“Tara.” Woohyun greets the girl at his doorstep when he opens the door.

“Hey Woohyun.” She greets back, “Can I ask you a favor?”

“Sure, what do you need?” he accepts right away, letting her into the apartment.

Tara only answers when Woohyun closes the door, “Can you teach me… how to use makeup?”

Woohyun blinks once before breaking out into bright laughter, “Of course I can, but why in the world would you, of all people, want to use makeup?” Tara had always been more of an athlete who saw extra oils that would be sweated off to be an inconvenience.

“You know… Because… I’m getting pimples and stuff. And… to be pretty, I guess?” she answers, pulling her hood closer to cover her face. But in all honestly, Woohyun was even more floored by this response. Tara says she wants to learn how to use makeup, and her reasoning is to look pretty, when she never gave a single care to her appearance before. Truthfully, Woohyun had also scolded her for being so messy when presenting herself to public eyes, but it was also another trait that he appreciated in his friend.

“Uhm… okay.” He blinks once more before beckoning her to his room, “Follow me.”

And with that, Tara learned the ropes of foundation, mascara, powder, and the maze of Woohyun’s bottomless skin care drawer. Although most of his products were for men, there were still many left over to share secrets about.

---

That was four years ago, when both Woohyun and Tara were still in middle school. Now, Tara was as skilled with makeup as she was with basketball back then. Although it was more of a trade-in. Tara had become a bit more girly, although her boyish personality didn’t change, while Woohyun grew burlier and more handsome, his greasy exterior becoming even more so over the years. It’s a wonder that the two could continue to deal with each other all this time.

However, their groups of friends did evolve. Tara hung out with the girl jocks while Woohyun hung out with the choir members and dance team. What a turn for gender stereotypes. But they did have several mutual friends, and they occasionally greeted each other in the hallways when they saw each other. But when they actually did get a bit of free time during breaks to sit down and talk to each other or go out for ice cream, Woohyun would always comment on how she learned well from him. And Tara would laugh at him and joke about how she had definitely already surpassed her master at this point.

This particular time on this particular day, however, there would be no laughter because when Woohyun spotted Tara sitting at the bus stop in the late afternoon, long after school had been let out, she was crying. Well, she wasn’t really crying yet, but it was easy for Woohyun to tell she was holding herself back from letting anything out. When he neared her and saw her trying hard to preoccupy herself with her phone, he greets her, “Tara?”

Stricken with panic, Tara freezes a little before trying to casually sniff and wipe her nose as she looks up to greet Woohyun back.

“Are you alright?” he asks, sitting beside her. If it were anyone else, it wouldn’t have been as easy to identify that Tara was having a hard time with holding in her feelings, but Woohyun had seen her cry once before in middle school after a boy had rudely insulted her after she attempted to confess to him.

“I uhm…” she clears and sniffs again before looking up at him, “Yeah. You know, just… boy problems.” She admits.

“Do you want me to beat him up?” Woohyun offers. He had offered the same thing when Tara cried over the failed confession to the rude boy. No, he didn’t offer. He actually was going to do it himself without any permission from anyone, but he was held back by Tara and their friends.

Tara lets out a shaky breath before saying softly, “No… You shouldn’t do that…”

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asks, putting a warm, comforting hand on her shoulder.

Tara shakes her head and says she only wants to go home. “Or… never mind.” She starts, but stops herself.

“Or…? Do you want to come to my place?” he offers, “I’ve got plenty of ice cream stocked up.”

Tara manages a small laugh, but when she tries to open to thank him for the offer, her feeble laugh turns into a choked sob. The frown on her face appears briefly before she closes her eyes and bites her lip as if to punish herself for showing weakness, even if for just the shortest of moments. And the moment she closes her eyes, the tears that had gathered up for so long stream down her powdered cheeks. There seems to be many layers of foundation and makeup on her face this time, because the teardrops that land on her skirt are tinted with color. And the streak the tears made down her cheeks leave a trail behind them.

Tara quickly makes a move to dab the tears away without touching the ruined makeup, but Woohyun stops her. “Hey… Go easy on the cover-up.” He jokes as he offers her a napkin. She nods with clenched eyes and covers the entirety of her face with the thin tissue. She continues to dab gently at her face before Woohyun decides to take matters into his own hands with a laugh.

The girl beside him is too busy trying to stifle her cries that she forgets to push Woohyun away when he starts wiping at the makeup on her face. The tears help to wash away the layers of foundation coating her face. But what Woohyun spots underneath the layer of makeup is strange. He swipes Tara’s cheek once with more force and he sees the blotchy purple coloring on her cheek. Panic starting to ensue into his chest, he uses his other hand to tilt her head to face him and he wipes away as much of the makeup away as he can. And what he finds underneath only confirms his worried suspicions. There are more black and blue patches that color her cheeks and around her eyes. “Tara…” he utters out.

She pulls away from his grip and lowers her face into her hands, bending over her elbows propped on her lap, knowing it’s too late and that Woohyun had already seen. And if she ran away, he would only follow until they both lost consciousness. She sobs into her hands, still trying to stifle her cries.

