"You know I love you, Emily," whispered the girl in between tears, "just… not in this way. It… It isn't right. I'm sorry."

Emily Fitch stood there in the rain, her face emotionless and seemingly unaffected by the streams of rainwater rolling down her cheeks. She stared blankly back at the other girl, who was crying hard now. "I'm sorry," the girl choked on the tears. She gave Emily one last look, a look of guilt and regret, before holding the boy by the hand and turning to walk away.

The girl walked further and further away, and she did not turn back. Finally, when she became a speck in the distance, Emily bit her lip as a tear rolled down her cheek. All around her, the trees and buildings started to spin and the street lights were whirling into a blur. Her senses must have begun to dull and shut down completely, because all that she could feel at that moment was a pain in the left side of her chest, a pain that comes from within and it felt excruciating; her hand grabbed into a fist instinctively at her chest to stop the pain, but it didn't make it go away.

It hurt so much she thought she was going to die from the pain, but she didn't. Moments later, she heard thumping sounds from behind her, the sound of horses' hooves hitting against the ground. The next thing she knew, she was thrown off her feet and landed hard on the ground.

"Ems!"

Emily grimaced and rubbed the bump on her head, as she opened her eyes to see what had knocked her off her balance. That room she was in was lined with sleek, poshed furniture. She was lying on the floor next to a bed. Her head hurt from the impact of collision with the corner of the side table.

It was a dream.

"Ems! At the count of three, we're gonna break this door down!"

The shouting broke into Emily's thoughts and she realised for the first time that someone was at the door. Standing up hastily, she tried to calm herself by taking several deep breaths and attempted in vain to clear her mind of the images still fresh from the dream. She thought she felt something wet on her cheekbone, and her hand went instinctively up to her face to wipe it off, but there was nothing there. What, what exactly would kill that disgusting icy monster in me? She sighed sadly as she walked to open the door of the hotel room.

"EM- ," the guy standing right in front of the door looked like he was about to continue shouting when he stopped short, surprised the door was suddenly opened.

"What the fuck do you want, Cook?" said the red-haired girl with her arms folded, with a look of annoyance.

"Gosh, Ems," the guy named Cook exclaimed with an evident surprise in his voice, as he looked Emily up and down in a manner of disbelief, "were you really sleeping at five in the afternoon? And in your work clothes?"

"It's the damned jet lag, okay?" replied Emily matter-of-factly.

"Aww, come on, jet lagging's for losers. Me and the boys are gonna hang out at a local club. Fredster says there's gonna be some strip show kinda thing with boys dressing up as hot ladies. Said they're so hot we can't even tell that they've got cocks like us. Hell yeah, it's gonna be fun to watch. And you're coming with us."

"I'm not in the mood to," replied Emily curtly.

"People maketh the mood, not the other way round, Ems. With a beer in one hand and a girl in another, you'll be in a good mood in no time. Cookie's gonna show you how to have a great time and you are coming with us," Cook replied with his charming grin. He didn't look as if he was going to take "no" for an answer.

Emily stood at the door, and seemed to be a little swayed. A night out with Cook and the boys would certainly take her mind off those unhappy thoughts.

"Fine," Emily said reluctantly finally.

"Awesome! Good choice, Emilio," said Cook with a wink. "I'll see you at the lobby in five minutes. And do get changed. You look horrible with these white long sleeves and awful man-pants," grinned Cook cheekily.

"O, shut up," replied the red-head as she rolled her eyes and shut the door in his face.

The club was surprisingly filled with more white people than one would expect in a nightclub in Bangkok. She glanced around the bar and spotted several white men groping the asses of the scantily-clad Asian girls sitting on their laps, their looks filled with lust. Some of these men, as she noticed, had rings on their fourth fingers. Married expats looking for a fling in a foreign land. Emily turned away disgustedly at the sight of these salivating wolves (as she called them in her mind) and her eyes landed on Cook and Freddie, who had abandoned her to chat up two pretty blonde girls at the bar. JJ was standing awkwardly right beside the two boys and he looked like he was feeling left out from the conversation.

Damn you, Cook. All those talk about hanging together tonight. Two pretty blondes come along and immediately all friendships sink to the bottom of the ocean faster than the Titanic.

"Hey, gorgeous," a female, seductive voice came out of nowhere and disrupted Emily's thoughts. Emily jumped in surprise at the intrusion and turned her head back to find a pretty brunette leaning towards her face at an uncomfortable proximity. "You looked so mesmerizing with that serious look on your face I thought I'd better come over and find out what's wrong," The brunette bit her lips as her eyes strayed to Emily's lips and back to her hazel eyes, "…and if I could make you feel better… In any way."

