Minding My Own Business

During freshman boot camp, my roommate covered herself from head to toe in her homemade sunscreen every day.

It made her skin fair and soft, and made her smell so sweet that she drew the attention of countless young men.

Even my rich boyfriend led the campaign to crown her campus beauty queen.

But only I knew the fragrance she added to her sunscreen was toxic. It would make her skin rot if she used it for a long time.

I said nothing. Instead, I quietly applied to switch dorms.

In my last life, I had warned her out of kindness. She cried in front of everyone and said I was trying to isolate her.

All the young men called me jealous. My boyfriend broke up with me in anger, then pursued her instead.

It didn't take long for my roommate's skin to really start rotting, and I rushed to apply the salve made from an old family recipe.

The wounds healed, but her skin turned dark and rough. She went from campus beauty queen to campus joke overnight.

My boyfriend dumped her, and the other young men avoided her like the plague.

She blamed everything on my jealousy. On the day she was forced to withdraw from university, she tied me up on the top floor of a university building.

Then she poured a bucket of sulfuric acid over my head.

"It's all because of your accursed salve that everyone's laughing at me! You ruined my chance to marry into a rich family!"

I died from the torment.

When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the first day of my university's freshman boot camp.

I could not stop myself from sneezing twice. Then, the familiar tickle in my nose made me freeze.

When I looked up, the girls in Aurora Sanders's row had already stepped out of formation and were introducing themselves to us.

"My name is Aurora. The Aurora dancing in the sky. Nice to meet everyone."

The familiar words made my fists tighten as I realized I had gone back in time. I was back on the first day of university's freshman boot camp!

As Aurora spoke, she tilted her head slightly, and the soft, almost-radiant skin on her face seemed to glow under the sun.

The guys behind us could only stare. "Aurora's skin is so fair and soft... I wonder if her skin would turn red if I pinched her?"

The freshmen from the other faculties looked over too. Even the girls started whispering. "Is her sunscreen really that good? The school said we can't wear makeup during boot camp, and it's 104 degrees today, but she's still at this fair without putting on any foundation."

"Smell that. Aurora smells amazing. What perfume is she wearing?"

The noises drowned out the rest of the introductions, and Aurora's smile grew wider as a blush spread across her cheeks while she listened to their praises.

The guys could barely stand still now.

My boyfriend, Matt Jackson, was standing diagonally behind me. His eyes were filled with awe. "She's pretty, fair, and smells so amazing too… Not to mention she has that hourglass figure. She's definitely one of the prettiest on campus!"

My fists tightened again.

In my last life, this was the moment Aurora became famous across the entire university because of her homemade sunscreen.

She was vain to begin with. After hearing all that praise, she applied it more and more often, going from once a day to four times a day.

My family was in the fragrance business, so I had grown up around scents. I could tell right away that the fragrance she used was toxic. But I never imagined that one warning out of kindness would make Matt betray me and turn my classmates against me.

Even then, after her skin began to ulcerate, I immediately gave her the salve made from an old family recipe. The salve could heal the ulcers, but after years of corrosion, her skin was already beyond saving. Her skin had become dark and rough.

I told her staying alive mattered more than anything, but she was convinced I had given her a toxin on purpose. For that, she poured sulfuric acid over my head as revenge.

"You were just jealous of my skin, jealous that Matt liked me! You deserve to go to hell for ruining my whole life, Wendy Summers!"

The memory of Aurora's twisted face made me shudder.

Then, I heard Matt asking me, "Is that your roommate? Does she have a boyfriend?"

Just then, the introductions ended, and we were given a five-minute break.

Aurora walked over, her pretty eyes drifting toward Matt beside me every now and then. Their eyes met. In that instant, Aurora's face turned bright red, and the sweet fragrance coming from her body grew even stronger.

Matt could hardly control his own breath.

But only I knew what was happening. The temperature was too high. Once Aurora started to sweat, it would mix with the fragrance in the sunscreen and make the scent even stronger.

However, it would also intensify the toxicity by manyfold.