Woohyun wouldn’t stand for this. Someone had hurt his friend, both physically and emotionally, and he had to be punished. He pulls Tara up and grips her by the shoulders, demanding answers, “Tara. Who did this to you? Is it that you’ve been going out with? Why would he do this to you? Why did you not go for help? When did he do this to you?” he bombards her with more questions when she continues to shake her head.

The sight of the tears still washing away at the smeared makeup all over her face is becoming too much to bare. When had she become this kind of person? And suddenly, a realization hits him, “Tara… How. Long. Has. This. Been. Happening.” Woohyun gruffly enunciates each syllable. When again, she doesn’t answer but only looks at him through pleading eyes for him to stop questioning her, he only asks another. “Is this why you asked me to teach you how to wear makeup?”

Her silence and stillness only confirms his guess for his question. “How could you have let this go on for so long? Who is…” Woohyun freezes when the answer comes to him. His eyes start spark a flame of fury and stands up.

“No! Stop!” Tara stops him, clinging desperately to Woohyun’s arm. Damn, the girl was strong. “Woohyun… Please.” She begs, standing up beside him, “Don’t say anything. Don’t do anything. You’re only going to make matters worse.”

“You expect me to sit on the side and watch you pat on another face with makeup brushes when your dad is probably giving you new bruises left and right?!” he exclaims.

“It’s not like that isn’t what you’ve been doing all this time!” she yells back.

Ouch. That hurt. That really hurt him. And he freezes at the pain that arises in his chest when she says that. He doesn’t get a chance to move before she continues, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. But seriously. Nothing’s changed, Woohyun. It’s still this way, and it’s always been this way. You hadn’t done anything before, so don’t change that now when we’re so close to graduating.”

“Graduating?!!” Woohyun shouts, “No, Tara, no. That’s too many months away, and I’m not going to let this happen to you any more than it already has. I can’t. I’m guilty enough as it is for being oblivious for this long. You can’t expect me to just continue on as if I don’t know anything now.”

“Woohyun, I’m begging you. Please don’t take matters into your own hands. I promise I’ll be more careful and you won’t see this ever again.” Tara pleads.

“Yeah, because you’ll be better at hiding by then.” Woohyun scoffs.

“What were you planning on doing anyway?!” Tara shouts. When Woohyun’s face just stays hardened, she takes that as confirmation that his plan probably wouldn’t have worked, “What can you do? This has been going on for too long now. It’s irrelevant. Please just make this easier on all of us and… stay out of it.”

It takes a minute for Woohyun to stop fuming, but he eventually sits back down on the bus stop’s seat and Tara follows. “Fine… But tell me why you were crying.” He requests. “It wasn’t really because of boy problems, was it?”

“Not really.” Tara answers, looking down at her hands.

She stays silent for another moment, so Woohyun decides to push a little more, “So what bothered you so much that it kept lingering in your head that it got to a point that it made you cry?”

“A good friend of mine just died several hours ago.” She finally answers.

“What? Oh my god, Tara, I’m so sorry.” Woohyun says right away, but then he realizes that this has nothing to do with what he was freaking out over at first. Just two minutes ago, he had been forming internal death threats towards Tara’s abusive father, and now he realizes that Tara is upset over a completely irrelevant reason. He had expected her to have had a bad day, and for her to admit it was finally a breaking point. But Tara has always been one to surprise him. “Wow… You sure have a lot of drama going on in your life.”

Tara lets out a laugh at that, “…Yeah.”

After another few seconds of silence, Woohyun asks, “So… who was your friend?”

“She was just… someone who’s always been there for me. And you know, I guess I finally realized that I wouldn’t have her around anymore. She knew all of my secrets and she understood every single one of them. And she didn’t do anything more than I wanted her to do. Sometimes I just need a calming voice to tell me everything will be alright. Pat my back and give me a hug and stuff. But yeah, I’m starting to sound really lame now…”

“Wait, she knew all of your ing secrets and she didn’t convince you to do anything about it? She didn’t do anything to help you?” Woohyun accuses.

“Woohyun, she was 85 years old.” Tara throws a glare at him, which makes him lose the angry flare in his nostrils again.

“Oh…” That’s right, Woohyun recalls Tara volunteering at a retirement institution.

“Yeah.” Tara rolls her eyes, “You see what I mean by she was a calm and understanding? Right when you found out, you were about to go shank someone.” She scolds Woohyun as if he was the one who did something wrong. “But you know, whenever I visited her on a particularly bad day, she’d always notice and react in all the right ways that would get me to console to her on my own. Where am I going to find someone like that to take care of my messy mind now?” she sighs.

“Ahem…” Woohyun gestures to himself as if the answer is right beside her, getting another laugh out of Tara.

“You’re too hot-headed to be my therapist.” Tara shakes her head gently, “But thanks for listening to me today, Woohyun. It’s been too long.” She leans her head over to rest on Woohyun’s shoulder, and he welcomes her by throwing an arm around her to bring her closer.

“You promised though, okay? If I see another bruise or scratch on you again after these heal, I’m going to do something about it.” Woohyun warns.

Tara stays quiet as she brings her hand up to touch her bruised face, still messy with all the makeup smeared around. Only her late friend had known of the cures to her inner pains that came with these hidden marks underneath her makeup. Now, she wasn’t sure if she’d be able to find another person to replace someone with such a similar history and consoling heart, but Woohyun was and always would be just as good a friend as any, “Okay, I promise.”