Solarion Chronicles Limited Edition Expansion Pack: Episode of the Desert Serenade. According to Maru's findings online, the pack even came with multiple scenario routes, some tailored to fill in backstory for certain character classes. With a release date slated for the day before Sebastian's birthday, Sam and Abigail deemed it a great choice in gift, and happily transferred their shares of the price tag to Maru.
Of course, as soon as Maru confirmed the order, and designated Pierre's General Store as the delivery address, the three's eyes turned to Kutone.
So what's the girlfriend getting for her boyfriend?
Honestly speaking, as the group adjourned in high spirits, and as the winter days dragged on toward the Festival of Ice, she still had no idea. Exposure to the group's positivity had lengthened the shadows in Kutone's thoughts again. More than ever, she starved to tell Sebastian more about herself, about the warnings she'd dropped ever since their mutual mid-autumn confessions, about why she wouldn't kiss him on the lips: about the truth. After all, despite his outward civility and patience, Sebastian's frustration was becoming more and more palpable.
"It's not you," she told him on one of his visits to the Banks. Completely ignoring the cold frosting her cheeks and reddening her fingers, she had embraced him tightly. "I'm trying to be really, really careful with you—so it's really not you."
The flat, gray words only instilled a darker mood across Sebastian's features, but stubbornness, as well as Kutone's warmth pressed against his chest, compelled him to stay. "I still don't get why," he'd replied. "And you know I'd listen."
"You're always so sweet like that."
Despite Sebastian's reassurances, Kutone knew she was playing a hard gamble. First off, no one liked hearing about exes, serious or otherwise. And second, no one liked facing the ugly truths. Could she depend on Sebastian to see her, figuratively mottled and stained, without turning away and retching? Part of her trusted his flexibility. Another part vehemently shook itself and screamed, No.
Compliments only worked so many times, however, and with Sebastian, naturally resistant to most forms of positive reinforcement, her deflections were already starting to lose their effects. And she dared not dredge up other tactics to keep his mind off his frustration. That, she thought, was power play, and like other times before, she vowed to never use those plays against Sebastian.
She had to tell him. Open up to him. And soon.
The day of the Festival of Ice dawned bright and crystalline, with the sun glimmering along the white snow over Stardew Valley for miles into the distance. Bare trees stood unmoving in the windless morning, as though even the slightest twitch of their branches would leave imprints in the snow below them. Only Kutone's breath disturbed the blinding winter, as she, huddled in her thick parka and knitted cap and scarf, sat on the front steps of her veranda, and thought.
First, she parsed her musings into statements.
One: Her fallout with Rhei wasn't only his fault.
Two: She hurt a lot of people. Purposely.
Three: She might do the same to Sebastian, if they decided to push forward together.
Conclusion—and it came with a pang—she didn't want to hurt him, and neither did she want to push him away. Since when had she become so greedy?
She stood from her seat and stretched her toes inside her snow boots. The festival began some time ago, just before the sun began its blinding ascent. She figured she'd cushioned enough time for the festivities to have picked up, and set out across the Banks.
Her steps crunching through the snow repeated those parses again.
One: Not his fault.
Two: A lot of people.
Three: She might do the same to Sebastian.
One: Not.
Two: A lot.
Three: The same.
Segmented thoughts stuck on repeat muddled easily, yet Kutone processed them again and again. She challenged herself to figure it out before she next saw Sebastian. Before she stepped into Cindersap Forest and started enjoying her first Festival of Ice. He deserved at least that much for his mounting frustration.
Her steps echoed along the frost-crusted wood of the Banks's bridges, as the perennial waters continued their trickling flow. She stopped, and watched the surface, glittering like a mirror. Deciding to do something—that was easy. Kutone was stuck on the how and when. "Face-to-face" and "soon" weren't viable answers anymore.
And where would she start?
She set off again, her clumping steps across the bridge fading back into muted crisps across the snow. "You know," she rehearsed, "it wasn't entirely Rhei's fault."