Emily swallowed hard and blinked at the brunette. She wasn't used to advances from members of the opposite sex, (well in this case - same sex), nor the other way round. God knows (actually, mostly everyone knows) the last time she made out was in college with her girlfriend who lasted for one month. What'shernameagain? Emily furrowed her brows in frustration as she tried to recall the name of her first and last girlfriend she snogged after five shots of vodka at the college party.

"I'm thinking…" the brunette said in a low, seductive whisper, "that maybe a kiss would help." As she leaned in suggestively, Emily shivered violently as her mind quickly ran through a list of possible reactions to partake in response to this code-red situation, like it always did when she had to handle emergency crises.

"RESULT: NONE" came the response in her mind.

"What do you mean, NONE?" cursed Emily angrily in her head.

Her thoughts were cut off by the touch of something wet on her lips which froze her completely. The brunette had leaned in and planted a kiss, and was gently nibbling on Emily's lower lip.

Emily's eyes widened in shock.

"RESIST FOREIGN OBJECT ON LIP," suggested her brain.

Emily jerked awake from her daze and pushed the girl away forcefully.

"What… what the fuck is going on?" demanded Emily as she swiped her lips with the sleeve of her shirt, disoriented and confused.

"Jesus, lady, there's no need to get all worked up alright?" exclaimed the brunette as she pulled away from Emily and straightened herself up, feeling offended that Emily looked disgusted by their kiss.

"Your friend over there Cook told me you were feeling lonely and needed a girl; he paid me £50 to come over and make you feel good. If you are not interested in snogging just say so? We could just talk, if you like,"

"What the… Fuck you, Cook!" Emily cursed angrily as she made sense of what the brunette had just said. She felt an intense anger surging through her insides as she glared in Cook's direction. Cook, who was oblivious to the swearing, caught her eye from the bar and thought she was thanking him, winked at her as if to say, "you are welcome."

Emily grabbed her stuffs and stormed out of the bar. As she walked down the streets past the rows of bars and nightclubs hugging her bag close to her chest she had a feeling she was being stared at by curious onlookers. She was wrong; coming to the nightclub didn't help make her feel better at all. Being surrounded by people all night at the club just made her feel lonelier than ever. And now, Cook paid a girl to seduce her so that she wouldn't be lonely? Was desperation really written all over her face?

Emily knew she was queer probably since she was seven or eight, but now she thought she was perhaps the queerest of queers. When she was younger, she was never interested in the things that girls were interested in at every age, be it fairy tales, fashion or boys. When she first fell head over heels in love with Leia, her straight best friend in high school, she went through a series of emotional roller coasters. It let her taste for the first time the sweetness of loving someone so much you would do anything to make them happy, anything, even if it meant murder or arson. But thereafter she was also downed with a huge dosage of the inevitable bitterness that accompanied the torment of unrequited love. She could still remember the day when her best friend called her to tell her excitedly that she got together with the guy she had a crush on for so long. From that day on a part of Emily broke inside and she knew she would be incomplete forever.

It was also then when she finally conceded to herself; she was gay. She liked girls.

Yet, strangely, after Leia, Emily never really fell in love with another girl again. Sure, she had a few flings and a series of one-night-stands, mostly after a night of heavy booze, but none of the girls she slept with she was in love with like she was in love with Leia. Sometimes, after the night of passion, Emily would feel an overwhelming sense of guilt from betraying her own feelings yet again. She knew that the night before was only a manifest of lust and sexual frustration waiting to be released, nothing more. She knew that because when she looked into the eyes of the girls she had slept with the night before, she felt no feelings of love, just pity and guilt.

Over time, Emily steered clear of one-night-stands and casual flings altogether, to avoid hurting others, and to avoid hurting herself and sought to bury herself in work. It came to a point where she was so used to not having a relationship in her life and not having her entire life revolving around another girl, like some couples do. She gave up on finding love again, not in a vengeful, angsty and self-pitying sort of way, but rather, in a fading, forgetful sort of way. Little by little, she had closed her heart to the world. And now that it's been closed for such a long time she was not sure if it was possible to open it again, or if she ever wanted to open it at all.

The other day, she realised that she could no longer cry. Like her tear ducts just decided to malfunction one day and stop producing tears in them like they were supposed to. It was a frightening revelation to her, and she was in jitters when she had told Katie, her identical-but-not-so-identical twin, about it. Emotionally strong, confident and armed with a tongue that could cut through diamonds, Katie's everything that Emily was not.

"Fuck, what?" Katie turned away from her toe nails that she was painting a dark shade of red and shot Emily an incredulous and somewhat annoyed look.

