World After Worlds

"Stop calling me sugar." Yanar frowned at him, Hansel smiled widely and walked past her, heading to the living room where he saw her laptop open.

"I like it, it has the same flavor as you."

"Hansel. It's not funny."

"It's not, I'm serious. Come here, tell me about your assignment." He sat on the couch and waited for her to sit beside him. Three months, he hasn't done anything to her for three months. Usually, he could last longer than three months, of not kissing or anything. But the closer they got, he was anticipating intimacy with her.

She sat not too far away from him, enough distance for Hansel to smell her shampoo.

"Case study, about suicide." She said and Hansel's attention shifted to the laptop. He saw articles on the web of painless death. His brows furrowed and shifted to her, she wasn't acting weird…

Yanarym's major is all about business management, how can suicide be part of her case study? She redirects her eyes to him and he immediately smiles.

"That's an interesting topic, did you think of this?" He asked and took her laptop, "Let's see how you have done so far, okay?"  He looked at the other windows and she was really doing the paper, he quickly went to the recent history on her web and screenshot everything then sent it on to his email along with her paper.

"I think that's very interesting too." She ardently said and got closer to him, instantly Hansel deleted everything he had done… "What do you think? Does my introduction look good? The solution and conclusion were still blurry, I am having problems on how to articulate my thoughts."

Hansel smiled, "Yeah, we could finish this in a day. Do you want to go outside and have some frappe or coffee? " He proposed and Yanarym agreed.

Yanarym smiled in her head, it's time to escalate matters. Like what Guide-sama said, time is running out.

They left the condominium and Hansel drove them to the nearest mall. Yanarym seemed to be acting normally, she was silent but smiling too, her eyes didn't look dead or depressed. She looks fine, nevertheless, Hansel somewhat felt uneasy.

Upon arriving at the mall, they headed to one of the famous coffee shops to do the assignment. Hansel left her on the table while he ordered them a drink.

While he was on the line, he kept on glancing in Yanarym's direction. Is she depressed? What is about the suicide topic in her case study? Is it sad about something? Was she affected by Spencer's lack of time to be with her? Did she find out that Spencer is cheating?

"Here's your latte." Hansel sat beside her and intently stared at her face.

"Thank you."

"What's your plan after graduating?" Hansel asked out of context. Yanarym stopped typing. "I heard from Gale that you have no specific plans for your future."

"I guess, whatever happens, that's what would be happening to me."

"Will you marry Spencer?" Hansel frankly asked, "You won't break up with him, so will you marry him?"

"Maybe."

"Then, why can't it be me?"

"Haven't we talked about this before?"

"No, Rym, I want to know, give me a reason why can't it be me?" Hansel asked, softly, he's saying it casually. "Spencer is not the person for you." Yanarym looked at Hansel. She smiled at him and mixed her latte, "Rym."

"You're not for me either." Yanarym said, "And don't make it sound like I am such a miserable girl. I am living the way I wanted, Sel."

"Are you?"

"Of course." She took the cup. "It's my life. Everything is in the palm of my hands." She added, "Why do you ask?" Hansel patted her head.

"Nothing, I just want to know if you are fine. Because if you are, I'm fine with it too." Yanarym laughed.

"You're being weird, Hansel."

"Am I? Yeah, I think so too." Hansel laughed with her. And caressed her cheeks. "I like your smile."

"Thanks." Hansel didn't let go of her cheek, "Hansel." She called him but he seemed to become absent-minded. Within seconds, Hansel leaned close to her and kissed her forehead.

"I like you, sugar."

Spencer and Gale were on the other, just right next to the coffee shop- where Yanarym was. Spencer met Gale because Gale wanted to talk about something, and since they met, she hadn't talked about it. He wanted to leave because these past days, Gale was being demanding, he was losing his time with Yanarym.

