"Stop! Stop!"

    The two words came as a slap to Amber. Although it wasn't exactly verbally abusive, she was at a point where it felt like bricks were being thrown at her face. Solid, rock-hard bricks. And it hurt. Oh, it hurt like hell. 

    She couldn't have seen this coming and as a matter of fact, she didn't. Honestly, it was one of the last things and worse-case scenarios that would have made up to her mind when she was sent to the pearly white gates for having lip contact with the person she swore she didn't have a crush on but did, as it always is for people who are twenty feet deep into the sands of denial when it came to high school romance.

    But now that the kiss was no more, this time having the sophomore breaking it up rather than Amber doing it herself unlike the previous occasion, she finally had a clear picture of how Krystal must have felt that afternoon. And how much worse it must have been realizing that she wasn't even the one who took the initiative to do..that. It was all Amber. All her. Who forcibly kisses someone and tells them to off right after?

    Oh boy, how was she ever going to look her junior in the eye now? She wished she could've taken back the words that escaped that afternoon. She wished she could mind-sweep Krystal so that she'd forget the past thirty minutes of her life, the past week of her life. She wished she had never been born with guts because if it weren't for them, she wouldn't be in this mess right now. She wished, she wished, she wished.

    "Why did you do that?"

    Maybe she could explain myself, shed some light onto the matter so at least one of them could walk out of this park less confused, but no, she didn't think her guts deserved a second chance. She didn't even deserve a second chance.

    "I don't know," Amber replied, feeling smaller than ever. She couldn't even give Krystal the straight answer she very much deserved after having herself taken advantage of. Twice. By the same person. What other feeling was justifiable in a case like this?

    "No, you don't get to do that. You don't get to run away from the problem you caused," Krystal beamed.

    Amber stared as hard as she could at the ground, as if asking, demanding for the ground to help because she didn't want to deal with Krystal. She didn't know how. But maybe the ground did.

    "Hey, my eyes are up here," and as if she already knew that Amber wasn't going to move an inch for the next decade or so, Krystal gently put both her hands on the side of the blonde's head. Amber felt her head getting lifted up by the pair of warm hands which had covered themselves over her ears. She felt dizzy all of a sudden, another train of thoughts rushing through her mind at the foreign gesture of the brunette. 

    She believed this was the first ever time Krystal had done something like this to anyone. As much time they had spent together at school or outside of school, she had never once seen her junior acting so boldly before. So boldly affectionate, or just affectionate in general. She'd know since this was a pretty heated topic among Amber and the two other girls of the group. Luna and Sulli who constantly wondered why Krystal still looked so distant even after months of hang-outs and eat-outs and even sleepovers never failed to pester Amber about it at least once every two weeks.

    "Why doesn't she join in on group hugs? Or link arms with us? Or do the cute stuff Luna and I always do with each other?" It was all Amber heard whenever it was that time of the month again and although she never got tired of the same replies that she gave, "she's just not a very touchy-feely person," she did however let curiosity have its fun. She'd pretend to shrug off her two buddies' questions and they'd let her because they knew Amber wasn't exactly touchy-feely herself, not to their extent anyway. So, she'd put on a little show for her two friends and be on her merry way but in reality, her mind wrecked over it like there was no tomorrow and she could spend hours and days on end thinking and rethinking about it until she finally woke up one day and have no recollection on what had been on her mind for the past week. 

    Much like what her mind was doing right now; it was going on overdrive, connecting all the dots and bridges that could possibly explain why Krystal was being so gentle with her, why Krystal was being so not-Krystal with her. And how warm hers palms felt against her ears, how it calm it made her.

    And suddenly, that was all Amber could think of. Not why she had her head in Krystal’s hands or why it was being held so delicately, like it was something feeble and fragile that could be hurt or broken with a mere touch. All that occupied Amber's mind now was the thought of having no thoughts at all. The thought of having absolutely nothing to think about because there was this soothing buzz at the back of her head, silencing everything and leaving only peace and tranquility on its trail.

    “Amber?”

