I rolled out the paper on the floor of the dorm so the long white sheet stretched across my entire living room. I plopped the bucket of ink down next to it, then looked up at Heechul. "You ready, Heenim?"

He looked up from the camera, shaking his head. "You're going to get in a lot of trouble for this."

"No I won't. I'm just making a poster."

"Not this, exactly. But the whole video. Huge trouble."

I shrugged. "I don't care. It's up to everyone else if they want to do it or not. If they don't, I'll just have to do it by myself."

He smiled. "I know. And that's why everyone's going to help you."

I stuck my foot in the ink bucket and began to paint, the ink flowing over the page. Oh, the wonderful feeling of being rebellious!

Fortunately, the video of the foot-painting calligraphy had turned out ten billion times better than I had hope. Unfortunately, calligraphy ink is really strong, so my foot was stained black. Oops. Well, it would be worth it in the end. By the time the company realized what was happening, it would be too late to stop it.

Fortunately, the way the video had turned out, it looked like I was dancing across the paper. Unfortunately, my stained black foot was not a pleasant sight for both the director of the drama and Jung Ah, and both of them gave me a pretty wonderful chewing-out. I was forbidden to wear shoes that didn't cover my entire foot until it faded away. Much like Eunhyuk's black eye.

Other than that, the drama went on. The filming was about halfway done, and we were releasing the drama that week. Normally shorter dramas don't run until the filming's done, but filming had to be crammed together because it took them so long to find an actress to play Rosaline Connor (aka me), and then someone to sing the main theme (me again), so they had to put out the first episode according to the release date they'd given, whether filming was finished or not.

For the grand premier, I took a group picture with Hyuk Soo and Hyun Woo and posted it on my Twitter account. We encouraged people to watch it. Then, when the big moment arrived, we all sat down in a room together and watched the episode. 

The entire main cast huddled together to watch it, laughing at the funny parts, focusing really hard on the dramatic parts. 

"Oh, I loved this part!" I exclaimed. "My favorite line of the first episode." I said it along with myself on the screen, whispering, "The man in bed number three... I think he wants to kill me." 

Hyuk Soo pulled me backwards. "Calm down, woman. It's hard enough to watch myself act without you in there, too."

I laughed. "Hey, Jung Ah, can we get something to eat? Like... Twizzlers!"

"Twizzlers?" Hyun Woo asked. 

"Yeah. I always like to eat red licorice when I watch a movie," I explained.

"Red licorice?" Hyun Woo exclaimed, "can we really have some, Jung Ah?"

Jung Ah scowled. "The rest of you, yes. Queen Be, no."

I almost jumped off the couch. "WHAT?! Why not?!"

Jung Ah clicked her tongue. "You still have to maintain a healthy diet. No candy. I took that stockpile you had hidden in your closet, by the way."

"That was for Min Hee! Everything in there was blue raspberry flavored!"

"Sure it was."

"Come on, Jung Ah! You can't just control everything I do! I have to have some freedom!"

Jung Ah shook her head. "I'm sorry, Queen Be. really. But if I don't do what the company says, I could lose my job. I don't know what else to do."

"What about trusting me? Okay, so I need to watch my weight, because I'm a fat American. I get it. But a girl needs to have some sugar every now and then. I'll go crazy if I don't. So please?"

Hyun Woo and Hyuk Soo exchanged glances, obviously not sure what to do about this. "Don't say you're a fat American, Queen Be..." Hyun Woo attempted.

"I belong to the most obese country in the world. That wasn't an insult, it was a fact. My country is fat. And because of that, SM worries that I'll be fat, too. Well, fine. I'll be right back with some Twizzlers. I strode out of the room to go to the nearest store, able to hear Jung Ah sigh in defeat as I walked past. I was being really rebellious that day...

I suppose I should say a bit on Jung Ah. I guess I've kind of painted her as a bad person. That's not true. She was actually a really good manager. She had the day's schedule set before I even woke up. She woke up at least an hour before I did, even when the day's schedule began before the sun rose. Because of her, I was on time for just about everything, and the press was starting to work towards me in a more favorable light. I owed it all to Jung Ah's hard work. 

