Friction

The story is made up of the beginning, the actual beginning then some dumb twist, sometimes clever, and finally an ending which usually is bad. Sticking to the end is hard. The story drags on boring both the writer and the reader.

The most boring part is the middle.

The middle is extremely hard to write, so when you lose interest in the middle the ending becomes someone calling you for some emergency just before the climax.

It leaves you unsatisfied and yearning for friction. 

Friction between your legs or between the pages.

And that friction is created by villains.

And so that was all that Ambre was. 

Friction.

When she reincarnated as the character she based on herself. 

Because, in the end, the author is the protagonist's biggest rival.

This was not her thought process at the time of writing. She just wanted to feel all high and mighty. 

But can a bug hold the weight of the crown? 

And she bit into fire burning her own tongue.

She wrote a story.

A dumb pathetic story.

A story only three have read, excluding her brother.

She did not even remember why she wrote that dumb story. 

Maybe because writing stories felt like a way to get loved.

To reduce friction.

Maybe because it meant warm dinners.

Every competition she won meant her mother would look at her like she did not regret giving birth. They meant her father won't hit her hard enough to leave a bruise.

After all, bruises were troublesome to hide.

And makeup was expensive.

While she had thought she loved stories.

By the end of everything, she knew she didn't, and even if she did. Even it won't save her from hell that was coming. That had come. 

But she did not want to dwell on the past. Her death meant nothing. No one in any world cared if someone like her was gone. Maybe the only good thing she would do was die and become some tree.

As she looked at the younger boy lying on the bed. She wondered if he was a reader. He most surely was. He wondered what anyone liked in that stupid story. Not that many people liked that story.

She sighed. 

She had been sitting beside the boy for hours on. As though they did not have hoards of servants to do that. Ambre's father was like her father. But since she had only based him off her brother's father. He was kind enough to just leave her alone.

If she had based him from the father she lived with, Ambre would have long broken her bones. 

Not that it should be compared.

In the end everything was what she believed she was.

A cruel sister.

A sick brother.

A loving father who only cared for her brother.

A mother who only loved her brother because he was weak.

She wanted to believe in a lie she made up to comfort herself.

She wanted to believe her parents were just more loving towards him. And that they did not hate her. She did not want to be hated.

She too wished someone loved her.

Maybe she was not worth any love at all.

She swallowed the saliva pooling in her mouth. Her throat was still dry. 

Well, at least she had one little brother that loved her. 

But she would have to leave him too.

When she runs away. She had magic. She would survive somehow. And the sleeping boy needed to be alive and well. Because otherwise she would have to become the duchess.

Her original plan was to take care of him, just love and care till he would be fit enough. Thinking back she was being delusional.

There was no way that would have worked. That boy based completely on her brother was sick and weak. Too pathetic to bother with anything. But always coming to her, as though she was some good sister.

She was not.

Not as Ambre.

And definitely not as who she was.

When she heard him talk back to her, he knew he was not Mael. He was softer and tried to smile. Not a grumpy old brat. 

None of them were worth liking. Neither was she.

She took a deep breath in. Then let go of it.

Looking at the boy, he found him staring at her. His narrow purple eyes, glaring at her.

"Shut up." Ambre said. A soft push of words.

"I did not say anything." The boy stopped staring at her. His voice weak from waking up.

"I'm sorry." Ambre said. She knew her actions earlier were illogical. She knew he was weak. She just wanted to scare him a bit.

"Then help me," the boy said.

"With?" The woman closed her eyes, clenching the cloth of her dress. She knew what he wanted. 

"I wanna run away." He said.

"You will die." She answered.

There was silence. 

The girl knew he would choose that. Watching him closely, the parents made him terribly disgusted. It was visible.

"I want to be stronger." The boy said with a little effort.

"Do whatever you want." She stood up from the chair, it creaking against the floor.

"Please help." As she walked away he reached out for her hand.

"No." She yelled. She turned towards him, her eyes bitter.

"You cannot be the one to run away. I don't want to be bound to this shithole either." Her voice rubbed on each other, creating a spark. It burnt both of them.

"I don't want to be here either."

"Then survive on your own."

"I can't."

"Exactl–"

"I will kill this boy."

The silence was filled with hearts beating wildly in their body.

"Those are empty threats." Her voice was broke. Ambre knew if the boy died, she could never escape her parent's fury. He was loved unlike her.

"I have once, I will again." His words on the other hand were sharp. Sharp and jagged. It would tear through someone's skin. 

His voice was still cracking.