(14) full circle

"I'm sorry for everything I've done to you."

Finally, she can say what she had been meaning to say for three years.

Nina gapes at her, caught off guard by the sincerity in her words.

"I know this will never be enough and honestly I don't know how to make up for everything I've done to you. I'm not asking you to forgive me... I just want you to know I regret what I did. Immensely."

But more than an apology, she would probably want an assurance most of all.

"Rest assured I don't plan on meddling with you guys again. This I promise you." She adds. The conviction in her gaze and the serious tone of her voice gave Nina a temporary lapse of judgment, believing her for a while before she is reminded of how miserable she had made her. She stares at Airi, dubious.

It was the reaction she was expecting.

She didn't need to believe her, heck she could even rant and scream at her, blurt out every nasty thing a kind person like her can muster, and walk out of her face right now. It doesn't matter. What's important after all is to do what she promised. For her to leave them alone and never bother with them again. And she stands by her words.

For some reason, she feels proud, like she had just crossed a major line on her checklist on her ongoing path to improving herself. It was something to rival Ren and his dedicated attempts of befriending her. It feels like a huge improvement, she feels contented

There was a good amount of silence where Airi continues to praise herself when Nina speaks.

"How did you do it?"

"Excuse me?" Airi looks up at her, making a confused face.

"How did you make Ren yield to you?" Nina says, her tone serious, waiting for an answer.

Yield? Like, to submit to someone? To submit to her? As far as she knows, she's the one who's starting to yield to Ren and his stubbornness to try and talk to and get along with her. She honestly doesn't know where this conversation is going now.

Nina purses her lips, "after all, he hates you."

There was a short pause as Airi raises a brow at the statement, wondering if she is saying all this out of spite, or to anger and annoy her.

She didn't want to dare imagine Ren being deceptive enough to pull this off, to smile genuinely at her and talk to her like he did all the while hating her to the very fiber of her core. Openly hating her is one thing, but being deceptive about it is a whole other matter.

Nina is lying, she thought, but it doesn't mean she won't play along. "I see. So, he hates me, huh."

Airi didn't miss the frown drawn on Nina's face at her uninterested reaction. This made Airi feel like she is somehow being tested. Again. She sighs, exhausted. Left and right, it seemed like everyone was all out to test her, to analyze the anomaly that is Airi. Is her being quiet and tamed that unusual to everyone that even Nina would go out of her way to do something unusual like talk to her despite knowing how she cowers at the very sight of her? Seriously. It's so bizarre to see Nina say something against anyone when she is the personification of the bundle of joy everyone wants to surround themselves with.

However, two can play that game. She decides to try something out, against her better judgment. She shrugs, "Then he's had me fooled all this time. I really thought he was trying to make amends."

She walks over to her, attempting to close their distance, "I remember back in high school, Ren has no idea I was the one bullying you. He even fought against you when you tried to tell him the truth."

Nina says nothing, her eyes fixed on her.

"When everything was exposed, were you the one who told him everything?" Airi observes her and sees Nina starting to struggle to maintain a straight face.

"I only told him the truth about everything you did, to me, and to the others," she answers matter-of-factly.

"I see," Airi nods in understanding, "then did you tell him about what happened that day?"

Nina's expression turns anxious. "He didn't need to," she tries to defend herself, "he was there after all."

And immediately, Airi got her answer. It is as she thought, even though she hoped it wasn't.

"What really happened that day?" she asks her, suddenly growing serious.

Nina stares at the ground and around her like a cornered rat looking for an escape. She steps further back whenever she hears Airi move forward. She decides to press further, "that day, you--"

"STOP!" Nina cries. "Just stop!" Her is body trembling and on the verge of breaking down, closing in on herself.

Airi stares at her, concerned that she took everything so far again as she continues to weep, continuously telling her to stop. Her trauma must run deep, she thinks, regretting what she had done.

And she just apologized earlier too!

