“What did you just say?” Amber asked as she stopped stripping Soojung.

“Oh my God, you know what? I take it back” Krystal said, annoyed and blushing.

“No, no. You just said you love me…” The tomboy repeated with a big fat grin. “I thought you were all ‘we’ve been dating for a day’…” She teased.

“Drop it Liu, you’re killing the mood” The younger said, glaring at Amber who couldn’t help but to smile.

“Am I that powerful?” She asked, scratching her chin.

“I just changed my mind, OKAY?!” The ice-looking girl yelled, now completely red faced. “Say you love me back… it’s so embarrassing” She commanded, covering her face with her hands.

“I won’t” The older back fired.

“You just want to make fun of-“ Krystal complained but Amber shut her up with a steamy kiss. Soojung completely forgot her embarrassment and started pulling the tomboy closer to her.

“Nice ” She said, boldly grabbing Amber’s and the latter jumped in amazement.

“It’s all yours, baby”

The short-haired girl resumed the make out session, stripping Krystal completely and then taking off her own clothes too, the girls memorized every inch of each other’s body, ran their hands all over the bare skin as the room was filled with moans and echoes of the couple’s names.

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The sun hit Amber’s face through the window, she furrowed her brows upon the sudden exposure of light and opened her eyes to see a sound asleep Krystal on her arms, her head resting on her favorite spot: Amber’s chest. They were covered only by the blanket and their bodies still laid intertwined with each other, the older girl ran a finger on Krystal’s cheek, removing a small bang of hair out of the way to contemplate her sleeping face. She couldn’t believe how lucky she was, even though she never had a ‘girl type’, she finds Soojung meeting her expectations, it’s true, she has some flaws but is nothing time can’t change. She leaned closer to her girlfriend and placed a soft kiss on her head, she took a deep breath of that strawberry smell of hers and sighed, how is she so perfect?

“Morning, Am” The ice-looking girl said, still half asleep.

“Morning, princess” Amber replied, holding her closer.

“You snored” Krystal said, stretching her arms as she pulled out from the other’s embrace.

“Oopsies” The tomboy said, blushing a little.

“We really need to shower” Soojung said while trying to get up from the bed.

“Tell me about it”

Krystal stood up, pulling the covers off of the bed to wrap them on her body, Amber giggled and caught her attention.

“What are you laughing at?” She asked, raising a brow.

“Look at you, all self-conscious when I absolutely ed the life out of you” She replied, grinning and making Soojung blush hard.

“Shut the up” The younger girl ordered as she disappeared in the bathroom.

“Aren’t you going to invite me?” Amber shouted, still resting on the bed.

“I swear to God I’m about to stab you”

The couple took their sweet time to get ready, they didn’t grab any breakfast because there was absolutely nothing in the house they could eat, so they exited the mansion and made their way to the city.

“Is that my shirt?” Amber asked, eyeing Soojung as she drove the Camaro.

“I ran out of clean clothes” She replied, looking to her phone.

“So you decided to steal mine” The tomboy teased.

“Yeah, that’s pretty much what I did” She replied, shooting a cheeky smile to Amber.

They made it to a small supermarket and grabbed a shopping cart as they roamed every aisle, collecting items as they passed by. They covered everything, from food to cleaning articles, once they were done, they pushed the full cart to the cashier.

“Are you paying in cash or by card?” The old lady emotionlessly said, passing the products in front of the code bar reader.

“Card, please” Amber said, taking out her wallet.

“Are we really going to be able to pay for all of this?” Krystal whispered to her girlfriend and the cashier glared at them.

“Of course, honey” She replied, smiling widely at the old lady.

When they were done with the grocery shopping, they returned to the house, Amber drove peacefully through the city while Krystal looked through the window. Busan is busier than Seoul, there were more foreigners in the streets and by consequence, more homeless people almost in every corner of the city. As they passed the huge buildings, it started to rain.

“Now this is weird” Krystal said.

“What? The rain?” Amber asked, eyes glued on the road.