No, she thought, pursing her chilled lips. That sounds like I want to go back to Rhei, when I want to stay here. And though sudden conversations of serious natures rarely fazed Sebastian, Kutone decided she wanted to ease him into the topic.
"How do you feel," she started again, looking up at the sky, "about your girlfriend being a serial heartbreaker?"
She grimaced, wrinkling her nose and sighing a long plume of breath into the air. Some twisted part of her apparently still glorified the gratification she tasted from watching lovers cry. To the boys and girls she'd slept with, "Kutone" became synonymous with "goddess," and to see her devoted followers crack, crumble, and eventually fade into nonexistence—after the steaming, gleeful climaxes, the emotional breakdowns were always the perfect downers.
But even before that, most people were fragile about a woman with vast experience. Some believed experience made her beautiful, independent. In their eyes, she knew what she wanted, and spurned the rejection of her peers. In the radiance of this strength, the world fell into step around her, and while she eventually absolved her sins, glory still glowed in her wake.
But in the minds of real people milling through the hours of work-desk slaving, an experienced woman elicited a conscious blindness to her humanity. According to them, she slept around and broke hearts due to an addiction. Or she hadn't found the right man to quash her illicit instincts. She became ugly and broken and a forsaken blot in the divine eye, but the truth—invisible to them—laid in the shortness of her breath, the balling of her fists, the ashamed aversion of her eyes, and the grind of her teeth digging into her lip, whenever she faced the kindness of a boy who had no idea.
Sins against other people were never absolved, after all, leaving their crystallized weight behind to pull heavy on her future decisions. Sebastian's naivete always made her smile at the irony, but regarding herself, she needed him to wake up.
So how about, "Listen. I know I haven't reciprocated. I can tell you why."
Simple and straight to the point, with the bonus of totally skipping the Can we talk scenario. That could work. All she needed, after getting Sebastian's attention, was a private spot to face him and spill herself. Expose herself, and then, let him decide on how he wanted to take the relationship. Cindersap Forest luckily provided many concealed patches of privacy.
Already, as Kutone crossed the last bridge and passed through the southern exit of the Banks, she spotted a few potential places toward the western edges of the forest. A copse there, not far from the frozen lake where Lewis and Willy sawed out blocks from the ice for the fishing contest. And the far end of Arrowhead Island, across the bridge from where Jas, Vincent, and Penny collaborated on a snowman. Maybe even, that circle of trees obscuring the path deeper west into the darker woodlands.
Plenty of opportunities, Kutone thought, and scanned across the forest clearing in front of Marnie's ranch. Sebastian's black sweatshirt should stand out like ink on paper, as long as he hadn't hidden himself behind one of the forest's pine trees.
But black wasn't the only color visible against white snow.
A green letterman jacket, especially on the shoulders of a sportsman like Alex, probably stood out more than the shadow lengthening in front of Kutone.
Separate from the rest of the festivities, Alex, arms crossed and chatting as usual with Haley, leaned back against the ranch's fences. With a nudge from Haley, stylish parka and brand-new snow boots sparkling in the winter sunlight, Alex turned around, and seeing Kutone, straightened his back. Breathed deep and exhaled a great cloud of breath over his scarf. Squared his shoulders.
And hands in the pockets of his jacket, stalked over.
"Can we talk?"
What should have happened: Kutone landing a knockout punch to leave Alex out like an exploded lightbulb.
What actually happened, due to the undeniable sway of those three damn words, was a resigned shrug, and Alex led Kutone westward. Haley, meanwhile, skipped back toward the festival, or at least, shuffled through the snow and bounced the golden waves of her hair enough she held the illusion of skipping.
Alex chose a circle of trees and bushes off the banks of the frozen lake, and hands still deep in his pockets, breathed a re-orienting sigh. "I know," he started, "you weren't leading me on."
Ah. A different variation, but Alex was going the I need to know what's going on route. Likely, Kutone surmised, a "because" and a confession hanging after that, and the thought alone made her pale in cold sweat.
"Back in autumn," continued Alex, voice slow and deliberate, "I asked you out. You turned me down. I got that. Fair enough."
