Eun-Ae smiled contentedly as she wriggled her bare toes in the soft, fine white sand of the famous Daeyang beachfront. The tiny grains were comfortably warm, having absorbed the heat of the burning sun shining down from the clear blue sky. A gentle breeze swept in from the rolling ocean waves; it carried the scent of salt with it, leaving a refreshing taste on Eun-Ae’s tongue. She clamped her hand down on her sun hat to keep it from flying away as she glanced over her shoulder. The boys were piling out of the car, dragging an absurd amount of beach towels, floating rafts, and umbrellas.

“Where did you get all that?” she asked incredulously as Taemin came by dragging a dinosaur-shaped beach raft.

“We went shopping while you were asleep!” the boy grinned, crying out as he stumbled off of the boardwalk. He lost his balance and went tumbling into the sand, the large raft landing on top of him before being carried off by the breeze. As the boy spit out a mouthful of sand and shook his head to clear the particles from his fluffy hair, the raft went bouncing away across the beach. “No! Come back, Mr. Dinosaur!” he wailed as he scrambled to his feet and took off in a desperate pursuit. While Eun-Ae laughed at the poor boy’s bad luck, she felt a large piece of soft fabric land on her head. She pulled off the beach towel, rolling it up neatly in her arms, before glancing up to see Key smiling down at her.

“It’s a good day for the beach,” he remarked. Eun-Ae nodded in agreement, closing her eyes to savor the soft sunlight warming her skin. In the back of her mind, she hoped that the day would go off without a hitch; according to the doctor, her leg muscles were starting to deteriorate as a result of the brittleness of her bones, and they weren’t sure how much longer Eun-Ae would be able to walk. She shoved the dark thoughts to the side and opened her eyes once more to find that the boys had already walked to the shore and were now setting up their assortment of towels and umbrellas. Gasping, she ran awkwardly across the sand to join them, not wanting to be left behind.

“Hopefully no one recognizes us,” Jonghyun mumbled as he sprayed sunscreen all over himself. “I would hate to have to deal with a bunch of screaming fangirls today.” He tossed the can to Minho, who shrugged in response and doused himself in the sticky protective substance. As Eun-Ae laid out her towel and flopped down to smear sunscreen lotion over her pale skin, she frowned up at the group of idols.

“You guys have to deal with that a lot?” she inquired.

“Oh, yeah. It’s nice to have devoted fans and all, but sometimes it’s just too much,” Onew sighed as he flipped the last umbrella open. “Kinda hard to have a personal life.” Eun-Ae frowned as dotted her nose with sunscreen, returning the bottle to her beach bag. It must be hard on them… The fact that they’re willing to risk that by doing all these things with me… she trailed off, smiling as her heart warmed. They really are the best friends I could ever ask for. Especially… Her eyes landed on Key, who had been the orchestrator of the entire thing. Her heart pounded as he pulled off his shirt to spray sunscreen on himself, and she could not help but stare at his toned body. Blushing when he glanced in her direction, she busied herself with tying up her hair.

“You remember when we used to come out here when we were little?” he mused as he tossed the bottle into the sand and ducked under the rainbow-colored umbrella to flop down beside her. Eun-Ae nodded, gazing out at the gently rolling ocean waves. It was calm, just like many of the times she and Key had come to play in the sand while their parents watching dutifully from the shore. Memories danced in her mind, phantasms of Key chasing her through the surf or the pair of them peering into the tide pools in attempts to catch little creatures. There was one memory that stuck out to her in particular.

“We used to make sand castles,” she remarked with a small smile. “Every time we came.”

“Oh, yeah! I remember. The last time we came here we made a huge one!” he laughed. “Then a wave knocked it down, and you cried.”

“No, that was you!” Eun-Ae laughed as she elbowed him in the shoulder.

“What, really? I don’t remember it that way!” he teased and tugged lightly at her ponytail. They continued to poke at each other, insisting on their version of the memory, when Taemin came huffing and puffing with his beloved raft in tow.

“Did I hear something about sand castles?” he asked breathlessly as he tossed his raft into the pile of other inflatables and flopped, exhausted, onto a vacant towel. While he caught his breath, suddenly Key grinned and jumped to his feet. His eyes were sparkling excitedly.

“That’s what we should do! We should have a sand castle competition!” he cried. The four boys blinked up at him from their spots lounging in the sand, then glanced at each other with shrugs.

“Sure, but, what do we win?” Onew asked as he rolled onto his belly and folded up the magazine he had been reading. Key frowned as he pondered the notion, then grinned mischievously in Eun-Ae’s direction. Oh, I don’t like the look of that… she thought with growing anxiety. He clapped his hands and rubbed them together like the evil geniuses on morning cartoons, sniggering.

