustion crept into the bodies inhabiting the room.  Starting at sunrise of finalizing choreography and adding updates to their upcoming album, the girls of f(x) struggled to keep their eyes open and their senses alert as they continued to watch Luna finalize her last segments of each song, as she was the last member to add to her parts.

A stifled yawn escaped Amber’s mouth as tears formed at the corner of her eye from the cause.  She ran her hand through her head back and forth and scratched her eyes, trying to awaken for the remainder of the night as it began to end slowly.  Sulli and Victoria were asleep next to each other, leaning on the other’s shoulder. Krystal was on the other couch stretched out, occupying the space Luna had previously taken up before leaving it to do her part in recording.  Amber saw Krystal struggling to keep her eyes open and her head on her shoulders.  She watched Krystal’s head bob comically on and off and chuckled to herself.

“Hey,” Amber called out.  Krystal slightly jumped at the voice that cracked through their silence and turned her head to face the caller.  She bit back a smile seeing Amber laugh at her millisecond heart attack. 

“What?  Leave me alone, I’m so tired,” Krystal whined.

Amber chuckled.  “I know.  Which is why I’m saying that it’s okay to give in and fall asleep.”

“You’re not giving in.”

“I’m not as sleepy as you.”

Krystal made a face.  “How are you not tired?”

Amber gave out a crooked smile.  “I’m not saying I’m not tired, but I am saying that I can last a couple more hours than you can.”

Before Krystal could reply, their director spoke up, concluding that each and every one of them have completed their recording sessions and were free to go.  Luna gave a sigh of relief as she stepped out of the box room and back into the room with her peers.  The others began to wake Sulli and Victoria up, Amber already texting their manager that they were done for the night—and for the fortunate day off to follow.

As excited as they were to leave, their silence again proved to themselves how hard it was to be an idol and they were certainly glad that they would be meeting up with their best friend, Sleep. 

As they entered the band van, Krystal took the seat in the front as she was always the first one dropped off considering she lived with her family, while the others all lived at their dorm.  Luna and Sulli took the seats all the way in the back, Victoria took the seat behind her manager that was driving and Amber took the seat directly behind Krystal.  Quickly, the girls with the exception of Amber and Krystal fell into a deep slumber as soon as they hit their seats, taking in any sleep they could even if they were only ten minutes away from the dorm.

Krystal turned around in her seat and found Amber looking out the window, her hood from her sweatshirt on her head.

“Hey,” Krystal called out.

Amber turned her eyes to the call and hummed a response.  “Do you have plans tomorrow?” the younger girl asked.

The latter shook her head.  “Not during the day.  Why, what’s up?”

“Can you sleep over tonight?  No one’s home and I watched “Orphan” recently,” Krystal reasoned with a laugh.

Amber gave out a tired chuckle and nodded.  “Did you happen to wash some of the clothes I left in your room?”

Krystal shrugged. “I didn’t but my parents probably did.”

Amber gave out another nodded and continued to look out the window as Krystal turned back to the front after seeing the approval of response.

Shortly after their conversation, they pulled up to Krystal’s house.  Krystal thanked their manager as she proceeded to get out the car.

“I’m sleeping over at Krystal’s tonight,” Amber said as she also started to get out of the car.”

Her manager nodded, “Do you want me to pick you up tomorrow and drop you off back at your dorm?”

Amber smiled slightly and shook her head. “No, I’ll walk home.  No biggie.”

Their manager gave a final “okay” and Amber stepped out finding Krystal waiting for the latter.  They waved at their manager goodbye as the van drove off and Amber and Krystal left to proceed to Krystal’s house.

As they entered the house, they removed their shoes as Amber stretched and let out a small groan from the release of tension in her limbs, to which Krystal chuckled at.  They headed up the stairs and towards Krystal’s room.  As Amber dropped her bag and laid down on Krystal’s bed sloppily, Krystal began to rummage through her drawers in search for her best friend’s clothing.  She managed to find a pair of red basketball shorts and a black Nike t-shirt.  She threw them to her tomboy of a best friend as it landed on her face and laughed.

“You can take the bathroom next to my room.  I’ll take my parents’,” the latter said.

“Okay,” Amber answered without moving, her voice slightly muffled from the clothes.  She knew they were her own clothes because she trusted Krystal and the fact that it now smelled like the younger girl caused thoughts to run through her head.  She sat up and let the clothes drop to her lap, only to be suddenly attacked by another pair of clothing thrown at her face.

She did a double take at the clothing now laying on her lap after the fall and found to see that it was a pair of green .

“They are the plainest pair I have,” Krystal said with her hands on her hips.

“Green?” Amber asked with an eyebrow raised.

“Don’t ask,” the younger girl responded.  She gave out a look.  “Or I can give you a nice pair of lacey ones.”

