Only a few days after that was Kangin's birthday, January 17th. Still, every time I saw him, I thought of a night in the rain. Either way, I was an ELF, and had a job to do. I'd closed my "ELF Queen" blog due to SM's orders, but I still had all kinds of messages to carry from my followers, of which, by the end, I'd had about a thousand of. I wrote all of their wishes for him down in a notebook and gave it to him on his birthday, wishing him a happy birthday, and then leaving, hoping he'd been too drunk that night to really remember what had happened. No such luck.

"Hey, Ahjumma!"

I turned back around, surprised. "Are you referring to me?!"

"Yes. You look like an Ahjumma."

"Kangin-oppa, as of today, I'm twelve years younger than you!"

"Really? Wow. You aged fast," he laughed, nudging one of the other members to laugh with him. "Well, thank you, Ahjumma."

Then I left.

The carrying of birthday messages from fans was a repeated duty in the early months of the year. After Kangin's birthday, I focused on my trainee jobs, and my school, but before I knew it, January turned to February, and it was February third, Kyuhyun's birthday. 

In addition to the notebook of fan wishes, I also had a few gifts from fans for him, tucked into a birthday present bag. They'd been gift requests from fans, dropped at a location I told them I would go to pick them up, since I wasn't about to tell any ELF where I lived, as wonderful of people as they are. I'd gone through them the previous night, though, to make sure I wasn't giving Kyuhyun anything horrifying. (Sorry, ELF. Just trying to help.)

Kyuhyun was harder to hunt down on his birthday than Kangin was, though. Admittedly, he had a lot of shows to do, being an MC for two things, along with the usual packed idol's schedule. It's a wonder he didn't always look like he was going to fall over from exhaustion. But instead, he always seemed so bright and energetic, with his evil grins, little tricks, and weird dances.

I finally managed to catch him at around ten at night, when he was coming back into the company building with a few of his friends. Oh my god, are those CNBLUE members?! They are! It was Kyu-line!

I ducked behind a pillar, steadying my heartbeat. It would be really embarrassing to just go and give him his present, when he was in front of his friends, but if I didn't do it now, I would lose my chance, and have to wait until the next day. Okay, Mel, just go. Just don't look at Minhyuk, and you'll be fine. Ignore Changmin, Minho, Yonghwa, Jonghyun, and Minhyuk. Just give the present to Kyuhyun, and get out of there. Yeah.

I peeked around the pillar, took a deep breath, and walked up to Kyuhyun. 

"Kyuhyun-oppa!"

"Jageun! See, I told you she was lurking around here, ready to spring on me."

They laughed, and I glared at him, setting my jaw. "I guess you don't want your birthday presents, then. After all of the love and care that the ELF put into these..." I started to turn towards the door, but he caught me by the back of my collar, like I expected he would. 

"Hey, if those are from the ELF, they don't belong to you."

I held out the notebook and the bag, keeping my eyes on his shoes, so they didn't travel to Minhyuk. I didn't want to be fangirling over CNBlue right then. Kyuhyun might get jealous. And I know he gets jealous very easily. 

"Hey, you guys, this is Jageun."

"My name is not Jageun!"

"Fine, introduce yourself, then!"

It didn't look like I would be able to ignore them. 

"Annyeonghasseo. My name is Melissa, but here in Korea people call me 'Choi Minsung'. My pen name is Queen Be. I'm honored to meet you." I bowed, working very hard not to look at their faces.

"There, you introduced yourself. Do you know who these guys are?"

"Of course. I know Minho-sunbae already. This is my first time greeting Changmin-sunbae, though." I bowed to him, and then to the CNBlue members, still trying not to look at them, or even to not think about how adorable Minhyuk was. This would be easier if Sungmin was here! "And the CNBlue members of Kyu-line, Minhyuk-oppa, Yonghwa-oppa, and Jonghyun-oppa."

"Ya! You know all of their names?!" Kyuhyun gaped. I guess he hadn't actually expected me to know. 

I bit my lip. Should I say or not say? I guess I'll say it anyway, to gain some points with CNBlue. I may be an ELF, but loyalty has its limits. 

"CNBlue was my first bias in the Kpop world. To be honest, memorizing all of their names was much easier than Super Junior." I heard laughing and high-fiving.

"Minsung, right? Who'se your favorite member?!"

"Ah, hyung, it's obviously Yonghwa-hyung. That's everyone's favorite."

I looked down at my feet. "Umm... actually... I Iike Minhyuk-oppa..."

"Awwwwww... can I hug her?! She's so cute!"

I swear, people say I'm cute just because I'm short when Americans are supposed to be tall.

To be honest, recieving a hug from Minhyuk felt really weird, like hugging a relative you knew when you were really little but haven't seen in so many years that you don't even remember them. I'd gotten pretty distant from CNBlue. I still liked them, but...