    “Yeah,” she felt herself blink but imagined doing it really, really slowly.

    “Can I ask you a question?”

    “Yes,” an absentminded reply was everything Amber could muster up while her head did that thing that happens in films where the bad guy pulls the trigger and the good guy jumps in front of the gun and the air movement abruptly slows and the audiences begin to see everything unfold at the speed of a garden snail.

    “You have to promise not to lie." Krystal blinked as she waited for Amber's response.

    “I promise.” She didn’t know Krystal had black eyes. Sure, she knew the brunette had irises the color of a dead TV screen but she always had strong assumptions that there were traces of brown in them too.

    She imagined Krystal’s eyes to have a coffee-black shade to it instead of being entirely black, but she now knew that all the imagining she had done and all the images she had put into her head of how she thought Krystal’s eyes would look like were wrong. They were all absolutely, completely and utterly wrong. Krystal didn’t have eyes the color of coffee or black coffee or even her chestnut hair, but they weren't entirely a spat of black paint either. No, calling them plain black would be a downright insult, a deplorable excuse for a comment because Krystal's eyes weren't just black­­­. They were the perfect shade of black, the kind of shade that deserved its own name and its own place in the world, the kind of shade that deserved to be photographed and preserved.

    "What did you promise to do?" Krystal didn't blink this time and neither did Amber. Even if it was just a second, even if it was just a fraction of a second, she didn't want to miss out. She didn't want to waste another moment looking at something that wasn't made, that wasn't crafted in pursuit of artistic perfection. 

    The kind of shade that deserved to be appreciated.

    "I promised not to lie."

    "I'm serious, Amber. No lies."

    "No lies."

    "No avoiding questions."

    "No avoiding questions."

    "No bull."

    "No," Amber swallowed, oh what have I gotten myself into, "bull."

    "Good," Krystal said before she tore her gaze away from Amber and with that, the senior was back. She was back to this ty world and its ty weather and her even tier situation. "Now, answer my question."

    Amber blinked. "What question?"

    "My first question."

    And Amber blinked again. "Umm..."

    "Really, Amber?" Krystal sighed.

    "I'm sorry," the senior sheepishly replied, "if you could just repeat the question...?" It wasn't like she wanted to be clueless. Blonde moments were bound to happen once in a while. Unfortunately for Amber, it had to be now.

    Krystal whirled around and stared at Amber. She stared long and hard, probably stuck in disbelief that an eighteen year old, a legal adult, was still capable of making a fool out of herself. "Fine, fine. I'll ask again," Krystal finally gave up.

    "Why did you," the brunette shook her head, as if finding the mere thought of it unacceptable, incomprehensible, "do it, do that, just now?"

    "I-I...I don-"

    "Jesus, Amber. If you can't even give me a simple answer, so help me God, I'm going to throw you into the lake and make sure you freeze to death."

    A series of stuttering ensued and as much as Amber hated herself for doing it, she couldn't help it. Even if she had the words, could they really help resolve what was happening between them? The fear of it not being able to paralyzed Amber so much, her subconscious would rather Krystal get mad at her for not saying anything at all than for her to say something and further disrupt both their lives. The stammering was out of her control and even if she wanted to say something, her mind wouldn't let her. Her mind just wouldn't.

    "Screw you, Amber," Krystal hissed as she paced backwards, then forward again. "Screw you!"

    Amber stood motionless, eyes overflowing with helplessness as she watched Krystal run her hand through her hair in frustration over and over again. She watched as Krystal's chest heaved up and down and up and down, faster with every second. She watched as the hands that used to twirl pens around in late afternoons ball into fists, shaking with so much anger and vexation. She watched as the girl she cared so much about transform into a completely different, darker person and tried her best to swallow in the guilt.

    "Krystal–"

    "Shut up!" the sophomore yelled, sending an electrifying shock down her blonde senior’s spine, "you had your chance to talk, now it's my turn so you just shut up and listen."