“Yeah… it isn’t supposed to be rainy season yet” The younger explained. The tomboy stopped on a red light and something caught Soojung’s eye in the distance… it looked like a toddler, standing in an alley.

“Amber park the car” She commanded and the tomboy looked at her in confusion.

“Why? What’s wrong?” She asked, furrowing her brows.

“Just park the ing car!!” She yelled and the older girl obeyed.

“Why do you-“ Amber was about to ask her girlfriend when she bolted out of the Camaro, running towards the alley, upon not getting an answer, the taller girl decided to follow her.

They arrived just in time to see how a man was punching a woman who was screaming like crazy some stuff in Korean, Amber could barely understand, but she didn’t need to be told twice when she approached the struggling lady and helped her out of the man’s grip. Now he started throwing punches at Amber and she answered punching back, but nothing was happening, the man was still standing and the lady still wanted to be part of the fight.

“What are you doing?” She asked the lady in her broken Korean and she replied something she couldn’t understand, so she looked for Krystal to act as an interpreter but she saw her hugging a little three-year-old.

“What?” The tomboy asked and because she got distracted, she was pushed to the sidewalk by the man and then he pushed the lady as well, her head hitting on the brick wall. “Oh my God” Krystal said under her breath upon watching the scene, she was holding back the urge to hurt the man by holding the crying child even tightly.

“Holy ” Amber cursed as she saw how the lifeless woman was lying on the cold, hard ground. She stood up and cursed the man as she punched him on the face. She turned to Krystal and signaled her to get in the car.

They finally got in the car with the child frenetically crying while screaming “Umma!!” Soojung did everything she could to calm the child but nothing was working, so she panicked and handed the little girl to Amber.

“What am I supposed to do???” She asked her alarmed girlfriend but the latter didn’t respond.

“Hey, hey, don’t cry” She pleaded the sobbing child who was clinging onto her shirt as she cried hard. She tried to redirect her attention as she gently pulled her face to have a better look of her big rounded eyes, just like Krystal’s, she thought. The girl gradually started to calm down as she stared intensely into Amber’s eyes, puzzled by the other’s intentions.

“Hi, my name is Amber” The tomboy continued to serenade the toddler to tranquility. Soojung watched as her girlfriend was capable of calming the child, and wondered why she couldn’t do anything.

“It’s okay… that bad man won’t bother you anymore” The older said, rubbing the toddler’s back.

“Umma?” The little girl asked with her tiny crying voice.

“I…” Amber couldn’t elaborate so she looked at Krystal to ask for help.

“What’s your name, baby?” Soojung asked the toddler who was sitting on the older’s lap.

“Hwa-Young” The shaking little girl responded. (The name means 'beautiful flower' in korean)

“Hwa-Young, we’re going to take you to our warm and big house, we can give you some food… and then we will bring you back to mommy…” Krystal tried to convince the girl to let them take care of her, it was still raining outside and the toddler was soaked, they needed to give her a bath and some food as she seemed to be a homeless girl along with her mother.

“How does that sound?” The ice-looking girl asked but the girl wasn’t convinced enough. Amber pulled her cellphone out of her pocket and played some kid’s show and showed it to Hwa-Young.

“Look, Hwa-Young” She said handing the cellphone to the toddler to distract her. “We have big T.Vs in our house, you can watch more when we get there” Amber tried to explain with her broken Korean and the little girl nodded as she crawled back to Krystal’s lap.

This is absolutely illegal, Amber thought as she started the Camaro and resumed their trip to the mansion. One thing was helping a woman who was being beat up by a man… another whole different thing was participating on beating up a man, watching how he practically killed a woman and then running away with a child. This is so wrong in so many levels but at the same time Amber couldn’t help her urge to rescue the little girl. Why didn’t I think this through? Krystal asked herself as she watched the girl on her lap falling asleep while watching some cartoons on the phone.

The ride home was awfully quiet and the couple didn’t know what to say or what to do. They made it to the house and Soojung carefully carried the girl to the master bedroom as Amber placed the groceries on the kitchen’s isle. When she was done, she walked upstairs and found Krystal sitting next to the sleeping toddler.