"I like Minhyuk-oppa, but... of everyone here... I like Kyuhyun-oppa the most."

I smiled, an apology for my earlier behavior. "Happy birthday, Oppa. From the ELF."

I bowed to the rest of them, feeling a little bit of myself slide into place. Piece by piece, the puzzle that was Queen Be was starting to become clear to me. "It was a pleasure meeting you all. I hope you enjoy Oppa's birthday celebration. Well, I have to go. I'm only a trainee, you know."

I could be a Boice. Just as long as I remembered that above all, I was the ELF Queen.

Two more SuJu birthdays in February; more messages to carry. Just one problem.

The birthday on the ninth belonged to Han Geng. What was I supposed to do now? It's not like I could just hop across the sea (Since going through North Korea was even more out of the question), figure out where he was in China, stalk him down and hand him his present. It would take too long, and way more resources than I had. I'd have to be the executive for an international company or something in order to do that in a few days.

What to do? I wanted, more than anything, to deliver it myself, but it looked like that was out of the picture. So I'd have to pass it through hands. 

"Henry?" I asked, tentatively. He'd kidnapped me from the school cafeteria, and now we were at some restaurant in the south side of Seoul, eating Mexican food, of all things. Apparently he'd had a craving. 

"Yeah?"

"I'm not sure how it'll work, but... can you give this to Han Geng for me? The next time you see him."

He looked up from his taco, hot sauce all over his cheeks. "That's right, it's Han Geng's birthday today. You really don't forget anything, do you?"

"I had to close my blog. My last post was to tell the ELF that I wouldn't be able to update them on the members' well-being anymore, but I would do my best to deliver the messages that they had already given. There aren't many for Han Geng, but the ones there are are pretty long."

He took the notebook from me, flipping through the pages. "Did you write all of these?"

"Post by post. I spent all night the day I deleted the blog writing all of them down."

"So that's why you looked so tired that day... Is it really worth it, working so hard to fulfill their requests, and still being a trainee?"

I nodded, grabbing a napkin. "I take my job as ELF Queen very seriously. Now wipe your face. You look like a baby." I laughed, leaning forward and wiping the taco sauce off of his face. 

He leaned into it, instead of taking the napkin from me, so I threw it at his face, laughing.

"So, can you do it?"

He took the napkin and wiped his face. "I'll try, Mel. But I don't know when the next time we'll see Han Geng will be. The company doesn't really like it. It makes them look bad."

Yeah, I knew about that. It seemed like everywhere I went in SM, Han Geng's name had been erased from everything Super Junior related. Like they wanted to pretend that he'd never been a member. Even if it was his birthday.

The final birthday of February was the very next day, with Siwon's birthday. But whn I asked him about it, he said to hold off with the gifts, because it wasn't actually his birthday. His birthday was in April. 

"But why say it's in February?"

He shrugged, holding open a door for me. "That way we have birthdays together. And it follows the lunar calendar, and..." he seemed to notice my confused expression, "and you don't get it at all, do you?"

"Nope. Well, I'll wish you a happy birthday when your birthday actually comes, Siwon-oppa. Until then..."

"Mel! Stop making chocolate! We have to go soon!" Min Hee called, putting her shoes on at the doorway. It was Valentine's Day morning, and I had a lot of chocolates to deliver. You see, in Asia, Valentine's day is celebrated by girls giving their love interests chocolate. But for me, well... you can figure it out.

"I just have to wrap this last one!" I quickly spun the tinfoil around the last chocolate, a lovely piece of white chocolate just for Heechul, then dropped it into the bag with the other nine and quickly ran to catch up with Min Hee.

"Seriously, everyone else just buys the chocolate. But you have to make it yourself."

"It's more special that way!" I argued.

"Yeah, okay. And you had to use our tiny hot plate to do it? We have a community kitchen to do that in."

We passed by the said community kitchen, and I pointed out to her why that wasn't an option. It was crowded with girls running to and fro, making chocolates. Most of them were trainees, I noticed.

"Okay, I see. You don't have to say anything," Min Hee grumbled.

"Come on, Min Hee, you can't say you don't have anything for your SHINee oppas."

"There's nothing."

I snuck my hand into her purse, pulling out a package of wrapped goodies. "A-HA! LIAR!!"

She snatched it out of my hand and stuffed it back into her bag. "You are so nosy!!!!"

"Caught red-handed. So when did you make it?"

"Yesterday, when you went to the Noraebang with FASE."

"I knew it. Guilty as charged." I smiled triumphantly. "I had to make more than you did, though..."

"If you'd just pick which one you want to date, you'd only have to make one."

"I'm not DATING any of them! They're all too old for me."

"The age difference between Girl's Day's Hyeri and Tony An is sixteen years. I think the Kpop world makes allowances."

"But that's-- I don't-- I can't--"

Min Hee patted me on the head. "Don't worry about it, Mel. They'd have to like you back that way first. So far, I think they love you like a cute little puppy."

