_________ found herself awake earlier than her other roommate the next morning. She tried going back to sleep but he body and mind wouldn’t cooperate with her anymore. Deciding to be productive even on a holiday, she got up and did her usual morning rituals and wore a hoodie and shorts to serve as her work-out clothes before heading out of the special lodging.

_________ first stretched her body before she started jogging around the premises. There were still spots that she wasn’t able to clearly look at the day before and the aura seemed different now that the sun was shining just right in the morning.

After a few minutes of exercising and roaming around, ________ spotted a guy playing soccer by himself in the resort’s lawn.

Her interest got the best of her and she unplugged her ear-buds and walked closer to the guy, not recognizing who he is just by the view of his backside.

At that moment, the guy turned around while joggling the soccer ball on his knee and catching it on his foot at times.

_________ stopped in her tracks as if she saw someone who she shouldn’t have seen but it was too late to pretend, their eyes already met each other’s. ________ had two choices, it’s either she turns around and ignore Donghae’s presence or come up to him and act like a civilized, mature person…in this case, ________ decided to do the latter. She wanted to stop all the awkwardness and negative vibe between them since it’s already consuming her energy and adding unwanted stress that could be avoided. No one wants to keep an enemy and prolonged drama, right?
‘Stay cool. Just act normal so you finally can befriend him again.’ ________ thought to herself as she showed a faint smile to Donghae and bowed a bit to greet him.

“Why are you up?” Donghae asked, starting the conversation. Maybe he felt and thought the same as ________?
“Force of habit I guess. How about you? Shouldn't you be taking advantage of sleeping in?” ________ was now just a few steps away from Donghae.
“Same as you, I already got used to it. My body clock is messed up.” Donghae chuckled.

So far so good…everything seemed casual.
________’s eyes went back to the soccer ball that Donghae picked up from the grass and so she asked him if he plays soccer.

“It’s my favorite sport and hobby. Do you play?”

“I used to, when I was still in school.” Her admission revealed new info to Donghae.

“Ahhh…” Donghae answered back before two fell silent and awkward again. They didn’t know how to continue the talk.

This is the first and longest civilized conversation they’ve had ever since they had a rift. 

________ pretended to check her phone while Donghae looked down on the soccer ball, thinking if he should offer her to play. ‘Won’t it be weird to suddenly be like this with her? Are we close enough to do that? Oh well, it’s worth a shot. This is much better than bickering with her anyway.’

“Want to play with me?” Donghae finally voiced out his thoughts, making ________ look up to him.
“Can I?” _________ seemed to have brightened up after Donghae asked.

“I don’t know, can you?” He asked in a teasing, playful tone.

_________ scoffed as she felt Donghae challenging her. She put her phone and ear-buds down and showed Donghae that she was ready.

The two went on a one on one friendly match, they both were able to score a goal each and kept stealing the ball from each other.

Isn’t it funny how a sport is connecting the two today? It was like a rebirth of their relationship.

“One goal, One question.” Donghae proposed out of nowhere when they were taking a breather.
“I'd rather play, no questions asked.” She answered back since she was hesitant because that question and answer part may make things uncomfortable for them again.
“Come on. Let’s make things interesting.”
“Isn't it already?” _________ responded after Donghae tried to insist and then kicked the ball away from Donghae’s grasp before shooting it to make a goal for herself.

Donghae and ________ played for what it seemed like forever, they walked back together to the inn with sweat covering their body and their breathing still unnatural yet they possessed positive auras and happy expressions on their faces.

“You should smile more, it lets me breathe easier.” ________ told Donghae without thinking much of her statement. It looked like the two were already acting natural around one another.

“See you later.” Donghae said before two went separate ways to go to their own rooms.

The turn of events is surely surprising. There must have been something different in the air in this part of town wherein it helped the two to have a big change and progress in their relationship.

During lunch time, everyone gathered again and ate together. Although Donghae and _________ didn’t ‘promote’ their new friendship to their label mates, the two occasionally smiled at each other but weren’t able to speak to each other because they were preoccupied with their other friends.

_________ was surprised when Donghae discreetly handed her a bandage considering that she didn’t see him walk up to her in front of the buffet table. What she didn’t know that Donghae waited for that perfect moment to approach her. Before parting ways earlier, Donghae noticed the wound that ________ got due to playing soccer a bit rough in some parts.

“This should cover the gash on your leg. Use an ointment to treat it and then when it dries, put an anti-scarring cream.” Donghae advised her while he was getting food for himself. He didn’t look at her while speaking so the others didn’t notice it. It was like they had a secret connection and ________ wasn’t complaining. There is something…what’s the word? AH! There’s something thrilling about it.

While waiting for the mini-bus to fetch them, the managers set up one last activity for everyone under the company. Small boxes scattered around the living room area of their inn, the same place where they played truth or dare the previous night.

The managers suggested that they all write messages, anonymous or not, to each other and express what they can’t say a loud or what they haven’t had the chance to say. This activity serves as a way for everyone to get closer and break down any more walls and to close gaps to make everyone at ease, if they haven’t done so during the trip.

________ didn’t have a hard time writing short letters to her colleagues and even to the seniors, she did however had a somewhat tricky time writing to two guys in her company.

Writing Nichkhun’s note made _________ think, she didn’t know if she should mention her response or anything related about his confession but then she chose to just go with a ‘safe’ letter.

‘Thank you for always saving and comforting me. You’ve treated me with nothing but kindness.’

With Donghae’s, it really took her some time, she would put his in the back to skip it first so that it’ll give her brain some time to come up with some message that can fit their somewhat rollercoaster of a relationship now. She skipped his note until it was the only empty one of the bunch.

She played with her pen and came up with sorts of messages in her head until she finally thought of one that would suit what she wanted to express.

‘Stop being grumpy and start being happy.’ She wrote down the quirky note fast and folded it.

‘He won't think that I left that silly note, right?’ She thought as she dropped the note on Donghae’s designated box.

Almost everyone started reading the notes they got after settling on the bus on their way home.

‘Unnie, you're the perfect addition to our group. I really like you already. – Sunmi’ ________ smiled and side-hugged the girls after she read all of their heart-warming messages for her.
There were also other notes that stood out to her.

‘I really like you. Don’t forget to write me song, okay? Run away with your music with me. - N’

‘It's not too late to be brave. Believe in your music’
‘Heart over mind. Sing like you mean it’ 
Although those 3 notes were written by ‘anonymous’ people, she could tell that one of them was from Nichkhun while another was probably from Donghae, it was something he would say. But what confused _________ is that there are 2 similar notes that she thought that could come from Donghae yet he could have written only one, right? He wouldn’t have bothered to write her an extra note, would he?

As for the comment replies, I tried the new AFF feature regarding that so tell me if you all got my response ^_^ 

Posted a new story / one-shot collection: Be with a guy who is...

Hope you can check it out and hopefully you'll like it ^_^ You can also suggest a Kguy and a scenario and I'll try to write ;)