“We should give her a quick bath, she’s going to catch a cold” She said, approaching to the closet to take out a white towel.

“We didn’t think this through…” Soojung said, looking up to Amber. “We need to take her to child services” She added.

“You changed your mind?” The tomboy asked her as she joined her on the bed.

“I wasn’t thinking, Amber” She coldly replied.

“We just can’t do that… I- I don’t know what to do… I never committed a crime before” The older panicked.

“It’s not because it is a crime… is because we’re too young to be parents…” Soojung reasoned with her girlfriend. “We’ve been dating for only a day, and now we’re raising a child? I think not, Amber” She finished, standing from the bed.

“So, we’re just going to leave her?” Amber objected.

“We’re not leaving her, she’s just going to child services where they can provide her a better place to stay” She replied, crossing her arms.

“A better place to stay? Is that really your argument?” The tomboy stood up from the bed to stand in front of the ice-looking girl. “We’ve got everything covered… a nice household, food, money… I can ask Jackie to make me some space in the company-“

“I said no, Amber. And it’s final” The younger girl adverted as she passed next to her powerless girlfriend. “Go make her something to eat, I’ll give her a bath” She said as she prepared the bath.

“Fine” Amber said and she stormed out of the room.

Krystal stared at the sleeping toddler on her bed, she looked so fragile… but they couldn’t keep her, it was too much of a responsibility and Soojung didn’t want to end up neglecting her needs like her father did to her. She carried the little girl to the bathroom and gently woke her up in order to be able to give her a bath, she filled the bath tube with warm water and made sure it was the perfect temperature for the little Hwa-Young.

“Let’s give you a quick bath, Hwa-Young” She told the little girl and softly got rid of her soaked clothes, revealing the girl’s bare abdomen. Krystal had a horrible flashback of her being abused in the mental hospital as she saw the little girl’s arms marked with cigarette burns. What’s wrong with people? She thought, making sure the toddler didn’t acknowledge her disturbed semblance.

“Don’t worry, little one. Everything is going to be fine”

Amber was sent to the kitchen by her girlfriend, while she walked down the stairs, she imagined the joy of having a kid and raising it with Krystal. Not now, apparently, she thought as she shook her head. She made it to the kitchen and placed the groceries in their respective spots. It was difficult for her to discern what was the right thing to do, it was true that they just witnessed a crime and instead of going to the police, for obvious reasons, they ran away with a child. On the other hand, it was also true that if they took the toddler to child services, they would most likely make it harder for her to find a better household than the one she was already in.

“I guess there’s nothing I can really do” She sighed as she opened the fridge and looked for the ingredients to make little Hwa-Young a sandwich.

After thirty minutes, Krystal came down to the kitchen with the baby girl in her arms.

“Hey, I made her a sandwich” Amber said as she slid the plate on the kitchen’s isle, revealing a sandwich without crust and a smiley face made out of ketchup.

“Jesus, you’re a five-year-old yourself” Soojung rolled her eyes and placed Hwa-Young on the chair.

The little girl saw the sandwich and inspected it, sticking a finger in the ketchup, taking it to as she tasted the condiment. She eyed the sandwich one more time and finally took a bite of it.

“Well, at least she appreciates my work” The tomboy said while resting her arms on the kitchen’s isle, supporting her weight on them.

“I thought of what you said and…” The younger said, walking to her girlfriend. “We’re just letting her stay for tonight, see how she feels about it… while we figure out how to tell her about her mom” She added, Amber turned to face her.

“No more child services?” The short-haired girl asked, with a sparkle in her eyes.

“Not for now” Soojung reassured, giving her girlfriend a small peck on the lips followed by a cheeky smile. Obviously, Krystal wasn’t sure of what she was doing, but seeing the toddler in such a precarious condition really broke her heart. What if it was her real daughter? What if Amber was right and they can provide her a better life? She saw herself in that small human, bruised and burnt, she didn’t know how but she wanted to take care of the little Hwa-Young. Huh, she’s a ‘beautiful flower’ indeed, she thought.