She decides to stop here and was about to walk away when she hears a rustle by the bushes and pauses upon seeing Ren, staring in their direction, perplexed.

"What's going on here?"

His gaze shifts from Airi to Nina and back. Just from looking at the scene in front of him, he can already assume what happened, which is far from the truth. She was about to clear the misunderstanding when Nina speaks up. "How did you find us?" she asks in a shaky voice.

"Someone saw you two together," he admits, walking over to her and sees her crying, the corners of her eyes are sore from crying so much, and her body trembling uncontrollably. He clenches his teeth, fighting back the urge to yell at her what she had done, Airi knows him well enough to understand how he thinks, how he would react against someone who hurt someone dear to him. He takes off his parka and wraps it gently around her. "Can you wait for me by the bench out front?"

Nina nods and walks off, glancing at Airi as she passes her.

When Nina is out of sight, Ren starts by asking, "What happened?" his voice is even and cold. She knows Ren enough to know how furious he is right now. She knows more than anyone that any explanation from her right now would just be thrown back to her.

Still, Airi tries to reason with him, "You're misunderstanding something," she says, "she's the one who approached me—"

Ren scoffs, "Yeah right. Like Nina could approach you considering she's still traumatized about what happened. What were you saying to her this time? To get the hell away from me again, or else you'll make her miserable all throughout college?"

"That's not—"

"Why don't you get it?!" he yells, his voice angry and frustrated, but at the same time strained and exhausted. Desperate. He is worn out, exhausted, and on the verge of giving up. Was everything he did so far for nothing in the end? Is it going to happen again? Will I have to go through it all over again? These questions ring constantly in his head, haunting him, frustration and anxiousness rising to his chest.

He thought of that empty desk at the corner of the room, drawn and written over with various curses and abusive words, and the feeling of everything crumbling beneath his feet, broken and irreparable.

It was the day it dawned on him that everything was a lie.

"Haven't you had enough of torturing everyone around you?"

He holds his head, vexed. "Just..." He tries to speak, but with all these questions and thoughts circling his head, it left him speechless, the words caught in his throat and he wonders why, why is it so hard? He shuts his eyes tight, drowning in his own self-pity. He feels stupid for even trying at this point.

Airi's heart breaks seeing him struggle with himself over the feelings that suddenly well up and explode, over the hardship he had gone through because of her. She was not the only one who suffered; she knows this. It is etched on her mind to remind her to stop moping and think about what she needs to do. But to know and to understand are two different things entirely. She only knows it as a fact, but she was only beginning to understand what it means as she witnessed the full brunt of it on Ren. On someone important to her.

"I don't understand what you're thinking!" he says in a low voice, almost on the verge of breaking. "Do you know how much she suffered because of you?!"

He is anguished, every fiber of his being screaming at her. He was the one who had it hardest after all, and his habit of keeping his emotions to himself wasn't helping either.

So, to see him like this, openly being angry and giving her a piece of his mind, gives her a bittersweet feeling of being hurt, and at the same time, it sets her at ease. He needed to release those emotions, or else it will only eat away at him. She breathes in, strangely relieved because this means that somewhere in his heart, Ren still has not forgiven her. That she had found the one flaw in him that she knows will release him in the end.

She thought of clearing up the misunderstanding earlier but decided otherwise. This is fine, she thought.

"You don't need to," she finds herself saying.

Ren pauses but didn't bother staring up at her,

"You don't need to burden yourself for me. I never asked to be understood by the people I've wronged," she says simply, looking away from him.

This is how it is and how it will always be until she proves herself. Forgiveness is subjective after all.

She smiles softly. "I'm fine being hated—"

"IT'S NOT BLOODY FINE!"

He roars, startling her.

The silence between them was engulfing, ready to swallow them both. He has this startled and confused expression on his face, as if his own words shocked him, still refusing to look at her. And before she could speak so much as a 'why', he storms off without another word.