"Cute."

[Name] covered her mouth to hide her blush throughout the day. Up until now she was still flustered by the action that Hanako did recently. "My gosh...you're such a handful..." [Name] brushed her hair back using her fingers. Yashiro noticed how spaced out [Name] is so she decided to wave her hand in front of her friend.

"[Name]? You've been spacing out lately and whoah—your face is completely red!" Yashiro pointed out with a worried look on her face might be because you have a fever.

"I-I'm fine Yashiro!" [Name] nervously smiled while swatting her hands.

"Why are you blushing with Hanako-kun in the bathroom then?" Yashiro looked at her in suspicion while moving her face closer to [Name]. Her face went red all of a sudden as she pulled Yashiro away from her to answer her question.

"It's not like that!" [Name] clarified.

"Wait, don't tell me, did you guys kiss—?" Yashiro covered her mouth in shock, hiding her smile that she was right all along when she said that [Name] is going to fall in love with Hanako.

[Name] leaned back against her chair as she covered her eyes with the back of her arm. "Can I just jump over the window?" She asked since she was too embarrassed for this day. Who wouldn't feel flustered when Hanako kissed you closer to your lips—what more if he actually kissed her on the lips?! "I haven't been this flustered since Souho laid his head on my shoulder before!"

"Has Souho kissed you before?"

"Of course not."

All of a sudden, [Name]'s phone suddenly vibrated in the middle of her conversation with Yashiro. She grabbed her phone on the desk, opening it to see a notification from an unknown number. [Name] felt a wave of dejavu, this is way too familiar, it's almost like the first time she texted—

xxx-xxx-0412
let's talk
meet me by the rooftop
-s.s

[Name]'s hands were shaking upon reading the message that Souho sent on her phone. For the first time he chatted but not for a good reason—he wanted to meet up. She inhaled, holding herself back from breaking her phone out of anger. They were literally over long ago, then why did Souho chatted her after ghosting her?

"[Name]-chan, what's wrong? You seem tensed..." Yashiro asked in concern, looking at her friend with worry because she had been staring at her phone longer than ten seconds. Yashiro took a peek at her phone, then looked back at [Name]. "Is Souho-kun chatting you...again?"

"It seems that the ghost itself wanted to talk to me after school." [Name] replied coldly as her voice was laced with hatred and anger. She stood up from her chair until Yashiro grabbed her wrist which caught her attention. "Seriously, doesn't he have better things to do like talking to his new girlfriend or something? And now he wants to meet up—he's kidding right?!"

"[Name], you don't have to go to him, let me talk to him for you instead!" Yashiro protested, she didn't want [Name] to be hurt once again and he might do something when they meet up. [Name] winced at Yashiro, gently removing her hand around her wrist. She quickly left the room afterwards, not saying anything. "[Name]! [Name]!"

Souho wanted to meet up with [Name] in an empty classroom, she had a bad feeling about this but if he does try something she might as well kick him, she knew a bit about self defense because she took kendo lessons during elementary. In this case, she doesn't have a shinai.

[Name] slid the door open to see Souho leaning against the wall with a serious expression on his face. A resting bitch face with a soft heart and a calm sociopath, a perfect contradiction between two exes. "I thought we compromised silently that we shouldn't interact anymore, then why the fuck do you want to meet up. The fuck do you want, ghost?" [Name] spat out.

Souho remained silent.

"Answer me, Shirasagi!" [Name] slammed her hand against the black board to catch his attention. Souho flinched, he never saw [Name] this angry before, he always thought she was kind and caring but seeing her snap—it scared him. Souho took a deep breath and looked at [Name] in the eye.

"I'm sorry, I ghosted you."

[Name]'s face softened, then laughed sarcastically. "Took you fucking long enough. I thought you're just pretending that nothing happened, I'm surprised that you still have a heart within you." She said. "Like you ghosted me for almost a month and hoeing around after your last message saying you're going to study and only now you apologized?"

"What made you do it, Souho? You're the type of guy who feels guilty about someone and not apologizing for it because you think that leaving them alone is better than talking about it. Or perhaps you're afraid of not being forgiven." [Name] put her hands behind her back and walked around Souho.

"I noticed that you were drifting apart from our relationship, I tolerated it because I wanted you to stay. I tried finding opportunities to talk to you about it until you stopped replying to my messages for almost a week." [Name]'s tone went cold all of a sudden, she looked at Souho with a glare and continued speaking. "And then I find out that you were hoe-ing around with some girl in your class in which case you said you were "studying" are you fucking kidding me?"

"You didn't even tell me about it. I just found out—do you realize how much I felt hurt and betrayed seeing your story about her on social media while you fucking hide me? You're so unfair for treating what we had was nothing just because we don't have a label and ghosting me was like a free estate for you."

"Is that why you ghosted me? Because I couldn't hang out with you more and you decided to replace me with someone in your class just because it's closer—"

Souho interrupted her. "I didn't want you to chat me almost everyday."

[Name] stopped, tilted her head in confusion to see if he's dead serious. There was silence between the two. At some point, [Name] carried their conversations more after a month of being official and Souho would reply dryly, showing his disinterest or that he was entertaining another girl.

