Who to Trust?

"Austin Wang." He breaks the long, awkward silence in the car.

"Mikayla Lin."

The two are raising their brows—they both have heard of each other. So far, they seem to not have that chemistry. Essentially, Liam is what they're fighting over, after all.

Minutes later, nobody has decided to make one sound. It was such an awkward moment, especially since Liam noticed that the two didn't like each other. The air seemed tense and heavy, the tension between the two palpable.

When they arrived at the food court at the mall, Liam left to get their meals after they had picked a table. Finally, Austin speaks to Mikayla.

"You like him, don't you?" He leans closer to Mikayla. He smirks at her as he asks his question, and she stares back with a blank expression on her face.

"He's my best friend."

"Ah, is that so, Miss... Girlfriend?" He says sluggishly with raised eyebrows.

"Austin.." She calls for his name, leaning closer to him making him lean back in search for privacy, clearly regretting that he leaned in first.

"You know that he's only dating you because you're handsome, right..?" A teasing smile occurs from Mikayla's face. "Besides, I bet he earns from the coffee shop more than you do. Well, especially now that you're barely getting recognized by... anyone." She chuckles under her breath and feels his collar with her hand as she continues to speak. "It wouldn't be that much of a surprise if he was seeing someone else behind your back—maybe someone... richer?"

She knows how to get on anyone's nerves. She just does not like it when someone does it to her, which is the only time she decides to get up their noses.

Austin grins at the vexatious brunette in front of him. "Fierce.. Too fierce, woman. You know we can talk about this somewhere private, right?" He says in such a hot and soothing flirtatious voice while he watches the brave-looking lady right in front of his face turn into the look of a confused scaredy cat.

"If you stop disrespecting me, I might even reward you however you want." He leans towards her once again when she tried to lean further away. He moves his hand to hold her chin, making her look straight up to him. "Are we okay with that?"

"No." Her face turns brave and dead serious. He lets go of her and they go back to sitting properly in their own seats. Just seconds later, Liam is back with their meals.

"So, um.. Getting along?" He looks at the two while they remain quiet.

"Oookay, um.. What do you guys say we start over, yes? Um.. Austin, meet my best friend, Mika, and-" Mikayla cuts his sentence. "Mikayla."

"Yes, right, Mikayla. Um.. Mika, meet my boyfriend, Austin."

Mikayla is in complete shock. Well, she has known and has heard of it from Eunice and has thought of all the signs, but it seems to still have left her eyes wide in surprise. How come he has only told her now?

The two best friends stare at each other. He could tell that she has something to say, and he knows what she wants to say.

"Since when? Why didn't you tell me about him at all?" Austin scoffs quite quietly, amused of Mikayla's 'reaction'.

"Since.. Since before the graduation, Mika." Hearing this from her own best friend even before 'before the graduation', she felt her heart ache in just a short matter of time. She looks down then up to hide her tears from falling, feeling betrayed. It's not that she's disappointed that he's in a relationship, but he let her make him do things to help her which he shouldn't have, and it made her feel guilty and heartbroken.

"I'm going home." She stands up from her chair after taking dollars from her bag as a payment for her untouched food. She wipes her tears when she had walked far enough from the two. She could hear her best friend calling for her to come back, but she did not want to lay an eye for him at all.

About 15 minutes later, she arrives at her dorm at almost 8:00 PM. She decides to go to sleep right as she entered her room, not even bothering to change to her pajamas. She's just too tired.

For the next few days, Liam has been sending her messages to try and check up on her from time to time. Mikayla, however, has not decided whether or not to reply to his messages at all, until...

"Liam?" He showed up to Mikayla after her class. He looked very happy, especially after finally talking to his best friend after almost a week. "Mika.."

Liam had made quite a scene just dashing from classroom to classroom looking for Mikayla. He missed her so much and wanted to know how to make things up for her that he decided to go out of his way to dash into a private university that he wasn't even going to.

"What are you doing here..?" She says while staying in shock as Liam hugs her tight.

He lets go of Mika and takes an exhale before he says: "Talk to me, Mika. We're best friends, right?"

"Mm, we were." She replies, staring back at him with an expressionless look.

"What?" The slightest smile of relief fades from Liam's face.

"We stopped being best friends from the day you decided to keep your relationship from me." She looks away, still blank.

"If we were friends then, you would have chosen to tell me everything." Her eyes start to overflow with tears, still not changing the expression that the rest of her face makes.

"Mika, I-" She does not let him say one more word: "Weren't we supposed to tell everything to each other? Why did you even hide it from me anyway?!" She added, looking up at him with her tears and creased eyebrows, completely showing it with her face that she's indeed heartbroken.

"Do you even know who your boyfriend is? Do you even know he's faithful to you?" She asks another pair of question, leaving Liam in confusion. "Mika, what are you talking about?"

"Your boyfriend tried to tease me, Liam!" She raises her tone, making the people walking in the hallway focus on them as they continue walking. "He tried to bribe me to stay away from you, Liam. He tried to touch me, Liam!", she added.

He slaps her.

"Don't..", his voice deeper and breathier than ever.

"Don't lie to me, Mikayla."

She looks back up to him, feeling stupefied as she cups her turned red cheek with her hand. Her tears brushed away, her whole expression changed back to emptiness, her heart shattered to pieces: "You've confirmed I've lost you long ago, Liam."

She leaves him with a glare. She continues to dash out of the building and to the dormitory, locking herself up. She sits just by the door, looking up to the light bulb whilst trying to stop her tears from falling. This is what she feels right now; the feeling of abandonment and hopelessness.

This is all his fault. If he had just been considerate of Mikayla and her feelings, she wouldn't feel this way at all. But no, he couldn't be bothered to tell her anything. So instead, he just continued on with his life like nothing had happened, only to end up making things worse as he knew it. Now, his best friend is left in pain... physically, but more emotionally.

More nights later, the two haven't talked ever since. To the both of them, it seems that they made a mistake that drew the other away, and further away. Well, to say the least, Mikayla didn't do anything wrong. All she did during their friendship was tell the truth, and try to be a better friend. That wasn't the case for Liam.

He hid something from her. He hid something that Mikayla would have loved to hear, for no reason. Now, he has done such a great job leaving a red painful mark on his best friend's cheek. Is this how you make things up for your best friend, Liam?

No. Actually, Liam had been constantly asking Austin about it—too much that it caused Austin to step away from him for a while, leaving Liam alone without his boyfriend or his best friend beside him.

After his shift at Kokoffi one night, he becomes determined to show up at Austin's to satisfy his curiosity, and... maybe end their relationship. Besides, Austin has said 'no' too many times, and Liam couldn't seem to be buying it, meaning that wasn't the answer he was waiting for at all. Feeling stupid yet, Liam Wu?

"What the heck are you doing here?" Austin stands by his opened door, staring at Liam in disgust.

"Honey, just tell me. Please.." He begs, his eyes start to shine with tears filling them up.