Archive of Our Own

The time on Amber’s phone ticks from 23:59 to 00:00 when she feels herself getting pulled by the wrist, her feet dragging forward so as to not let herself stumble lest she stays in position for too long. October chill seeps into San Francisco air and settles deep within Amber’s bones despite the leather jacket wrapped around her shoulders, smelling slightly of cologne and something sweeter she can’t quite put a finger on but is all too familiar with.

Music pours from the inside of the bar and out onto the pavement. Her feet step over the threshold of the building and she sighs in relief when the warmth of the interior washes over her, the cold dissipating with every second in which the music grows louder as she lets herself be guided to a table tucked in the corner of the bar.

Blue eyes flick upwards and meets brown when she feels a hand land on the small of her back, urging her into the booth which she settles into quickly without a word.

"Danny! I almost thought you'd never show up."

The jab isn't directed towards her, but Amber huffs a laugh anyway, not wanting to feel too out of place within ten seconds of being here, surrounded by people whose faces she has only seen from afar up on stage, by music that feels almost foreign to her ears after what she'd rhythmically nod her head to only about an hour ago.

Danny makes a similar sound from where he is seated next to her, nestled into her side like the concept of personal space is distant from his mind. "My bad. We got, uh, carried away."

The table erupts into low ohhh's and chuckles and Amber feels embarrassment blooming in her chest and her face in coats of pink painting her cheeks. It isn't clear to the others what Danny meant by 'got carried away' but she knows they have an inkling as to what happened in his car prior to the couple's arrival, indicated by the slight red tinge on Danny's lips which he's still trying to make an effort of wiping away with the back of his hand. She ducks her head, but her eyes peer up barely a second later to assess the situation before her.

There's a girl whom Amber guesses is younger in age planted in the far-right end of the booth, her back against the wall as she looks in her and Danny's direction. She doesn't make eye contact with Amber, she can tell that the brunette is looking right at Danny. She isn't sure what to make of that, yet. A blonde-haired guy sits on the opposite end, whom Amber notes to be the one who spoke up when she and Danny had walked in. Parallel to them and to her right sits a girl who is all starry-eyed and dew-skinned, Amber had locked eyes with her briefly two minutes ago when she was being forced into the booth, though they haven't exchanged a word since she'd found her shoulder nudging against the girl's. Amber isn't sure if she could talk, if it is even permissible for her to speak in the presence of her boyfriend's friends – band mates, whatever. It's not something Danny has made clear to her, yet.

"Who's the pretty lady?"

Amber's gaze snaps from the chipped wooden table to the direction she thought the voice had come from.

There, sitting in the middle of the booth and directly opposite of Amber is the girl whose face Amber has only seen once but knows she'll remember forever the second she gazed up at the stage, with her mouth a breath away from the microphone and a voice that had left Amber planted on her feet, static from where she stands amongst the crowd of bodies moving in tandem around her to the beat of the music.

Brown hair frames the girl's heart-shaped face and Amber can see that some parts of her hair are a tad lighter than the rest, a clear sign of a hairstyle she'd perhaps grown too lazy to maintain, pushing it into the back of her mind unless she looks too close in the mirror and sees the remnants of the person she once was.

Amber makes eye contact with her. A beat passes, then another.

Neither of them look away. Neither of them seem to want to.

Amber knows she cannot.

"Alysa, this is Amber," Danny says next to her, hand gesturing from the girl – Alysa – to Amber, then back to her. "Amber, Alysa."

Alysa's smile stretches itself wider. Something metallic glints under the low light and it makes curiosity swell in Amber's gut, though she presses down on it. For now.

"You're Danny's –"

"Girlfriend," Danny interrupts, sheepishly running his hand through silver hair. "She's my girlfriend."

Alysa squints her eyes at him, indignation carving itself onto her eyebrows. "That so?"

She looks to Amber when she says it, and Amber tries to hide the split-second look of surprise that flashes across her face. "Yeah, hey. I–I'm Amber."

Amber does an awkward little wave and regrets it immediately, pulling her hand down under the table and covering it with the other like it would try something else if she made no effort to restrain it. Alysa, bless her heart, returns the wave, however. Fingers wiggling in the air with that coy smile that doesn't seem to want to leave her face anytime soon.

"The girlfriend can talk, it seems."

Her gaze is shifted over to Danny and Amber has a hard time telling whether the lilt in her voice is one of a teasing nature or just straight up exasperation. It's probably both.

A voice next to Amber cuts through the air before Danny could respond to Alysa's remark. "It's so nice to finally meet you, Amber! I didn't know Danny had a girlfriend!"

"Has, present tense. I have a girlfriend."

"And I'm Isabeau!" The girl introduces herself with a hand pressed against Amber's arm and it is all sweet charm and genuine enthusiasm. Amber can see her front teeth now that Isabeau is grinning at her. Amber thinks she looks a bit like a bunny rabbit. Amber also thinks that she looks younger than everybody else sitting at this table and wonders if she's even allowed to be here. Who even is she?

Isabeau notices the inquisitive look on Amber's face and is quick to answer her non-verbal query. "I'm Alysa's roommate. I come to like, pretty much every jam session so I'm basically like, part of the band now."

"No, she's not." Blonde guy quips over the rim of a beer-filled glass.

"Hey!" Isabeau glares at him. "Who got you guys access to perform tonight's gig?"

"Well –"

"Isababy is Calliope's unofficial manager slash agent and we love her and appreciate everything that she has done for us," It's Alysa who opens her mouth to speak this time, and Amber's gaze flicks to her for a brief period because she can't help the fact that her eyes are as stubborn as the needle of a compass that is constantly looking for north.

"This is Ilia, you can ignore him, it's okay," Alysa says, which receives a slight shove to the shoulder from this Ilia, it seems. "And to my left here is Ellie."

Both Ilia and Ellie flash her a friendly smile and Amber feels the anxiety quell in her stomach. She feels safe enough to fidget with the sleeves of her jacket with her elbows resting on top of the table now instead of under, and she does exactly that.

Conversation flows easily between all of them once introductions are over and they've all gotten acquainted with – in Amber's words: the random girl their drummer just happened to bring over for celebratory drinks who just so happens to be his girlfriend. Familiar conversation ebbs and flows in the gaps between them and it seems like everybody is falling into a rhythm that's almost habitual for them. Or at least everybody but Amber, and Alysa for god-knows-what reason, who Amber catches stealing glances at her every now and then.

Her eyes find a dark stain that seems to be permanently embedded into the old wooden table, and sitting in this booth takes her back to when Danny had asked her to come to his band's first serious gig while they were seated in the booth of a run-of-the-mill diner ten minutes away from Amber's place.

"So, I have some exciting news." He had announced one late evening while stuffing his face with pancakes that he had practically drowned in syrup.

Amber felt the urge to tell him to chew, swallow first before you speak but swallowed the words rising inside her throat. This sounded important to him and she wasn't about to let her own personal pet peeve sour the air between them.

"What is it?" Her hands tightened around the steaming mug of coffee she'd requested from earlier, a stark contrast to the vanilla milkshake standing menacingly tall across the table. Danny's, obviously.

"Calliope is doing a show this weekend," Danny's lips smacked together as he chewed. "It's a big one."

"Oh my god, Danny, that's huge!" Amber exclaimed.

"That's what she said." He snorted. It's a little gross, and it doesn't help that he still has food in his mouth, either.

She ignored his attempt at an innuendo, choosing to focus on the fact that her boyfriend's finally getting to do something he'd been talking her ear off non-stop about wanting to accomplish. Something pride-like rose in her chest, steadfast and heavy. Amber always knew he had it in him, always knew just how badly he wanted to do this. To perform in front of a live audience that was bigger than the regular inhabitants of a run-down bar whose only reason for booking them in the first place was because they were the cheapest option.

"I'm really proud of you, Danny," She smiled warmly, because she really was. She knew what it felt like to want something so badly that it hurt.

She also knew that if she managed to accomplish something like this, she'd want somebody to be proud of her too.

Danny nodded and muttered a "Thanks," and Amber had let the quiet between them stretch a bit further, waiting to see if he had something more to add, if he wanted to talk about how he felt about all this… or something. Anything, really. The realization hit her as if on cue.

"Do I… get to watch you perform?" Amber tapped her fingers against the ceramic mug and she's certain the smile on her face came off more as awkward and sheepish rather than exuding nonchalance like how she'd intended for it to be.

The look on Danny's face when he looked up to meet Amber's eyes told her that he barely considered how he was going to fit his suspiciously girlfriend-shaped puzzle piece into the bigger picture.

"Oh," Danny started. "I mean – If you want to, then, sure."

A laugh escaped Amber's throat but she realized it probably sounded more like a scoff than anything. "Wha– of course I want to watch you play. This is a big deal for you."

"I know, babe. I just… wasn't sure if you were into stuff like that."

Frankly, if she were to tell the honest truth, it really wasn't her thing at all. But she wouldn't have minded, she really wouldn't have given two shits about it. Amber would have showed up for anybody regardless of how little she cared about what it is they were doing, and she especially knew she would have showed up to Danny's show despite what little interest she has in the music he plays, personal preferences be damned.

There's no point in lying to herself and pretending that his complete disregard for her availability didn't tinge her heart with an inexplicable sadness. She was fully aware that they were two different people with their own interests, and it's not like they were the kind of couple who'd do everything together.

Life with Danny was… monotonous, in a way. But it was easy and safe enough for Amber who has spent her whole life living life on edge. She loved Danny, and Danny had told her that he loved her too, and so she believed exactly that, because why wouldn't she?

And since they're already here, telling each other the things happening in their own personal lives that they were most excited about – at least Danny was – Amber ought to do the same.

"Do you remember Emily? Remember when I told you about her last week?" She asked. Danny stopped cutting into his stack of pancakes, eyes wandering elsewhere like he was thinking of how familiar it sounded but he couldn't quite put a finger on when and where exactly.

"Is this one of your friends?" He questioned back with an eyebrow quirked. Amber glanced down at his plate before her gaze flicks back up to stare at his face, though he seemed to be focused on trying to get the perfect pancake-to-butter-to-syrup ratio on his fork instead of meeting her eyes.

"No, she's one of the kids that I've started coaching," Amber said flatly, like she's surprised that Danny doesn't remember her mentioning this to him. Equal parts surprised and disappointed, even though she's fairly sure she brought up her experience with coaching kids at the rink to him at least twice a week.

Danny pondered some more, like it's coming back to him in flashes of his memory. "Oh, right. What about her?"

"She's just such a quick learner. Last week she could barely get her feet on the ice and today she's doing little jumps without falling on her butt," Amber giggled to herself upon remembering her junior student. It's something she'd been very fond of for as long as she could remember, teaching little kids how to skate. It's like raising a bunch of baby birds and feeding them worms, waiting for the day they gain enough confidence to finally soar to the skies on their own.

"That's great, babe," came Danny's response. Amber had expected a follow-up question, not that she'd know what to expect if he did, but she wasn't exactly prepared for the conversation to be put to a stop so abruptly like that.

They've been busy, sure. Juggling responsibilities like adults do, that's normal. Amber also thinks it's normal to be missing your boyfriend a little after almost an entire week of little to no contact, save for the updates here and there in the form of oddly-angled photos throughout the day exchanged through the iMessage app, though it was mostly her who was sending them.

Perhaps she'd hoped for a little more curiosity on his end. Was that so wrong?

A thunk sound of glass hitting the table snaps Amber back to the present. She looks around curiously before the memory of where she is come back to her.

Right, she's "hanging out" with Danny and his band mates, if you could even call it that seeing as how she'd just spent a good portion of 5 minutes staring off into space.

"Hey, you good?" Isabeau asks softly from her right. Amber's neck swivels to look at the girl at an alarming speed, clearly caught off guard at the question. "You were kinda just in your head for a minute there."

Amber's mouth is open, a response assuring Isabeau already at the tip of her tongue, but a deeper voice interrupts her before she could speak.

"Oh, don't worry. She does that sometimes, she's fine. Right, babe?" He nudges her with his shoulder and Amber's head goes back and forth between looking at Danny and Isabeau before nodding and huffing out an I'm fine.

She feels a thump behind her ribs that sounds quieter than the usual volume of her heartbeat. Usually that's her body's way of telling her she wants out of here, and she does. In a sense. But she grounds herself in hopes of holding out just a little longer. She thinks it would be pretty rude to excuse herself for a breather if she hasn't even been in this bar for 20 minutes.

A tsk comes from across the table. It's Alysa.

"She asked Amber, doofus, not you," Alysa says pointedly and it makes Amber's body tense up for a brief second when she hears Danny's irked huff of air next to her.

"Don't worry, I'm okay. Just a little, uh, overstimulated," she swallows the urge to projectile vomit everywhere. Danny's friends probably wouldn't like that. "With the noise and all."

"You not a fan of loud places?" Alysa inquires, directing her gaze to the blonde in front of her now, and Amber notices the shift in her tone when she's speaking and how it differs from when she'd spoken to Danny earlier. It's gentle, softer like she doesn't want to scare Amber off.

"I don't really mind! It's just been a long day," she tries to play it off with a smile but the way Alysa is looking at her right now is making her stomach hurt. Amber briefly breaks eye contact to glance at something behind Alysa and notes that there's a line right outside the bathroom. Amber has been told before that she possesses the patience of a saint, but she knows that statement is untrue when it comes to bathroom queues. So, nevermind that.

"What did you think about the show?" The conversation is shifted from something else entirely by a grinning Ilia who leans in closer from where he's seated next to Alysa. There's something of a twinkle in his eye that Amber finds to be quite endearing, it's the same look he had on his face when strumming his guitar

"Oh, you guys were so good. I loved it, truly," she says, her mind going back to a couple hours ago when she'd been standing in the crowd looking up at the band performing on stage. The sea of sweaty bodies encircling her quickly became a forgotten thought the second the sound of Alysa's voice had carried itself out and across the entire perimeter of the warehouse.