"So what needs clarification?" Too cold, she thought, cringing. Don't lash out. You never planned this. You weren't trying to break his heart then, and you're not trying to do it now. She tried again. "I mean, I'm guessing someone suggested I was leading you on? When I wasn't?" Her frosted cheeks flared icy hot. Why did they already sound like a couple in the middle of a row?
"That's not—no—that's not it. You were clear about it. 'Don't hold your breath.'" Alex lifted a hand out of his pocket, and irritably rubbed his face. "I know I'm probably the dumbest in the valley, but I got that. You were being nice."
So why this talk? If the pattern continued any further in its permutation, Kutone needed to run. Extricate herself from the tangles of this damningly overplayed scenario, and fucking run. Prove that she had nothing to do with whatever would next come out of Alex's mouth, and just, fucking, run. I'm not doing this to him, she told herself. I'm not the one this time—it's not me!
"I just need you to hear me out. Just, I gotta get it off my chest before it makes me even weirder around you."
I already know, she wanted to scream. I already know, and thank you for your feelings, but I can't! I fucking can't, I'm committed now, I'm a committed woman, and I'm not gonna fuck this up—
"I've had a massive freakin' crush on you since you first moved in to town."
Really. She really should have knocked the daylights out of the poor guy, and left him for the snow to bury him. But she turned her groan inward, and changed it into placidity. As Alex ducked half his face under his scarf, Kutone rocked back and forth on her heels, squeezing her frustration into one short, "Oh."
"They're short lived! I swear to you, my crushes never last this long, but Kutone…" He dragged down the scarf muffling him, and cast shy eyes in her direction. "Kutone, it's been hard this time. I really, really like you."
Her racing thoughts, and even the admonishment she directed at herself, screeched to a halt, as two terrifying facts came to the light of her mind.
One, an old voice: You could play them both. You've done it before.
Two: a silhouette had appeared in the shadow of the tree behind Alex, and it was difficult to mistake a dark-skinned, flat-topped grown man against the valley's snowy landscape.
How Demetrius had silenced his steps, Kutone decided not to guess, but she wished and begged an icicle could rocket down from the trees and impale her on the spot. She forced her attention back to Alex, tanned features bright red, and stiff in anticipation of her reply.
Be. Careful.
"Alex," she started, her voice trembling in unison with her scrambled thoughts, "trust me, when I say I appreciate your feelings." She cast a quick glance to Demetrius, unmoving. "As someone who's felt like an outsider for so long, it's—it's nice, to be so accepted that you've developed those feelings."
Her response was getting too long-winded. A listener could mistake her words for flattery. Stop. End it. "You understand though, don't you, that I've a thing with Sebastian?"
Alex silently stared at the snow-covered ground beneath him. While his scarf muffled his breath again, his eyes held a soft, sad glow: sunlight, Kutone hoped, reflecting off the surface of the frost. He blinked once, hard. "When one of your closest friends is a gossip fountain named Haley," he murmured, "a guy hears a lot of things." He blinked again. "And still stupidly hopes, y'know?"
"Gossip doesn't need a name," said Kutone, equally quiet. "I'm sorry, Alex."
His scarf failed to muffle his heavy sniff. He swallowed and shook his head. "You don't have to apologize. Like I said, Haley told me everything she heard and saw, and I kept holding on to this stupid crush. It's on me."
"Look, it's not your fault—!"
"So, what, is he actually kind of a cool guy?" Alex looked up from the ground, inquiring Kutone with wet eyes. "Not that I talk to him. Ever. He's kind of an asshole. Weirdo too. Who the fuck wears black all the time? What's up with that hairstyle? Y'know?"
Demetrius shifted slowly, quietly, avoiding Alex's listening ear. Kutone, still keeping one eye on Demetrius's reactions, replied, curtly, "I don't know. But for someone who gave the outsider a chance, you won't do the same for your neighbor? Who's really the asshole here?"
His eyes went wide, like her words had physically, brutally, slapped him. Then, as he looked back down to the ground, at the space between his and Kutone's feet, he grumbled his response. "I gave you a chance because—!"