    After giving a few rueful nods, Amber backed away and readied herself for whatever that she had coming her way. If all she could do for Krystal now was to stand back and listen, or even to climb the highest mountains or cross the harshest of seas if she was told, there was nothing else she would've wanted to do and nowhere else she'd rather be.

    "Listen here, dirtbag. I've been trying to get this out since we had that stupid fight over what, I don't even know, but I'm sorry," Krystal inhaled deeply, "I'm sorry for being a . I'm sorry for being a to you."

    She noticed.

    "If you weren't so busy playing , I would've apologized to you a long time ago, but my point is, I'm sorry," –pause– "now, here's the real deal," Krystal said as she began strutting towards Amber. She came to a stop right in front of the blonde and let out a loud scoff. With her index finger, she began tapping on the area below the latter's collarbone.

    "Who. Do. You. ing. Think. You. Are." And with every word, the tapping on Amber's chest got harder and harder. "Do I look like a childhood toy, a doll perhaps, that you used to play with but threw away once its dress started to wrinkle? Huh? Am I a ing toy to you?"

    "Did you think you could come on to me, pretend to be my friend for a month or two and then leave when you got tired of me? When you got what you wanted out of me?”

    Although Amber didn’t quite understand the last part of the sentence, she perfectly understood the expression dawned on Krystal’s face and she understood that she had to be quiet. She used to see it every time her sister sat in the doorway of their two-room apartment, fingers clasped loosely around an unopened can while other used, empty cans and bottles piled from her room to the front door. Amber knew what enough but not quite looked like. Her whole life was a big fat bunch of enough but not quite. She knew Krystal wasn’t finished.

    “Well, guess what, Amber? I’m not a toy!” She flung her arms up, “I’m not some plastic, factory-made object of entertainment for you to play around with when you’re bored because surprise, surprise, es have feelings too!”

    “I feel things and I know things. I know what bull looks like and I know that’s exactly what you’ve been doing with me since day one. And you know what’s ing ironic?” –a rhetorical question no doubt– “It’s ing ironic when you called me out for my bull because here you are, Queen of all bulls.”

    “You come swooping into my life, claiming to understand me when you don’t know , telling me all your lame jokes and stupid details about your stupid life and never leaving me alone, basically shoving yourself into my face. Then what, you just woke up one morning and realized that playing kindergarteners with me wasn’t fun anymore so instead, you decided to just literally –and I mean literally– shove yourself into my face as an end to your little charade?”

    Krystal finally turned herself away from Amber and faced the lake. Amber couldn’t be more thankful for that because she was burning with so much guilt and embarrassment –not to mention the sudden blush that came out of nowhere– her face felt like a tomato that was a moment away from exploding. Suddenly, the park wasn’t cold anymore and Amber could feel her feet, her legs, her arms and face sweating like she had been on a 3-hour hike. Even her insides felt like they were sweating, like someone had lit a candle and put it right between her lungs.

    She watched as Krystal threw her head back and looked up at the sky. She wanted to do the same and feel the sky –one of God’s most beautiful creation, gaze down at her but felt like she had no right to be following what Krystal was doing. She didn’t want the brunette to find her more annoying than she already was and what’s more annoying than a parrot that won’t keep quiet?

    “Is this,” she heard Krystal exhale, her head still looking up, “is this a game to you?”

    Without giving Amber enough time to come up with a response, she looked back down and pierced her eyes through the blonde’s. “Do you kiss all of your pretend-BFFs? Do you mess with all their heads? Screw with them for fun and use them for your needs?”

    “Does it make you feel good, knowing that you’ve stripped someone to their bare skin? Are you glad to see me so pathetic? Does my vulnerability please you?” She paused, then added almost mockingly, “or do my lips please you more?”

    There was a long pause. A pause so long it felt like it was the end of it; the final full-stop to a story. Then, Krystal laughed. But it was empty and hollow. It brought weight into the atmosphere, as if it wasn’t heavy enough before. Amber felt like she was standing beneath a roof made of cardboard with blocks of clay on top of it and more were getting stacked up with every passing moment.

