Roads That Cross...

... with a Phone Call (Part 2)

Ámbar had to give her thanks to Simón— The extra sleep really made her feel better throughout the day.

She also had to tease him for inciting her to break the rules. Who was he and what had he done with her boyfriend? 'If we don't tell Vidia, they won't know you skipped work.' Oh, he was a bad influence. (And she loved it.)

Of course the only times he chose to be even a little incorrect were when it was for someone else's sake, she thought with exasperated fondness— First with that music video they filmed at the Roller behind everyone's backs and now with her. Ámbar shook her head with a smile. He was incorrigible, her boyfriend.

Ámbar sent him a text to have lunch together (actually eat food) and Simón didn't reply. Maybe he was busy.

She sent some memes throughout the afternoon, then another text asking if he could start helping her with the decorations that evening once he got to the mansion. He didn't answer that one either.

That was odd. Her messages didn't even appear as 'read'— Was the Roller really that busy? Well, it had rained for a couple of hours, that always brought in an influx of people. She found solace in the fact that if it was really bad, one of the guys would've called her over, and they didn't, so it had to be manageable.

Still, Ámbar figured that, with all that work, it would be unfair to ask him to do even more, so around 6pm, she put all the half-made decorations she was working on in a cardboard box and carried them up to her room. Simón could help her some other day. Or maybe Mónica could help her? She had already offered her help the other day, and Ámbar only said no to be polite, but if they were both at the house and she wanted to do it, why not?

Ámbar left the box on her little center table and went to wash her hands. Once she walked out of her en-suite bathroom, she grabbed her laptop and brought it to her bed. She allowed herself fifteen minutes of mindless scrolling through social media, as a treat, before getting to the emails she had to reply to.

That was what she was doing when she heard her bedroom door open.

"Oh, hi, my love," Ámbar greeted quickly. She brought her gaze back to the screen. "Give me one second, I gotta send this document... Okay, done."

She put her laptop aside and got up to greet her boyfriend the correct way. "Hi, welcome back."

Ámbar went for a kiss, but Simón moved his head to the side, dodging the contact. Her hands, too, which had risen to cup his neck, grasped nothing but air as he took a step back, putting space between them.

Immediately, a pang of worry ran Ámbar through.

"Is something wrong?"

Simón wasn't looking at her. His face was turned away from her and there was tension in the lines of his body, though nothing that indicated a particular emotion.

His voice, when it came, was deceptively level.

"I talked to Emilia today."

Ámbar felt too much in the span of an instant.

The Earth cracked open, time stopped, her heart stopped. All in one second.

Time didn't even grant her the mercy of actually stopping so she could process it all— It kept going, relentlessly, viciously, hand in hand with Simón, who was still talking.

"I didn't think it was fair that she was harassing you when you haven't done anything to her, so I went to tell her that what she was doing was wrong," he said, "but she showed me her phone's call history and, turns out, your name what nowhere to be found, Ámbar." Finally, his eyes turned in her direction. "Could you explain that to me?"