"If you knew me, the person I was before moving out here, you wouldn't have." She waited until Alex looked up again. Fully aware of Demetrius turning his enraptured observation to her, and yet, fully uncaring of his scrutiny due to her bubbling anger, she went on. "If you knew even the slightest reason why I moved out here, you definitely wouldn't have."
Alex's tears had frozen into dry, cold streaks at the corners of his eyes, as he silently regarded Kutone. Before, she would have turned away in shame, remembering all the reasons she'd first opened Grandpa Issu's last letter to her. Alex was a good test, a precursor to facing Sebastian. To face everything she needed to confess inside, while also facing the honest eyes before her. "Let's just say, I'm not the good person you think I am. I may even be sparing you a good amount of heartbreak by keeping it to just, I can't reciprocate your feelings. It might even be the only good I can do you."
Alex said nothing, sounded nothing. He still watched the snowy space between their feet, but pensive thought clouded his features. With no wind to whisper through the forest's barren branches, or even to stir the frost or the plumes of their breaths, the silence prickled on. Maybe he'd start crying again, Kutone thought, as Alex squeezed his eyes shut. Unlike past times, the sight made her queasy, but a good kind of queasy—the right, remorseful kind that she never cared to indulge before.
But Alex opened his eyes again. They were dry, but alight with a determined sparkle, as he finally looked up from the ground. "You've been friends with me," he said. "Even though I was a jerk to you, and even though I'm pushing my feelings onto you without thinking about how you might be feeling, you're still standing there and listening to me."
He pulled down the scarf blocking his mouth. "I'm not a smart dude, Kutone, so I've no clue what you're talking about when you say you're not a good person. Honestly, I don't give a damn, because right now, you're being a friend."
In Kutone's honest opinion, Alex made no damn sense. First he confessed, then he ripped on Sebastian, then he started crying, and now he called her a friend. Her confusion rippled visibly enough across her features, that Alex nodded and stuck out his hand. "Truce," he declared. "You broke my heart, and I confused you. We're equal now, right?"
His rebound from rock-bottom happened so quickly, Kutone, blinking dumbly, soon dissolved into laughter. How very Alex-like, she thought. Busy and sunny. "No truce," she chuckled. "You're killing me here."
Alex withdrew his hand, and crossed his arms. His confident smirk was back like a sun peeking through the clouds. "That's your loss."
She wiped away tears with cold fingertips. "Strange. I don't think I'm missing much."
"Hey!"
After another chuckle, Kutone went on, her honesty unplugged. "You're a lot like someone I know," she said. "Ambitious, confident, but still a sweetheart." She snickered at Alex's blush, but her voice dipped into melancholy. "I hurt that someone real bad, Alex. Like, he should never have forgiven me for what I did to him, but he did the same thing as you."
"Called you a friend?"
She nodded. Maybe she was getting better at this treating-people-right thing. "I think he'll be okay."
The sky, she thought, glared white more than blue. Like a pure reflection of the wintry valley, without the noise of people or trees or thoughts or memories. "They'll find someone perfect for them. You will too. If not already." She nodded toward the fence around Marnie's ranch, where Haley had stood before.
A reassured grin lit Alex's features then, but instead of saying anything, he nudged her out of the forest copse. "I'll walk you back to your boyfriend," he teased. "You think he'll flip?"
"That's—that's actually a good question."
"Time for some experimenting, eh?"
"And you were just shit-talking him."
"Auto response. I have to be ready to punch the dude's throat in if he ever hurts you."
If only Sam or Abigail would say something similar for Sebastian's sake. Or Robin. Hands in the pockets of her coat, Kutone allowed Alex to throw his arm around her shoulders, as they trudged through the snow toward the rest of the festivities.
Behind them, Demetrius stepped out of the shadows. His stony expression held the same undertones as Alex's first words: You and I need to talk.
She rather liked the Festival of Ice, capturing quaint country life in a way so different than any winter festival back in the city. Sure, the city had street vendors and ice rinks, maybe a few pony rides and reindeer petting zoos, and she definitely missed the freshly-made donut holes with drizzles of sugar and chocolate glaze, but the Festival of Ice embodied everything that made Pelican Town, well, Pelican Town.