"A puppy?"

"Haven't you noticed that people haven't been calling you 'Henry's Pet' very much anymore?"

"Yeah, but I thought that Sungmin-oppa announcing me as Queen Be was the reason for that."

"No. It's because they're calling you 'SuJu's Pet' now. Because you're babied by all of them, not just Henry."

I scowled. "I liked my theory better."

Fortunately, the members didn't seem to find anything romantic about it at all. Actually, I felt a bit bad, since it looked like they'd gotten a lot of fanmail with candy in it. But they accepted my chocolates, nonetheless.

When I gave Sungmin his chocolates, I suddenly had this image of him as a high school flower boy, opening up the door of his locker and a wave of candy pouring out. Oh wait, that was just a scene from Attack On The Pin-up Boys. My bad.  There was no wave of candy, but there was a fairly substantial pile. He said that he was probably going to donate it to charity, because he just can't eat that much candy. Oh sweet, sweet Sungmin.

Eunhyuk, on the other hand, was not surrounded by a mountain of candy, but instead a mountain of empty wrappers.

"Oppa!" I cried. "You'll get fat!"

He laughed. "This is my favorite holiday! So much sweet stuff! Hey, did you bring me some more?!"

I hid behind my back the candy I'd so carefully made. "Not if you're going to eat it right away. Oppa, you're going to get sick if you keep eating!"

He looked down at the candy wrappers. "But it looks so good..."

"Do you know how many crazy fans put their blood, sweat and tears into these chocolates? Literally? Just so they know that you have a little piece of them inside you?"

I felt a bit bad at making that vicious comment when he turned a sickly shade of green.

"Are you serious?"

"Yes, actually," I admitted. Some fans were crazy like that. "Okay, I'll give you my candy, but you have to promise to save it for later, okay?"

 "Okay, okay!"

"Promise?"

"I promise!"

Reluctantly, I handed it over.

I couldn't believe how quickly time passed. I watched as BoA recorded the songs for her new album, one of which, I was proud to say, was my song, "A Dream By the Sea."

I was still working on my song for Super Junior. Every time I thought I had the lyrics right, I would try to compose it, and it would just sound tacky. I'd started over more times than I could count. 

My other songs were being dispensed to various artists. The song I'd written about the experience with JiHoo was given to Girls' Generation, and apparently the song I'd written with Kangta for TVXQ had become a fan favorite. I can't say I wasn't proud. Soon enough, people would see that there was one name that kept popping up in SM albums. Soon enough. 

Of course, the kidnappings continued to happen. In addition to my dance classes, I also was repeatedly stolen by EunHae for my private dance lessons, I think because they found it entertaining. Unfortunately, there were no performances like the first day. I know, I was disappointed, too. Either way, I was starting to gain confidence in my dance skills (Or the lack thereof), as my body was starting to learn what to do without my brain having to tell it. Possibly thanks to their wonderful coaching.

The other members also continued to frequent my vocal training lessons, much to Nakata-sensei's chagrin. I think she especially didn't like Kyuhyun, because he always talked back to her, but personally, I loved it when he came in. When it came to teaching me how to sing, he was actually quite gentle. Well, by Kyuhyun standards. But in a way, his meanness made it even more fun, and sometimes he'd make an example by doing something dorky. It took me a while to weasel out of him what he thought of my performance of his song, that day after the party, but eventually I found out that he was surprised I even knew that song, but that I needed more practice. Even though I'd been practicing it for about two years.

Ryeowook also often came, helping me by playing the piano parts of whatever song I was singing, always giving me encouragement. 

And sometimes, when I was playing ukulele, Sungmin would come in and listen. Once, he'd been practicing his gitar, so he was carrying it with him, and he sat down with me and we played together, making a pretty awesome duo, if I do say so myself. But those times were not as often as I liked.

I felt pretty special for all of these visits and lessons until I found out (through Min Hee) that a lot of groups were adopting trainees like that, and giving them individual training, although it was because a lot of people had become jealous of my special treatment from Super Junior. Min Hee, I found out later, was getting taught by SHINee, which made me happy for her. 

As usual, the two members I saw the most were Henry and Zhou Mi. I was still being kidnapped quite frequently by Henry and the other members of FASE, but I still didn't know what their evil plan was. Zhou Mi, on the other hand, I ran into almost every day at roughly the same place, same time. I would always stop to chat for a second, and he'd always talk for a while until he realized that he was going to be late for wherever it was he was going.

In March, I spent the whole month focused on my trainee duties, only taking a break on my brother's birthday to web-chat with my family. 

All of a sudden, school was over. Forever. For me, at least. In early April, I attended graduation with John, despite having only actually spent half of the year at school. But they'd decided to let me graduate with the rest of my class. I was... free. No more school. But what would come to fill in that huge gap in my schedule? I was still a trainee, after all.