"Spencer, is something wrong?" Gale asked when she saw Spencer halted her step. When Spencer didn't say anything, she looked at where he was looking and saw Yanarym with Hansel, they were laughing- Gale's eyes widened when Hansel bent over to kiss Yanarym's forehead. "Rym? Hansel? Is that them?"  Gale pointed out when she saw Yanarym standing up and leaving Hansel behind. "Spencer, Spencer wait!" Gale ran after Spencer who stormed to the cafe.

"Babe?" Spencer opened the door and met Yanarym. He looked at her from head to toe, she was wearing the clothes she wore when he left. She had her laptop bag and it was not zipped, Spencer could see that she was in a hurry to leave. "What are you doing here? I thought you were doing a thesis- Gale?" Spencer's eyes narrowed to Hansel that followed Yanarym from behind.

"Why are you here?" Spencer's expression became distorted. "You didn't tell me you were going outside." He added with sarcasm. "And why are you with Hansel?"

"We were doing an assignment." Spencer laughs menacingly. He's mad. He knows that he was the one who's performing an affair with Gale, but he was doing it because he wants Gale out! But Yanarym would be cheating on him… that's a fucking different story. "Babe?"

"Let's go home." He took her bag and zipped it, before grabbing her arm and thrashing his feet to the parking lot.

"B-babe, slow down." Spencer didn't listen and dragged her roughly. Hansel saw that followed them and held Yanarym's hand. With that force, Spencer halted in his movement. He turned to see what happened and saw Hansel holding Yanarym's hand.

"What do you think you are doing?" Spencer growled.

"You're hurting her." Hansel kept his calm and looked at Yanarym, "Are you alright?" He smiled at her and Spencer saw Yanarym nodded and smiled back at Hansel.

That didn't make Spencer happy, the scene where Hansel kissed Yanarym's forehead replayed, he forcefully pulled Yanarym to him and she bumped on his chest. "Stop fucking smiling back at him." He whispered to her, glaring straight into her eyes. "We're going home."

"Rym-" Hansel tried to interfere with Spencer but Spencer was already unable to keep his cool and punched Hansel straight to his nose. Hansel slammed on the floor.

"You fucking stay away from my girlfriend, you asshole." He pointed a finger at Hansel's face and dragged Yanarym again. Almost carrying her out of the mall.

"Why are you here?" Hansel didn't react on time and came to his senses, the couple was already gone. He looked at Gale and stood up from the floor. "Didn't I tell you not to meet Spencer in public?"

"I just, I want to talk to Spencer." Gale said, "I didn't know you were here either."

"You should have told me!"

"I didn't know!" Gale screamed and nibbled her lips, Yanarym saw them, but they weren't caught doing anything. Yanarym won't suspect anything, right? It was Hansel and Yanarym that were caught, not her and Spencer. "Are you already with Rym? Why did you kiss her?"

"No, I did it without thinking."

"What do you think will happen? Spencer was so mad." Hansel's lips were bruised with Spencer's attack.

"Won't you run after them?"

"No, it'll make things worse. Rym can only calm him down." Hansel looked at the floor and saw Yanarym's phone. It fell on the floor when Spencer attacked him.

"Babe." Twenty-five minutes later they were back in the condominium. He dragged her to their bedroom and sat her on the bed while he was frantically maundering his feet back and forth in front of her. "Babe, can we talk-"

"Don't talk, don't move, don't explain, don't- just don't do anything!" Spencer cut her off. He doesn't want to listen, he wants them to talk but he doesn't want her to speak. Yanarym rolled her eyes as she was directly reading his mind through Guide-sama.

"Did you see it? When Hansel kissed my forehead?" She asked Spencer, froze at his spot as his eyes darkened. He looked at her angrily.

"Are you proud of that? Huh?!" She flinched after he growled. "Are you happy that that bastard kissed you, then fuck it, Rym!" Spencer can't keep his cool, he was always confident that no one would dare to show any interest in her while he is her boyfriend. That no one would dare try to steal her away from him.