Tiffany's PoV:

The sound of my phone vibrating wakes me up.

The sun is out.

How long have I slept? What year is it?

I scratch my eyes and rub my face. I mentally slap myself for irritating my face, but shake it off.

Oh yeah. Why should I care if I ruin my eyeballs or get acne from rubbing my face? I just failed 3 AP tests that I thought I'd pass.

It's because I'm pretty, huh?

Well. Where does being pretty lead me?

What am I even saying? I'm not pretty.

I'm ugly inside and out.

My thoughts are again distracted from my vibrating phone.

I scrolled down and counted 18 messages from Jessica. I was about to listen to the voicemail but Jessica's most recent text caught my attention.

After rereading that text, I glanced at the time.

1:13 PM. Had I slept for nearly slept for another 7 hours?

I pull the comforter off me and walk to my vanity table. I sit in front of the mirror and just stare into myself. My hair was oily and tangled, probably due to sweating in my sleep since I slept with a comforter in the hot weather. My face looked bloated and I couldn’t find the will to smile. Even my high school famous eye-smile wasn’t shining as bright as usual.

She can’t see me like this.

I speed-dialed her contact, knowing she’d respond faster.

The first thing I hear is her shouting at me. “Hey! Why haven’t you been responding to my messages?!”

A wave of guilt passes toward me; I didn’t mean to make her so worried. I sighed, suddenly having a loss of words.

“Tiffany?” She spoke with a more delicate tone. “Are you there?”

I tried to think fast. “Yeah. Sorry. I guess there’s bad signal where I am.” I lied.

There was a pause. “But there’s always good service in your room.” She was a bit skeptical.

“Yeah. Well I’m not in my room,” I sounded a bit too defensive even though it was a lie. Maybe it was better just to text her.

There was another pause. I didn’t know what to say. I knew she could tell I was hiding something and sooner or later she would figure things out. I realize how much time I was wasting. She is probably walking to my house, but with her head start from her text, she probably had less than 3 minutes. “Well. Where are you then?”

“I’m--uh,” I tried to think fast of a place in my house with bad signal. “I’m in my laundry room.”

She laughed sarcastically. “Wow. I never thought you did laundry. I thought you didn’t know how to.”

I tried to cover up my tracks. “I’m trying to learn since I’m gonna need it for college.” I try to say nonchalantly.

“Well. If you’re still in your laundry room. Why did your signal become better?” She interrogated.  

“I walked outside so I could hear you better.” I subconsciously curl into a ball. I only did that when I was afraid of getting caught. I was running out of time. “Look Jess. My mom gave me a crapload of chores to do. Can we reschedule? Tomorrow. I promise.”

“Reschedule? We still have time. Its barely 1:30.” Jessica yelled skeptically. Unknown to Tiffany, Jessica was already at the front door of her house looking for the spare key. She didn’t care if Tiffany was busy or not in the best shape; they were best friends and she wanted to spend as much time together before they moved to college. “I could always help you with your chores. They jobs get done quicker and we'll spend a lot of time together.”

I genuinely and softly smiled. I was thankful to have such a caring friend. “Still. I’m tired and I’m only going to be more tired. I want to fully enjoy our date~” I knew if I , she would let it go.

“Uh, um. F-fine.” Jessi managed to stutter out.

“Is everything okay?” I became concerned because her confident tone disappeared. “Look, I was just kidding.” Suddenly, mine went away, too. Did something happen? Is she okay? I wanted to run out the house and check if she was alright.

“It’s not that. It’s nothing,” she sighs. I suddenly heard ruffling. “Can I still come over? Maybe later? I don’t care if you’re tired. My house is empty and you know me, jobless.”

My smile drops to a pursed line. I think about how we’ve barely done anything this summer. We always went to the mall or the park. I untangle myself and stand up to pace around my room. My eyes caught my computer and I’m reminded of what had happened. “I’ll think about it.” I smile sadly. “Why don’t you check with Yuri. I think she came back from her family vacation.” I heard no response. “I should be done with everything by 5PM. I’ll call you if I’d be okay by then.”

She grumbles something. “Fine.” She scoffs. She suddenly hung up. I flinch at the sudden end of conversation.

Bye Sica. Talk to you later.

I’m sorry.

I opened the door of my room and headed to the kitchen. My stomach is mad at me for skipping breakfast and needs some comfort food. I grabbed a banana and started munching on it. Guilt was crawling all over my body. I felt bad for lying to Jessica. I felt bad for keeping this all in. I felt bad for making her lonely on a day where she was probably super ecstatic.

I’m a horrible person.

I search around the pantry, but lose appetite thinking about Jessica.

I decide to text her; maybe she won’t be so angry.

There I went again. Lying.

I head back to my room, leaving the door open. I plop on my bed and reboot my laptop. For some odd reason, I find myself in Collegeboard, somehow imagining that what I saw this morning was just a tired hallucination. I did pass some tests. It was all a mistake.

I mean, there’s bound to be a couple other 'Miyoung Hwang’s... in California, in all those classes, in the graduating class of 2015.

The results load again.

Hitting me again, the results were exactly as I saw this morning.

I push my laptop away and hug my knees.

Why didn’t you try hard enough?

Why did you get senioritis?

Why did you take all those classes?

You were too naive and greedy. Look where this went. You didn’t even get Top 10. You gave up being the dance captain. Everyone depended on you. This is probably why all the UCs denied you.

This is all a waste. You should’ve been like Hyoyeon and Sooyoung and enjoyed senior year. You’re not like Juhyun or Yoona. You aimed too high and achieved nothing.

I hide my face in my arms.

For the first time in a while, I cry.

I didn’t cry during my graduation. I didn’t cry on my 18th birthday. I didn’t cry during my last dance showcase. I didn’t cry over all the stress. I didn’t cry out of happiness.

Now, I let that all go.   

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A/N: Sorry if this seems like a filler chapter. I don't know if this was conveyed properly, but this chapter was meant for realization to hit Tiffany. It's about pretending to be okay when you're not~ idk. It's something I went through. I swear the next chapter will be better[: 

Also, sorry if the photo edit was too much. I did it myself~ ..but idk how to make is smaller... ^^' any help?

Thank you for your support!