Then, [Name] laughed. "What the fuck was that? What kind of bullshit is that? Hahahahaha!"

"[Name] —"

[Name] raised her palm to prevent Souho from speaking further because she's not yet done making her villain-like speech. "Nope, let me fucking speak first." [Name] narrowed her eyes almost immediately and the tone of her voice lowers down after laughing at his reason for ghosting her. "You didn't want me to chat you almost everyday? That's your fucking reason? Shirasagi I thought you're a fucking honor student why the fuck do you look so dumb saying that?"

"You know what you're good at? Studying. You're a selfish greedy person that thinks about himself more than others and that's why you fuck up in most of your friendships and relationships. Sure, you aced all academics and extracurricular activities but you gained nothing when it comes to people...simply because you don't care at all."

"You didn't care what I think when you ghosted me. Of course I'll get angry whether you told me or not because what you did was shitty in both ways!" [Name] moved a chair to the side out of anger to get more space.

"I don't get why you are so overly attached when it comes to this type of stuff. We don't have a label [Name], so we can both don't take this seriously. Why do you have to feel like you're the one lacking here—? Where were you when I needed you?" Souho asked. "You would always decline all of my proposals, making up excuses just so you wouldn't come out and go outside."

"Making up excuses? Are you fucking kidding me? You're the one who couldn't even provide quality time in our relationship!" [Name] put her hands on her waist, growing more angry on how he accused her of something like that. "You'd be gone for a whole day and I won't complain about it because it's understandable that you have stuffs to do and that you'll tell me sooner—but noooo, you pretend like you didn't disappear for a day until you thought about ghosting me because you were bored."

"Why are you assuming things that I didn't even do? I've been trying hard to make time for you, reassure you and even sacrificing some of my stuffs just to be with you even—like sure, I'm trying to be a better boyfriend, even though we don't have a label but it's like that but I can't give you what you want all the time!" Souho retorted with the same tone.

"I can't give you what you want either! But I'm trying to give as much as I can to our relationship but you didn't appreciate it because you wanted something more."

"Of course I wanted more! Do you think I wanted us to be in this no-label relationship in the first place?"

"You're the one who proposed to be in a no-label relationship!"

"That's because I tried to convince your parents to date you before I asked you out. I tried to beat your Dad in hanafuda because it seems that my intelligence, since that's what I thought they wanted to find for a guy, is not enough for them to prove myself." Souho panted for raising his voice while [Name] was looking at him confusingly, there's no way he did that, she thought it was his choice to do it that way. Now it made sense as to why Souho wanted them to be in a no-label relationship. "You didn't even fight for our relationship once!"

"Oh, so now you're saying its my fault and that's why you ghosted me? If only you told me that I would've done something—but never once you told me, not even my parents, how the fuck would I know?!" [Name] suddenly started to tear up, she looked down to the ground, not even showing her face to Souho. "I guess the reason why we fell apart in the first place was because of the lack of communication, we didn't exert our efforts, and we didn't even defend our relationship."

"You could've said that you wanted to break up, not by ghosting me and replacing me afterwards...You've changed Souho, you said you wouldn't hurt me and that we'll fix and understand each other when we fight yet why did we end up like this...?" [Name] whimpered, trying not to cry in front of Souho because it would make her feel weak. "Why did you stop calling me dear...?"

"Stop."

[Name] froze. "Just stop."

Souho placed his hand on top of [Name]'s head causing her to blink in tears. "Let's end this." He begun. "I knew from the start that things are going to change especially when we're in an unlabeled relationship but when it comes to those things, it is something that you and I can fix—in this scenario, we can't fix it anymore."

"We can't continue on if I'm being selfish and you're being emotionally attached, I suggest that if you don't want to get hurt anymore, it's best that you should find another person, unless you're doing that already. Go on with your life without me."

[Name] angrily yanked her hand off of Souho, gripping it too hard as if she was crushing his carpal. "I hate you, I hope you suffer." She said. There was an epiphany that it was both of their faults as to why their relationship went downhill, Souho wanted to pursue more while [Name] accepted the fact that their label will always be none and all because of the lack of understanding and communication.

Maybe their relationship would've worked out if stated otherwise. "I still see you as a friend."

"Are you fucking kidding me?!" [Name] pushed Souho away from her. "Do you still think that everything would be fine and dandy after this? All this time and in the end, you'll still think of me as a friend, this whole fucking time?!" She shouted as Souho shielded himself just in case [Name] would throw hands on him. "The only one who isn't fighting for this relationship is you. You didn't even try convincing my parents again and again that you're worthy of being my boyfriend, then I didn't even know the whole story as to why you didn't want to be official."

"Can't you just forgive me?"

"You're begging for forgiveness? The Souho I know doesn't even care whether he is forgiven or not, he prefers to have people grudging over him. Forgiveness doesn't come out easily Souho, you should know that." [Name] wanted to go home so bad, she didn't want to deal with Souho in the first place yet why does he want closure when they've been gone for so long. Souho was about to break because of [Name]'s stubborness, he tried to be calm and collected but it wasn't enough—it's just them passing faults instead of fixing things.

