CHAPTER 1
The Flower

Mingyu POV

          Wonwoo and I stood along the street outside our dorm, we could just hear the chatter from the rest of them within the building, probably asking for clean socks or still scavenging each other's underwear drawers. But there we were, just basking in the morning sun and taking deep breaths of fresh air, it felt a bit too stuffy inside with all the morning ruckus the rest of the members were making. I'm not usually one for summer but today's weather was rather pleasant. We waited casually outside, the rays from the sun were at an enjoyable temperature, summer's humidity was just right and the slight cool breeze that brushed across our skin felt rather refreshing.

          It was a not-so-quiet start to the morning and I won't deny it, I'm still a bit tired from yesterday's practice but hyped up enough to prepare for our upcoming comeback. Today was the day, the day where we were going to finish the remaining choreography for our new title track.

          "I'm still sleepy, aren't you?" Wonwoo yawned as he stared up at the sky.

          However, before I could reply with a "Yeah, very." I noticed a girl around Jihoon's height run hastily past the two of us. She glanced at me ever so swiftly that I could just catch her eyes to be a hazel colour and her waist length brown hair flowed gently behind her. But all I could notice after was that she had managed to drop a white coin purse that matched her dress on the ground not too far away from us.

          I quickly rushed over to where it fell and noticed the floral lace details along the seams with a sky blue zipper that kept the coin purse sealed shut. I reached down to pick it up and rapidly stood up.

          "Hey! You dropped th-" I began, holding up the purse above my head.

          But she was gone...

          Wonwoo approached me fixing his glasses to lay properly on the bridge of his nose. "Wow Mingyu, thanks for the reply to my question." He said sarcastically.

          I heard a bunch of footsteps walk past me and realised that some of the members had already left our dorm and begun walking. I then turned around to face Wonwoo and saw Seungcheol standing by his side.

          "Wonwoo, did you not notice the girl who ran by?" I asked pointing in the direction she ran towards.

          He shook his head, a blank expression upon his face. Seungcheol placed his hand out suggesting that I put the small purse in his palm.

          "What's this?" He questioned while I handed him the purse.

          "Some girl dropped it," I said. "I was gonna give it back but by the time I picked it up she was gone."

          Seungcheol held the purse in his hand and ped it. "She might have an ID or something, we can just hand it back to her, that's if she does have one in here though."

          He opened the purse but looked towards me with a confused look painted across his face. Wonwoo peered over Seungcheol's shoulder to take a look at the contents within the purse and grabbed the purse from his hand. Wonwoo then proceeded to take the contents out of the purse and the first thing I noticed was a small violet-blue flower between his thumb and pointer finger.

          "It doesn't look like a flower that grows around here." Wonwoo said whilst inspecting it a little bit more.

          "A flower? What kind of person keeps a flower in a coin purse?" I snickered as I took the items from Wonwoo's grasp and placed the flower back into the purse.

        Seungcheol started walking in the direction towards the practice room. ""Well... If you ever spot that girl again just return it to her. Might be an important flower of some sort if it's not from around here."

          Wonwoo laughed jokingly as he followed after Seungcheol, "Hopefully her flower won't be dead by then."

          Seungcheol turned around towards me. "C'mon, you don't want to miss out on Soonyoung's new choreography he made in the dorm earlier."

          I immediately tucked the small purse in my back pocket and ran after them towards the practice room.

----

          "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Right step, left, kick, point da da da da! Got it?" Soonyoung smiled into the mirror, clearly proud of the new choreography he created this early morning.

          Seungcheol passed him a cup of shin ramyun. "Ok, eat up, we'll practice some more after lunch."

          Everyone sat around just chatting away while eating but all I could think of was the flower. Why would someone keep a flower in their purse and only a flower?

          I reached for my back pocket to take the purse out and inspect the flower again. But why couldn't I seem to find it? My pocket isn't that massive.

          "Hey Mingyu! You dropped this during practice." Hansol shouted as he threw an object towards me. I caught it and realised it was the purse, it had a partial shoe print of dirt marked upon it. Someone must've stepped on it during practice meaning the flower must be ruined now. "Why do you have a girl's purse anyway?"

          "It's not mine." I replied immediately. "It's just some random girl's."

          The rest of the members turned towards me and shuffled closer. "He's secretly dating someone." Seungkwan spoke with sarcasm filling his words.

          I ped the purse to check on the violet-blue flower and surprisingly it was still in perfect condition regardless of the purse being trampled on. "It's okay?" I said baffled at its undamaged petals. I took the flower out and got a closer look at it, no damage at all...

          "Why do you have a flower?" Soonyoung questioned as he came to sit next to my left side and just as he said that, the lights flickered out. It was pitch black in the practice room considering how there were no windows and only mirrors that lined the walls.

          "Ouch. What the heck guys?" I heard Jihoon complain.

          "What? What happened?" I asked right away.

          "Aish!" Soonyoung exclaimed and I heard him shuffle away from me. "Why would you pinch my wrist that hard?"

          "What do you mean? Who pinched who? What's going on guys?" I was beginning to get a tad bit scared, a random black out and now everyone else is saying they're getting pinched by something?

          After the rest of the members complained one by one about a pain on their wrist, it became quiet in the room for a couple of seconds and then I felt it. It was like a jolt of static electricity or someone grabbing a small needle and lightly pricking my right wrist. Immediately after I felt the small jolt of pain the light flickered back on.

          Almost instantaneously everyone looked at their wrists but there was nothing there. We all exchanged looks in confusion and I opened the purse to place the flower back inside. The only problem though was that the flower was gone.

          "Weren't you holding that purple flower before the lights out?" Wonwoo questioned pointing towards my hand.

          I nodded and looked around on the floor surrounding me. Nothing.

          Jeonghan looked at me with concern. "Yah Mingyu. What's going on?"

          "I don't know." I said slightly panicky. "Why don't we just worry about this later and finish up our choreography."

          Everyone else agreed, we waited half an hour, letting our stomachs digest the food we just ate and trying not to worry about whatever the heck just happened. I put the empty purse into my back pocket again then resumed with practicing our dances.

----

          We began walking back to the dorm, the sun had set and the temperature had cooled down a tad.

          "The part of my wrist that the random static attacked me is starting to feel like its burning." Chan looked at his wrist as we were walking. "Hey... Guys I have a small red line where the static feeling hit."

          Hansol walked beside him and looked at Chan's wrist out of concern. "Ah damn." Hansol said as he flinched and immediately looked at his wrist. "Mingyu... What's going on? The moment you took that flower out this happened."

          I shrugged as I felt a slight burning feeling on my wrist after that. This definitely must be linked to that flower.

----

          I pulled the thin sheet over my body as my blanket. It was too warm to use a quilt during these summer nights.

          "Goodnight guys!" Jeonghan said as he switched off the lights. "Hopefully no other strange things occur."

          I closed my eyes and couldn't help but wonder... Where could've that flower disappeared to?