Amber briefly remembers being entranced upon seeing – and hearing – the girl on stage. Heat emanating from the crowd of bodies had been enough of an explanation for the humidity tonight, causing her bangs to stick slightly to her forehead from perspiration before the show had even officially begun. Most of her upper body had been concealed by the bass guitar she was holding, attached to a rainbow strap slung over her shoulder, but Amber could still catch a glimpse of skin exposed by Alysa's shirt riding up her torso, to which she'd shyly glance away from to focus on Danny aggressively playing on the drums a few feet behind the singer.

Alysa has a smug grin on her face and it is then that Amber finally catches a glimpse of silver hanging from the girl's frenulum. She fixes her gaze on it longer than intended, observing how Alysa looks under the low lights bearing down on her, incandescent beams of yellow casting her in a pretty, warm glow.

Amber doesn't know why she's been staring so much, and the thought of it coming off as creepy crosses her mind. That would not be a very good first impression.

The conversation gradually moves to other topics; addressing Ilia and Ellie's aggressive headbanging during the show and whether it was possible to get a concussion from that (not that either of them would care), Amber's curiosity on how Isabeau managed to find a venue for them to play at to which the younger girl had responded with a wink and I pulled some strings, duh followed by Danny's her uncle was managing the event.

It is quickly established in Amber's conscience that her boyfriend and Alysa do not get along quite well, despite literally being in a band together. Apparently it's a normal occurrence for them to butt heads quite often, with Danny's exasperation being fueled by Alysa's witty remarks directed towards him which Ellie has kindly called to attention as rage baiting – Amber recognizes that word from when one of her students had angrily stomped toward her one day, accusing another kid of ragebaiting him and she vividly recalls frantically pulling up Google on her phone and doing her research before attempting to resolve the animosity between two ten year-olds that afternoon.

Eventually, it circles back to Amber. The looks on everybody's faces brought a smile to hers when she told them she taught kids how to skate – like on ice? Isabeau inquired, to which she confirmed meekly, watching as the surprise on their faces grow upon discovering that Amber used to skate professionally. She then tells them that she's also very geeked out when it comes to Magic: The Gathering, the entire table save for Danny eyeing her with beaming curiosity as she explains the general concept of the trading card game.

"For real? I've been meaning to get into MTG," it's Alysa who speaks up first when she finishes talking their ears off about the mechanics, the lands and spells that exist within the game. "I'd love for somebody to show me the ropes."

"I can teach you," the words leave Amber's mouth before her brain could process it happening, over-eager with an enthusiasm she has no business possessing. She brushes it off as excitement over someone actually being interested in something she loves, that someone like Alysa's curiosity is piqued at something as nerdy as a trading card game.

"Oh?" Alysa's head tilts to the side. "Yeah, dude, for sure. That sounds nice." The reply rolls smoothly off her tongue, as earnest as one can be. A quiet softness blooms in Amber's chest, the thought of having somebody to talk to about her obsession making her giddy.

It feels nice, she thinks. To have people care about what she has to say, as far as to actually want to take a look inside her mind and dip their toes in the little things she cares about. It feels different than how it is with Danny; don't get her wrong – she loves her boyfriend, but he's not someone who takes much interest in the things she does outside of their common shared interests.

They would geek out over anime and manga together, going as a pair to conventions and events suited up in matching cosplay, but Amber always felt like it meant more to her than it did to Danny.

Hours go by in the dimly lit bar – voices continue their chatter in the background, muffled slightly by the local band performing on stage for the night, playing some songs Amber doesn't recognize and others she can distinguish as covers of songs she's heard before. It makes her wonder if Alysa has ever performed at scenes such as this one – thinking she probably has, what with the indomitable confidence the girl seems to exude regardless of where she goes, be it on stage overlooking a smothering crowd or a rustic bar tucked in a little corner of the town.

The group is several drinks deep by now. Danny cracks a joke that nobody quite understands save for a tipsy Ilia who laughs harder than he should, smacking the table and sending his glass toppling over (thankfully empty), and it is only then that Ellie's voice cuts through the rowdiness, declaring that they should call it a night and head back to their respective homes.

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Amber stands outside, leaning against the brick wall near the bar's entrance where she fishes her phone out of the purse slung over her shoulder. The display on the lockscreen tells her that it's close to 3AM – she didn't realize they'd spent that much time in the bar.

The rest of the girls are scattered around her, Isabeau and Ellie conversing with each other about their plans for next weekend as they're all waiting for Danny and Ilia's exit, the two men settling the bill inside and Amber really doesn't know what's taking so long, Isabeau remarks off-handedly that they're probably arguing about splitting it in half, muttering something about boys under her breath which Amber could hear the exasperation in it.

Which leaves her and Alysa, dallying about on the sidewalk with prolonging silence whilst conversations continue to progress and people are milling about around them – the occasional 'excuse me' is muttered under quiet breath when someone would try getting past Alysa who would mumble out a sheepish apology before stepping aside, interrupted from the thrilling act of kicking rocks beneath her feet and onto the street, yet she still doesn't fully step aside to give way to other passersby.

Amber takes this moment to analyze her for a bit. Alysa looks… smaller now that she's standing by herself, though it's not like Amber is much taller, either. Alysa carries herself with a reservedness that reveals itself with every passing minute that slowly unravels her unruly demeanor. Gone is the rowdy girl she saw singing on stage hours ago to sitting across from her in the booth of a dingy bar – she seems a lot more withdrawn now, it's like Amber is seeing a completely different side of her that she hadn't thought of before.

Alysa seems to feel the ghost of a stare pressing onto her back, so she turns around and brown eyes meet blue when Alysa catches her stare and it makes Amber jolt slightly, eyebrows shooting upwards in surprise like she hadn't expected Alysa to notice her so soon. She expects Alysa to turn her back on her once more, returning to digging the toe of her boot into the pavement, but she seems to have other plans as she takes a couple strides forward in Amber's direction.

A knot forms itself in Amber's throat when Alysa finally steps into her space, a knowing smile pulling at her glossy lips. "Hey," Amber chokes out, swallowing the knot and trying to appear as if she wasn't just observing Alysa like a creep. The blush blooming on her face betrays her, unfortunately.

"Hey," Alysa replies. Her voice is soft, like a hitch upward in volume would have Amber scurrying away. "How'd you feel about tonight? Had a good time?" There's a certain curiosity that edges Alysa's tone when she asks, like she's trying to lure Amber in, or something.

"Yeah, it was—" Amber starts but cuts herself off, adjusting the strap on her shoulder before she continues. "I had fun! You guys are lovely." She flashes Alysa a warm smile, shifting her weight from one foot to another, like the weight of Alysa's presence being too close feels too much.

Amber doesn't know why Alysa makes her so nervous.

Something in Amber's mind tells her it's because Alysa is unlike anybody she's ever met before, not that she's used to meeting anyone new – at least not after she met Danny and got into a relationship with him, and even when she did, they didn't particularly linger in her mind the same way she has a feeling Alysa will.

"I'm glad you came," Alysa pulls a hand from the pocket of her jeans to give Amber a little tap on the arm. "It was nice getting to know someone Danny's been keeping a secret from the group for so long." She rolls her eyes at the mention of the man.

Amber can't help the awkward chuckle that escapes her. "He really never mentioned that he has a girlfriend before this?"

"No, not really. Which is crazy because," Alysa does a once-over of Amber's figure from top to bottom and it makes Amber flush once she realizes. "If I had a girl, I'd personally never shut up about her when I'm around the band."

There's a pause when Alysa says if I had a girl, almost like she's trying to hold herself back from saying like you. Though, Amber thinks it might be the beer talking and betraying herself, but her face is already doing so, the tinge on her cheeks turning a darker shade of red under Alysa's gaze.

"Makes sense. I mean, he's not really one to talk about his life like that," Amber says because it's true. When they first met, it took Danny a while before he could truly open up with Amber, and even now that he has a band that he's actively been participating in, he doesn't talk about that part of his life much either, at least not with Amber.

"Sure, but you deserve to be shown off, you know?" Alysa moves to lean on the wall next to Amber, nudging the blonde with her shoulder. Amber can smell her now that she's standing closer, too closer, perhaps, yet Amber doesn't flinch nor does she shift when the warmth of Alysa's body heat makes itself known beside her.

Alysa smells of flowers and cigarettes where she leans next to Amber, tender wreaths of jasmine mingling with the subtle scent of tobacco lingers in the air, and Amber resists the urge to lean in closer to try to catch whiffs of her scent.

The words that had just come out of Alysa's mouth are ignored as Amber attempts to shift the conversation. "I don't believe you when you say that you don't have a girlfriend," she jests with a teasing lilt in her tone, it drives a mock noise of surprise out of Alysa's mouth before her face shifts to something slightly more serious.

"Meh, I sleep with people sometimes – one night stands and all that. It's fun, sure, but nobody's really made an impact," Alysa says. "Someone did catch my eye in the crowd tonight, but I fear they're unattainable, unforch." Amber's eyebrows quirk up at that. She tries not to think about what kind of girls Alysa's had in her bed before, about what they looked like and whether any of them bared a resemblance to her.

No, that's the last thing she should possibly be thinking about. "Unattainable? You look like someone who could get anyone they wanted," Amber quips, tugging her leather jacket closer around herself.

Alysa turns her head, sly grin playing on her lips with an eyebrow raised at Amber's statement. "Now what does that mean?"

Amber's eyes flit toward the smiley piercing then back to Alysa's own, something warm brewing in her gut at the way Alysa voices out her question. "I just mean like – you're this really cool, really confident, really charming girl that I don't doubt that you could get whoever you want as long as you… I don't know, put your mind into it, I guess?"

It seems to get a reaction out of Alysa, clearly, because her grin widens and she's leaning on her side now, hazel eyes still burning into Amber's. "You think I'm charming?"

Amber stammers, a small laugh leaving her as she ducks her head down, the blush from before returning furiously this time. "I mean like, it's just, you know—"

"Mm, no I don't, actually," Alysa's voice drops to a low register. "Care to elaborate?"

The air shifts between them, growing warm with something Amber hasn't quite put a finger on, but she sighs into it anyway. "Yes, you do have an undeniable charm of some sort."

Alysa nods slowly, like she's rolling the words around in her mind and is attempting to process it. "Thank you. I do try," she says, and it makes Amber's heart beat a little faster in her chest when she looks at her again. Her eyes search Alysa's own, like she's trying to look for a hint of mirth or something alluding to the fact that Alysa is simply joking around, but finds nothing like it.

The muffled sound of drunken patrons and flowing melody of a song carries out onto the street when the door next to Amber opens, accompanied by a warm gush of air and out comes Danny with Ilia trailing behind him, muttering something under his breath she couldn't hear.

It pulls her out of her daze, drags her eyes away from where it had caught onto Alysa's smile and settles on Danny who makes his way towards her. He gives her a tight-lipped smile, and Amber notes the way it droops slightly when he turns his head to Alysa, acknowledging her with a firm nod and nothing else. Alysa doesn't say a word next to her, but she presumes her expression mirrors that of Danny's own.

"Ready to go?" Danny asks curtly, hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans.

Amber nods, turning her head to Alysa to give her a silent goodbye after she'd bid goodbyes to the rest of the band, but she decides against it right as she prepares to walk out of the bubble they'd intricately built for themselves over the course of seven minutes, last time Amber checked.

"See ya," Amber says, it seems to make the tension in Alysa's shoulders relax slightly. Danny is already a few steps ahead of her by now, and Amber turns to catch up to him but a tug at the sleeve of her leather jacket along with a tiny wait halts her in her tracks. Amber turns back around.

Alysa stares her down with a subtle flame flickering in her eyes. "Will I see you again?" Amber fails to pinpoint what it is exactly she hears in Alysa's voice, but it sounds strikingly familiar to desperation, if anything.

"I hope so," Amber chuckles softly into the air, keeping her voice light but she knows some weight is still held in it – uncertainty, doubt, bashfulness carrying themselves into it through the low register of her tone.

The sleeve of her jacket is freed, eventually. Alysa releases a breath, one that Amber has a feeling she didn't know she'd been holding. Danny waits in front of a closed flower shop a couple doors down, back turned to the fake decorative flowers lining up at the front of the shop – Amber makes sure to speed up her pace once she finally starts walking toward him.

Amber's head is turned away, kept straight ahead where Danny is silently waiting for her, and yet the burn of Alysa's stare still feels warm on her back, it still lingers.

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Jujutsu Kaisen is playing on the television when Amber feels her phone buzz. The sky is pitch black outside where she can see it when she peers out the floor-to-ceiling windows of her apartment and it makes her wonder who the hell is texting her this late at night.

Amber is in the middle of the Hidden Inventory arc when she sees it for the first time:

She squints her eyes down at her phone screen.

The response comes barely 10 seconds later. Okay, sure.

Amber regrets taking a sip of her 7Up immediately, because she ends up not swallowing the liquid properly and now she's choking on it and coughing pathetically.

It takes a minute or two before she thinks she's fully composed, grabbing her phone off the coffee table to stare at the unknown number's text – Alysa's text, to be specific.

A grin pulls itself at the edges of Amber's mouth and she allows it.

It would be dishonest to say that she hasn't been thinking about the brown-eyed girl ever since she turned her back on her a couple weeks ago at the bar – and it wasn't until the morning after did she realize that she didn't quite have a way to keep in touch with Alysa, seeing how she didn't ask for her number or her Instagram handle or anything else that could be traced back to her.

She tried to look up Alysa's name on Instagram, one day. That was when she learned that there are a lot of people who spell their name with just one 's' – and it's not like she knows what Alysa's last name is, either.