"Fine, I don't care what others think of me and you know what else I don't care about? You, [Name]." Souho grabbed the sides of her hair as [Name] took a fistful of his hair—so basically they ended up pulling each others hair out of anger. "This is what I don't like about you, you're deflecting the blame on others when it's clearly your fault."

"I don't know whether the rest of your braincells went to your academics and you did not leave some for interpersonal relationships or that your head is fucking empty."

"I'm smart for other things too, I know how to make decisions that benefit me."

"Like that? In a multiple choice test?"

"Why do you have to make fun of me anyways?"

"Because you're an entire circus—!"

"This is why I ghosted you!"

"Huh? I thought you didn't want me to chat you almost everyday. Make up your mind Souho unless you don't have any." [Name] gritted her teeth out of anger as she harshly pulled on his hair. Souho tried to pry her fingers off but the latter was too strong to let go. "Ugh! I hate you so much!"

"I love you."

[Name] blinked in tears, slowly letting go of his hair. It's been a while since he told her that, when was the last time he told her that he loved her? Last month ago? Before things had changed? It used to make her feel butterflies whenever he sent her cheesy texts and this is probably the first time he said it to her face directly. Plus, he has a girlfriend and they have broken up a long time ago—how is he saying this right now?

"See? Even in real life, you couldn't even say it back." Souho frowned.

"Why would I say it in real life—you already have a girlfriend!" [Name] was seriously annoyed by Souho, giving her mixed signals to confuse her even more. He did say one time in their chats back when they were still friends, he wanted two girlfriends out of context but [Name] didn't want to be a part of that. But oh, how she misses it when they talk about dumb stuffs like that back then. "If we were still friends I would've laughed at you and tell you to choose better."

"I don't miss you." [Name] pursed her lips together. "But I miss my bestfriend."

Souho was surprised.

"I miss my friend who would wait in front of my classroom to drag me to an arcade to play games until we ran out of coins, eat fast food with me, say stupid out of context texts in our chats, telling me to meet up in a library to gossip instead of studying..." [Name] furrowed her eyebrows at Souho. "This isn't about me and our former relationship—this is about me, you and our friendship and why it fell apart in the first place."

"I actually enjoyed our times together from when we were friends, I know it will never come back because everything that we had done has stained the foundation of our dynamic." [Name] explained while wiping her tears quickly before Souho could realize that she was crying. "If you think everything that we did was nothing to you—then fine!"

In the middle of the confrontation, Kou walked in to the scene with a confused yet concerned look on his face once he saw his senior and another guy fighting in an empty classroom. "M-Minamoto-kun...?" [Name] stepped back from Souho as she covered her mouth in shock. Kou looked at [Name], then at Souho before he walked towards the green haired boy.

"Did you hurt Senpai?" Kou narrowed his eyes.

Souho scoffed. "Seriously, you have kouhais to defend you now?" He asked [Name] while raising his eyebrow at her. Souho glanced back at Kou to answer his question. "Yes but I'm trying to talk things with her for the sake of my peace of mind because I don't want her to spread that I'm a ghoster like that's my only personality."

Kou grabbed his wrist and looked at Souho dead in the eye. "No one hurts Senpai like that, I don't know who you are but I can see how much you made her feel hurt!" He yelled while pointing at [Name] who is really trying her best to hold herself back from crying. "If I ever see you making her cry—I'm going to launch you up to the air!"

Souho yanked his hand off from Kou. "Fine, sucks to sucks I guess." He said before turning around to leave the classroom so that [Name] and Kou are the only ones left.

Kou whipped his head around to look at [Name] in a worried state. "Senpai, are you okay?!" He asked as he ran towards her. "Did he hurt you?!" [Name] stumbled on her feet as she made her way to Kou. "What did he do—?"

[Name] pressed her face against Kou's shoulder, then letting out an exhale before crying completely. Kou only stood there in shock that he just witnessed the person he looked up to was crying because of some guy whom she didn't deserve in the first place. "Senpai...?" Kou blushed at [Name]'s sudden closeness because this is probably the first time he ever hugged a girl. "I-It's okay Senpai."

[Name] sobbed at his shoulder, letting all of the tears that she held back because of Souho. She wanted to think that he's not worth it to cry but she admitted that she was really really hurt because of what he did. "Minamoto-kun...I-I'm sorry, I..." Kou didn't let her finish as he hugged her back to comfort her. "I promised myself that I wouldn't cry for him and that it's his loss for not treating me right, yet why does it still hurt...?"

"I think you've been putting on a brave face Senpai, you didn't want to show that you're hurt because you think that you're weak to do so." Kou grabbed her shoulders with a determined look on his face while [Name] blinked in tears. "He deserves to know that you were hurt by him, he can't just go on in life thinking that you are okay when he treated you like that."

"By the way, who was that person Senpai?"

➽───────────────❥

i pre-wrote some of the chapters in ghosting, especially the confrontation between [name] and souho because writing it would take a lot of time to do so because i wanted to pinpoint the hatred.