After passing Robin, chisel carving an intricate buttress to her icy castle, as well as Leah alternating between snow and water to smooth out the curves and engrave the scales on her Snow Syren, Alex pointed across the frozen lake to Sam and Sebastian. "Delivered safe and sound," he said. "Just don't fall into the holes the mayor opened up, alright?"
It might be a suitable end for her, Kutone thought, but Sam kept an eagle eye out for his best friend's feelings. Alex raced off through the snow to join Haley, as Sam snorted, "Town jock's all friendly with you, huh?"
"He was one of the first people to talk to me," replied Kutone. "Not nearly as charming as my boyfriend, though."
If he were bothered by Alex before, Sebastian never showed it, and expertly saved himself, fitting a cigarette between his lips and cupping the open flame of his lighter as he lit the end. The soft fire light hid the embarrassed flush of his features, even under Sam's teasing scrutiny. "You and your silver tongue," he muttered.
"And you," Sam snickered, "fell in love with that. Man is Abby missing a good one here." Laughing at Sebastian's shove, Sam nodded to the frozen lake. "You're joining the competition, right? Give old Willy a run for his money?"
Kutone stepped off the ice, and stood close enough to Sebastian he could place an arm around her waist. Not that he would, of course, given Sam right next to him, and the entire town gathered in the forest. Plus, Demetrius made his way across the snow, stopping once with Robin, then with Maru building a snowman, before stopping and turning toward them.
He waved, prompting a long sigh from Kutone. "I might end up missing it," she replied. "Seems like everyone wants to hang out with me today."
Sebastian's voice fell to a hard whisper. "Demetrius isn't harassing you, is he?"
She would have chosen different words, something along the lines of No, he's harassing me about me, for your sake, but Kutone diffused Sebastian's ire instead. "Just worried, I think," she said. "I haven't socialized much since winter came, y'know?"
"Kutone, he's just standing there like he knows you're gonna head over right now to talk to him." He grasped the sleeve of her parka. "What's he picking on you about now? And don't lie to me."
Oh, honey, if only I could tell you everything right now… But as Sam frowned with concern, Kutone chuckled. "He's not picking on me. Don't worry too much."
"I know what he says about people he doesn't know." Sebastian loosened his grip, as he stared at the ground. "I remember what he said about you—he doesn't get where you're coming from."
"Oh yeah," Sam agreed, "I heard about what happened back before you two were a thing. Demetrius, what a tool, am I right? You should have heard what he used to say about me!"
Turning to face Sebastian, Kutone slid her gloved hands up, and pressed her palms against his chilled ears as she smiled. "Sometimes, a little skepticism is healthy. I just have to prove he can trust me."
He just needed to know she could be a good person for his step-son. Of course, believing the exact opposite herself, Kutone knew she faced an insurmountable wall. Demetrius, already skeptical since autumn, would never approve of her. The facts spoke in her stead.
So she ran her thumbs across Sebastian's cheeks, and murmured to him, "Believe in me, okay? That's all I need you to do."
At Lewis's call, viewers of and participants in the ice fishing competition gathered around the frozen lake, while Demetrius and Kutone strolled south toward the shore of the river. Demetrius led the way, beckoning Kutone to cross the bridges to Arrowhead Island, where he stopped once the trees blocked their view of the festivities. Expression severe, he crossed his arms and turned his gaze toward the flowing river. Kutone, on the other hand, dug her hands into her pockets, as she braced herself for his judgment.
"You were rather kind to Alex, don't you think?"
Here goes. There really was no point to arguing the facts. She shrugged. "What was I supposed to do? Tell him 'fuck off with your feelings' and make him even more uncomfortable?"
Demetrius shook his head, his features still dark with consternation. "Miss Kutone," he started, "you remember I said I'd keep my eye on you. Maru's bright future isn't my only concern."
"Sebastian, right?"