So to have this notification come to her at 11:46PM on a Thursday felt like a nice little coincidence, one that she'll spend some time relishing in, even though the voice at the back of her mind is telling her to ask Danny what's his deal with giving strangers access to her phone number – but then again, it is Alysa, so she'll let it slide just this once.

Their conversation carries on to the depths of the night; Alysa actually asks her about MTG, to which Amber does not hesitate to info-dump like she's had all this information locked inside her brain just waiting to be let out upon seeing the perfect opportunity to do so. Amber asks what she's been up to, though she does have a vague idea from asking Danny about his whereabouts and occasionally getting vague replies that he's in practice with the rest of the band, which aligns with their schedule that Alysa kindly lays out to her.

They fall into a rhythm of back and forth questions and easy conversation, one that Amber finds herself not needing to put too much of her mind into because it's just that easy to talk with Alysa. She's aware of that in real life, and now she's aware of it over text, too. Amber doesn't quite know what to do with that information, but she pays no mind to it.

A yawn escapes her mouth and it is only then that Amber realizes that the time on her phone is displaying 01:19AM. She blinks her eyes open and watches as the words and numbers on her screen blur in and out of focus, a drowsiness overtaking her consciousness.

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A month goes by after Amber finds out that Alysa has obtained her phone number from her boyfriend.

They've been texting a lot, that's a given, though it isn't everyday that the texting happens seeing as how they both have lives to tend to. Amber's been getting a lot of calls from concerned parents who are looking to see how their kids have progressed in skating, while Alysa's hopping between jobs since it's not like Calliope's getting gigs every other week. Last time Amber had texted her – which was two days ago – she'd received a picture of a white substance spilled all over the floor of what seems to be a kitchen, finding the familiar green apron of a Starbucks worker upon closer inspection. Swiping to the next photo, she sees Alysa's own apron covered in the spilled liquid, some of it getting on her face and it gets a good laugh out of Amber.

Three hours ago, Amber wakes up to the chime of a notification. Alysa had sent her a picture of two cats; a black cat and a gray tabby – the caption at the bottom reads: meet my cats, Sesame and Chia followed by a benevolent smiley face emoticon.

She responds back with an impromptu photo of a black puppy nestled against her side, arm draped across its silky fur. She captions it: This is Uki – not forgetting to put her own twist on Alysa's signature smiley face emoticon, this time adding a nose to it with the addition of a hyphen.

Swiping out of her text messages with Alysa, Amber hears Uki huff a breath beside her – she's wide awake now, yet is still cuddling up to Amber's side like she isn't planning on moving anytime soon. Amber doesn't complain, just pulls her closer and gently pats Uki's butt as she does so.

There's a text from Danny sent while she was asleep.

He doesn't respond immediately, so she takes the time to get ready for the day, muttering a soft apology to Uki as she slips out of bed. The dog doesn't protest, just licks her nose and nuzzles deeper into Amber's sheets.

Amber is already halfway through drying her hair when the ping of a notification echoes throughout her bathroom.

That gets a thumbs up reaction from him. Which, okay, it's not like Amber minds, but it's not wrong of her to expect something a lot more cordial than that considering they've been dating for 2 years – approaching 3 now that anniversary plans are about to be discussed and put into motion.

Amber throws on a black sweater over her black jeans and walks over to the kitchen where Uki is occupying herself with her very own bowl of breakfast, kneeling down to give the dog a kiss on the head ad making her way to the door, putting on her combat boots before opening the front door of her apartment.

A hand waves Amber down from the outdoor seating area of Caffe Greco upon her stepping onto the vicinity.

Amber takes several strides forward before officially finding herself standing over the little wooden table occupying the space between two matching wooden chairs. Danny tilts his face upwards and Amber leans down with an amused smile to plant a brief kiss to his cheek.

Her eyes drift to the glass filled with… something topped with whipped cream sitting on the table. Amber isn't certain that it's coffee because it's a lot more colorful than her usual definition of coffee, but it's definitely something that she wouldn't find herself drinking at 10AM. "You ordered?"

"Yeahhh, I didn't think to order for you too since I didn't know how long it'd take for you to get here, but—" Danny gestures vehemently to the drink in front of him, Amber stares at it. "Hey, you got here earlier than I thought you'd be?"

"Okay," Amber smiles down grimly at him, patting him on the shoulder. "I'm gonna get my own drink, be right back."

Amber returns with a caramel macchiato in hand and sits down on the wooden chair across from her boyfriend, ignoring the way it creaks faintly beneath her as she sits down. "So…" She trails off, a hint of excitement edging her voice.

"So…" He mirrors her tone. "Anniversary plans?"

"Um," she starts. "I was thinking we could have a nice little dinner? I could cook for you and we could finally put to use those candles I've been meaning to use since, like, forever." Amber lets a fond smile wash over her face as she watches Danny take a sip of his absurdly unicorn-like drink, though it dims slightly when she sees the crease between his eyebrows.

"Why, did you have something else in mind?" She questions, blowing the steam off her coffee before taking a small sip.

"Not really, I just thought we could go somewhere nicer instead of just… staying at home," he excuses, not meeting her eyes completely.

Amber pouts a little. "But I've always wanted to cook for you for our anniversary. I have a good marry-me chicken recipe that I think you'd like," she mumbles. Something flashes in Danny's eyes when she mentions the word 'marry' but it's gone as quickly as it comes.

"Alright, yeah," he sighs, hand reaching up to scratch at his head. "Yeah, we can do that. Why not?" He says, a smile finally reaching his face. It doesn't meet his eyes like how it usually would, and Amber tries not to let her mind linger on that detail for too long, shifting the conversation to something more casual than their anniversary plans.

The topic somehow shifts to Alysa after several minutes. Somehow.

"I heard you and Alysa have been talking a lot lately," Danny jolts up in his seat, eyes narrowing down on Amber's coffee.

"Yeah, we're friends. Speaking of," she pauses to squint her eyes at him. "Why'd you just give her my number?"

He's silent for a while, contemplating the words entering his left ear, ready to make their exit out of his right. "'Cause she asked for it?"

Quirking an eyebrow, she ungraciously eyes him up and down in an act of scrutiny. "Isn't there someone else you forgot to ask?" Amber asks, arms crossed in front of her chest.

"Babe, c'mon, it's not like you mind either way, right? You guys are like, friends now or whatever," Danny tries and something about the way he gesticulates his points with a flick of his hand causes indignation to flare up in Amber's stomach.

"Yeah, but, what if it wasn't Alysa? Would you be cool with that?" She says meekly, hand reaching out to wrap her fingers around the handle of her cup.

Danny doesn't respond, opting to stare acquiescently at Amber's hands, paler than they usually are and wrapped around the cup in an effort to chase after heat. His own hands are fixed in his lap – unmoving, unreaching.

"Look – I'm sorry, alright? Can we please drop it now?" Danny pleads, an exasperated sigh leaving his mouth when Amber doesn't react.

She looks up, finally. "I'm just saying, you could've asked—"

"Perhaps I should've, yes – but what's the problem now, though? You guys are clearly getting along," he interrupts, a sharp edge in his voice.

Amber opens her mouth to argue, but finds that the words refuse to leave her mouth. They stay there, stuck to the walls of her throat, withering and faltering.

"It's nothing, forget about it," she relents, dropping her shoulders as she keeps her eyes to the ground next to him. Part of her will admit to herself, at some point in time that she's grasping at straws, telling herself that she's getting mildly upset about nothing, even if it feels like something to her, something that Danny doesn't view through the same lens.

Tension stretches between them like a rubber band just waiting to snap. Amber tries to blanket it by shifting the conversation to a different topic. "Are you and Alysa like… actually friends?"

Danny glances up at her curiously, brows furrowed like it was the last thing he'd expected to hear coming out of her mouth. "What do you mean?"

"That night at the bar," she begins. "There was some kind of weird tension between you two, like you didn't really get along." Her eyes search Danny's eyes for something that might answer her curiosity.

"It's not like we hate each other or anything. I guess our personalities just kinda clash? Like, we disagree a lot over things – mostly when it comes to band stuff, like the direction of our music and whatnot, performances, etcetera. But also, she's a bit iffy to me, I don't know," Danny finalizes his response with a sip of his drink. Amber's curiosity gnaws at the walls of her brain, still, upon hearing the last part of that sentence.

"Iffy?" Amber tests, urging him to say more, just to quiet that nosey part of her brain that begs to know everything.

Danny bites the bait. "She's a bit of a player, not that that's a bad thing – well, not like it's a good thing, either," he states, and it only makes Amber's curiosity grow. "The stereotype that lead singers tend to sleep with fans they pick up at shows… she's somewhat of a poster child of that. Nothing crazy about that, whatsoever. Not judging," he gestures subtly, yet it only makes Amber stare at him with utmost focus as she waits for his next words. Danny seems to notice, because he continues. "But we had a falling out with someone who used to be in the band a couple years ago 'cause of that."

This information undoubtedly piques Amber's interest. A band member she's never heard of? That's new. She has pretty much met everyone in Danny's orbit, as far as she knows, and nobody from that night at the bar had done as much as mention anything that alluded to the fact that there had been someone else in the band before this.

The fact that Calliope started just a little over a couple years ago wasn't a mystery to Amber. She remembers Danny telling her that it started as a fun little project between friends, something they weren't expecting to take off and gain much traction until it developed into something undeniable that came with the want for recognition. There wasn't much that she knew about these friends Danny spoke of, then, considering he only vaguely spoke of the other members and it wasn't until a month ago that she had finally gotten to know their names and faces. Perhaps it was out of fear that some sort of attachment would grow had Amber been introduced earlier, the realization that it would all feel too real hitting him once Amber enters the world he'd separated from his personal life with her, that she would see a side of him that Amber's gut told her he hadn't been ready to show her then.

And she understood the assignment. Recognized that and didn't bother prying into it lest she crosses an unspoken boundary, as livid as it made her sometimes because she'd felt like she didn't know her boyfriend as well as he knew her.

If he knew her at all. If he knows her at all.

Amber digs a hole in her mind and buries that thought deep inside the mental grave, nodding slowly like she's mulling Danny's words over in her head. "I didn't know there was someone else."

"His name's Vadym, he was on guitar for a li'l while. That was until Alysa," he pauses, the way he says Alysa's name makes Amber think that it holds a lot more weight than intended. "Let's just say that she slept with his girlfriend."

Amber can't help the way her eyes widen, her eyebrows shooting so far up she almost worries they might blur into her hairline. "I'm sorry?"

"You heard that right. She also slept with Isabeau's cousin's girlfriend at some point, then went on to fuck a fan who had a girlfriend who got reaaally mad and left a comment under one of our Instagram posts threatening to kill her," Danny shrugs flippantly like he's talking about the weather, like those weren't the most insane amalgamation of words Amber has ever heard come out his mouth. "Point is, Alysa has a pattern when it comes to sleeping with people, and I just happen to find it weird."

The story ends there, Amber becomes increasingly aware of how dry her mouth is becoming after having it open for so long out of sheer disbelief and shuts it close after a moment before finally finding the words stuck in her throat. "That's gotta be a coincidence, no?"

Something defensive rises in Amber's chest and she isn't sure why. She has only known Alysa for about a month, and even then it's only been through text and random late night phone calls. They haven't found the time to hang out one-on-one, a work in progress, if you will, but Amber still feels the need to defend her friend, a baseless excuse ready at the tip of her tongue.

"I mean, I guess? Obviously she's not going around finding people who are taken to sleep with their girlfriend and telling us about it, but still, y'know?" Danny says, a stroke of indignation evident in his voice.

And no, Amber does not know. In fact, she thinks that whoever Alysa chooses to sleep with is none of her business, and it certainly isn't Danny's or anyone else's, really, for that matter.

She fights the urge to defend Alysa this time by saying something about the partners of those girls she slept with. There's gotta be a reason for that, isn't there? Something that became a tipping point for them, the impact great enough for them to fall into Alysa's temptation. It would be surprising if there weren't issues arising from those relationships, especially if your partner felt comfortable enough to send death threats to other people.

But then again, it's not like Amber knew these people personally; their motives unknown to her, yet it does leave questions tucked into the back of her mind unanswered, still. The curiosity spreading like wildfire in her mind yet her best effort to trample it is by dousing it with alcohol from what it feels like.

The conversation circles back to Amber and Danny's anniversary plans. Amber engages, of course, though at some point when Danny talks, she can't help her mind from wandering back to their conversation from earlier – back to Alysa.

She wonders if Alysa's coincidental habit is done with intended purpose, if she sits in bed at night with the guilt after knowing – if the guilt reaches her, even – if she finds satisfaction in that sort of forbidden pleasure. Amber doesn't know when exactly it penetrates her mind, but she wonders what the girls who ended up in Alysa's bed looked like, whether blonde hair and blue eyes fit the description of any of the girls she'd bedded.

She shakes that thought violently out of her head as quickly as it came before it lingers any longer than intended.

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It's been approximately 24 hours since Amber had met up with Danny over breakfast.

24 hours since Danny dropped that bomb of information over her head.

24 hours since Amber finds herself unable to get Alysa out of her head.

She drags a hand down her face, an annoyed grunt leaving her lips which seems to startle Uki for a bit. The dog perks her head up from where it rests on her paws, looking up at Amber with an inquisitive look on her little face.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Amber asks, like Uki just caught her in the act of doing – or rather, thinking of – something she most definitely should not be thinking about at 10AM on a weekend.

The image of Alysa's face has been pressing insistently at her temples ever since the previous night, they'd been texting each other about everything and nothing all in the past month and yet, Amber feels a faint sense of want in her chest – the want to know more about who Alysa really is as a person, to really talk to her and get a sense of who she is behind all those enigmatic layers she seems to be shrouded in even through the phone.

It is done by complete instinct when Amber reaches to the nightstand and unplugs her phone from the charging port, unlocking it, opening the iMessage app and hovering her thumb over Alysas name.