    It was hard to breathe, it was hard to think. She didn’t think this would happen. There was little she knew about straight-forwardness and all that she did, she thought she had seen during her everyday life with Krystal. She never fully understood how people could be so…direct. So brave. To say that she admired them would be the understatement of the year because as hurtful or offensive some of them might be, it still wasn’t something easy to pull off. It wasn’t something anybody could do and Amber knew what she was and wasn’t capable of. And she knew that was something she could never do because she wasn’t and probably would never be strong enough to handle the truth, the problems that came with the truth. Her problem with the truth.

    “Tell me how it felt to have your lips on mine. Tell me how the back of my neck felt. Was it soft? Warm? Did you like it? Did you want more?” Another empty, unnecessary laugh. “What is it with you people? Do I look that easy, desperate? Do I have the words ‘ Me’ written over my face in red paint? Why does everyone get the impression that I want to be touched, that I want be brought to a dark corner to be violated?”

    Her voice amplified question after question and it never stopped for answers, probably because Krystal already had them. It didn’t matter if they were the wrong ones, the only thing that mattered was that Krystal believed they were right and that was where she had completely lost Amber. But once the confused Amber pieced the puzzle together, she was instantly replaced with a worried Amber. A very worried Amber and a very, very frightened Amber.

    Touched. The word shook Amber to the core. Violated. Images, bits and pieces of articles from the internet flashed through her mind, scaring the living crap out of her. She didn’t want to think about it. She didn’t want look at Krystal and think about it. Associating them with her was wrong, associating them with anyone was wrong. It was wrong.

    “You can’t just, just take what you want and leave. You just can’t.” Krystal’s voice shook and Amber’s heart broke. This was nothing compared to seeing strays looking for food at the side of the road, pictures and clips of starving children from India, watching the magnificent ocean liner sink on Titanic, killing a little over 700 people because as much as Amber cared and had her heart ache for them, they weren’t personal. They didn’t hit home. But Krystal was and Krystal did.

    And when Amber summoned enough courage to look her back in the eye, she felt a part of her wilt inside. Gone was the calm and collected version of Krystal. The look in her eyes was like the stormy sea during monsoon season –ominous, threatening, unpredictable. Then, it wasn’t anymore. And Amber saw only a still desert. An unmoving piece of land that had no edge, no end –desolate, deserted, lifeless. Hopeless. Her eyes seemed to be the meeting point of all the harshest conditions Mother Nature had to offer and Amber didn’t know what to do to make it go away. She didn’t know how to calm a brewing storm, didn’t know how to give life to a dying vessel. Damn it, what exactly did she know?

    “Krystal…” She started, but couldn’t find the words to continue. A failed attempt, but an attempt nevertheless. She wasn’t calling quits just yet.

    “Soo-Jung.” She never called her this, never did and never had –not to her face anyway. The name felt weird, awkward rolling off her tongue. Even with the amount of times Amber had mumbled it as she waited for slumber to arrive, playing around with the name until she got comfortable saying it like it was the name of a childhood friend she grew up with or the middle name she never got to choose for herself, she still couldn’t get this peculiar feeling off her chest, like by addressing her in this way, the seriousness in the air had been intensified tenfold and if Amber weren’t careful, she’d be easily crushed by it, like an ant by a boot.

    “I’m not leaving.” She chose her words carefully. “I’m not going anywhere.”

    “So, you’re just avoiding me for fun then?”

    “I…” Amber didn’t think she’d get such an immediate response.

    “Like how you juggled my feelings around? That must’ve been a lot of fun too.”

    “No, that’s not… I didn’t,” Amber swallowed, shaking her head, “I wasn’t doing that.”   

    “Then what were you doing?”

    “I…”

    “Goddamn it, Amber. I’m-”

    “I was being stupid!” Amber exclaimed. Yelled, really. And that seemed to have garnered a reaction of some sort from Krystal. Her eyes widened, mouth agape –not an expression people often, or ever see from the sophomore– as she let Amber cut her off.