She actually was good to me, most of the time. She could make jokes, or laugh at mine, and told me the truth no matter what. I trusted her. 

What drove me crazy, though, was that she always followed the rules that SM gave her. Without question. It was stifling. I couldn't go to the public market anymore. I couldn't go out onto the streets and chat with random people. I couldn't eat junk food, even a little, and my diet had been harshly restricted. My taste buds were dying of longing. I wanted chocolate. I wanted big, juicy steaks. I wanted bacon. Oh, how I missed bacon. And I'm not referring to the member of EXO. Although, I suppose, I was hungry enough most days, I could probably eat Baekhyun, too.

And like I've said before, I can get slightly cranky when I'm hungry. So I felt sorry for Jung Ah, because she was just trying to keep her job, but it was a bit late for that.

I came back into the episode-viewing room just in time for the second commercial break to finish. I sat down between Hyun Woo and Hyuk Soo and began dispensing the Twizzlers. Once he received his Twizzler, Hyuk Soo leaned back on the couch, yawning. I saw his arm up in the air and snatched it, holding it up high so he couldn't bring it down.

"Don't even think about it," I growled.

He tried to force his arm back down, but I locked my elbow, glaring at him. "What's with you?" He asked, triying again. "I'm just practicing for the character..."

"I hate the yawn trick. It's a pet peeve. Besides, Hyuk Soo, your character is supposed to be the bad guy who's really forceful about his feelings." I glared at him, enjoying the feeling of watching him shrink into the back of the couch. On the other side of me, I could hear the choking sounds of Hyun Woo stifling laughter. I let go of Hyuk Soo's arm, letting it fall to his side, before sttling myself back into the couch to watch the drama.

Hyun Woo hugged me, still laughing, and leaving his arm around my shoulders. I smiled happily and tried to focus on the t.v. screen, which was difficult when sitting between the two boys, when Hyun Woo stuck his tongue out at Hyuk Soo.

See, I never said I hated it when people put their arms around my shoulders. I said I hate the yawn trick. Completely different thing.

When the episode was over, we clapped and got up. "I think it turned out great, you guys!" I cheered, jumping in my excitement. 

"This coming from the girl who kept bursting in with 'I looked really bad in that lighting,' and 'wow, you could totally see through my shirt in that scene', or 'I remember I kept cracking up in this part'..."

I stuck my tongue out at him. "You forgot the part where I said it looked like you were staring at my a-"

Jung Ah cut me off. "Not that this isn't fun, but Queen Be, you have a meeting with some of the higher ranking managers today. When that's done, you have a vocal training lesson that you're NOT supposed to miss. They liked what you did for 'Divide', so they want you to keep your voice in check."

"Great. See you guys tomorrow." I waved to them, heading off obediently with Jung Ah.

I left the meeting with an increased anger. Restrict, restrict, restrict! The company was replacing some of my free time after filming, with some independent training. With all of this put together, my sleep schedule was restricted to six hours on a good day. They had appearances on variety shows planned, and meetings with companies interested in having me advertise their products. It was crushing. When would I sleep? With what time, exactly, did they expect me to write songs?

Jung Ah followed me out, hanging back a bit. I spun around, trying to control my breathing. I took a deep breath, noticing the dark circles under her eyes. "You can go home, Jung Ah. I'll be alright by myself for a few hours."

Jung Ah sighed in relief, then paused. "Are you sure?"

"Yes. You look like you're about to fall over. You can sleep in early, too. I'll be at the company early tomorrow. I have something i have to do."

Jung Ah hesitated, then nodded. "Just don't be late."

I waited until she had disappeared to pull out my phone and dial a number.

"John? Can you bring your camera to the company building tomorrow? I'm putting the plan into action."

I looked around the company nervously as I hooked the music up to the giant speakers in the lobby. Today was the only day. The management staff was busy in the branch buildings, arranging tours, but the various artists were all scheduled to be coming in and out of the building at least once during the day.