The response doesn't come immediately, and Amber can't for the life of her find it in herself to wait for a reply, so she swings her legs over the edge of her bed and walks to the bathroom to wash the remnants of yesterday off her body instead.

A ding sounds from her bedroom while Amber is in the midst of brushing her teeth. She's quick to spit the fluoride out of her mouth before peeking her head out the bathroom. Uki turns her head away from the phone sat on the bed upon noticing her owner's presence from the bathroom entrance, not leaving Amber's form when she damn near sprints toward the bed and kneels on the side, unlocking her phone with quick precision.

Amber stills, arms going lax and dropping the phone in her hands onto the mattress. Right, it's not like she had a solid reasoning for texting Alysa, much less starting with a 'Hi.' She decides to take the risk anyway and type out the first words that pop up in her mind.

Something catches in Amber's throat upon reading Alysa's reply. The smug-looking emoticon feels as though it carries something weighty that Amber isn't sure she's quite ready to unpack yet, or if she wants to unpack it at all.

If she didn't know any better, she'd get the idea that Alysa is flirting with her.

That can't be right. That's probably not it. It's really not. Amber spends the next 10 seconds repeating those exact words in her mind before eventually reacting to Alysa's text with a heart, pushing herself off the side of the bed to actually get ready this time.

Hours go by faster than Amber had liked.

She'd spent a decent portion of her day getting to chores she'd been holding off for the past week or so; laundry, which was a tad bit dreadful to endure seeing how her dryer keeps making noises that she can only describe as demonic, going through texts from her students' parents who ask questions that don't seem to end. She spends the better half of her day sprawled across the couch, putting on Love Island with the intent to turn her brain off with Uki next to her, who seems concerningly invested with the television in front of them, a half-empty box of pizza forgotten on the coffee table.

Golden sunlight streaming in through the windows gently wake Amber from her short slumber. There's a warmth pressing against her back, which she soon finds to be her phone heating up after fishing around for it all thanks to her body heat. Amber blinks the last remnants of sleep from her eyes, focusing on the text that had appeared under her notification center just a little over 3 hours ago.

After about twenty-or-so minutes of internally freaking out over an impromptu hang out that she had put zero thought into, and another twenty minutes later, Amber somehow manages to make herself look presentable.

Presentable in Amber's definition being a loose black tank top that makes her arms look nice, a pair of jeans that are also black in color because she cannot be bothered to go through her unfolded laundry, completed with Doc Martens that seem to be the only thing grounding her physical self to the ground while every organ in her body threatens to fling itself into the heavens above as she stands, right in front of Alysa's apartment building.

It's only then does she realize that she'd forgotten to ask Alysa for her unit number.

With a disgruntled sigh, she makes quick work of finding the texts exchanged between them.

'Delivered' turns into 'Seen' in the blink of an eye, which makes Amber think that Alysa had been waiting for her text. Something about it makes Amber's guts churn, painting a soft smile on her face at the image of Alysa on her couch kicking her feet in giddy anticipation whilst waiting for the blonde's arrival.

The response doesn't come as quickly, however, which Amber sees as the perfect opportunity to overthink everything. What if Alysa had changed her mind? Leaving her on read when she's already standing outside the building is a pretty shitty move, but it isn't entirely implausible. She supposes that it's a bit odd for her to just ask to come by when there hasn't been any prior discussion of a meet-up, but then again—

"Amber?"

Amber hears the smooth sound of a voice calling out her name before she sees it. Looking to her left and to her right, and even behind her, she's greeted by nothing but an empty street, save for the guy across the street walking his chihuahua at almost 7PM.

"Amberrrr. Up here, babe," the voice speaks once again and Amber's head snaps upward this time. Alysa is standing there, out on the fire escape looking down at her with what might as well be the biggest shit-eating grin Amber has ever seen on a person.

"Oh, hey," Amber feels the wind get knocked out of her lungs, even though there's plenty of air out here that she doesn't have to share. "Mind letting me in? It's pretty chilly out here."

"Come up to unit 103. Why aren't you wearing a jacket?" Alysa laughs, squinting at her inquisitively. Amber looks down at herself, assessing the outfit she had put conscious effort into putting together. She'd regretted not bringing a jacket about 5 minutes into her walk to Alysa's place, but had been too nervous thinking about the girl standing above her to turn back around and grab something from her coat rack.

"That's a good question," she replies, starting to make her way to the inside of the building. There's a door leading to a supply closet on one side of the wall a cluster of mailboxes mounted against the other, and Amber's eye catches onto the number 103 sticker plastered on top of one of the mailboxes and sees it open. Thinking that Alysa must've forgotten to close it after retrieving a package, she pushes it close on her behalf before making her way to the elevator at the end of the hallway.

Technically, she could've taken the staircase that had greeted her upon entry, but she decides against it. The quietness of the elevator providing some much-needed silence for her to calm her racing thoughts.

The elevator doors slide open with a mechanical sigh, and Amber warily takes uneven steps forward until she reaches the end of the hallway, standing directly in front of apartment unit 103. She raises a hand and gives 5 firm knocks before her mind could protest against it and send her sprinting down the stairs.

Alysa's face greets her as soon as the door opens, saying something before stepping aside to let Amber in. Amber does so, hearing the door close next to her and the realization that she's right here in Alysa's apartment, in the entryway standing just inches away from the other girl, and all regrets from earlier about not wearing something warmer completely exits her mind when Amber feels her body increase its temperature by a hundred degrees.

"Welcome!" Alysa says cheerily, the grin from earlier returning and this is probably the closest Amber has ever gotten to seeing her frenulum piercing up close, she thinks.

Alysa skips forward, spreading her arms out by her side enthusiastically. "Mi casa es su casa," she says with much dramatic flair. It gets a chuckle out of Amber, who trails behind her as she leads her to the living room.

The couch dips with Amber's weight as she sits herself down after Alysa who had – for a lack of a better word – unceremoniously plopped down onto the tattered leather beneath them.

"Hey there," Alysa says, a smirk pulling at her lips.

"Hi," Amber responds, laughing slightly when Alysa quirks an eyebrow up at her. "What?"

"What brought you here? Not that I have any complaints, I mean, it just seemed so sudden," Alysa shoots back, hitching a leg up onto the empty space between them, half her leg hanging off the edge.

Amber can see her outfit a lot more clearly now, and she looks… nice, Amber thinks, comfortable, in her element; feet clad in a whimsical pair of socks that have yellow rubber duckies all over them, gray sweatpants that are a little baggy but hang off her legs just right, a T-shirt with the logo of some band Amber doesn't recognize printed across the front, the hem hitched up ever so slightly when Alysa lifts an arm to drape across the back of the couch…

There's a sliver of skin revealed where Alysa's shirt rides up her stomach and the telltale sign of her boxers peeking out over her sweatpants, intentional in its positioning what with the trademark Calvin Klein etched onto the waistband, it almost makes Amber think that Alysa wants her to look there. Almost.

Amber snaps her eyes away from that sight, not wanting to mortify herself by being caught staring too long at the waistband of her friend's boxers, she looks up only to meet eyes with Alysa and oh God she definitely saw that.

The smirk on Alysa's face doesn't falter, but Amber is thankful that she doesn't point out the painfully pathetic attempt at not checking her out.

"I didn't have anything to do today, and I thought it'd be the perfect opportunity to actually hang out with you, and so I thought," Amber shrugs, pressing her shoulder into the backrest. "Why not?"

Alysa jumps out of her seat, standing in front of Amber with a triumphant stance. "Well, I'm glad you asked," she quickly makes her way to the kitchen behind them and for a second, Amber considers following after her until Alysa yells out, "Sit still! I'm getting you a drink."

Alysa returns briefly, carrying a bottle of what Amber assumes to be wine and two glasses for her and Amber. She hands Amber the bottle, to which she reluctantly accepts, her grip around the neck of the bottle faltering and quickly putting her other hand under the bottle to support it. "Woah," Amber mutters, looking up at Alysa who only flashes her a small smile as she returns to her previous position on the couch, scooting a bit closer to Amber this time.

"It's heavy, huh?" Alysa teases, and it catches Amber slightly off guard, she'll admit.

"Yeah, what is this?" She squints at the label on the front of the bottle, Marie-Courtin is printed in big, bold letters across the front.

"Champagne my dad got as a gift at a function with some of his other attorney buddies, he gave it to me when I moved into this place and I just haven't found the right opportunity to bring it out," she says, taking the bottle from Amber's hand as she begins to loosen the cage, rotating it slowly at a 45 degree angle while keeping a firm grip on the cork until it pops out with a slight fizzle with barely a drip spilling out.

"Until now," she continues, her voice quiet when she takes one glass to fill up with the bubbly liquid before handing it to Amber, filling the other with her own share. Alysa holds up her own glass and Amber extends her arm to clink their glasses together.

Alysa's eyes don't leave Amber's as they take respective sips of their drinks, a satisfactory hum leaving her lips as the flavor settles on their tongues.

"So, how are things with Danny?" She asks, looking at Amber with her head cocked slightly to the side, the smallest hint of curiosity gleaming in her eyes.

Amber holds back a groan. "Really? I came all the way to hang out and you're asking me about my boyfriend?" She says, but there's nothing mean in the way the words roll off her tongue, a grin pulling at her lips when Alysa makes a sound of mock disbelief.

"Do you not want me to?" Alysa's voice is smooth when she says it, and Amber has to bite back the grin that threatens to stretch wider across her face.

"It's not that, I mean – we're doing fine, our 3rd anniversary is coming up in a few days," Amber responds, swirling the liquid in her glass before taking another sip, watching as Alysa's eyes widen slightly, the movement of her eyebrows covered by the brown of her bangs.

"Congratulations, I didn't know you guys have been together for that long," Alysa admits.

"Yeah," the response comes curtly, getting a small laugh out of Amber for reasons she can't find it in herself to explain.

"What's wrong?" Alysa huffs out a laugh, nudging Amber's foot with her own upon noticing the slight uncertainty in the blonde's tone.

"Nothing, it's just…" Amber trails off, though Alysa doesn't rush her, just waits for her to continue as she takes a generous sip from her own glass. "It feels different this year, I don't know."

She doesn't wait for Alysa to ask her to elaborate further on that statement, downing the entire glass of champagne before continuing, Alysa looking at her in surprise before retrieving the bottle and pouring her another glass.

"Feels like there's just nothing there anymore, you know?" Amber mutters, and the reality of it all starts to unravel right in front of her.

She's fully aware what it sounds like – speaking about her love life in such a manner to someone she's only known for a short amount of time. But something in Amber's heart relents anyway, Alysa feels like someone she could unload just about anything onto, none of those judgmental looks and ted talks advising her on her own relationship she knows would befall her. Amber glances up briefly, Alysa's eyes boring into her but not in the scrutinizing way she'd expected, instead they hold her gaze attentively, her own unspoken way of telling Amber that she's here and that she'll listen, and perhaps that alone is enough.

"Danny used to get me flowers like pretty much every other week the first year we got together, but I can't help feeling like he's gotten bored of me. Like, he's grown pretty distant over the last few months and I feel like I'm just… trying too hard to get back the him that was familiar to me, you know?" Amber gets the last part of her sentence out with one deliberate exhale, everything she's been keeping to herself – the words that she'd kept close to her heart and let sit on her chest in fear that if she were to say it out loud it would sound all too real.

The part about flowers didn't feel all that necessary, now that she's painting a much bigger picture for Alysa to grasp on, telling her about all the little things that have lead to her coming to that conclusion; the lack of time they've been spending together as of late, Amber feeling like she's trying too hard and the man she thought she'd spend the rest of her life with barely scratching the surface in making an effort to make things feel like how they used to be – signs and signals that have emulsified into something that leaves a bitter, rotten taste in Amber's mouth whenever she tries to speak of it with grace.

They're about 3 pours deep now – or was it 4? Amber can't recall, all she knows is that they've moved from the couch somehow, bare arm pressed against Alysa's where they've positioned themselves on the floor, backs resting against the couch and Amber can feel it all – the alcohol slowly settling itself into her bloodstream, that incessant buzz that only comes around once in a blue moon because she doesn't drink that often, that's more of Danny's thing. "He doesn't really like it when I drink," it slips from her mind and out of her mouth before she could catch herself, Alysa whipping her head to the side to stare at her incredulously.

They're both equal parts tipsy, teetering on the edge of drunkenness, that much Amber is aware of. She assumes Alysa has a higher tolerance because Amber's looking back at her and swaying ever so slightly, unsure of where her mind is exactly. "What do you mean?" Alysa questions her, taking another big sip of her drink just like they've been doing in the past hour – fuck, how long has it been? Amber shoves those thoughts at the back of her mind, focusing her blue eyes on Alysa's warmer, much darker ones.

"We went out with his buddies one time and I got drunk – like really drunk, and I guess I made a fool of myself, or him, judging by the way he was talking my ear off the next morning over the phone. He got really mad," Amber scoffs, a sound that she convinces herself is half of a laugh, half genuine irritation. "Naturally, I got curious and asked one of our friends who was there what I did to make him so angry at me, and it was barely anything. Like, all I did was go on a drunken ramble about how much I loved spending time with him and all that sappy shit, I guess."

Alysa tips her head backward when she laughs, loud and bubbly without a care in the world. It startles Amber for a second, but she laughs along albeit a little delayed, eyes dragging down the expanse of Alysa's exposed throat without meaning to, she swears.

"You're fucking kidding me," Alysa manages to gather herself, wiping at her eyes like tears had threaten to spill because of how much she'd been laughing. "That's ridiculous."

"Meh, not really," Amber shrugs, voice straining. She clears her throat a bit disjointedly, trying to pretend that she doesn't feel Alysa's gaze burning the side of her head – and fails.

