It was cold, though it was April already. The wind was blowing strongly, pushing her hair into her face - she'd given up trying to bring it back to place a long time ago - but it had nothing to do with the weather. It was sunny merely minutes ago, before everything had fallen apart. Again.

She put her arms around herself in an attempt to calm down the avalanche of emotions that seemed to arise from the pit she kept throwing them into far too often lately. She didn't know what to do - whether to approach the source of the cold wind making her shiver, or whether she should just let him be. She suspected neither of the two options would help, so she just kept standing there, enduring the harsh weather.

She was standing at the top of a Scottish hill just outside of Edinburgh. The grass was green already, and if she'd looked down, she would've seen pretty flowers of all colors swaying gently in the wind.

A long time ago, a pair of large, but gentle hands used to put them in her hair all the time, saying she looked on the outside like she did on the inside when he did that. Beautiful.
 

She shook her head, not wanting to go back there. She had put a fullstop to that chapter a long time ago. Moreover, she'd closed the book, too, burned it while laughing maniacally and then scooped the ashes up and thrown them into a lake, exactly where they belonged - at the bottom of a hole, where no light would ever reach them.

Further ahead, below the hill, he was standing as still as a statue, his back turned to her. No wind reached him, though he probably would've wished it was otherwise. He often said he hated how it could not hurt him, how it could never hurt him, no matter how hard he tried. The fact that he'd wanted to be hurt almost made a sob creep out of , but she bit her lip and kept it in. This was not the first time they were at this place, in this position, and something awful told her it would not be the last.

But she endured. She had to, for in a way, all of this was her fault. Why he kept insisting it wasn't, even though he hated her with every ounce of his being, was beyond her understanding. Why the wind was never directed at her but at the beautiful, innocent nature instead, was a punishment which hurt her far worse than if it was the other way around. Even now, as much as he was in a state of rage, the wind's hands touched her gently, almost soothingly. She hated it, hated the duality of him, hated the blows he would not direct at her, the yells others received instead.
 

The yells Suho received today. The blaming that poor Suho received, the Suho who was the only person out of all of them who had tried his best - and even more - to prevent everything from happening. The Suho who warned them all, who told her what would happen if she did what she did and who begged her not to do it.
 

But she had not believed him. Who would've? He never gave her gentleness. He never once looked her way, never once reacted the way Junmyeon kept insisting was a standard ritual for him. He never once gave her reasons to let go of the hand that was holding hers.

And now she'd lost both of them. They had all lost both of them, and it was completely her fault.

They stood there, two statues not cracking or crumbling under the harsh weather. They were both being punished, by silence and this beautiful scene that laughed at them silently as if they were a joke. If only the sun was shining upon them, the scenery would've been perfect, even with the wind that was his stormy feelings. She could not see the beauty, though, not when she was suffocating. Not when he was suffocating, too.

She thought about what happened merely minutes ago, the words echoing in her head.

If you hadn't kept pushing him to fly us out of there, this wouldn't have happened.

Well, if you hadn't thrown a ball of wind at him, maybe he would've actually done that and saved us all.

Well, if he hadn't said what he did, maybe I would've been able to control myself!

Yeah, just like you're controlling yourself now? Who else are you going to kill with your childish emotions, Sehunnie? How long until you accept what had happened was your fault, for what he said to you was only the truth?

I did not kill him. We don't even know whether he's alive.

Yeah, because that maze wasn't full of things meant to kill us. If they'd caught him - and they did - he's as well as dead, and you know it!

You know what? If you weren't such an incompetent leader, maybe we never would've ended up there in the first place. But who insisted we infiltrated a high school - and obviously got ourselves caught within seconds, forced to tone down our powers because we were worried we would hurt someone, just like you were implying? And now you're preaching about controlling one's powers? You're no better at it than I am, Junmyeon. If you tried to summon a drop of water here, we'd be caught up in a freaking tsunami, so don't you dare point a finger at me.

I... have made some mistakes, and I will regret my choices for a long time to come, Sehunnie, you can be sure of that. But one thing I know is that the power you summoned up that ball with was perfectly controlled, and worse than that, that you had wanted to hurt him. Worse than that, you had wanted to hurt him because you were jealous of him for Lami-

You do not have the right to speak about that. You do not have the right to say her name, even. You know absolutely nothing about anything, you pathetic old man, so stop talking!

That was when Suho started making strangling noises. He was choking him, because of nothing, because he wanted him to stop speaking, because he did not want to hear the truth, and the look in his eyes said he would not stop until Suho was dead.

So she sprang up, started yelling, hot tears she did not remember even being in her eyes falling down her face, started prying the hands that were not on Junmyeon's throat off him. His movements did not cease - he was a puppet in her arms, only his eyes focused on the target of his rage, only his eyes summoning the power to possibly kill him.

She did not have much time. She had to stop him, had to save both him and his best friend, so she started sobbing instead, hitting his chest over and over again.

She wouldn't have been able to save either of them. She was useless. It took Kyungsoo's earthquake, Baekhyun temporarily blinding him and Yixing healing both Junmyeon and his incapacitated eyes to stop him from doing the stupid thing he'd decided to do.

This was not who he was. The emotionless monster with glassy eyes in front of her was not the smiling, awkward boy she'd met such a long time ago. The boy she might've even fallen in love with... She could not find him anywhere, for he seemed to have abandoned her or gotten consumed by this empty shell a long time ago. And it was all her fault.

The wind was getting stronger, and the raw power of it brought her out of her thoughts. He was still an unearthly statue, but his beauty was terrifying now. If he wanted to, he could end her life within moments. He was probably thinking about it right this moment, and she closed her eyes, fresh tears finding their way out and sliding down her cheeks. She wished he’d just strike already. She knew he wanted to, badly, and she’d gladly take the strike. She wanted to hurt, because she was the one who deserved the pain he was feeling right now.

