Seriously?  He couldn't make someone's day a little brighter by expressing his charm without having it turn into something more?  It was the first time he felt irritated by Jiyong's advice.  He made similar conversation with the opposite in the past and never received these types of comments before.  Hell, that's all it ever turned out to be - nothing but friendly talk.  God knows he tried over time, but all he ever did was amass a deluge of female friends.

But of all a sudden this changes because... what?  He had just gotten out of a relationship? It wasn't as if he and Amina were together for a long period of time... less than a week, if you wanted to be exact.  And sporadically over a long distance period of six months. And it was almost getting close to that one year mark when they last contacted each other.  Didn't he deserve a break?

He focused his frustrated eyes straight ahead at the LCD monitor and put his headphones back on, ignoring Jiyong completely. This seemed yet another thing that would continue to haunt him - the stigma that he still wasn't over Amina.  At this rate, he'd be forever tied down by the ghost of her memory.

Youngbae powered through the rest of his exercise routine and took a quick cold shower afterwards. His morning was ruined and the rest of the day didn't bode well for him. They had a meeting to go over the rest of the week's schedule in one of the conference rooms in less than fifteen minutes.  He headed down towards the basement level to grab a quick snack before it started.

He walked down through the brightly lit, steel-affixed, curved hallway towards the cafeteria.  He could hear the thud of bass music thumping loudly from the dance studio nearby, indicating another trainee dance class in session.  He rounded the corner to the cafeteria and spotted Nara sitting in the corner alone, eating her lunch and reading something familiar.

Youngbae approached one of the lunch aides and asked for a banana to go.  He took the piece of fruit with him and headed towards Nara, his eyes immediately going towards the cover in her hands.  He sat down in front of her and started peeling the banana. "You read 'One Piece'?"

Nara yelped back in surprise.  So engrossed in her reading, she hadn't even noticed when he sat down. She tried to hide the comic book under her notebook.  "N-neh," she replied, her eyes widening in embarrassment.

He took a large bite and smiled.  "It's one of my favorite comic series. Do you want me to tell you what happens?"

"Ani!" Her eyes shot fire.  She immediately blushed at her outburst.

He grinned.  So she's passionate about her comic books as much as I am, he thought.

Interesting.

"I-I just want to read and find out about it myself if you don't mind," she stammered. Her eyes immediately lowered to the bowl of rice in front of her.

"Mianhae," Youngbae said, taking another chunk of banana.  "I didn't mean to ruin your lunch.  I just noticed you reading my comic and had to stop by."  He swallowed.  "Is this your normal lunch time?"

She glanced up and shrugged her shoulder.  "I guess so.  I'm not sure. It's my first day and we haven't really established anything."

He nodded and stood up. "Well, if you ever want to discuss why Luffy decided to take..."

"Stop! Stop! Stop!" She closed her eyes and covered her ears with both of her hands.

He laughed, un-peeling the rest of the banana to take with him. He smiled and bowed to her.  "Have a great rest of your lunch Nara-yah." He popped the remaining fruit in his mouth and tossed the peel in the nearest waste bin.

Nara watched as he walked away, a bemused expression on her face.

It seemed that April showers were making their way early in Seoul.  The heavy downpour caused the boys and their team to arrive later than scheduled for the Inkigayo show.  Backstage was hectic, as stylist and crewman ran around setting up their stations. They normally recorded two takes for their "live" show performance, which took a couple of hours tops.  But it looked like tonight was going to be a long night for all of them.

Youngbae finished with hair and make-up and was ready for wardrobe.  He waited patiently by as Ji Eun worked on Seungri.  They were going for a retro-vibe and his hair was slicked back high off his forehead.

"Ah, Youngbae.  Your clothes are hanging over there," Ji Eun nodded pointedly towards the clothing rack nearby.  "Just put on what you can and Nara can help you with the jacket and any buttons on your cuffs."

He nodded and grabbed the outfit that was marked with his name and found a spot in the backroom to dress.  When he had the majority of the outfit on, he came out with the jacket in tow and searched for Nara.  She was with Seunghyun and was brushing off the back of his jacket with a lint roller. When Nara finished, she bowed and they parted.  She turned towards Youngbae and hesitantly smiled.

He walked forward and laid the jacket in a nearby chair.  "Annyeonghasaeyo..." he murmured. His eyes raked over her casually.  She was wearing dark wash boot cut jeans with white sneakers and a simple pink sweater. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail and her bangs were clipped away from her face.

"Annyeonghasaeyo," she replied, her cheeks turning the same shade as her sweater.  She quickly tried to make conversation as she worked on clasping the buttons on his cuffs.  "Pretty busy, huh?"

He glanced over her head.  Some people were milling about, while others were rushing here and there. They could hear the crowd of fans getting restless outside.  "Neh," he smiled down at her.  "But we're used to it." He noticed her nervousness as she worked on him.  Her fingers brushed against the underside of his wrist and it started shaking slightly.  He looked away politely.

"Did you finish that manga issue you were reading the other day," he asked the air around her.

"Neh."

He heard the smile in her voice and felt encouraged.  "Wasn't that crazy, how...."

Jiyong sat back in the swivel chair as they worked the finishing touches on his hair.  He silently observed Youngbae and Nara through the mirror reflection as they worked closely together. He could tell Youngbae was being his usual friendly self, but what his friend couldn't see was the affect he was having on the intern.

The girl practically gushed every time Youngbae flashed a smile (which was pretty damn often).  But he had to ease up on Youngbae tonight.  He hadn't seen his friend this relaxed or carefree in quite awhile.  Whatever they were talking about, was working its magic.  The last time Youngbae was like this was when he was with Amina.

Amina.

Jiyong used to ask her cousin, Hanna, if she had heard from Amina.  But every time he did, she'd end up crying or becoming teary eyed.  There was some history between the two that he wasn't privy to.  And he didn't feel the need to intrude, so he let it go.  He just didn't like the fact that Amina left his man hanging.  But in the short time that he'd known her, he was certain she had her reasons.

He just hoped it was better than Youngbae.

"Now that I'm done reading One Piece, I've kind of run out of things to read until they release the next issue."

Youngbae stood up straighter as she went around to his back and brushed the lint off his jacket.  He hadn't noticed it before, but she was tall.  Well, taller than him.  Which wasn't difficult to be.  He just never thought about his height much when he was with Amina.

"... if you wanted to go?" Nara prompted.

"Huh?" Youngbae snapped out of his thoughts.

"I was thinking of picking up some more comics at Booksaetong to read later on this week," Nara said.  "I wanted to know if you wanted to go with me? And you can tell me which ones to basically stay away from," she grinned, "since you