"No, like," Alysa starts, locking in to make herself sound a lot more serious than what she knows would come out of her. "If my girlfriend did all that when she's drunk, I'd kiss the shit out of her, no question. Consensually, of course. But, it's sweet! It's cute, Danny's a pussy for not thinking the same – at least you didn't beat someone up… oh God, did you?" She leans in closer to Amber, and it makes the both of them fall into hysterics.

"I mean I could've, but I had no reason to," Amber replies once the laughter dies down, she flexes her arms a little just to prove a point, completely missing the way Alysa lets her eyes trace over every muscle for a beat longer than intended.

They fall into a comfortable silence, eventually. Alysa managed to fumble around for the TV remote and put on an animated film neither of them are paying attention to, too absorbed in each other's presence and the alcohol that's close to finishing right in front of them. Amber lets her mind run back to Alysa's words from earlier, at the subtle implication of her imagining Amber as her girlfriend, at the implication that she'd kiss her.

The thought makes Amber's heart skip a beat, a thump beyond her ribcage that becomes impossible to ignore the longer she sits here, pressed against Alysa where she can smell her citrus-y jasmine perfume, much more intense than how she remembered it to be at that one time in the bar. It's almost intoxicating, in a sense, like Alysa had put thought into spraying it onto her pulse points before she arrived, all in the hopes that Amber would notice it.

"You know what I think?" Alysa's words cut through the silence like a knife to butter. Amber gives a respondent hum, head tipped towards Alysa as she feels the alcohol making her feel heavier than she really is. "I think you deserve better."

Her response doesn't come right away, but Amber notes the way Alysa has her head turned towards her, lips mere inches from her ear and it sends a slight tingle down her spine. She straightens herself, just a little, enough so that she's facing Alysa directly now. "Really?" Amber says, wobbly in its execution partially because she doesn't believe Alysa's words in its entirety, partially because she doesn't know else it should sound like when Alysa is sitting this close and she can feel their breaths mingling with each other's and every neuron in Amber's brain is working together to keep her from bursting into flames.

"I do," Alysa replies, soft in the way she says it, earnest in a way that tugs gently at Amber's heartstrings.

"And what does that look like, exactly?" Amber asks, it's meant to be teasing but Alysa seems to take it seriously, making it a challenge for her to prove a point.

Alysa leans in ever so slightly and Amber can't tell if it's the 5 whole glasses of champagne or Alysa's perfume that's intoxicating her. "You deserve someone who cares about every little thing you have to say, regardless of how important it is," she mumbles, a newfound tenderness woven into every syllable that escapes her lips. "Someone who'll worship the ground you walk on, holding you in the utmost regard even through the rough patches of the relationship."

With this little proximity between them, Amber finds that she can't help but flit her eyes downwards to Alysa's lips. The other girl notices, she knows Alysa notices, yet she doesn't avert her gaze. "Yeah?" She asks.

"Yeah," Alysa mutters, nodding weakly, eyes flickering from Amber's eyes to her lips like focusing on one part of her face is too difficult of a task. Her voice drops down to a whisper, like she doesn't want anyone else but Amber to hear what she has to say next. "You make it hard not to."

There's a hitch that makes itself known in Amber's breath, which Alysa notices, daring herself to lean into it, even. Her words are repeated in Amber's brain like a broken disc, unrelenting in the way it loops the same part over and over again until she's forced to shut it off, but Amber finds that she doesn't want it to end, she wants to hear it, again and again. Alysa's words play like a lyre trying to lure her into her heart, and Amber's placing one methodical foot in front of the other stepping forward.

The ache in Amber's chest is tangible, and for a second she stops and thinks whether it is shared, whether the way Alysa's looking at her right now is her own attempt at reaching out into their shared space, trying to get a hold of Amber in a way she hasn't been able to, not before this – whatever this is. This being the way Alysa's bangs are softly brushing against Amber's forehead, this being the alcohol in their breaths mingling with each other's in the compact space between them, this being the way the Alysa's eyes shine in the low light of her own apartment, looking at Amber with a want that's almost imperceptible and hard to catch had she not been holding Alysa's gaze for the past minute and a half.

Amber dares herself to shove the words out of her throat. "What does that mean?" Her voice wavers slightly when she speaks, faltering under the pretense of upholding a perfect composure. Alysa leans in until her cheekbone brushes lightly against Amber's and it takes everything within Amber to remind herself to breathe, heart slamming against her ribcage so hard she has to place one hand on the floor to steady herself as Alysa's lips hover over ear.

"Means that—" Alysa whispers, low and saccharine. "Means I could do better."

A sharp inhale filters itself into Amber's lungs. "Oh," she murmurs, not trusting herself to speak another word lest the resolve she's been slowly building for herself upon coming here starts to crumble.

Alysa pulls away slowly, allowing space for Amber to breathe. She doesn't stay there a beat longer with her lips lingering against her ear and it brews frustration in Amber's gut, frankly enough.

All Amber can do is stare, eyes hazy and lips parted as she tries her best to get air back into her lungs, all while Alysa sits there, all poised and unruffled and so unlike the state she put Amber in mere seconds ago.

The alcohol continues to thrum inside her bloodstream, pulsing deep and steady beneath skin Amber is certain is flushed beyond belief. The liquid courage does nothing to quell the want that churns in her heart, resolute and pounding against her ribcage, it only drives her brain further into making the decision to reach out to clasp a hand to the back of Alysa's neck and pull her in, closing the tiny gap between them.

Teeth clash against teeth upon first impact, but Amber eventually finds Alysa's top lip, relishing in the way cold metal rubs against the warmth of her lips. Alysa isn't any less desperate, not with the way her hand has found its place beneath Amber's jaw, cupping it as she sighs into Amber's mouth, tongue poking out to brush against her lip before capturing it between her own.

Amber sighs, tangling her hand into Alysa's brown locks and pushing her forward, deeper in a silent beg for more – and Alysa yields, licking into Amber's mouth, tasting the champagne, the one they'd both drunk but she finds it all the more sweeter now against Amber's tongue.

A part of Amber tells her to let go, to let herself get lost in the way Alysa's lips feel against hers, soft and sweet just like how she'd imagined it to be. The other part, however, the guilty, sober voice in her head urges her to pull away, to stop whatever it is they're doing and Amber so badly wants to tell it damn it all to hell when Alysa makes a breathy noise against her lips that sounds too close to a whimper but the thought is trampled by the blaring alarm that starts to sound in her head as a warning.

She's quick to pull away but Alysa is even quicker to chase her lips as she does, and it doesn't dull the ache in her chest when she opens her eyes slowly, all glossy and somehow even darker than before.

"We can't – we can't do this," Amber rushes out in one brief exhale, her hand that had tangled itself in Alysa's hair moving down to rest on her shoulder.

Then Alysa looks at her, really looks at her with those doe-like eyes and Amber has to swallow thickly before she lets out a sound she knows she'll never forgive herself for.

"No?" Is all Alysa says before brushing her lips against Amber's cheek, pressing a tender kiss there and God, it takes every single fiber of Amber's being before she pushes her hand against Alysa's shoulder, firm but not enough that it's deemed aggressive.

"Alysa, no. I can't," she says, then opens her mouth as if to say more, but the words die in her throat. Her lips purse into a firm line upon seeing the hurt flash across Alysa's eyes but it disappears as quickly as it came.

Alysa manages to put some distance between them, scooting away from Amber and letting her hand fall to the space between them. "Yeah, no, I get it," she nods, a quiet heaviness in her voice that Amber refuses to let her mind linger on.

"I'm sorry," she mutters into the space between them, the guilt slowly creeping up her chest this time. Alysa shakes her head, not letting her get another word in.

"No, don't apologize," she responds, deliberately avoiding Amber's eyes as her gaze falls to the linoleum floor. "I shouldn't have… I don't know. Just, don't be sorry."

Amber starts to feel the hot, angry sting of tears pooling in her eyes, sharpened even further by the impending guilt already consuming every inch of her being. "I should go."

She stumbles a little at first, before eventually finding her footing and steadying herself with one hand placed on the arm of the couch. Alysa finally looks up at her, then, worry etched across her face.

"You sure? It's getting late, and you walked here, right?"

"I did, yeah. Don't worry, I'll be fine."

The silence stretches on between them, before Alysa finally stands up and leads Amber to the door. Her fingers shake slightly as she unlocks the bolt, reluctant to even pull at the knob.

She does, eventually, twisting the knob and letting the door open, a gush of cold air seeps into the apartment and Amber sighs, the regret of not bringing a jacket from earlier returning in full force once she feels the air start to press into her skin, a grave reminder that it's only going to get colder here on out.

Amber barely makes it past the threshold before Alysa calls out to her.

"Hey, um, we can forget this ever happened alright? We were drunk, it's whatever – I won't tell anyone, don't worry."

Amber sniffs, a small, timid sound. "I know, thanks."

"Get home safe," Alysa says, a breathy exhale leaving her lips before she adds. "Text me when you're home?"

Amber nods wordlessly, though she doubts that she will.

The door closes behind her, and she takes one final glance at it before walking away, the burden of guilt filling her chest so heavily she's surprised she's even able to put one methodical foot in front of the other.

The walk back to her apartment is all cold breeze and hushed silence. Amber doesn't let her mind wander any further beyond what has already happened tonight, what she let happen. The act of unlocking her door feels like routine, the only thing that's grounding her to the earth as she steps foot inside.

Uki's already been fed before Amber left the apartment, yet the pitter-patter of the dog's little footsteps are enough to bring a small smile to her face.

"Hi, baby," Amber says, kneeling down to scratch the space between Uki's ears. "Mama wants to go to bed, okay? Let's go." Uki seems to get the message, practically sprinting out of Amber's reach and making her way to the bedroom.

Amber shucks her boots near the door and doesn't give it a second thought before face-planting right onto her pillow. The last thing that plays in her mind are the plushness of another pair of lips against hers. Amber forces her eyes shut, trying to push the hurt look on Alysa's face away and out of her mind, sending a silent prayer to the heavens above for sleep to overtake her.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

It's been about 3 days since it happened. 3 days since Amber felt the press of Alysa's lips against hers, a craving brewing in her gut driven by a drunken haze.

Alysa had asked her to text her when she got home, but she hadn't bothered to once she'd been completely engulfed by her sheets – letting Alysa know that she got home safely was the last thing on Amber's mind, yet here she was, checking her phone every 5 minutes just to see if Alysa had sent her something, anything that alludes to the fact that she's thinking of Amber.

But alas, nothing comes up. They haven't been talking ever since that night. Alysa had probably assumed Amber did actually get home just fine, avoiding the act of texting her because she knows neither of them would know where to go from there, whether they should talk about it like proper adults do or shove it under the soft rug that had carpeted their bodies from the hard linoleum floor where they'd kissed, right there in the living room of Alysa's apartment, all flushed skin and soft to the touch, capturing each other's lips in a way that Amber has never felt before.

All that is one thing. The guilt sitting heavy atop Amber's chest, however, is something else entirely. Not even the guilt that she'd kissed someone else behind her boyfriend's back – no, she knows it's wrong. But the look on Alysa's face when Amber had forcefully pulled away introduced a whole new world of hurt.

It plagues her at night, frankly, a subtle ache that carves itself into Amber's heart with careful precision, a surgical knife that pushes and pulls enough for it to hurt, but not so much that she feels as though it'll kill her, even though that's exactly what it feels like, at times.

Amber tries not to think about it, tries to tuck the memories of 3 nights ago back to the uppermost back of her subconscious, she has other things to worry about:

Things like getting through her and Danny's anniversary dinner without wishing for an anvil to fall over her head and knock her out cold, for example.

They had decided on doing it at his place, despite his initial reluctance towards the idea. Dinner has been made; her grandma's recipe that Amber has spent the better half of her life trying to perfect. She's clad in a wine-colored dress that hugs her in all the right places, hair falling in flawless waves over her shoulders, lips a darker shade of red than what she usually goes for.

Gifts have been exchanged; Amber had gotten him a watch that he's been eyeing – hint: heavily hinting at, more like – and he'd given her a necklace adorned with a jewel deep red in color, one she's far too certain she already owns in sapphire blue, but it's fine.

According to Amber, everything is fine. She feels fine and there is absolutely no reason for her to be overthinking things – not with Danny, not with her, nobody in particular.

It's simple. She has dinner with Danny where they spend the next hour or so giving each other their gifts over a candlelit dinner, to talking about mundane things about their week or anything they find relevant enough to tell each other. Amber refreshes memories of the past week, purposefully ignoring the events of last Saturday night, she watches him give her responses she knows are half-assed in nature, in that tone she knows he uses when he just wants to keep things going to avoid properly engaging with her, he goes on and on about himself and Amber watches with apt attention – same old, same old.

The night goes on, he leads them to his bedroom and kisses her with the desperation of a man starved for days on end. Amber feels the stubble against her mouth and momentarily forgets where she is, images of soft brown hair and kiss-bitten lips of a girl flashing behind her eyelids which she rids her mind of while he's in the midst of kissing her.

She tries not to show the pure horror on her face, masking it behind the calm and collected demeanor she has managed to perfect in all the years they've been together because Amber is afraid, afraid of showing too much, afraid of the vulnerability that comes with cracking your heart open to one person.

Danny kisses her neck and she sighs, because she knows he'll question it if she stays silent, too silent and Amber cannot find it in her to explain that silence, the reasoning behind it, can't find it in her to elucidate the gaping hole that's beginning to form in her heart.

It goes by in quite a blur when he's all over her, panting on top of her and Amber moans and makes all the noises that sound right. Nothing comes out of her when he collapses on his forearms, at the very least she's appreciative that he's careful not to crush her with his body weight. He rolls over, eventually, catching his breath next to her while she does the same.

Amber lays contemplatively, feeling the creases in the crumpled sheets press against the exposed skin of her thighs. Danny gets out of bed to clean up in the bathroom and she watches him until his figure disappears behind the bathroom door and she's left to her own devices.