"I don't know why, okay? I just can't anymore. I CAN'T CRY ANY MORE! I'M A FUCKING HEARTLESS FREAK." yelled Emily as she let herself onto her sister's bed and started screaming into the pillow and thumping the bed violently with her fists.

"I'm sure you can, bitch. You just need to wait for something worthwhile to come along to cry about," replied Katie, ignoring her sister's outburst while continuing to paint the last toe nail.

Emily didn't know what the hell what Katie was talking about, but one thing she did know: that every day she discovered more and more things about herself that seemed to justify her point that she was a heartless freak.

Like the other day, there was some show on Nat Geo Channel they were watching at some work party; about Somalia's child soldiers who were forced to join the rebel army at gunpoint and carry out heinous killings, some at the tender age of 10. Almost all the females in the room teared when they watched the interviews of the children, who described to the interviewers what they would want to be doing if they had a choice to lead a free life somewhere else. Emily thought that the interviews were all rather touching and well-shot alright, but the scene of everyone whipping out their handkerchiefs to blow their noses into was just baffling.

Then, there was the funeral of her high school classmate, Kenneth the other day, and all the old classmates who had turned up were weeping for him at the service. Really? Emily thought as she eyed her classmates in surprise. Were you all even that close to him?

It was after a couple more incidents (one of which involving a documentary of sharks being finned before being thrown back into the seas or something along those lines) when it hit her that something might be really wrong with her.

It was as if she can't feel anymore. Like all her years trying to numb her feelings for Leia with work really succeeded and now she's fucking permanently numbed.

Even with that sexy brunette (give her some credit, she had some really gorgeous tits) hovering over her like that at the club, Emily felt nothing. Not lust, not desire, no, just fear. Fucking fear. She's afraid of anyone who dared come too close.

Her thoughts disintegrated and she was brought back to face with reality, standing in the middle of the walkway beside a massage parlour as the streams of passers-by walked past with curious stares.

If Emily had thought that staying in a nightclub full of white people with her friends had made her feel lonely, standing alone on the streets of Bangkok on a cold, windy night certainly didn't make her feel better. She glanced at her watch. 10:03pm. She was not sure if she still knew how to get back to the hotel, but she knew for sure that she didn't want to return to an empty hotel room yet.

Emily's mind floated back to her words, "You know I love you, Emily. Just not in this way. It isn't right. I'm sorry", and she felt this tight feeling in her chest surfacing once again.

Just then, she heard shouting from around the corner and just as she turned back to see what was going on, a white boy dressed rather oddly - wearing a vested suit and a grey beret (the kind where newspaper boys from the 1940s would wear while shouting, "Extra! Extra! Read all about it!") which hid most part of his face in the shadows nearly ran into her as he abruptly appeared from around the corner. The boy couldn't have been more than 18 years old.

Emily peeked around the corner as the boy apologized hastily and continued running. About a few hundred metres away from where Emily was were three men apparently chasing after the boy, and they were shouting words that Emily can't really make out.

Emily turned and saw that the boy had stopped in his tracks a few metres from her. Then, as if suddenly realising something, he turned back and ran up to Emily, whispering, "Please help me."

Before Emily could even react with a With what?, the boy removed the beret he was wearing hurriedly and Emily blinked in utter amazement as long wavy blonde tresses flowed from the insides of the beret that reached down to beyond his shoulders. Then, with the fastest speed Emily had seen anyone undressing, the "boy" hastily stripped off his vested suit to reveal a tank top within. Emily gasped; the "boy" had breasts that were fuller than hers. Emily's mouth hung open as it dawned on her the boy was no boy at all. "He" was a woman disguised as a man.

Emily had not even time to ask questions when the most ridiculous thing that had happened yet happened next. The blonde leaned forward and pushed Emily against the wall, locking her lips in a passionate kiss as her hands grabbed Emily's neck gently from behind.

In that split second, Emily's mind went into freeze mode. A violent wave of electricity snaked through her body, causing her to shudder uncontrollably. The streetlights and the people on the walkway fell away into the background as she felt the girl's lips on hers; the lips were soft and tasted sweet like cherries. Emily's heart was beating violently against her rib cage, threatening to burst into flames.

Oh, god. Oh, dear, dear god.

Emily must have stopped breathing, because her lungs felt like they were going to burst and she might just die on the spot. Just as her mind was searching dutifully for the number to call for the ambulance, Emily felt the lips being pulled away from hers. She jolted back to reality to realise the blonde had pulled away from her, and was now anxiously looking into the distance at the three men who had run past them and headed in another direction.