Amber forced an uncomfortable chuckle out and shook her head, grabbing the clothes and proceeded to exit the room.  “No, thanks, haha.”

“Oh wait,” Amber stopped as she turned around to face the inside of the room.  “Towel and a spare toothbrush?” she asked.

Krystal hummed a response and nodded and went to exit the room.  Amber followed her best friend as Krystal stopped to rummage through a small closet near the staircase.  Krystal handed Amber a maroon bath towel and a beige spare toothbrush with a smile.  The latter smiled back and gave her thanks.  She headed for the bathroom as Krystal did the same, heading to her parents’ bathroom.

Sleeping over Krystal’s house wasn’t an uncommon thing, but as Amber forwarded into the bathroom, she felt as if it was her first time again—just as if it was her first time when she became close to the girl and had their biweekly sleepovers when they were still trainees, which wasn’t even that long ago.  The last time she ever really slept over the girl’s house was a little before the whole scenario with Vanessa occurred.  Amber furrowed her eyebrows as she turned the shower faucet on and let the noise of the water hitting the bathtub fill the bathroom.

The thought of Vanessa creeping through her head suddenly brought Amber to a melancholy state; undressing herself lazily, subconsciously bowing her head lightly out of shame and guilt.

“Our friendship almost ended because of her…” Amber said to herself as she let the water hit her head.

She sighed roughly, rubbing her face with her hands and the water as if she was cleansing how badly being in a relationship with Vanessa turned out to be.  Krystal became her best friend, but she didn’t think that she would feel this guilty for almost ruining it.  Yeah Amber lost friends here and there throughout her life—as soon as she left to Korea distance grew between her and her friends back home and once she made her debut, she could feel the distance beginning to grow between her and her friends here.  The more she thought about it, however, she found a growing anxiety and pain piercing into her side thinking only about Krystal—how it would feel if their friendship really did end.

As she finished washing her hair, she reached for the soap bar and began to wash her body.  Rubbing the soap all over her body, her thoughts picked up onto a new train. 

Did Krystal lose her ity to Aiden?

And even if she did, why did Amber care?  Yes she was her best friend, of course best friends were supposed to know these things.  Still, Krystal just turned fifteen—American age that is.  She exhaled roughly through her nose.  Amber strongly assumed that the younger girl knew that she was not a , at least with women.  Amber couldn’t fathom to think about having with a male. 

And then it picked at her brain again—the fact that Krystal was always so…pushy and aggressive towards her relationship with Vanessa.  She continued to rub soap all over her body as she tried her best to stop her train of thought regarding the manner—moving onto thinking about things on the lines of how their next song was going to be, popularity wise, or what she was going to have for breakfast tomorrow when she returned back to her dorm.  But it didn’t work.

Amber’s face retorted at the realization of how everything lately was all about Krystal.  Now of course, it wasn’t in such a bad way—just in the way she didn’t quite think it would be, which was how often she thought of the girl, or even how often she caught herself looking at the girl.  She began to veer down a road she kept hoping she would never touch back on every single time she thought of it—and that was quite often.

Amber washed away the soap quickly, giving up on how much cleaner she could possibly get.  She groaned to herself out of frustration.  The more she pressed on trying not to think about Krystal in a romantic way, the more it kept catching up to her.  She wondered to herself, how, if Krystal and herself were just regular people—regular teenagers, going to a regular high school, having regular friends and not being K-Pop idols—how much it would be different.  She came out to her friends back home easier than she did to the ones here.  And even then, she caught herself realizing how distant she was to those friends and how distant she was suddenly becoming with her friends here in Korea because of her debut—Krystal included.  Yeah they saw each other every waking moment on schedule but it wasn’t the same as how it used to be back in their trainee days.

Somewhere in there, sparked Amber in a way she didn’t want it to be.  She continued to let the water run down her body and down her back, turning the faucet to make the water hotter.  All of the “what if’s” came back to visit her; the main “what if” question being, what if Krystal really did have feelings?  Would that be so bad?

Would that be so bad..?

She couldn’t understand why she kept asking herself that, but she understood that the thoughts began to circle her head once she noticed how the younger girl reacted towards Vanessa from the beginning.  Amber found it interesting how Krystal didn’t mind all of her other friends besides that specific one, especially when she found out that the two were an item in the long run.

So, if Krystal really was jealous of Amber’s relationship and if Krystal really did have feelings for Amber, would that be so bad?

To think that if Krystal actually had some sort of romantic feeling towards Amber—would she be happy or upset about it?  Amber shut off the faucet and remained still, hearing the water drip sullenly.  Amber sighed slowly and deeply.

“She can’t,” Amber said lowly to herself.  “It just wouldn’t be right.”