A long, deep exhale escapes her lungs. She taps through her phone until Danny returns from his endeavors inside the bathroom, pulling the covers over himself as he kisses her goodnight, muttering a small thanks to her before turning over and falling into a slumber that is his and his alone.

The silence seems to stretch on forever – Amber lets it, until snoring can be heard next to her and that is when she swings her legs over the edge of the bed and makes her way to his bathroom.

The water runs while she peers at the reflection in the mirror. Nothing worth noting makes itself known to her at the moment, and so she splashes cold water on her face and hopes that the ache in her chest dissolves enough to a point where it becomes bearable.

Sleep doesn't come to her, not while she's laying here in a bed that's starting to feel unfamiliar beneath her – the mattress he'd chosen is too hard, the sheets cold in the way that doesn't hit the same as her own sheets do. So, Amber makes the only sane decision she thinks she's ever made tonight: she leaves, the craving for her own bed far too strong to ignore. She'll find time to explain it to Danny when morning comes, when he's not curled up in his own bed sleeping what is left of the night away.

Amber gathers her own things and grabs her leather jacket from the coat rack – she's learned her lesson, October doesn't get any warmer – and walks her way through a hallway and a lobby before finding herself outside.

Her mind is set on going home, the dream of surrounding herself in the smell of her laundry detergent-scented sheets calling to her heart and just barely out of reach, it isn't until another 10 to 15 minutes before she arrives at her own apartment complex and she feels giddy for the first time tonight.

Her feet, on the other hand, seems to have other plans – because 10 minutes later she finds herself stopping in front of a familiar building she wasn't expecting to see so soon, or at all, really.

Shuffling through the building in what she can only be described to be an alcohol-induced daze caused by a singular glass of wine, she miraculously finds herself standing in front of unit 103, and heavens forgive her for doing the unthinkable – she knocks.

Movement can be heard from where she stands outside, feet firmly planted on the doormat that had been placed outdoors seemingly eons ago, then the muffled sound of a deadbolt rattles through the door before it opens to reveal who Amber can only describe as the bane of her existence, and yet—

"Amber?"

Alysa stands there in clothes that scream 'I wasn't expecting any guests' all over them, an oversized tee with RAD DAD printed in bold and a pair of shorts that are barely visible beneath the hem of her shirt.

Amber stands there, statue-like and hopes that her eyes are enough to convey what her words cannot. Alysa doesn't hesitate to push the door a margin wider, inviting her in.

"You brought a jacket, at least," Alysa jests, or she tries to, the look on her face tells Amber that she's still trying to make sense of the entire situation.

"Alysa…" Amber starts but her voice falters at the very last minute as the hot sting of tears turn the girl standing in front of her into nothing but a blob of muted colors. Alysa stills for a moment, eyes glancing around in a panic before setting her mug onto the kitchen counter, rushing back to Amber's direction to engulf her in a hug.

"Shit – Amber, hey, hey," Alysa mutters into Amber's hair when she drops her head down to her shoulder. "Hey, I got you."

Alysa is several inches shorter than Amber, yet she manages to lead them to the couch, sitting Amber down onto the tired leather as she rubs circles into her back. Her shoulder is most definitely soaked, a dark gray patch of tears staining her shirt but Amber allows herself some grace, sobbing softly in Alysa's arms until it subsides, turning into little hiccups that Amber is very much aware is making her look a bit pathetic.

She pulls away after several minutes, and notes that Alysa doesn't move until she has done so, relaxing her shoulders slightly as she looks to her, eyes searching yet she doesn't push – not yet, not until she's sure Amber won't fall apart once she opens her mouth.

"What the fuck, dude?" Alysa exclaims softly. It doesn't sound angry, edged with a softness that comes naturally to her while she eyes Amber curiously. "What happened? Did Danny do something or—"

Amber interrupts her. "No, no, it's not – he didn't do anything."

Alysa raises both her eyebrows questioningly. Amber sighs. "I can't—" her voice comes out a little scratchy from all the crying, so she swallows to clear her throat. Her heart may as well burst out of her chest from how hard it's pounding. "I can't stop thinking about you. About what you said, about what happened, about – everything. It's everything."

The admission drives forth a silence that is almost deafening where it presses against Amber's ears, and she dares herself to glance upwards, trying to catch Alysa's reaction – she sits there, seemingly befuddled with her lips parted slightly and eyes unblinking and for a split second, Amber worries that she may have committed the biggest fuck up of the century.

Well, the second biggest fuck up of the century. She has yet to think about it.

"Wow, okay," Alysa finally says after a beat, several, beats of silence. "Amber, you didn't text me for 3 days."

Amber closes her eyes, exhaling softly through her nose. "Well, its not like you did either." That draws a reaction out of Alysa, who furrows her brows and looks into Amber's eyes disbelievingly.

"I honestly took that as a sign that you didn't want anything to do with me anymore, which—" Alysa sputters, tongue caught in between her own teeth as she chooses her next words carefully. "Fuck, it hurt like a motherfucker, but I understood."

There it is again, that guilt flaring inside her chest, the one she'd felt when Alysa had looked at her like a wounded puppy returning in full force. "I'm sorry, I really am," is all she can say, hoping that it's enough to carry the apologetic tone in her voice.

Alysa sighs, reaching up to rub a knuckle against the space between her eyebrows. "It's okay, don't beat yourself up about it. I'm more worried about you right now," she admits, her words are like hands reaching in through Amber's ribcage to give her heart a thorough squeeze. "Where'd you come from, anyway?"

"Dinner with Danny," Amber rushes out. Alysa's eyes widen at that.

"You were with—" she chokes, stopping momentarily to compose herself. "Jesus fucking Christ, okay. This is fine."

Amber doesn't respond, she's not even really sure what she should say during a conversation like this.

"What happened, seriously?" Alysa asks again, and Amber pushes down the urge to burst into tears once again at the gentleness laced in her voice.

"Nothing felt right," Amber responds, her voice thick with unshed tears. "And I know how that sounds. It's fucked up, it really is, but I just don't know how else to describe it," she laughs wetly, brushing the back of her hand against her wet nose. "All I could think about was how your lips felt against mine and how – how nothing in my life has ever felt more right than it did in that moment."

Tears run down Amber's face in unsteady droplets. She can feel it, sees it in the way they form wet patches against her dress. "And fuck, do I feel guilty about it – so, so guilty. But God, it would be a lie if I said I didn't want it to happen again, which is so—"

She sniffs, glaring daggers into her own lap in contempt. Contempt for herself, for the universe that seems to have a sick, sick way of messing with her feelings and playing in her face.

Alysa huffs out a soft laugh. "That's fucked up," she says, but there's nothing mocking about it. It gets somewhat of a laugh out of Amber. A wet, non-committal laugh that catches at the back of her throat and forces her to clear her throat, albeit a bit disjointedly.

And then Amber feels a warm hand on both sides of her jaw, tilting her chin upwards and practically forcing her to make eye contact with the girl in front of her. "You look a damned mess. C'mon, let's get you cleaned up."

So, she's being lead to Alysa's bedroom, sitting on Alysa's bed, the bed which she knows is meant to be slept on. It feels a bit too intimate, she thinks, being surrounded by all things Alysa like this, but she doesn't dare to move away, not when Alysa has very firmly directed her to sit down and wait until she returns. Amber scans the room; a desk is pushed to the opposite side of the room adjacent to the bed, scattered with miscellaneous times she can't make out in the dim light, a pile of clothes stand in between the desk and the dresser and the walls are plastered in posters of various bands and movie posters, some pages of artwork that looks like they've been torn out of a sketchbook are dispersed across the wall.

Alysa returns briefly with a clean washcloth in her hand. She plops down next to Amber on the mattress and gently takes Amber's face in her hand, starting to dab carefully at places where Amber is well-aware her mascara has gracelessly run down her face.

Amber can't help but stare at Alysa as she does so, tracing the features on Alysa's face, something she had been too drunk to do that night in her apartment. Alysa cleans her face with the utmost focus while Amber examines the freckles that dot along her cheeks and nose, biting back a small smile when she notices that the moles on Alysa's face could make for a perfect game of Connect 4.

Alysa makes another quick trip to the bathroom to discard the washcloth. When she returns, she's standing directly in front of Amber, barely two feet apart from her – Amber thinks of how easy it would be to just reach out and grab a hold of Alysa's shirt and pull her in, her hands itching where they sit by her side.

There's a sigh coming from above her and Amber looks up, only to be met with dark eyes that are overshadowed with something almost akin to pity – and Amber starts to feel her resolve crumble, the regret of making the decision to come here already starting to seep in, that is until Alysa reaches out a hand to grasp at her chin, tilting her head so that she's looking at her properly.

"Look at me," Alysa commands gently, Amber doesn't peel her eyes away from the brunette's face. "Mhm, look me in the eye and tell me what it is that you want."

Amber's throat runs dry, all the feelings from earlier swept away from the shore when Alysa looks at her like that, like she's asking for an answer she's unsure she's even capable of giving. "What?" Amber's mutters, voice straining slightly under the pressure of Alysa's gaze.

What she doesn't expect is for Alysa to lean down, putting her hands on the mattress right next to Amber's thighs, lips ghosting over Amber's ear like how she vividly remembers all those nights ago. "Tell me what you want, Amber. Let me help you," and then she has the audacity to pull away to stare Amber dead in the eyes.

An inexplicable feeling rises inside her, rumbling low and deep where it looms in the farthest depths of her stomach. There are far too many emotions swirling inside those pools of brown and Amber doesn't know which one to focus on – not with the way Alysa's gazing into her eyes, holding a certain kind of possessiveness in them that makes Amber's heart race and her guts churn.

"I want to – I want you to kiss me," Amber croaks out, heart in her mouth and all.

Alysa nods, hand gliding upwards to brush a stray strand of hair from Amber's face before cupping her jaw, her thumb brushes against her cheekbone, sliding downwards until the pad of her thumb brushes against Amber's bottom lip and she parts it—

"Open your mouth a little," Alysa tells her. Amber can feel the blood rushing into her brain and before she knows it, Alysa's leaning in and slotting her lips right up against her in a kiss that has Amber melting into far too quickly for her brain to comprehend – and then she's pulling away.

Amber blinks open, a query ready at the tip of her tongue before Alysa leans back in. The kiss lasts longer this time, she feels the gentle glide of metal against her lips and pushes forward, practically trying to chase Alysa's lips before a firm hand rests on her shoulder.

A little smile stretches itself across Alysa's lips. "Easy, girl," she gives a gentle peck to Amber's lips, further coating them in clear gloss. "I'm not going anywhere."

Alysa's words land deep in Amber's chest. Her hands clench into fists where they sit atop her thighs – which Alysa seems to notice, pulling each hand away with both hands, intertwining her fingers with Amber's and pinning them down beside her. Amber cranes her neck slightly forward and Alysa leans in, just as delicate, closing the distance between them and letting the kiss linger for a little longer this time.

The sound of the kiss rings loud in Amber's ears when she pulls away. There's an insatiable hunger that starts within her when Alysa beams down at her, looking at her like she may as well be the most precious thing she's ever seen.

She tugs her hands slightly from where Alysa has her trapped in her grasp. "What is it?" Alysa asks, a chuckle leaving her lips and Amber can feel her breath against her lips and she wants more.

"I wanna touch you."

Alysa's throat bobs subtly as she swallows. "Yeah? Maybe if you ask nicely…"

Amber releases a shuddering breath. "Alysa, can I touch you?" But there's no sign of Alysa letting her hands go anytime soon, so she tries again, voice dropping down to a whisper this time. "Please?"

The familiar warmth of another hand on hers leaves her, and Amber is quick to reach her hands out, bunching Alysa's shirt into fistfuls in her hands, the fabric riding up her thighs and her stomach. She looks up at Alysa pleadingly, like it's enough to get her point across even though she knows it's not.

Alysa's hands return to land on top of Amber's. "Be patient, okay?" She directs, relishing in the soft, frustrated groan reverberating from Amber's throat. She delivers an apology in the form of planting generous kisses along flushed skin, starting from the behind Amber's ear – sensitive, she hums – down to the base of her throat and to the open neckline of her dress until she's kneeling down in front of her.

Slender fingers find their way to the back of Alysa's scalp, treading through thick locks of hair. Amber is grateful enough that she's seated, because the image of Alysa on her knees, expression morphing into something pleading and insistent, is enough to make her knees buckle and her breath falter in her lungs.

Alysa proceeds to push the hem of Amber's dress up her thighs, seemingly possessed by an otherworldly thing when she decides to press a kiss to the inner skin of Amber's knee, looking devilishly up at her when she asks. "Can I?"

And all Amber can do is nod, conjuring up images of Alysa bunching her dress up around her waist and pushing her panties aside, but instead she instructs Amber to lift up her arms and her brain damn-near stops, but she does and she lets it happen – lets Alysa pull the dress off of her body completely until she's left in nothing but a matching pair of lacey bra and underwear.

She doesn't miss the soft gasp that escapes Alysa's lips as she ogles her, hands resting on the toned muscles of Amber's thighs, tongue poking out to wet her lips – Amber feels a hint of shyness creeping into her, subjected to Alysa's gaze where it's nothing if not hunger behind those eyes, sights trained on every muscle visible beneath the smooth expanse of her skin.

Alysa scoffs, her voice dropping to a lower register. "Seriously? Danny can't handle all that."

Amber winces at the mention of his name, but smiles nonetheless. She's never felt so exposed, despite not even being fully naked, but the way Alysa's eyes seem to undress her like this are like a match to the gasoline-soaked logs planted beneath skin. Then, Alysa leans in and kisses her; it's hungry, desperate, and all-consuming, what with the way Alysa runs her hand up the plane of her stomach and rests on one of her breasts. Amber instinctively reaches up to cover Alysa's hand with her own, moaning into Alysa's mouth when she squeezes, and it doesn't stop there.