"He isn't…" Demetrius sighed here, and slowed his speech, carefully picking his words. "He hasn't faced reality like you have." At Kutone's testing glance, Demetrius turned, facing her like a wall. "He's still naïve. Still unaware of how badly the real world could break him."
He squared his shoulders under the padding of his blue coat, and pulled a troubled expression. "I know he doesn't see me as his father. Given our situation, it's to be expected. But I'm also aware of his shortcomings. I'm worried about him. You, frankly, have seized him in a way that worries me, especially given your history."
She slowly processed the words. Seized him. Like a viper sinking its fangs into the neck of a rabbit. Injected the squirming thing with a venom that made the rabbit docile, subservient, willing to crawl down the snake's maw and satiate its hunger. Kutone could already feel herself deflating. "You dug around about me, didn't you?"
Demetrius produced a small notebook from an inner pocket of his coat. "It took some negotiating," he replied. "Young insisted you've done no wrong, and wouldn't offer anything else about you."
Rhei didn't break? Huh. He finally pulled through on his word. Sure, Demetrius was an overprotective father, not an office superior. Yet, knowing Rhei had kept his word, had followed through on his vow to change—that progress made her inwardly smile.
"I did manage to get in touch with someone who claimed to be your friend before. What she said about you…" Demetrius fiddled with the corners of his notebook. Unease and disbelief made him stare at the cover.
"Oh," said Kutone, aware of her extremities numbing. "Jaci, huh?"
"So you're still keeping in touch with her? Did she lie about you dropping all of your contacts?"
"No. In fact, I'd love to know how's she continuing her smear campaign against me."
"She did admit to spreading the initial rumor that cost you your job." Demetrius read from his notebook, like a detective's bullet points from a case. "But you never recovered from the incident. You've had how many partners in the two years since that demotion?"
Kutone shrugged. "I'd need to borrow your hands and feet to count."
"And how many affairs were you courting at the same time?"
"As many as my mental schedule let me."
"You did these knowingly?"
"Affairs can never be 'on accident,' Demetrius. Whoever says that is full of shit."
Demetrius held a pained expression, as though he were nursing a migraine. "I tried making sense of it. I truly did. Purposely sleeping around, drinking—I figured that was your coping mechanism."
"Revenge tactic," Kutone corrected. "Probably also a figurative suicide?"
"Because you lost everything." Demetrius shut his notebook, and glared down at nonchalant Kutone. "You should have known none of it would have ended well for you."
"I got what I wanted," Kutone snorted, meeting his glare with a dead look of her own. "Look, I'm clean. I'm healthy—Harvey's done his tests and check-ups. I took my precautions and broke the hearts of those who wouldn't respect me the same way."
"And you plan to do the same to Sebastian, when?"
Never. Tell him, never! Half of her believed her words, but the other half faced the facts. Those enumerated accusations did indeed happen. Her path of carnage left many a sad sod behind her, and heaven forbid Demetrius knew she used to enjoy that power. "Sebastian," she hissed, "is the one good thing in my life I don't want to break. I ended the old me when I moved here, so I'm not going back to what I did to those people!"
"Kutone. You assaulted your superior—who also happened to be your lover at the time—and then cheated on him that very same night. I may be splitting hairs over something that's been done and already dealt with, but how do you expect me to trust you? At all?"
The numbness in her fingertips and toes ballooned through her whole body. Had Rhei talked? No, no he wouldn't—he might have been a yes-man slimeball before, but he'd never disclosed their private relations during those six months they'd hidden it together, and even in the two years since they split. So how the hell did Jaci get that information? Had she become a tabloid reporter after Rhei kicked her from the position she stole from Kutone?
But that question of "who" became one directed at a loud crunch in the snow, the sound of dead weight falling into the wintry cushion. Demetrius took one glance, pocketed his notebook, and laid a firm clamp on Kutone's shoulder. "You two will need some time about this," he muttered, and trudged back toward the festival.
He brushed past Sebastian, seated in the snow with a dazed expression. Gently ruffling the boy's dark hair, Demetrius held a pained grimace. "I'm sorry, Sebastian. Face it as best as you can."
