Author’s POV

On the way home, by yourself, your mind was completely blank. Your feet just walked on and on, until you bumped into someone’s hard chest.

A pair of large hands quickly reached out to catch you from your fall.

Without even looking at the person, you rubbed your head and observed your surroundings. It appears that you have walked way past your own street. And now, you find yourself standing right outside Café Lavender, of all places.

“Ahem”

Finally taking notice of the person who still had their hold on you, you looked up to meet the eyes of none other than Kris. Blankly blinking, your mouth parted, only to say one word.

“Oh.”

Kris raised his brows at you as you took a step back,

“Mian”

You apologise to him. An action that had him raising his brows higher, if it was possible. He took notice of you soulless expression and questioned what’s going on in that mind of yours, before relaxing his own expression.

A sigh escaped his lips, a sigh that communicated a message somewhere along the lines of ‘why does this girl always bother me so much?’

“Come on in, you look like you’re in need of a nice cup of drink”

Without saying anything, you looked at him again as he gestured you to go in. Strangely enough, you actually obliged with his request as he held the door open for you.

“Eo! Hyeyi-ah, annyeong!”

Luhan cheerfully greeted you first, followed by all the other boys. And their greetings were returned with a smile which didn’t quite reach your eyes like your usual ones. Seeing this, the boys’ own smiles falter slightly in worry.

“Just wait for me at my usual table”

Nodding at Kris, you trudged along, leaving him to take his order.

Quick to realise that you were actually listening to the older male, Lay and the others uniformly turned their heads to follow your movements, acting like it is the most bizarre thing they’ve ever seen.

At the table, you let your eyes wander outside, feeling like you were gonna nod off to dreamland any second.

“What’s up with you? You don’t seem to be yourself today”

His words seemed to have pulled your soul halfway back to Earth as you looked at him and tiredly laid your head and arms on the table.

 “I feel like school’s drained all my energy away”

A chuckle was heard as Kris watched you sprawl all over the table *now that’s more like you*

“Is it really just school?”

“Hm?” you looked up with your head laid in your arm “what do you mean?”

 “Nothing” you eyed him curiously “…so, how was your evening with, Kai…was it? The boy from yesterday”

You subconsciously groaned, the moment you heard that name as it instantly had you remembering how he hurt himself because of you. You had no idea why, but just thinking about it made you really annoyed.

“I should have known you’ll ask about him…” now you suddenly felt completely awake, your body sat up properly

At that moment Tao came along with the drinks.

“Americano…” he placed the cup in front of Kris “…and hot chocolate with extra marshmallows”

Kris watched you in amusement as your eyes gleefully widened in surprise, seeing the cup of scrumptious sweetness being placed in front of you. *Seriously, what is this girl? It’s not even been 5 minutes and she’s already went through a few different moods*

“Enjoy”

You got from your seat and squeezed the boy in your arms as the cheery tone returned to your voice “thank you!”

“Hehe…Duizhang ordered it for you, you should thank him…I’ll be off to work then”

Releasing Tao from the hug, you turned to Kris.

“What? Don’t I get a hug as well?”

“…no” sitting yourself back down, you happily looked at all the marshmallows in your cup “…thanks, I didn’t expect you to remember”

“Well I’m glad that cheered you up. Now back to the topic…how’s it going with that Kai guy? Is his hand ok?”

The smile on your face dropped and that feeling of annoyance crept back. For some reason, you didn’t make any snarky comment or avoid the topic. It kind of feels natural to just let things out and speak to him about things now.

“Yeh…about that…”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Meanwhile, in the dance studio, music loudly blasted out from the stereo and there were some pretty intense practicing going on with five young boys dominating the whole place.

Kai stood at the side, observing the smoothly organised dance moves. His mind took in every little movement and positioning each of the members took, analysing the whole routine. As he glances over at the mirrors, something in particular had snatched his attention away.

On the back wall, a very noticeable poster was stuck on – SHOWSTOPPER.

As a dancer, it is impossible for him not to have heard of this yearly event. SHOWSTOPPER - an internationally recognised dance competition that takes place in New York, where young dancers from all over the world competes against one another.

The music stopped and the five boys sprawled onto the floor. Amongst them, Taemin sat up and turned to Kai, catching him stare at the poster. He nudged Jonghyun who was beside him and nodded at Kai.

“I see you noticed it then”

His voice brought Kai’s attention back to them

“So what dya think? Up for the challenge?”

Taemin noticed the unsure look on Kai’s face, he knew that Kai’s problem was that he liked to have his own space, meaning that group dance isn’t his thing. Not to mention that he never considered himself to be an official member of the studio.

“You know, even though you don’t practice with everyone else, as long as you use this studio, you are one of us”

 “And with Yunho in charge, the whole studio has been signed up anyway”

“Everything’s been sorted out. We’re just hoping that someone would take the open sport for the solo category”

Kai looked at the encouraging smiles on their faces, causing his lips to twitch up into a smirk.

“You’re not really leaving me with much of a choice are you?”

The grins on the boys’ faces grew wider. Key jumped up onto his feet, clapping his hands together,

“Well that’s that then! Wooo we’re all going to New York together!”

Onew lightly smacked the back of the diva’s head “yah! Don’t be too relaxed, we’re not going for a vacation you know”

Kai chuckled at the older studio members until Taemin spoke again.

“Oh and by the way…we knew you’d agree so we already had you signed up”

Taemin flashed him his sweet, innocent smile causing Kai to playfully scoff at him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Back at the café, you have just finished explaining what you had found out this morning to Kris.

“And you say you weren’t getting bullied…”

“Well I really didn’t think I was”

“Whatever…I knew it would be like this, but at least that Miyoung girl won’t do anything to you now”

Back at the counter, Lay and the others had gathered around watching the two of you.

“Since when did those two get along?”

“I know right? It’s no fun like this”

Kris took a sip from his drink. And for some reason, you couldn’t help but to stare at him with a thoughtful expression.

*It’s so strange how I can feel so comfortable talking to him. One minute, you’re arguing with me and the next minute, you take in everything I say like you truly care…*…“…sometimes you’re really like a real oppa” – the words in your mind gradually got louder and without even realising it, you had already spoken them out loud.

“You should start calling me that then”

Kris didn’t even look surprised or anything. It was like he already grown used to the way you act. You on the other hand felt embarrassed. Like you had just been caught red handed, by this giant…again.

“Neh?!”

“I’m older than you, so it’s only right if you call me that anyway”

“Oppa?”

Calling him that somehow felt so right to you, ‘oppa’…that word seemed to fit in with your image of him really well…though you already called the other boys that. You didn’t know what this feeling was, but you felt so happy.

…to put it in your own weird way…it was like that one word had you two connected like that of an oath made by sworn siblings…well yeh, that’s just your weird way of thinking, but still…

What you didn’t know is that that one word had his heart skipping a beat, but as usual he kept his feeling well hidden and simply nodded at you with what seemed like to you, a brotherly smile.

“Well, I should get back to work soon…so let’s send this clumsy xiao mei back home, shall we?”

“Me…xiao mei?”

“…little sister, now come on”

A/N: Hm...i wasn't too sure about this. What do you guys think? Is the whole Kris as the brother figure a bit too much, too rushed?