"What happened?" asked Giselle, reaching to touch the cut on his eyebrow.

Xavier's dark eyes widened ever so slightly, then his jaw locked. "Don't worry about it."

"Xavier," she whispered. "How did this happen?"

A slash on his right eyebrow marred his handsome face, the wound swollen. It wasn't too big, but what concerned her the most was that it didn't look like he'd gotten it from a fistfight, not to mention her inability to imagine him getting into one at all. The cut looked too clean as if it was sliced open by a knife.

"I said, don't worry about it." He crossed his arms over his back leather jacket and looked at her with all traces of smiles erased. Now that she thought about it, had she ever seen him smile properly?

She huffed, trying not to sound angry as she said, "Who did it?"

Xavier's both marred and perfect eyebrows elevated. "Why? Will you kill him?"

"What kind of a ridiculous question is that?"

He shrugged. "You tell me."

Her hands raised in a gesture of what-are-you-even-talking-about, then she blinked twice. "Do I have the right to inquire about your injury at all?"

"Don't worry about it."

It was like talking to a stranger. Although she shouldn't have judged him by their only interaction that week, he didn't seem anything like the man she'd spent the last year chatting with through the nights.

Giselle opened her mouth to argue, but a voice interrupted her.

"Mate!"

She turned toward the man to her left. He scanned her from bottom to top, his hands folded in front of him, tongue pushing on his cheek from the inside. His dark straight hair reached down to his shoulders, and he was clad in black leather similar to Xavier's.

"What?" replied Xavier, his eyes meeting Giselle's for a fleeting second before they turned toward him.

"Won't you introduce me to your plaything?" he asked, his lips stretching into a grin.

Her head whipped toward Xavier with the accusation of letting someone he knew to call her that way, then wondered if it was even herself that the man had called a plaything. But her boyfriend didn't look at her.

Xavier ran a hand through his hair. "What is the matter, Rais?"

"Ashley is gonna kill you."

Her heart dropped to the pit of her stomach. Ashley?

"She means nothing to me," he replied, his words tumbling out fast.

"You know she'd kill for you, right?" He shoved his hands in the pockets of his black leather pants, still grinning.

Bile rose to her throat and she gulped down her suspicions with it, contemplating ditching everything and returning home without a word.

Xavier let out an impatient breath. "Is there a point to this conversation or do you like to hear yourself talk?"

The man shrugged. "Meeting at seven. Sean wants you there."

Xavier nodded, then waved his hand at Rais to dismiss him, who gave Giselle a fleeting glance before retreating to where he'd come from.

"Who's Ashley?" she asked before she could stop herself.

Xavier looked at her for a moment before saying, "An extra weight on the Earth."

She pursed her lips, waited for a few moments, then let out a breath. "I trust you, okay? But if you're into someone else..." Her voice shook and she cleared her throat. "If you're into someone else, please let me know so I can leave with dignity. Don't lead me on."

He threw his umbrella on the ground, rested his hands on her arms, and ducked down to be closer to her face. He leaned in and pecked her lips softly, then looked at her with disappointment. "I don't know how you can doubt my love."

Her eyebrows furrowed involuntarily. "I'm not doubting your love. I'm just saying that--"

He straightened, placed a kiss on her head, and said, "Have you visited the graveyard yet?"

She sighed, a thousand words stifled inside her brain at the abrupt end of the conversation. "No."

"Want me to take you?" he said against her hair.

She wondered whether she'd be comfortable with that but didn't have the strength to argue. "Sure."

Her words drowned with the roars of the clouds, as rain drummed a beat. Xavier picked up his umbrella, and opened it, sheltering them both under it. She slipped her footwear on. He held her hand and lead her to sit on one of the rocks, waiting for the rain to halt so they could go to the graveyard.

Giselle didn't let herself think too much about Rais or what he had insinuated. Maybe they worked together. Maybe Ashley was a co-worker as well.

"Where do you work?" she asked as the rain slowed down into a drizzle.