    “I was being stupid, alright?” She yelled again. She turned her head sideways, away from Krystal and sighed heavily. Her chest didn’t feel as tight as it did anymore. She flicked her attention back to Krystal. “I know I’m stupid on a daily basis, but this is, it’s a different kind of stupid.”

    Krystal pressed her lips together. “What kind of stupid is it?”

    “The kind of stupid where you take your friend’s ty advice because you were too big of a wimp to fix your own problems.”

    “What does that mean?”

    “It means Key was wrong and I’m going to beat him into a pulp,” Amber stated.

    “What?” Krystal asked, her eyes narrowed.

    “Because he was being the kind of stupid where you confuse TV and fictional books reality with real life reality.”

    “I don’t have a bloody clue on what you’re saying.” Krystal’s eyes still a narrowed slit.

    “Well, I didn’t get what you mean by take what you want and leave,” Amber quoted, suddenly finding a strong voice to a thought that had been bothering her since the words left Krystal. Amber hardly ever turned the tables around with her, so this counter-questioning was a pretty big move. A pretty big and risky move, but it was worth a shot.

    She stared at Krystal while Krystal stared right back. A moment of silence past before Krystal decided to tear her gaze away. She whirled her head towards the lake again, facing away from Amber but not before the blonde saw a mix of uncertainty and panic settling on her face. “It didn’t mean anything,” Amber finally heard her say.

    “No,” Amber disagreed as she too, looked towards the lake, “I’m pretty sure it meant something.” She gave her current spot another two seconds before slowly moving towards Krystal. “Actually…” She dragged the word out as she moved and moved and moved, until she no longer stood behind the brunette but in front of her, putting herself directly in Krystal’s view. “I’m completely sure it meant a lot of somethings.”

    Krystal shot a cold, hard stare at the person who had just blocked her view. “Do not put words into my mouth.”

    “You’re the one who has been going on about how I toyed with your feelings and taking and leaving when I’m pretty sure I haven’t done any of that.” Amber tried not to coo on the words. She had a feeling her immaturity would not be appreciated right now.

    “Please, you know exactly what you did and what you didn’t do.”

    Amber scoffed. Yes, scoffed, in the presence of Krystal Jung Soo-Jung. She figured she’d better keep the tables turning. “We wouldn’t even be here if you knew what you did and apologized for it long before.”

    “What the hell did I do?” Krystal’s face twisted, voice defensive.

    “It doesn’t matter, you already apologized for it,” Amber said and Krystal had never looked so confused, blanked before. “But please, explain to me what I apparently did and did not do that has gotten your in a twist because that part remains a mystery segment to me.”

    Krystal’s bunched eyebrows and wrinkled forehead told Amber that her cogs were turning. And judging by the length of time Krystal let pass between them, Amber knew she was completely lost in her own thoughts. Krystal was thinking real long and real hard. Amber prepared herself for battle.

    “What did you do? Hmm,” she started, “Okay, first you befriended me, made me befriend you and let the whole world think we’re BFFs. And then, you ignored me, gave me the cold shoulder and acted like we didn’t just spend months learning things about each other. I then confronted you about it but you kissed me and told me you didn’t want to see me again. You confused me and then avoided me like I’m radioactive. And you, you…you just, you confused me!”

    That caught Amber by surprise because for the most part, they were true. Embarrassing, but true. She did befriend her, she did give her the cold shoulder, she did kiss her and she did avoid her. But confused her? Although that was the biggest shock of all, Amber was determined not to let Krystal know that the news had affected her in any way. She needed to look tough right now. She needed to show Krystal she could stand her ground, even if they were shaking and falling apart underneath her.

    “And what about the things I didn’t do?” She asked softly, trying not to agitate Krystal as much.

    “You…” Krystal trailed off, drew a few blanks before falling completely silent. She had no idea what to say.

    Amber felt herself smile on the inside, if that was even possible. Cue, show-time.

    “I’ll tell you what I didn’t do,” Amber said, voice boasting a load of phony confidence, but Krystal didn’t need to know that, “I didn’t leave to be someone else’s friend even after all the crap you made me go through."