Fingers dance along her skin until it reaches the clasp of her bra, tapping against the fabric as if asking for permission to which Amber nods frantically. "Take it off," she tries to say but it comes off as more of a whine against Alysa's lips. Her bra is off within seconds, skillfully undone with just one hand and Amber so badly wants to ask her how she did that but she doesn't get to when Alysa pulls away, forehead pressed against hers and breathing hard into the space between them like she wants nothing more than the air exhaled from Amber's lungs to filter into her own.

"You wanna know something?" Alysa asks, clearly not expecting an answer from her, at least not with the way she's rolling one of Amber's nipples with her thumb and it makes Amber's hips jerk forward ever so slightly. Alysa leans in for another hungry kiss, pulling away just enough for her to whisper against Amber's lips. "I've wanted you ever since I saw you in the crowd that one night," Amber can feel the grin pulling at her lips before it morphs into a slight pout. "Imagine my disappointment when you walk into the bar with that stupid little boyfriend of yours."

Amber holds her lip between her teeth when Alysa adjusts her position just so until her teeth catches onto a nipple, tugging slightly and relishing in the saccharine whine that escapes Amber's lips, soothing her by swirling a tongue around the pink nub.

"And here you are," Alysa says, doe-like eyes gleaming in the low light. "In my bed, waiting for me to fuck you."

There Amber is, letting Alysa talk to her like that – it staggers on the edge of being filthy, something that should bring shame to her senses and force her to stop what they're doing, push Alysa off, but instead, here she is, looking at Alysa through her eyelashes with an almost uncontrolled lust she's surprised she hasn't begged pathetically for Alysa to fuck her yet.

With twitching hips and fingers curled so tightly into the sheets beneath her, Amber doesn't dare respond to Alysa's taunt with words, instead choosing to let go of the soft moan that's been building up in her throat ever since Alysa started kissing her neck.

Teeth scratch delicately against Amber's stomach when Alysa returns to her kneeled position. The eye contact is intense, Alysa's eyes refusing to leave hers when she hooks her fingers into the waistband of Amber's panties.

"Alysa, please…" Amber says breathily, desire twisting deep in her gut, her skin feeling like it's on fire. "Need you – your mouth."

There isn't much to be said when Alysa finally pulls the garment down Amber's thighs and discarding it fully when it reaches her ankles. All the oxygen in Amber's lungs threaten to leave when Alysa spreads her legs gently with her hands and hooks her arms under Amber's thighs, leaning just close enough that she can feel the other's warm breath against her pussy.

"Look at you," Alysa says, like she's enamored at the sight in front of her. "Just so fucking wet for me, aren't you?" She teases the pad of her thumb against Amber's lips, pulling them apart slightly and Amber so badly wants to groan when she watches the hunger in Alysa's eyes intensify even in this dimly-lit bedroom.

Alysa then leans in and presses a kiss to Amber's cunt and she just about loses it.

She tries canting her hips forward, chasing the feeling of Alysa's lips on her but to no avail, Alysa's grip on her thighs is strong, grounding in the way it holds her down to the mattress below, unrelenting even when she leans down and licks a delicious stripe from the entrance, tongue gliding upwards before eventually flicking gently at Amber's clit, finally giving her what she wants.

It pulls a hopeless moan out of Amber's throat, which seems to be fuel to the fire burning inside Alysa, because she repeats the motion again, gathering wetness with her tongue and swirling it around her clit with just enough pressure that it feels good but not so much to drive her to a quick orgasm.

Amber makes the mistake of looking down and locks eyes with Alysa who continues to lap at her cunt, tongue prodding into Amber's entrance, fucking into her all while staring into her eyes and Amber doesn't miss it – the way Alysa's eyes darken, swirling with overwhelming want and desire it only pushes her deeper into Amber's pussy, all for the sake of watching the girl above her twitch and writhe, coming undone on her tongue.

Amber cries out, a stray hand reaches out to tangle itself into Alysa's hair, pressing against her scalp in an attempt to beg for more. The sound her lips make against Amber's cunt; wet and messy and loud only threatens to push Amber to the edge, then she moans and Amber feels the vibration throughout her entire body and it pulls a broken sound out of her. Alysa mumbles something against her, not that Amber can hear it but it feels like intricate tendrills of pleasure reaching in and wrapping themselves around her and she lets it – lets it pull her in, feels herself crashing into a hot, white peak as she comes undone on Alysa's waiting tongue.

Alysa doesn't relent immediately. She doesn't stop the ministrations against Amber's cunt, regardless of the pleading whines sounding above and much less regard for the way Amber throbs violently against her mouth, all sensitive and delicate and it only triggers Alysa to go on, practically making out with her pussy in a coveted attempt to soothe her from the previous orgasm.

She feels it before she hears it, Amber's thighs twitching where they're trapped in Alysa's arms as she's forced into another orgasm. Alysa chances a glance upwards and sees Amber's lips forming a perfect ring, the hand on the back of her head showing no signs of letting go and it makes her grin slightly, pressing one last kiss on Amber's oversensitive pussy before pulling away completely.

"Fuck, what the actual fuck," Amber lets herself fall backwards onto the mattress, "is wrong with you." She says, but there's no hint of irritation behind her words, as tired and breathy as they are. Alysa shifts upwards, torso pressed against Amber's as she leans in to give her a kiss, her mess still evidently sticking to Alysa's skin, on her lips, her chin, her nose and just about everywhere on her face.

Amber doesn't stop her, in fact, she sighs into it and cards her fingers through Alysa's hair as she tastes herself on Alysa's tongue, sucking on it gently in a way that gets a tiny noise of surprise from the girl on top of her.

She feels Alysa's warm breath against her ear when the girl leans down, nipping gently at the skin beneath Amber's ear before she opens her mouth in a whisper.

"You let him come inside you?" Alysa says teasingly. Amber's eyes widen in pure shock, the realization hitting her like a ton of bricks, she tears her eyes away from the ceiling to stare at Alysa but there's nothing but a naughty grin on her face.

Her blood runs cold as she tries to push her words out. "Shit, I'm so sorry that was—" disgusting? Sure, but Alysa just made her cum twice, and now she's shushing her, index finger pressed against her lips.

"No, nonono, not letting you get another apology in tonight," Alysa tuts, catching Amber in a moment of surprise by planting a kiss to her lips and watching the horrific post-nut clarity paint itself across her features. "I don't mind. In fact, I think it's kinda hot," she mutters lazily, brushing her nose slightly against Amber's.

As if on cue, Amber feels the subtle twitch of something against her stomach and a soft gasp leaves her.

Alysa notices, quirking an eyebrow. "Feel that?" She asks as she grinds her hips lazily against Amber's stomach. "That's how hard you get me." Amber doesn't say a word, poking out her tongue to wet her lips when she feels them going dry within seconds, tasting herself on her tongue and something else that's indescribable.

She swallows thickly, the realization that Alysa is enjoying this – perhaps far too much – sends a shot of adrenaline straight into her bloodstream. The sound of blood galloping against her temples dares her to move her hand downwards, grazing her fingertips down Alysa's back before coming down to what little space exists between them. Her hands find Alysa's bulge and she carefully wraps her fingers around it, pressing her palm against the outline of Alysa's cock and breathing in the soft exhale that leaves Alysa's lungs.

She could do this forever, she thinks, watching Alysa like this – resolve or her lack thereof, whatever she'd allowed to exist before going down on her knees and eating Amber out until she sees stars, crumbling just from the slightest pressure on her dick.

Alysa's eyes are closed, like she's savoring the feel of Amber's hand on her clothed cock, seemingly holding back from grinding deeper against Amber's hand. She opens them a moment later, unable to help the lazy smile that stretches across her lips when she notices Amber's eyes already searching for hers.

There's a beat of silence followed by a shaky exhale as Amber slowly hooks her fingers into the waistband of Alysa's shorts, tugging whilst a plea falls short on her tongue. Alysa doesn't peel her gaze away from Amber, stuck on her even when she clears her throat unevenly and tries once again to get the words out of her mouth.

"I want—" Amber manages to choke out, heat pooling low in her stomach when she feels Alysa throb against her, seemingly turned on by her pitiful attempt at asking for it.

Amber tries to put on her best puppy-dog eyes, hoping it's enough for Alysa to take the message and to just take her on, then and there, but it only causes the grin on her face to stretch further and it's maddening, Amber thinks, how easily her resolve falls apart when Alysa looks at her like this.

Fingers come up to brush damp strands of hair sticking to Amber's forehead. "Aww, baby," Alysa coos. "You look so cute looking at me like that. But I'm gonna need you to use your words properly, pretty girl."

There it is. The pet name lands on Amber's heart and it's nothing if not merciless like a bomb propelling straight into her chest. She squeezes her eyes shut, outwardly cringing at herself only to open them back up when she feels Alysa plant a firm, encouraging kiss on her lips.

"C'mon, say it," Alysa says, tone commanding and gentle and it makes something stutter in Amber's chest.

"I wanna feel you inside of me," Amber squeezes daringly, testing out the waters. Alysa suppresses a groan from the back of her throat. "Wanna feel your huge cock stretching me out."

It seems to do the trick, apparently, because Alysa's all over her now, capturing her lips in a heated kiss and Amber wraps her arms around her waist like it's instinct, trying to pull her in closer and for a brief moment she wonders if it's possible for their bodies to merge into one because Alysa's kissing her so fiercely as if being this close simply isn't enough and that she's fueled by a wanton need to crawl beneath Amber's skin and settle there, all warm flesh and strong muscle.

Heavy breaths fill the air when Alysa pulls away, nodding in an upward motion at Amber. "Make yourself comfortable, will you?" Amber doesn't hesitate, shuffling until her head hits the cold of Alysa's pillow and suddenly she's missing the warmth of Alysa's body on top of her.

Amber locks her gaze onto Alysa, who pushes her shorts down her legs before her hands tug on the hem of her shirt and she's pulling upwards, getting it off and letting her clothes fall to the floor in a disorderly pile. She stands still for a little while, as if presenting herself to Amber. On the bed, Amber eyes every curve of her body hungrily, tracing her collarbones and her tits, perky and just begging to be sucked on, but she's quickly distracted by the messy trail of hair shadowing the space beneath Alysa's belly button, accentuated by her hip bones, trailing downwards until she finds a nicely trimmed bush of hair leading to Alysa's cock – already leaking and so, so hard where it rests against her stomach and the sight of it alone sends arousal shooting straight through her spine, pulsing red-hot as she pushes her legs together and looks to Alysa with a beckoning gaze.

The mattress shifts with Alysa's weight when she plants her knees on either side of Amber's legs. Amber feels warm hands on her knees in an instant, spreading them further apart until she's fully exposed – once again – in front of Alysa, the cold air that welcomes her doing nothing to quell the heat that rises inside her, especially not with the way Alysa's practically drooling as she looks down at her.

Nothing could've prepared her for what Alysa does next. She'd imagined it in her mind before Alysa had motioned over, expecting a cute remark from her before telling her to ask nicely. Unfortunately for her sanity, Alysa opens her mouth and lets a long string of spit fall from between her lips, descending down and briefly catching the light before Amber feels it between her legs.

It forces a sharp inhale into Amber's lungs, and she feels the urge to close her legs again, but Alysa is much quicker, firm hands planting on the inside of her thighs as she forces Amber's legs open.

A soft sound escapes her at the feeling. Alysa's hand finds her again, rubbing gentle circles onto her clit and the motion makes Amber's back arch off the mattress.

A hand is quick to hold her down, though, Alysa shifts forward ever so slightly until her one hand is fully pinning Amber's hips down with half of her weight.

"Tell me if it's too much," she feels Alysa's thumb rub gently at her skin, sending a soft ache straight to her chest, but it dies down when Alysa uses her spit and Amber's slick to play with her clit and Amber finds herself having to suppress a cry when she sees Alysa grab the base of her cock and rubs her wet tip against her cunt, pressing onto her clit just enough to get Amber to squirm and a sob breaks free from the confines of her throat.

"Alysa," she whines, both hands covering Alysa's where it rests on her stomach. Alysa stops, turning her attention to Amber's now tear-stricken face.

Alysa presses forward and Amber has to bite back a strangled moan when she feels the delicious drag of a vein against her clit. A soft tap against her cheek forces her to meet Alysa's eyes, all while her cock pulses urgently against Amber's lower half.

"My eyes are up here, doll," Alysa says innocently, but her actions seem to do the complete opposite. She shifts her hips until the tip of cock nudges against Amber's entrance. "Talk to me."

"I can't – I don't know, fuck, I can't, I can't think," Amber tries to grind her hips forward, trying to see if she can get the tip to push in just a little deeper, but the hand from before returns, pressing down onto her muscled abdomen and holding her down once more.

"Use your words properly or I won't fuck you," Alysa says sternly, like she means it this time. The words run in circles around the muddled state of Amber's brain, she weakly attempts to clear her over-driven subconscious despite the awareness that the contents of her skull is probably, probably leaking straight through her cunt.

"Want you to fuck me," Amber manages, a tear slips down the side of her face. "God, Alysa, I need it so fucking bad. Please. I wanna feel you for days."

That does it.

With a soft inhale, Alysa guides her cock through wet folds, right to the entrance where she pushes forward, breaching Amber's lips and swallowing the broken sound that falls from her with her own mouth until she finally bottoms out, pushing her whole length inside of Amber.

Alysa holds herself up by the forearms, caging Amber's toned form between her body and the mattress. She starts to thrust, shallow at first, paying close attention to any shift in Amber's expression that might allude to any ounce of discomfort towards the stretch of her pussy around Alysa's cock, that is until she feels nails digging into her hips, pushing her deeper in a silent plea.

