Holy shit. The sudden slam of fear that shot through her body was enough for her to whip around and start to make her way out of there. Oh God. Amber pinched herself, kneading her flesh between her fingers. The pain that radiated from her skin was a welcoming shock that drew a gasp from her lips.
It was not a dream.
She couldn't take it. She felt vulnerable and alone in the sea of fans before her. Her emotions were a mess, her life was a mess. She was sweating profusely, her heart pumping blood through her system so fast that she felt lightheaded and dizzy.
Her stomach churned and her cheeks burned, so hot they could just about set fire on anything they touched. She needed to think. She needed a time out. A moment to consider her next step. She pushed through the crowd quickly, making her way out of the stadium.
Sieon must have stepped closer because the fans surged forward, heading the opposite direction and conveniently concealing her from his view. A hand gripped onto her forearm and Amber turned.
Miri.
"I can't...I need to go," Amber mumbled to Miri, who was looking confused.
"What? Amber? Is that you? What's wrong?"
The sound of her best friend's voice brought forth an odd surge of emotions that flowed through her body. It squeezed out the desperate tears that began to form at the corners of her eyes. She was going to cry.
"Ambs?" Miri asked, her voice going soft as she used her nickname and Amber gripped onto her hand, holding it tightly. She squeezed once, before letting go.
"I'll text you."
Da-hee stopped her with a hand on her shoulder. "Dear, are you alright? We can talk this through, don't worry."
Don't worry...Amber's lips twitched as she avoided the eyes of her future mother-in-law. "I'm sorry. I just need a moment to reset." She gave them an awkward bark of laughter. "T-toilet...Yeah."
Then she was tearing through the crowd, pushing past the girls who swarmed forward like a wave.
"AMBER!" Miri yelled. "WAS HIS PENIS REALLY THAT SCARY?" Amber pushed harder, breaking into a run. On a normal day, the words of her best friend would have sent her laughing hysterically, but not today.
She was darting through the gates, heading straight for the makeshift toilets. The ones outside the venue were empty and she pulled open the door, slamming it quickly to lock it in place.
She doubled over, clamping her fingers to her lips and screamed into her palm to muffle the sound. She was hyperventilating and panicking, because really. Seriously. This wasn't just fun and games. This wasn't a One Direction fanfiction on Wattpad. This wasn't an Otome game with a bunch of male leads.
This was her life!
There were many things that Amber longed for, but each year on her birthday she usually wished for only one thing when she blew out her candle: Please give me a simple life with no drama. Well, clearly the birthday cake wishing was a fluke! A ploy to increase the sales of cakes and candles!
She turned to gaze at the mirror and the familiar square of her face winked back at her. She looked like a wreck in the white light of the toilet. There was a redness to her cheeks that she had never seen before.
It was not the glow of an intensive work out. It was a sweet dusting of red that spread across her cheeks and to her ears. There was a small quirk to her lips that couldn't help but appear. And if she allowed it, Amber was sure she would be grinning from ear to ear. She groaned as she pressed her cold fingers onto heated cheeks.
Then with bated breath, she slipped the scarf from her hair. The scarf was pretty. It was a deep rouge colour with strips of yellow. However it was nothing compared to the arrangement on her head.
The flowers on her head were a little different. While MinJae's flower crown was more randomly placed in his hair, her crown had a distinct circle around her head, the bundles of lilacs weaving prettily through her locks of hair.
It was beautiful.
Even in the shitty lighting of the toilet, the flowers shone, looking as if they were cut out from photographs taken under studio spotlight with a professional camera. Somehow, they didn't seem out of place on her head. Instead, they framed her features, the lavender and pink shades highlighting the rose of her cheeks.
The crown made her look pretty and the golden flecks of light coming from it reflected upon her pupils, highlighting the sweet hazel in her eyes. It was so pretty that she was struck with the need to paint the flowers. Preferably the ones on MinJae's head. Her expression twisted.
Amber didn't know if she was happy or not. It was one thing to dream about love with her idols. It was another thing to have it happen to her. She stifled a hysterical bark of laughter.
The situation was different now that she knew she was in a reverse harem soul bond with seven men. Perhaps, if it were only MinJae she would be less afraid, less frightened by the prospect of having an idol as a soulmate.
She was not fearful of loving them or of being unable to give them her heart. Amber knew she would grow to love them even if their personalities were nothing like the ones that they portrayed on stage. They were soulmates after all, and soulmates were made for one another.
They were destined.
That fact was also what scared her the most. Soul bonds could be like arranged marriages. It was a tie to their freedom, a decision that they could never make by themselves. Amber was scared because the boys thrived on the lack of a partner.
Many of their fans were girls who longed to be their soulmates. Girls with soul bonds that did not pinpoint to a specific person. And if the crazy fans knew that she was their soulmate, not just to one of them but to all of them...
They would kill her.
Amber sank on the toilet seat, kicking out her legs. The IDOL members were also all well past the usual speculated soul bond age. This could mean that they had moved on from the idea. They might have already found love in one of the Lonely, the women without soulmates.
When life sucked, one moved on. One did not just sit and wait for magic to happen.
She could potentially destroy them. They could be disgusted by the fact that they had to share. And was she even worthy enough to be loved by seven of the world's most cherished human beings? They had probably met hundreds and thousands of the prettiest of girls, shook hands and talked with the most gorgeous of women and they were stuck with...
A pudgy, Asian kid.
Damn it.
There were too many possibilities, too many unknowns and that was why Amber was scared. She would have been happier if she had only received Sieon's rose mark. But being in JieMi's body made her realise exactly what was at stake.
Their dreams were at stake.
And for Amber, as someone who was fighting for her dreams to be an artist, she didn't know what kind of person she would be if she were to steal their dreams from them. Even so, it would be unfair to them if she didn't even give them a chance to see her and decide if they wanted her or not.
Amber's lips twitched at the thought of MinJae's smile and Da-hee's story about JieMi. Her mind flickered back to the thought of Sieon, running across the stage in his mad attempt to see her. Her heart swelled and she coloured into a brighter red.
She thought about sexy Ezra, about adorable Hikaru who had carried her across the stage. She thought about Casper, the guy who had tried his best to reassure her, and Oliver...Her lips spread wider at the thought of his glasses. She needed to return them and she would return them.
The future was unknown but she would be a happy girl as long as they accepted her.
She draped the scarf over her head once again with an excited smile on her lips. She stepped out of the toilet, carefully pushing the door closed behind her. She turned, her eyes widening to see the familiar pom-pom earrings fan standing before her with an entourage of more richly dressed females.
Oh fuck.