The song , and I nodded at John. He shrugged and the camera, capturing me dancing. I made it look like I was just trying to practice (which wasn't too far from the norm. Some of the bigger groups used the lobby for practice, too. that's why the speakers were there in the first place.), moving my arms to the beat I knew.

Before I knew it, there was Henry, right on time. He gave me a strange look. "What are you doing?" he asked.

"I'm practicing a dance. By Han Geng oppa. It's really easy." 

Henry looked confused, then watched what I was doing some more. It didn't take him long to pick it up, which wasn't really a surprise. The dance was designed to be easy.

"Left, right, left, left, then fist! Right, left, right, right."

People dropped in, one at a time, all recorded by the camera. If they didn't start to attempt the dance, I would explain what the plan was, and they would promise to come in later, when we planned the group scenes.

Before the group scene's filming time was even close to arriving, I had confirmed participation from SuJu, Henry & Zhou Mi (of course, since they all knew about it ahead of time), the two TVXQ members, f(x), all of Girls' Generation and SHINee, many of the members of EXO, and even BoA. Many of them had agreed quickly when I told them it was my project for Han Geng's birthday, saying that they missed Han Geng a lot, and "of course we want him to do well." I took a short break, sharing a water bottle with John, while we watched the collection of the videos so far. 

While I was focused on the video, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I looked up, suddenly afraid that one of the company's managers had come back early. 

It wasn't a manager. The woman looked at me shyly, although several years my senior. She looked familiar to me, although I couldn't remember seeing her at the company before. She was Chinese, I could tell. I could hear it in her accent when she spoke, too. "Annyeonghasseo... you are Queen Be, right?" she asked, carefully. 

I nodded, then suddenly realized who she was. "Oh! You're Zhang Liyin, right?" I asked in Chinese.

She nodded. "Oh, you speak Mandarin?"

I nodded. "Not perfectly, but what I know I was taught by Henry, Zhou Mi, and Song Qian."

She smiled. "Zhou Mi and Song Qian told me what you were planning to do."

I bowed. "Then I will have to thank them. Do you... want to help?"

She nodded. "I usually don't stay here. I've been in the branch in Beijing. I can see Chinese media. Han Geng gets further and further away from us, and sometimes I think time has dulled his memory so he rememers only the unpleasant things that happened to him here. I think your idea is a good one, and that he will appreciate it. I'm not a dancer, but... is it alright if I participate?'

Not a dancer was an understatement. The woman had the perfect voice for ballads. It was extremely depressing how many people didn't know who she was. She was ridiculously talented.

I felt the grin spread across my face. "Of course you can. The dance isn't hard. But here's what I had planned..."

The dance was totally awesome, and worked out exactly the way I'd intended. Leave it to the artists at SM to pick up a dance in like ten seconds, and then just take off with it. We started with the basic dance, then went off on our own. By the time the song was over, and we'd concluded, cheering loudly and high-fiving. I smiled at John, who handed me the camera. "I'll let you borrow it until you have it uploaded to your computer. But I want it back as soon as you're done with your little project. Don't you be gettin' me in trouble there, either."

I nodded, then threw my arms around him. "Thank you, John."

He shoved me away, grinning. "Alright, alright, none of that. Now I'll be going before any of your superiors get in. I hope this works. It'd be right dreadful if you get kicked out this soon after debuting."

I shrugged, then, before letting him go, asked, "hey John? Can you tell Min Hee to call me? The girls' been a ghost."

He nodded. "Sure thing, Queen Be. Now go chat with your other friends."

I was swarmed by my SM friends before John was even out the door. 

"You're going to have it posted by his birthday?" Heechul asked.

"Midnight the night before, Beijing time," I replied, coolly.

"Spending my birthday celebratingsomeone else's birthday..." I heard Kyuhyun mutter. 

"Hey, everyone!" I yelled suddenly, "since we're all here, who wants to bring out Kyuhyun-oppa's birthday cake?!"