"Get away," the voice devoid of all emotions said, startling her and making her open her eyes. He was standing in front of her, his eyes as brown as the wet sand of the desert, his face as emotionless as the rest of him. The wind was all around them, nearly a hurricane, and they were in the center of it, but ironically protected from it. She did not understand why. If he moved a step away from her, she would be taken away and he would not have to see her ever again.

But he did not do so much as flinch, or move at all. They stood there for what seemed like eternity, looking into each other's eyes, both desperate and lost. She did not dare break eye contact. This was the most she'd get of him, and she wanted to etch the picture of the man she had destroyed into her brain so that she would forever remember the mistakes she'd made.

"I said, Get away," he said an eternity later, his voice laced with anger now, while the hurricane was getting stronger around them.

She shook her head with determination. "No. If I do, you'll never be able to find your way back. I won't let you lose yourself to your power. Not again." She was begging him now, but she didn't care how low she sank if he'd just listen to her, just this once. She couldn't lose him again, even if he remained a soulless monster for the rest of his life. She would make it right somehow, or so she had to believe in order to keep at least a little bit of sanity.

"It's none of your concern," he said in a painfully low voice, probably trying to control himself. Why was he doing it, anyway, that control? Why would he not just tell her everything that was on his mind and get over it? Why couldn't he tell her he hated her, though it was clear as the day he did, with his whole soul - or what was left of it?

"If you want to get angry at someone, get angry at me," she tried again. "If you want to use your power on someone, use it on me. Not Junmyeon or Jongin or other people who love you and are trying to understand you and help you."

She balled her hands into fists, starting to shake. But she could not hold the words in anymore, and the setting seemed right anyway - they were in the middle of a tornado now, and she had to yell for him to be able to hear her now. "I know you hate me and I know you want me to die, but I can't! So if you have the urge to kill someone, then kill me! And then go back to who you used to be and just live a normal life!" She couldn't help the sob that came out of , but she did not care. The only thing that mattered now was for him to go back to being himself again. She believed he was still in there somewhere. She had to, for if he didn't exist anymore, then she wouldn't either.

He laughed so soullessly that she shuddered. He was truly a monster, a monster moving closer to her, and his smile directed at her was diabolical. He could snap her neck with the flick of a finger.

But as he raised his hand towards her neck, she did not flinch. Instead of ending her, he took a strand of her hair in his arms and fondled with the curl as he said his next words. "You think that's it? That I hate you?"

His eyes were a cold, cold bottom of the ocean now. "I wish I hated you. I want to hate you, and I think about it every single moment of my life. I imagine suffocating you, taking your breath away and watching you struggle as your lungs constrict. I think about it all the time."

The diabolical smile turned into a mask of stone, as the wind enveloped her, as it moved through her hair and tickled and then went away. She waited for his promises of a painful death to be fulfilled, but the choking never came. The whole time he kept staring at her, into her and through her, as if trying his best to do just what he'd been imagining for such a long time, but somehow being unable to.

"Do it," she said in a low voice filled with fear and defying and self-hatred, knowing he could see the raw determination in her eyes. She wanted him to know that there was one person who hated her more than himself - it was her.

He let go of the curl of her hair and gently trailed his hand down her left cheek, a ghost of something she could not let herself feel right now or ever again constricting in her chest.

And then the wind disappeared. The sun was finally allowed to come out, bathing the hill in an unearthly glow. He was beautiful, more beautiful than ever before, a bigger monster than ever before, a dry desert dine devoid of all emotion, but beautiful regardless.

She could not take it anymore.

"Do it!" she screamed, hitting his chest with her white-knuckled fists again and again. It was the same scene from not long ago, except this time she wasn't begging him to stop. "Do it, damn it! Kill me!" she said, sobbing as she crumbled in front of him.

He did not move. Did not stop her, did not do what she was begging him to. He just watched her fall apart, probably wondering how low she could go. Perhaps this was more entertaining to him than watching her die - perhaps watching her suffer was finally giving him satisfaction.

She sank to her feet, still sobbing and crying, hitting the ground with her fists over and over again. "It's all my fault, I admit it!"

The dam broke. She did not know if he'd went away or if he was listening. It didn’t matter anymore. She screamed her next words to herself, to Junmyeon and him and the large hands putting flowers in her hair and the whole universe. "It's my fault that I accepted to be his girlfriend while falling in love with you! It's my fault that I thought I'd stop loving you if I let him love me instead! And I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

I'm sorry, she chanted over and over again.

But there was no wind to carry her words into the distance, no soft breeze to hum the melody of love and forgiveness and understanding to her and away, far away until it reached the sea. She was a pile of broken pieces at the top of a hill, and she was alone.

Perhaps he was never even there at the first place, and it was all just a long, awful dream she could not wake up from.

She hoped it was only a nightmare. She hoped he was happy somewhere, that he'd never really met her and that if they someday met each other, his eyes would not light up in recognition.

She hoped she'd forever remember this dream, so that she'd never repeat her mistakes again.

She hoped she’d forever remember the sandy eyes holding secrets she would never discover, secrets she’d turned her head from and pretended did not exist.

She would never love again, she was sure. The only thing she could do was destroy those whom she loved, and she could not watch herself put a dagger in her lover’s heart again.

Kris was wrong. She was not a pretty flower on the inside.

She was a raging hurricane, too, one that could not hurt herself no matter how hard she tried to direct the wind at herself.

She could only send a gentle breeze through his hair as soft as the autumn wheat, yearning to touch what would never be hers, and trying to convince herself she hated him.

She'd keep convincing herself until she did, though, just like he was.

And she would not blame him when he succeeded, even if she knew she never would.