    “I didn’t hate on you even when I realized that our friendship was one-sided and that you couldn't care less about my feelings. I didn't spit into your drinks no matter how many times you made it clear that you didn't want me around and wanted me to leave you alone, but I never did; I never left you alone. Not when you had your sudden breakdown on the first day of our tutoring session, not when you constantly rolled your eyes at me like it’s your way of greeting me –or not greeting me–, not when you shrugged me off or completely ignored me and the fact that I was in a conversation with you to go mingle and be all nice and friendly with other people.”

    “I didn’t try to mingle with other people even though they probably wanted me around more than you did. I didn’t try to make you like me more because I didn’t want to make you feel uncomfortable by doing something you didn’t want to.”

    “The only thing I did but immediately regretted afterwards was pretending to hate you. I honestly pretended,” –Amber made sure she put enough emphasis on the word– “to hate you and I know that’s pathetic as hell because who pretends to hate people? But I thought I’d be doing you a favor. I thought that maybe the more I fake-hated you, the more you’d feel at ease about hating me and soon after, you’d finally kill that basket case mentality you have of me and leave like you’ve always wanted to without anything holding you back.”

    So much truth in such little time. Amber felt her legs start to go weak and she knew in another 10 seconds or so they’d transform entirely into jelly and then she’d look even more sad and pathetic as staggering away from the biggest mistake of her life. She’d better wrap this up as quickly as she could.

    “Look, I’m sorry. I’m sorry if I’ve ever made you feel that way about yourself,” Amber sighed, turning away from Krystal’s direction. “But most of all,” she took a step back, “I’m sorry for showing up in your life, intruding it and annoying you, I really am.”

    She looked back at Krystal and waited for both their eyes to meet. Luckily for Amber, it didn’t take long for them to finally see eye to eye, in literal terms.

    “I really am sorry. You won’t see me again.” she said before giving Krystal a small, tight-lipped smile that didn’t look anything like her usual megawatt smile. Her big, cheery, authentic megawatt smile that shined with so much positive energy it could probably make the saddest and darkest part of the world feel like Disneyland.

    Without uttering another word, Amber her heel, walked and never looked back. Not even when she swore she heard her name being whispered, not when she felt the lump in begin to shift upwards and was just aching to exit her esophagus and into a dreadful drain somewhere, not when she realized she was leaving behind what could’ve been the best days of her remaining high school life. And definitely not when every part of her cell was screaming at her to stop at her tracks, to turn around, change the course of everything so that everything will be made alright.

    It’s not too late, it’s never too late.

    In the midst of all that self-resistance blowing up a storm in Amber’s head, lyrics from the Three Days Grace song managed to squeeze their way through. Funny how it did though because it’s all bull, bull, bull, Amber thought to herself. It is sooo too late. What has happened has happened and there’s no correction tape, no delete button, no ing do-overs.

    She reached into the front pocket of her hoodie for her keys as her Honda City came to view. With a ‘beep’ from her car, the doors were unlocked. As she was reaching out to open her car door, she suddenly felt a grip as tight as the noose around the neck of a death-sentence convict around her outstretched arm and before she knew it, she was being pulled to a different direction.

    “Wha–”

    “You didn’t.”

    Amber traced the hand that still gripped onto her arm like its life depended on it onto a pair of plump lips, cute button nose and eyes of indescribable beauty.

    “Krys–“, Amber began to say, “tal?”

    The latter’s chest was heaving up and down again, her breathing as rapid as Amber’s pulse was. “You,” –inhale, exhale– “didn’t.”

    “What?”

    “You didn't intrude,” Krystal finally said in one breath. She took in a few more breaths and steadied her composure. “And you don’t annoy me,” she said again, looking at Amber straight in the eye, “you make me nervous.”

A/N: here's the update. and it only took a month. ha-ha. right, so sorry for the delay yet again. hope this was an okay read though, my longest post to date. have a great weekend, guys!