He licked his lips. "Oh, uh, well, um..."

"You said you did social work for a living," she said to jog his memory, his hesitation starting to annoy her.

"Yeah. Um, at Amara Orphanage. It's near where I live." He looked at her and gave her a small smile--the first one of the day.

She paused. Did she know anything about him at all? All their conversations over text messages were random. She would talk about the silliest things. He'd sometimes send "hahaha" when she'd mention the city culture or everyone's focus on keeping a good front in society because he considered it shallow. That used to unsettle her. But mostly, it was all laughter and silly talk.

There had been toxic moments, too. One thing similar between him and Chris was that neither liked the other. Whenever she'd talk to Xavier about how her day went, and Chris was there with her most of the time, he'd either steer the conversation in another direction or shut down completely, replying with one-word answers.

She never told him that it hurt. She would've preferred clearer communication.

"Where do you live?" she asked, ignoring her negative thoughts.

A slight disappointment was all it took for her mind to start overthinking. Sometimes this made her wonder if she had Borderline Personality Disorder, but then every Psychology major inexpertly self-diagnoses at one point or another.

He squeezed her hand then let it go, folding the umbrella as the rain stopped, and he said, "Nearby."

Right. It was funny how someone could differ so much from your idea of them. She wondered what it was about their text messages that encouraged smooth and endless conversations. In reality, although he was the same person, it felt like she didn't know him at all.

"Shall we?" he asked softly.

She nodded. He took her hand in his again and together they headed toward the cemetery where her mother's grave awaited her.

A cold wind blew as an aftermath of the ten minutes of rain. She shivered, and her feet got stuck in the mud as she made her way to the tombstone.

Goosebumps formed all over her body when she spotted the grave among the hundreds that dotted the uneven landscape. Unable to decide whether she wanted to leave or stay, she stopped walking. Xavier stood behind her patiently.

After a few moments, Giselle took a deep breath and walked forward again. Her legs wobbled slightly. The backside of her head hurt due to the sobs she was trying to keep in.

Upon reaching the grave adorned with a beautiful assortment of red roses, Giselle dropped to her knees for her mother.

The scent of the flowers enveloped the headstone like a blanket, bringing back the memories of her parents' room. Whenever her father could, he'd bring his wife a few roses, for she used to love them. Little Giselle would steal the flowers, then she'd stick them wherever she could in her room to mimic a jungle. Giselle remembered her mother standing against the doorframe to watch her five-year-old become a tigress and roar.

Giselle wanted to call her. She wanted to say the word "mom" and not have silence be the only reply. Words weren't needed to tell her how much she missed her warmth, so she slowly laid her head on the surface and closed her eyes. When she was a kid, she'd be in the same position on her mother's bosom and listen to her heartbeat. But all that greeted her now was the hard surface pressed against her cheek.

Nothing could replace the warmth of a mother except, perhaps, the cold surface of her own grave.

Nauseated, she got up abruptly and let Xavier hold her for a while. Her tears fell, and she wondered if it was ever going to get easier.

"Please take me somewhere else," she whispered to him.

He kissed the top of her head. "Okay."

A few moments later, they sat in the park where they'd waved at each other every year before meeting for the first time.

There weren't many people there. A man in his thirties sat on the farthest bench with a cup in his hand from which the steam rose, either enjoying the weather or trying to wear off his worries. An elderly couple held hands as they took a walk around the park. Even with crouched backs and gray hair, they still managed to make each other smile. It was proof that love could last forever.

She felt Xavier's eyes on her while she played with the grass, pulling it out, throwing it away, and repeating it. She looked up at him but his eyes were fixated on the grass she was pulling.

"Xav," called Giselle, her voice hoarse.

He didn't move, lost in his own world. He was frowning as if re-living a crippling memory that could turn a twenty-five-year-old soul like him into a sixty-year-old one. Was that why he had a hard time smiling or communicating? Had he lost someone, too?

She asked, "Are you okay?" He didn't reply, so she called him louder, "Xavier."