Maybe, Kutone thought, watching Demetrius's blue coat join the rest of the town crowd, she should be thankful. Demetrius had provided this opportunity, accelerated as it was, and really, relief dampened her aggravation at Demetrius's impromptu interrogation. But Sebastian—poor Sebastian—no longer had that cold fortitude that had supported him for so long. Like ice melting in the sun, he'd lost the strength to even look her in the eye.
Yet, in Kutone, realizing that, yes, Sebastian was fragile about a woman with experience, a numbing frost permeated deeper. This was the consequence of honesty, of facing herself. Better to lose him with the truth, than keep him with a lie.
She spared him her gaze. "He confronted me," she started, "because he saw Alex confessing to me."
He frowned, confused and skeptical. "Because the town jock has everything to do with this conversation."
"I could have slept with him."
And there it was, that struck expression like she'd taken a knife and rammed it into his chest.
She drove it deeper. "And I could have done it so quietly, you'd have no reason to suspect, except for Alex being so obvious about it."
"I don't…" His confusion hardened into disbelief, as he clenched his hands together. He gripped hard enough that his knuckles seemed even paler than the snow permeating through his pants. "I don't get it. I don't believe you."
With a smirk, Kutone murmured on. "Demetrius is legitimately looking out for you, you know. He knows what I did to Rhei."
"No." Sebastian held a grimace painful enough to look like he was nursing a headache. "No—that's the thing, isn't it? Demetrius doesn't know—about Rhei, about your work situation, about everything—!"
"He figured it out," Kutone corrected. "And not just Rhei, Sebastian. Others. Boys. Girls. Whoever thought they were in love with me—I played them."
"But not—!" Distress had drained the color from Sebastian's features. "Not cheating on them. Sleeping around? You're not that kind of person—I know you're not!"
"You don't."
She'd been looking up at the sky, and contemplating the whiteness and grayness of it. What she remembered perceiving as blindingly bright just a few minutes ago, now held the same dreary tones as the sky in the old cityscape. She knew this consequential silence well. But unlike other times Kutone had given this similar speech—to too many others to count anymore—Sebastian's silence, a deathly, murdered kind of quiet, lodged a hulking wedge of regret in Kutone's throat. If only she hadn't been so stupid before. If only she'd made the right choices before!
If only she hadn't known, that the simplicity and surety of her words would destroy her good image in Sebastian's eye.
"You don't know me," she echoed. "I told you, didn't I, that I'm the worst for this kind of thing? For the concept of 'us?'"
Sebastian opened his mouth. Sounded out the first syllable of her name, but choked on the rest. He might as well have thrown up. While he wasn't about to cry, he wasn't going to recover readily, either.
And again, unlike other times, Kutone wasn't sure she would either. She rather liked Sebastian seeing her as a good person, but… "There you go, I guess. That's why I can't kiss you." She had to look at him, his eyes down on the snowy ground, hands still tightly clenched. An unconscious smile flickered across her lips, as she said, reassuringly, "Cigarettes taste better than dirty skanks."
He finally looked up. Released his hands and stood up, gritting his teeth. "You can't—why would you smile about that?"
"I guess…" It really sucked to have her character dragged through the mud, but at the same time, her shoulders felt lighter. Sebastian's judgment dragged her stomach down like a lead weight, but Alex finally made sense to her. "I guess it feels good to finally get it off my chest." She trudged past him, eyes averted from him, and avoiding contact with him. "Demetrius wasn't lying or picking on me. Take it as you will."
His expression, shattered, disbelieving, put her on the cusp of a cathartic revelation, in the bitterest way possible. She decided to go home. To take a boiling hot shower and scrub her skin until her pores bled. To sleep long and hard and dream nightmares of Sebastian's spurning rebuke. It was about time she paid what she owed, right?
"I'll give you some space," she said, voice trembling. "And don't worry. You don't have to come back."
A/N: I may return to revise this chapter, as there's quite a bit of the debacle I'm not satisfied with. I'm sorry if this isn't what you were expecting of me, but I promise I've done the best with what I have. And I promise, the next chapter will make up for it.
(Content edited 2/16/2018).
