As they ate, Lada was particularly quiet, her mind obviously busy, like she’s debating something important. “Should I tell them?” Said Lada between her and herself, she seems to carry something huge she needs to say.

“The medicine isn’t working.” Lada said, she suddenly broke such huge news at this time, unplanned, it can both Ibrahim’s and míngxīng’s attentions, Ibrahim was particularly surprised and a little concerned. Her medicine was the only thing that kept her in check, it stopped her from committing suicide multiple times, so her medicine suddenly not working is disastrous, what if her episodes get uncontrollable? What if she tries to kill herself again?

“Yeah, she’ll get even more scary now.. how far do I have to run?” Míngxīng said to himself, he was clearly more scared of her than anything.

“That’s not good at all.. oh god..” Ibrahim said between him and himself, thinking of all the bad outcomes that’ll come with that.

“How? They were supposed to be the best…” Ibrahim said, he sounded concerned but tried to hide it, though it was obvious this distressed him.

“It’s because I am fine, you all just got me medicine I don’t need.” Said Lada, but this time it did sound like she believed it, which is even worse, míngxīng just watched the chaos, too scared to intervene, Lada kept eating like it’s nothing and Ibrahim put his Elbows on the table, clearly distressed.

“Stop lying to yourself for at least one minute, can you?!” Ibrahim shouted, it wasn’t loud enough for the entire buffet to her, but enough for it to echo in Lada’s mind.

Lada slams her hands against the table, loud enough for other people in the buffet to hear. “I am not lying to myself, I am fine! You’re just insufferable and wants to make everyone else as mentally unstable as you are! Why? BECAUSE YOU ARE A COWARD WHO HATES BEING THE ONLY ONE TO BE DIFFERENT AND WANTS TO DRAG EVERYONE ELSE ALONGSIDE YOU TO FEEL LESS INSECURE.” Lada yelled, she seemed clearly frustrated but she’s never gone this far, Ibrahim looks in shock and is slowly shaking his head, trying to convince himself she didn’t just say that, míngxīng looks scared for his life and also very shocked, he never in the slightest expected this, Lada looked just angry at first but then the saw the look of pure hurt on Ibrahim’s face and realised she had just broken the camels back, but it’s too late to fix it now. It might get healed but will the camel ever trust you not to break its back again? She sat down, trying to process what she said while míngxīng just looked at the both of them but backed away from her slightly.

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“It’s just an episode.. she doesn’t think that.. she doesn’t think that.. she-“ Ibrahim said to himself, he was trying to brush it off but his look said otherwise, his eyes were wide open, he blinked too much, his eyebrows were as low as it can be, his lips slightly downwards.

“W-why did I just say that?! Oh god can I stop ruining everything for once!?” Lada said to herself, her face went from one of anger to one of guilt, she barely muttered out “I- I didn’t mean it..”

Ibrahim’s eyes went back to normal, he had figured out a way to deal with this with carefulness, probably by just saying what he thinks is true.“Listen, I gave you excuses for too long, it hurts to have to carry a disorder around but that doesn’t, not in a million years give you the right to go hurting people around and thinking an apology is gonna solve everything.” He said, clearly hitting a nerve she never expected him to hit.

“No.. no.. he’s just lying.” Lada said to herself.

Lada looked shocked and just nodded along “I-I guess it’s one for one.” Lada said but she grabbed him bag and left, clearly with no intentions of returning yet.

Lada ran near the river and cried her eyes out, she kept repeating “he’s just lying, he’s just lying, he’s just lying.”

Ibrahim and míngxīng stayed for a while, Ibrahim just looked at his plate trying to process anything of it but he couldn’t, he didn’t even finish his plate.

“I- it makes sense for everything to end here, right? I heard there’s a great clinical psychologist in fact, maybe we can fix things before it’s too late.. maybe?” He said to himself, trying to find the best outcome where everything doesn’t fall apart.

Míngxīng just stayed looking at him and out the window, he looked scared of both Ibrahim and the people watching them and whispering stuff like “that woman is crazy..”, “that man has no heart!!”, “poor child..”, “they ruined my breakfast!” , míngxīng got so scared he just ran back to his room, and Ibrahim went to his room, when he entered he just laid flat on the bed, still trying to process.