He blinked twice and looked at her. "Sorry, did you say something?"

"I asked if you were okay." She licked her dry lips.

He sighed, reached toward her, and held her hand. "I should be the one asking you that."

She managed a smile. "I'm fine."

He stared at her. "Are you really?"

She nodded and looked down.

"Do you wanna talk about it?" he asked

"About mom?"

He squeezed her hand, his skin rough against her soft one. "Yeah."

She inhaled deeply, then let it out in shudders. She shook her head and looked up at him again. "Talk about yours."

"My what?" His throat bobbed as he gulped.

She smiled at him warmly. "Your family, of course. Your mother..."

He clenched his jaw and let her hand slip out of his. Giselle's eyebrows knitted.

"What?" she asked. "Did I say something wrong?"

He shook his head but stayed silent. It was another topic, she realized, he wasn't ready to discuss. Not having the strength to plead, she looked down again.

"My mother was," he began, and Giselle's eyes snapped up to meet his. Pausing, he took a breath, then continued, "She was beautiful. Loving. Sacrificing. Sometimes, I wonder how she did it all... That kind of patience is possessed by mothers only."

His gaze dropped to the ground as he gulped. She stared at him, startled by the pain in his voice.

He said, "She'd knitted our misbalanced family so well. She had the most beautiful blonde hair, you know. And she loved to paint. Sometimes she'd save up a little money to buy a single color so she could continue the canvas she was working on. Sometimes she'd paint the walls if inspired. We were happy." He hissed as if hurt and fell silent.

She waited for a few moments before saying, "What happened?"

His eyes met hers and she saw fire in them. "She died."

She whispered, "How?"

He stared at her, blood starting to slowly branch out in the corners of his eyes.

When he said nothing, she called, "Xavier?"

"What?"

Her heart dropped at his tone, but she held her own. She knew what it was like to keep things buried in till they ate you up. She knew he had to let out whatever storm destroyed him on the inside, even if it hurt her in the process.

She placed her hand on his and rubbed in soothing motions. "I'm here for you."

He looked away. "Okay."

"Do you wanna talk about it?" she asked tentatively.

He let out an exasperated sigh and looked at her. "Please stop forcing me, Giselle. If I wanted to talk about it, I wouldn't need pestering."

Heat rose to her cheeks, her lower lip quivered, and she looked around the park to see if anyone had noticed his behavior.

She removed her hand from his. "Fine."

"Shit." He turned his body toward her. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap at you. Of course, you can ask me anything you want. You can annoy me. I'm yours to--"

"It's okay." She forced a smile at him.

"No, it's not. I don't know what came over me. My family is not something I like to talk about--"

"Among other things."

He blinked. "I'm sorry. I'm just not comfortable with it."

She wondered if he knew that she respected his need for privacy and that it wasn't something she'd gotten offended by. It was the tone of his voice. It was the words he'd chosen to snap at her with.

"Then I won't pester you about it. Don't worry."

He sighed. "I'm saying sorry, Giselle."

She closed her eyes for a moment. "Thank you."

Sorry--what a sorry word. People, sure, used it without realizing what it referred to. It didn't just mean that they regretted what they did. It was also a promise to refrain from making the same mistakes again. But unfortunately, 'sorry' had become just a weightless word that people liked to throw around as a band-aid to cover the wounds that their toxic behavior inflicted.

"Are you mad at me?" he asked.

"No," she said, unable to muster the energy to be upset. "I just wanna go home."

He understood.

Back at home, Giselle lay on her bed, stifling her cries. Everything was falling apart that day.

Xavier's behavior made her heart hurt. Although she excused his harshness with the reason that he had his own problems, at the back of her head she knew that love had made her weak.

Her mother's face kept surfacing in her mind, reminding her of the warmth she'd never be able to experience again.

Her father's grief was starting to eat him up again, and she felt scared of losing him the way she had in the first few months after her mother's death.

Her eyes burned and the tears fell endlessly. And that particular night, she missed Chris a lot.