"Whew", the blonde girl heaved a sigh of relief. Emily couldn't help noticing how gorgeous this girl standing before her was. The platinum blonde hair that framed her face, expressive deep blue eyes that seemed to have a life of their own (Emily had a really soft spot for beautiful eyes), and lips that were soft and full and oh-so-tantalising.

"I'm sorry for using you," said the blonde girl as she turned back and smiled awkwardly at Emily, snapping her out of her thoughts. The girl bit her lips and looked really apologetic. "It's just that I couldn't run anymore and you happened to be nearby so I thought you could help me get away from them."

"Oh", Emily mumbled in a daze as her mouth hung open, still a little disoriented by the sight that stood before her.

"It's… it's fine," said Emily absent-mindedly as she stared at those beautiful eyes she could not tear her eyes off. Oh dear god, how could you make something so heartwrenchingly beautiful?

"I figured that they would just think it's a couple making out and not notice me," added the blonde.

Really? Lesbian couple making out on the streets? Sure, that's not really the most noticeable thing around. Emily thought and chuckled quietly to herself. But for all it's worth, Emily had to admit, this blonde standing in front of her was certainly no dumb blonde. Quick thinking indeed.

"The name's Naomi Campbell" the girl said, eager to break the awkward silence that had crept up on them.

"I know, I think I heard them. Emily Fitch," Emily recovered her senses and replied with a smile.

"Hi Emily," chirped Naomi happily, "let me guess. Your accent – South Western?"

"Bristol, to be precise," replied Emily.

"Oh my," Naomi's eyes lit up at the name, "I'm from Bristol as well!"

"Really?" chuckled Emily at Naomi's outburst of enthusiasm, "I haven't seen you around much," joked Emily with a wink.

Naomi laughed, and added, "I can't say so for myself though. You look really vaguely familiar for some reason," said Naomi.

"That's one cheesy pickup line," teased Emily.

Naomi felt her face turn red. "No, I mean it. I really think I've known you somewhere!"

"Why were the men chasing you?" Emily said, trying to change the topic to help Naomi out. "You're not a wanted criminal, are you?" said Emily as she eyed Naomi suspiciously and pretended to widen her eyes in fear.

Naomi let out a hearty laugh that made Emily's heart skip a little and she shook her head smiling.

"They were paparazzi reporters," explained Naomi, and she sighed a little as she said that.

"Oh," Emily said, "You're famous?"

"Apparently not, since you don't even know me," Naomi said, giggling.

Emily chuckled at that. "Pardon me, I don't get the time to watch TV usually."

"Really? What do you do then?" Naomi asked, curious.

"Oh, fuck," said Emily.

"I beg your pardon?" Naomi furrowed her brows in confusion.

"Fuck, they are coming back!" cried Emily, pointing behind Naomi.

Naomi turned and, sure enough, the three men from before were running back in their direction, shouting, "That's Naomi Campbell!"

"Shit!" Naomi cried, and without warning, grabbed Emily by the hands and ran off in the direction in which she came from earlier.

Emily felt the cold night wind in her hair as she ran behind this stranger whom she has just met less than ten minutes ago, their hands locked together as they weaved through the bewildered locals and the cars on the roads. Car honks sounded all around them as they caused a mini traffic confusion on the streets of the Ratchadaphisek district. Feeling the other girl's hand in hers caused a warm wave to surge through her entire body. She suddenly thought about their kiss a while ago, and she couldn't help smiling as she brought a finger to the corner of her lips. Then, as if suddenly realising what she was doing, shook her head to get rid of the thought and mentally slapping herself. God damn it, Emily Fitch. You just met that woman five minutes ago!

Despite chiding herself inside, Emily couldn't tear her eyes off the blonde that was holding her hand right now and still had a smirk on her face while this whole cat-and-mouse chase was taking place. It even seemed like Naomi was sort of enjoying it, her face all flushed and excited from the adrenalin rush of running. They must have been running for really long now because Emily realised that the noise of the streets were fading away, they were running along alleys now, and the relentless paparazzis were still behind them, though much further away. Emily tried hard to think if she could have seen Naomi before? Since she said she was famous? On a magazine? No… The rare times she watched TV? Nope. Emily concluded she was really out of touch with pop culture.

Her thoughts were rudely disrupted when Naomi came to a halt without warning, making Emily bump right into her shoulder blades.

"Ow, why did you sto-," Emily started, just as she caught sight of Naomi's gaping face and what lay ahead of them.

Emily saw the entire river lined with countless wooden boats along the banks. The boats were empty and bobbing up and down on the water, some were tied to the banks with a thick rope, some were tied to other boats. Just about ten metres away from them was the other side of the river. So near yet so far, thought Emily. She and Naomi were staring down at one of Bangkok's world-famous tourist attractions: the floating market. And they were effectively trapped.