“Eun-Ae will be the judge. Whoever wins… Gets a kiss from her!” he grinned widely. The boys instantly snapped to attention, obviously intrigued by the reward. Eun-Ae’s mouth hung open as she stared incredulously up at Key, simply stunned by his audacity. Before she could offer any refusal, however, the boys took off in a feverish dash for the shoreline, eager to begin constructing their castles right away. Eun-Ae cried out as they kicked sand in every direction, spraying her with the fine, grainy substance and tossing their towels across the ground. While she attempted to brush most of the grains away, the boys were hooting and hollering as they tossed insults at one another.

“Minho, your castle looks like a big, fat hill!” Taemin giggled as he slapped wet sand into a mound. Minho, highly upset by his remark, threw a glob of mud at him.

“Look who’s talking!” he called back.

“Why did I even get involved in this?” Jonghyun sighed as he began forming towers and parapets on his blocky structure. Despite his statement, he looked more animated that Eun-Ae had ever seen him, with bright eyes and a cocky smirk playing across his lips.

“Talk all you want, losers, you’re going down!” Onew howled as he toted a bucket of wet sand to his construction site. With a well-aimed glob of wet sand to the face, Minho knocked him into the surf, causing all of his hard-earned dirt to be washed away by the rolling waves. As Onew recovered, the boys cackled and rolled in the sand with laughter. “I call foul!” Onew whined as he stumbled out of the water with an empty bucket.

Key, on the other hand, was uncharacteristically quiet as he constructed his sand castle. He seemed quite determined. Groaning at their tomfoolery, Eun-Ae snatched up the magazine Onew had been so interested and began perusing its contents. She found it highly impossible to concentrate under the intense pressure that she was going to have to reward one of her friends with a kiss, and so threw it aside with a resigned sigh. The lingering sand in her hair and skin was beginning to itch uncomfortably, so she rose from her towel and removed her bathing suit wrap to plod down to the water and wash herself off in the waves. When she resurfaced, she found Key staring at her with an unmistakable smirk.

“What?” she huffed with a red face.

“Thar’s a cute bathing suit, Eun-Ae,” he mused as he turned his attention back to his sand castle. Eun-Ae flushed with embarrassment and looked down at herself. Her mother had bought the suit for her some time ago, but because of her illness she had not been able to use it until now. It was the first two-piece she had even worn, with yellow bikini bottoms and a ruffled yellow-and-white top that was sleeveless. She hadn’t thought about it until Key had pointed it out, but she was showing an astonishing amount of skin. Seeing her mortified reaction, Key began to laugh more. Angered, she splashed him. “Hey, hey, watch the work of art, miss!” he cried as the water droplets landed on him.

“Speaking of, we’re done! Are you ready to judge, Eun-Ae?” Taemin called impatiently from his spot. Eun-Ae sighed and marched out of the water, taking her place before the five creations. I can’t believe I’m doing this, she thought miserably as she surveyed the castles. Minho’s did indeed look like a glorified mound, bless his heart. Taemin’s and Onew’s were average, simple blocks with towers carved into them. Jonghyun’s was surprisingly sophisticated, with bricks drawn into the four walls that surrounded a little town square, complete with a crude fountain. Key’s took Eun-Ae’s breath away, and she felt tears come to her eyes.

It was the castle they had built their last day on the beach together. It was built exactly like it had been when they were children, with all the crudeness and imagination of a young child. A small moat, complete with a sand bridge, surrounded the small structure, a leaning abomination of towers and walls that had been carefully slapped together. Chuckling slightly, Eun-Ae walked closer to get a better look.

“Remember, Eun-Ae?” Key murmured softly behind her. As she traced a finger over the little sand-brick walls, she smiled as she reminisced.

“Yes,” she murmured. “I remember. You were the one who cried that day, and I told you I would give you a kiss on the cheek to make it all better,” she chuckled softly as the memory came flooding back. So that was his game all along, she thought as she glanced shyly up at him. In that instant, a massive wave crashed onto the shore, eliminating the boys’ hard work. Taemin fell to his knees, wailing at the loss of his mound.

“Of course,” Jonghyun muttered as he kicked the sodden remnants of his sand structure.

“Okay, but Eun-Ae saw them. Who wins?” Onew demanded. Eun-Ae giggled, then stood up on her tip-toes to plant a soft kiss on Key’s cheek. The other four boys groaned slightly in disappointment, while Key grinned stupidly and rubbed the back of his neck, delighted at his victory. He then beamed and grabbed Eun-Ae around the middle, throwing her over his shoulder as he charged into the water. Screaming, she bounced up and down on his shoulder until he tossed her lightly into the waves, laughing. She bobbed u to the surface, cackling with giggles, and began splashing him mercilessly with water. He shielded her eyes from her assault, then cried out when Onew jumped onto his back to pull him down into the surf. They began wrestling in the water, hooting and hollering, while Taemin dived into the water on his dinosaur raft. Jonghyun helped Eun-Ae to her feet before smirking and pushing her back into the water, earning him a face-full of salt water.

They played in the waves for a long while, their laughter echoing on the salty breeze as the sun crept across the clear blue sky.