The night is cold and the mountain is quiet. All they can hear is the sound of her sobbing. She is still crying in his arms. She wants to stop but it is too hard. Her heart aches, her eyes aches, her whole body aches. This pain is even more terrible than when she broke her arm 10 years ago. This pain is probably more than any physical pain that she will ever experience in her life. If one day her body explodes completely she probably won’t feel as painful as she is right now. She is broken, from the inside.

He feels her body shaking. He feels her tears running. And he feels her heart is breaking. His heart … is … breaking too. Her pain is also his pain. Since the first moment he met her, all he wanted to do for her is making her happy. But it seems as he failed terribly. All he had done to her was bringing her tears and misery. His consistence seems to hurt her, unintentionally but he is hurting her. He wanted to protect her but he ended up being the one that hurts her the most. Is it why she keeps avoiding him? Is it why she is staying away from him?

Yeah!

It’s probably why.

He has been hurting her.

He is such a bad guy.

May be he should stop, stop persuading her, stop hurting her. He should. So she won’t cry any more, won’t struggle anymore, won’t get upset anymore. It is the only thing he can do for her, leaving her alone. He leans his body back, leaving her a space to breathe. Her eyes are still wet; her cheeks are still wet with tears. Her body is still trembling with emotion. Slowly, he bends down, cups her face in his big warm hands then he kisses. He kisses each and every teardrop on her face, from her eyes down to her jaw. He wants to kiss away all her tears, dries her face with his love, for the last time. He tastes her tears. They are salty as all the struggles that she has been going through. She must be hurt very much to squeal out those salty tears.

Sorry for making you cry this much, my love.

Her heart skips a beat every time his lips touch her cheek. Tears stop pouring out but her eyes wide open, surprise, confuse, and … touched. Her face is freezing cold from the wind but his kisses burning her face with heat. The soft touch of his lips is warm, so warm that makes her chest tightened and her knee weak.

He dries all the tears off her face then he stops at her lips. His lips keep on hers for more than a minute, not moving, neither his or hers is moving. Those lips are softly pressing on top of each other. His forehead is pressing against hers; the top of his nose is touching hers. They stand there, under the cold wind, feeling the breath coming out of each other noses, feeling the passion coming out of each other lips. Neither of them wants to move, they want to feel this moment a little bit longer. There are no passionate kisses; there is no thrilling passion on top of the car hood. There is only silence, a scary deadly silence where they can hear their heart cracking, where they can feel a half of their soul leaving their bodies.

May time stop for them at this moment? May darkness remain for the rest of their life so they can just stand here, forever, so they don’t have to come back to their painful reality.

Of course time can’t stop, of course everything has to go one, and of course, he has to move on, from her, from his love, so she can stop struggling.

Slowly, he slides his hands down, away from her face. He presses his lips to hers, firmly, for the last time. She feels her tears on his lips, she tastes the saltiness on his lips. And slowly, his lips leave her. She wants her hold him back. She wants to grab his hairs tightly and pulls his head back to her. But her hands can’t move. Her entire body is paralyzed. She can’t even lift her arm up, her useless body, can’t do anything, can’t hold on love, can’t hold on him, can’t hold on anything. It is more than useless. The only thing she can do is watching him drifting away from her.

It is a good thing. She needs to let him drift away from her, for good, for his good, for her good, for their good …

“That was our last kiss.” – He softly says, somehow his eyes are sting speaking out those words, speaking out something that he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t want that was their last kiss. He wants to taste more of her, feels more of her. He doesn’t want to make tonight the last night their lips could meet. But in life, as an adult, people sometime have to do what they don’t want to, let go what they love so their loved one can be less struggled, less painful. – “From now on, I will try my best to stay away from you. I will try my best to stop myself from coming to you.” – He pauses a little bit, trying to get some air inside his body. He didn’t know that talking can be this difficult. His nose can’t even breathe and he has to inhale by his mouth. He can’t even look at her while talking to her because if he does, he probably won’t be about to continue his saying – “I … ah …” – He his dry lips, inhales sharply again – “I can’t promise that I stop loving you but I will try not to show you my love. I guess it will be easier on you that way, won’t it?” – He exhales sharply as he ends his sentence. It was the toughest speech in his life even tougher than the one he gave on the day he took over the CEO position.

The words he said were the words that she has wanted to hear. She wanted him to stay away from her. She wanted him to give up on her. But at this moment, when she finally heard those words why she didn’t feel any easier? Why the pain inside her chest kept building up even more? The muscle in middle of her chest tightened up to the point of breaking, to the point of dying. Those words were painful. The way he said it were painful.

She would definitely feel better if he said that with a hateful, disgusting tone but his tone … his tone was too sorrow, more sorrow than any sad ballad that she has ever heard. And his body language, the way he messed with his own hands, the way he kept looking on the ground as he spoke, the way he bit his lips after each pause. Those sad body languages made her heart tingled. She had to grips her hands to the fists to stop herself from touching him, from embracing him in her chest and patting his back so all the sadness can go away.

He … why does he have to be so sad?

She inhales sharply, her body is shivering as the air blowing inside her nasal, she drops one last tear then softly says – “N-ne, please do that.”

He lifts his eyes up and looks at her. Her face is pale, she is probably very cold right now. His arms are lifting half way up. He wants to warm her cheeks with his hands. But then … but then he lets his arm down, tie them together behind his back. – “Will it make you feel better?” – He asks, softly.

She lifts her face up, toward the sky, trying to take in a little more air by both her nose and , also trying to swallow down some drops of tear that hanging on the corner of her eyes. Then she drops her head down, staring at the dark ground for a moment before looking at him – “N-ne, it will.”

He nods a several times. For what reason? He doesn’t know. To agree with her? To agree with himself?” Or just to shake the blue off his head. – “That’s good” – He says, clearing his throat to bring back his normal tone – “Then at least let me walk you back to the camp. It will be out last walk. I promise.”

She shakes her head. – “I can walk back by myself” – It better ends here. The walk back to the camp is quiet long. She is not sure if she can hold herself back. She is not sure if she won’t look for his hand if her hand feels cold. She is not sure if her heart won’t turn weak. So to stay on the safe side, they should be separated, right now.

He sighs – “Don’t be like that. It is very dangerous walking alone this time of the day. I promise I will keep distance from you.”

“I said I can go back by myself.” – She yells, frustrated. Frustrated at him promising to keep distance from her, maybe she doesn’t want that, maybe she doesn’t want to end anything, maybe she already regrets about her stupid revenge, maybe she wants to give up everything and staying with him.

She is frustrated, so damn frustrated that she doesn’t know what the hell she wants any more. She shakes his hand violently again and ends up losing her balance. They both have been too emotional to realize that they are standing on top of the cliff. She lost her balance and slips down the hill. In the panic moment, she holds tightly on his hand and pulls him down the hill with her.     

He is surprise from rolling down the hill but the first thing he can think of is protecting her. He takes all the strength he has left in his body to reach her head. His big left callus hand covers the back of the head, while his right hand pulling her body to his chest.

Even in panic, she still feels her body is cushioned by him. The rock is sling as hail but none of them hurt her. She is covered, by him. She takes a quick glance at his face. He is biting his lips, his forehead is frowning, painfully. He is taking all the pain. He is protecting her, again … she is hurting him, again, and this time, physically.

She, really, she can’t do any worse than this. Until this moment, she is still hurting him …