Alysa gets the message, speeding up her thrusts and Amber pushes down the urge to roll her eyes to the back of her skull. Alysa feels so fucking deep inside her like this and she wants nothing more than to keep her there, between her legs and staring down lovingly at Amber, her breathy moans and whimpers mixed with her name every now and then playing like a mantra in Amber's mind and putting her in a trance she doesn't want to get out of.

"Fuck, look at you," Alysa breathes out mid-thrust. "Pretty girl, taking my cock so well." Amber preens at the praise, nodding frantically at her words. Alysa pushes herself up until she hovers over Amber's body and allowing the girl beneath her to get a good look of her face. Alysa looks star-stricken, Amber thinks, painfully stunning with her sweat-slicked face and flushed cheeks and Amber thinks she wants to burn this image behind her eyelids forever, wants to count the constellations that dot along her cheeks and trace her fingers over every single one of Alysa's moles.

Amber notices a bead of sweat running down Alysa's chest and yearns to lunge upward and press her tongue against Alysa's neck to taste the salt on her skin. Alysa's thrust falters slightly, her fingers twitching where she has a hand on Amber's stomach now, looking down hungrily, lips parted and all.

"Holy fuck," Alysa moans, laughing slightly. Amber's brow furrows and she follows Alysa's gaze to see what she's staring at, and it doesn't take her long to notice, definitely not with the way Alysa splays her fingers over her stomach, pressing down carefully against skin pulled taut. Amber gasps upon noticing the slight bulge that seems to appear in her stomach where Alysa's cock is nestled deep inside her and it sends a violent shock of arousal through her.

Something flashes in Alysa's eyes when she drags her gaze from Amber's abdomen and to her face – it's almost… animalistic, is one of the only ways Amber could describe it. Feral. Deprived of something she has only known for a short while but craves more of. Alysa's hand finds hers and instantly aligns it to the base of her stomach. "Can you feel it?" She pulls her hips back, then pushes forward. "Look at how my cock bulges against your stomach – holy shit, Amber… so fucking pretty."

Amber whimpers shamelessly, reveling in the movement of Alysa's cock sliding in and out of her presenting itself on her stomach. "You're so fucking big," Amber sobs. "I don't know if I can take it."

Alysa is quick to lean down, elbows firmly placed against near her sides. "Oh, sweet girl," she gives a slow, languid thrust, relishing in the whine it pulls from Amber. "Yes you can, baby. I'll make you take it, hm?" She says, shifting slightly to allow room for her to put her hand under the back of Amber's knee to hook it over her shoulder, her other hand pushes her farther apart. Taking advantage of Amber's flexibility, she leans forward, partially fold Amber in half until her lips are just a breadth away from Amber's.

Alysa closes the distance briefly to give Amber a kiss. It's tender, almost apologetic. Amber wants to say something, to ask Alysa to move but she reads her mind before the words get to come out, her kiss being the last warning before she all but jackhammers her cock into her.

Amber cries out in surprise, her hand coming up to grasp Alysa's bicep, eliciting a grunt from the girl on top of her when she scratches her nails against the skin, leaving angry red marks in its wake.

Sweat drips down Alysa's eyebrow as she pounds relentlessly into Amber, fingernails digging into the soft flesh of Amber's skin, the obscene sounds of their hips colliding with each other, skin against skin fills the room until whatever thought that lingered in Amber's brain becomes muted, turning to mush with each squelch of her cunt that fills the space between them.

"You showed up at my door with cum already dripping out of this pussy and think I wouldn't do something about it?" Alysa says, watching amusedly at the crease that makes itself known between Amber's brows. "You let your boyfriend come inside you, bet you wouldn't mind if I did the same now, would you?"

A pretty sound falls from Amber's lips. She feels the way Alysa's hips falter for a brief moment—

"Yeah," Amber chokes out, pulling her bottom lip between her teeth.

A delicious moan is drawn out of her when Alysa delivers a particularly devastating roll of her lips, driving her cock further into Amber's soaked cunt, aided by slick and spit that's starting to soak the sheets beneath them. Alysa tightens her grip on Amber's thigh. "Yeah what?"

"I'd let you come inside me," Amber bravely declares. "Just like how I let him do it."

That seems to crack something within Alysa. She pulls back before fucking into Amber in a way that knocks the breath out of her lungs, but she stays there, unmoving as she catches her breath – lets her cock throb insistently where it sits snug inside Amber's pussy.

"Tell me," Alysa demands, breath still heavy.

Amber's voice strains when she responds. "What?"

"Tell me I'm better," her voice grows quieter, her words settling into the space between them. Amber can't say that it's comfortable.

"Tell me I fuck you better than he ever could," Alysa rolls her hips experimentally. Amber's hips jerk up to meet hers.

"Alysa, that's—" insane, is what she wants to say. But Alysa's looking at her with the most serious expression Amber has ever seen on the girl, and it does nothing but soften her already-weakened heart.

"I know I do," Alysa pulls back to plant a kiss to the side of Amber's thigh. "I just wanna hear you say it." She rocks her hips against Amber a few times, because she can't help herself. Neither of them can, but she stops quickly and lets Amber's leg fall from her shoulder, gripping Amber's hips as she looks longingly into her eyes.

"Please, Amber," there's a quiver in Alysa's voice that almost goes unnoticed, but Amber catches it. It's vulnerable and it's fulfilling its intended purpose; pulling at her heartstrings even when Alysa's inches deep and pulsating inside her.

"No one fucks me better than you do," Amber releases a shuddering breath. "Nobody. Especially not him – fuck, Alysa," she gasps when Alysa delivers a particularly hard thrust, lips curled into a small smile as she watches Amber squirm beneath her, canting her hips forward where Alysa's hands still have a steady grip on them.

"Yeah?"

Amber nods frenziedly, composure gradually slipping away as Alysa maintains the steady thrust of her cock into her warmth. "Alysa, I'm so close."

Alysa lets out a moan at the feeling of Amber's walls fluttering around her length. "Fuck, okay, yeah," she leans forward until their chests are pressed flush against each other's, Amber doesn't hesitate to throw an arm across her shoulder, legs instinctively wrapping themselves around Alysa's waist as if pulling her in deeper and deeper.

"Gonna make you come so good," Alysa whispers against her neck, taking in her scent, teeth grazing against sensitive skin. Amber feels herself getting pushed to the cliff's edge, the promise of an impending orgasm setting fire to the heat pooling in her belly. She knots a hand into Alysa's hair, relishing in the hearty groan it gets from her as she pulls back slightly to ghost her lips over the shell of Alysa's ear.

"Promise?"

It causes something to snap, because Alysa looks to her and Amber can see the way her pupils dilate even in the low light and it sends a shiver down her spine. Alysa looks fucking feral like this, like she's just about ready to swallow Amber whole and Amber's thought interrupts her through the fog, she thinks she's never seen anything quite like this, and even if she has, she's certain it's not as beautiful as Alysa looks right now.

"If that's what you want, then that's what you're gonna get," Alysa snaps her hips forward, pressing her lips against Amber's as she does, muffling the pleas and moans that spill out of her as she steadily pounds into Amber.

Amber can feel her getting closer, with the way she tucks her head closer to Amber's neck, babbling about everything and nothing all at once, desperate pleas running from her lips as she continuously drives her hips forward, pubic bone stimulating Amber's clit until Amber thinks momentarily that it all feels like too much.

She's about to come, she knows that, and she knows Alysa is on the verge of it, too, hips moving frantically against Amber's and forcing her to feel every vein, every delicious ridge of her cock rubbing against her walls, hitting her spot over and over again until a string of warnings leave her lips as her orgasm appears closer and closer within reach.

"Alysa, please, pleasepleaseplease—" Alysa says nothing in response, letting out a mere hum as she shallowly pumps into Amber's slick cunt. "I'm gonna fucking come, ohmygod."

A broken sound leaves Alysa's throat. "Me too, Amber, shit."

"Come inside me, please. I need it—"

"Yeah? That bad?"

"Baby," Amber whines, tears pooling in eyes. "Your cock feels so good inside me, I wanna feel you filling me up."

Alysa brushes her thumbs under Amber's eyes, seemingly spurred on by the tears that have started to fall. "Mmh, gonna be a good girl and let me breed you?"

Something stutters hard in Amber's chest. "Yes, Alysa, yesyesyes—"

The sound of skin slapping against skin doesn't fade, instead becoming louder until it rings against their ears.

"'M gonna breed you," Alysa mumbles into Amber's salt-soaked skin. "Fill you up so fucking good you don't even think about running back to him."

That does it. Amber comes with a cry, Alysa following seconds after with a sharp gasp of her own and an incoherent string of curses as she stills. She feels thick ropes of cum pooling in inside her, pushed deeper into her cunt as Alysa eases her through the orgasm, cock throbbing in violent pulses as she continues to spill inside of Amber.

It takes Amber several minutes to come back to earth, relaxing the death grip she has on Alysa's body. Alysa's catching her breath where she has her head tucked into Amber's neck, absentmindedly massaging her hips as she comes down from her high. Slim fingers press gently onto the bulge in her belly, Alysa pulls her hips back, a wet, filthy noise occupying the space between them briefly as she slowly eases her cock from slick warmth and the sensation draws a sharp hiss out of Amber.

The mixture of her and Alysa's cum slowly trickles from Amber's cunt. As if the sheets aren't wet enough, she's certain they're soaked now. Alysa presses a kiss to her neck, gentle and reverent like she didn't just fuck her brains out barely less than 10 minutes ago.

"You okay? I didn't hurt you, did I?" Alysa perks her head up to stare at her. Amber reaches a hand up to rub her thumb against the space between Alysa's eyebrows where a hint of worry is starting to show.

"No, you did good. Really good," Amber says softly, smiling hard when Alysa ducks her head back into Amber's nape shyly, a tint of red already visible in the darkness of the bedroom. "Seriously?" Alysa's what is muffled as she mumbles into the pillow. "You just came inside me and now you're being all shy about it?"

A groan reverberates in Alysa's chest. She pushes her head off the pillow, shifting her position until she's looking directly at Amber's face. "Okay. Hi," she chides, face flushed in a way that makes Amber lean up to peck at her lips before letting her grin widen. "I'm glad to know I made you feel good."

Alysa's voice drops down to a quiet register and it lands in Amber's chest, makes her heart do a funny little flip, but it starts to shift into a sinking feeling once she realizes where she really is. Alysa doesn't miss it, because of course she doesn't.

"Hey," she nudges her gently. "What's wrong?" Technically, she already knows the answer to that, but for the sake of easing the burdens that she knows is sitting heavily on Amber's chest, she listens.

"I don't even know what happens after this, Alysa, I—" Amber's throat closes up, but Alysa's hands are quick to cup her face. Her touch feels warm, grounding, settling deep beneath her ribs. "I don't know."

"Look at me," Alysa instructs. Amber does just so. "Here's what's gonna happen: you're gonna get your shit together, and you'll do whatever it is you need to do because I know you can," Alysa leans down to press her forehead against Amber's. "And I'll be right here if you need me."

Amber lets air filter into her lungs before exhaling deeply. "You're not gonna flee the country in the middle of me breaking up with my boyfriend?" She jokes, but a part of her can't help actually imagine it happening.

Alysa laughs, and Amber feels it deep in her chest. "I want you, Amber," she admits, expression shifting into something serious as she licks her lips. "This is like the most fucked up situation we could've found ourselves in," she chuckles at her own admission. "But God, do I want you. Like, the mere thought of not having you just kinda hurts and I – I don't know what the hell to do with myself, okay? I don't, I really don't."

"I want you, too," Amber says, letting the admission settle deep into the space between them, a certain kind of finality to it. "I'll figure it out. We'll figure it out." She mutters, slowly leaning into Alysa's space for a kiss. It's a lot more gentle this time, lacking the desperation and urgency from before. Amber lets herself indulge in, savoring the softness of Alysa's lips against hers, moaning softly when Alysa's smiley piercing grazes her tongue. Amber feels her cock harden, twitching where it's sandwiched between their stomachs.

"Are you being for real right now?" Amber says playfully once she pulls away. "All I did was kiss you."

Alysa gawks at her with a dopey smile on her face. "What? Can't blame me, you're a good kisser," she leans in, peppering kisses onto the skin of Amber's neck. "And I can't stop thinking about how you looked earlier taking all of my cum, such a pretty girl." Alysa nuzzles into her, and Amber can feel the arousal slowly coming back to life within her, groaning when she feels a gush of wetness coming out of her entrance, still leaking with their combined juices.

"Mmh, wanna come inside me again?" Amber suppresses a laugh when Alysa's head shoots up attentively. Her flush tip leaks steadily against Amber's stomach now, coating their skin in sticky slick.

"Say that again and I'll breed you for real this time," Alysa rubs her thumb along Amber's bottom lip before pushing it in and watching as the pink muscle swirls around the tip. "Do what we both know your boyfriend could never do better."

Amber's cunt throbs at her words and she whines shamelessly with her swollen lips wrapped around Alysa's thumb.

Alysa leans forward and Amber allows it, Lets her cock stretch out her sensitive heat one more time, lets herself get pounded into oblivion once more, Alysa's name spilling from her lips like a sacred thing when she bottoms out and spills inside her a second time. Alysa holds her when she is boneless and pliant in Alysa arms and she lets it, even through tears she doesn't recall shedding. Amber lets Alysa take her to the bathroom where she cleans her up and presses soft kisses to her lips and forehead all while whispering the sweetest of praise into the air before they end up on Alysa's bed again and she's curled up with her head against Amber's chest, lulled by the quiet sounds of Amber's steady breathing and her fingernails scratching softly at her scalp.

It feels good, Amber thinks, having somebody care for her like this and allowing her to just be. The future holds much for Amber to worry about, but she allows herself to be eased into comfort she has not come to know in a long time, right here, with Alysa tracing her name into the skin of her hip and the buzzing warmth of something sweeter spreading throughout her veins

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