Kang Raena

When Jiwon had brought me home, he had insisted to go in and meet Lae Ahn, god, that weird boy that loves my sister, a bit too much. When I had unlocked the door, it was a ing mess. There were blankets strewn around, food everywhere, and screams from the top level down, loud crashing in the kitchen. 

When I had looked up, I saw the exact cause. Woo Hyun, Sungyeol and Dong Hyuk were running after Lae Ahn from the top level as Han Bin, Sung Jong, Dong Woo and Eun Hee were doing the exact same thing to Jae Han. Jin Hwan and Yun Hyeong popped their heads out of the kitchen and waved at me as though they didn’t just invaded the house.

After a few minutes, they had finally settled down and Jiwon gave me a shrug as though he wasn’t involved in planning this. Clearly, a bad liar. We were all gathered around the television as it played the opening of Finding Nemo. The only empty seat was beside me and Myung Soo had appeared out of the kitchen with a bowl of popcorn. We caught eye contact as I looked away hurriedly, he hesitated beside the empty seat before I decided to be the ice breaker and patted the spot to welcome him. He sat beside me and murmured his thanks.

“We can’t go back to being university friends if you’re going to hesitate every time you’re near me.” I muttered to him.

He gave me a small prince-like smile and placed the popcorn between us. As we got into the movie, we found ourselves being more comfortable with each other, occasionally conversing about how Nemo was just an orange fish and how fishes could live by themselves without family. In the middle of the movie, the door to my house opened and revealed two figures; Saemin and Jun Hoe. They had joined in and complained about us not waiting for them, the only thing Jun Hoe did, was to push the blame to Saemin who had work till late.

As the night got deeper, we had heard from the boys about how the entertainment agencies were treating them. Apparently, Sunggyu’s team got their names as well, Infinite. It had held aspirations that they’d be limitless, there would never be restrictions on their possibilities and they’d continue working hard to improve. We were chatting deep into the night as it felt like before again, with everybody around, poking fun of each other. Woo Hyun and I even had a banter about the theory of Nemo. He had been supporting that Nemo meant nobody in another language, hence, they weren’t finding anybody, but I, on the other hand, just felt that it was a simple child story. It had almost caused war between us, thank goodness Jae Han and Lae Ahn were put to sleep early, if they had heard about his theory, they’d be whining and leaving little punches on him by now.

In the end, we were playing chicken fight to send two people out to the supermarket to fulfill our hunger and cravings for snacks. And to my luck, Myung Soo and I were the losers of this game. He was reasoning that he had no strength in his legs after coming from the individual dance practice but it deaf ears to them.

And this was how we ended up, walking in the night of 3.47 am towards the direction of the supermarket that was the only store lit up in the night. The stones on the floor would occasionally be heard in the silence, crunching under our feet.

“You can head back first, I’d just go to the mart and get what they want.” This was the 3rd time he was repeating this.

“It is okay, for the 3rd time, Myung Soo, I had lost the game as well, and I’ll just go with you, unless you are trying to get me away, secretly?” I .

“N-No that was not what I had meant.” He panicked, his face was growing red in the dark night.

“I know, learn to take a joke, Myung Soo.” I nudged him with my elbow.

He let out a smile and the atmosphere grew more comfortable.

“So, how is it like working in the