"I already got it!" I heard Sungmin yell, already re-entering the room. Somebody turned all of the lights off, and we all sang "Happy Birthday". Kyuhyun looked like he was about to strangle me, but with thirty people in the big lobby room, all patting him on the back and cheering for him, it didn't seem like he was going to.

"Is this home-made?" I heard, feeling someone nudge me on the arm. I turned to face her, finding BoA. I bowed. "Yes, it is. I made it myself."

She smiled, chewing happily. Then suddenly she lashed out, and a smear of white cream frosting appeared across me face. 

"Sunbae!" I cried, flicking a piece of frosting, landing on her nose. Before we knew it, it was an all-out war, and not much cake was actually getting eaten. Kyuhyun hid in a corner, but we were able to find him and warpaint his entire face.

With lots of birthday congratulations, some cake eating, and lots of face-painting, the various artists thanked me for letting them help with my project, and headed out to their own various schedules. Before long, I was left with Henry, Victoria, and Zhang Liyin. I bowed to them, as deeply as I could without looking ridiculous. 

"Thank you for helping with this. I would never have been able to get the message across without you."

"It's a really great idea. They can't just pin the entire thing on you. Since we all participated, there's not much they can do about it," Henry smirked.

"You said you planned on putting it on the SMTown Youtube page? How?" Victoria asked.

I grinned, pulling a slip of paper out of the pocket of my jacket and holding it up. "account password, courtesy of Kim Jonghyun. Shhh, don't tell anyone."

Henry's eyes widened. "How did he know the password?!"

I gave him a weird look. "Do you not remember when he posted a random video of his dog on the page? Donghae-oppa has it, too. All hail the random-video posting!"

Victoria just stared at me flatly. "No, really. Where did they get it?"

I laughed. "If I'm not mistaken they used their overwhelming masculine charm to convince the Eonnis in charge of the site to let them have it. And there wa probably shirtlessness in their somewhere. 

Henry frowned and pulled his shirt up, looking down.

"Oh, please, Henry, put your shirt down. It's embarassing," I chided, then running away, laughing. I came back to Zhang Liyin, switching over to Chinese. "I'm sorry. You must feel so awkward. We've all known each other for a while..."

She smiled gently and shook her head. "No, that's alright. I'm just glad I could help. Will you be giving me a birthday party like this one?"

"What do you mean?" I asked. 

"Wel... my birthday is in the same year as Kyuhyun's."

I stared at her, wide-eyed. "What?! No way! I thought you were older than Kyuhyun-oppa!"

She shook her head, laughing. "No. I was born in 1989. So was he."

I made a face, muttering, "I was just Super Juniored..."

Henry gave me a weird look. "Super Juniored?"

I looked up. "Oh. It's a reference to the Engrish in Mr. Simple. Something my friends and I came up with. When your mind has just been blown, you say 'I've just been Super Juniored'."

Henry rolled his eyes and shrugged to Zhang Liyin. "You might as well just ignore her. She's a little..." He rolled his finger around his ear, earning himself a smack. 

"I'll definitely try a birthday party for you, Liyin. I'm sorry for thinking you were older than you were. Here I thought you were the same age as Han Geng Oppa, or maybe Donghae-oppa, but Kyuhyun-oppa! No wonder you're so pretty!"

She laughed again, turning to Henry. "I like this girl more and more."

Henry started to say something, but was interrupted by Jung Ah. She ran into the lobby, screeching, "Minsung-ah! Have you been here ALL day?! You need to go to filming!"

I gave her a strange look. "There was no filming today. We took the day off because Hyun Woo had to film a commercial, and the director was discussing things with SM about the rest of the soundtrack!"

She snapped open her phone to show my the schedule, growling "for the commercial. Remember? For the American company you agreed to advertise for?!"

I swore quite colorfully in Spanish, yelling "that was today?!" then bowed to Zhang Liyin and Victoria. "Mianhae. I have to go. Thank you for all of your help!"

Okay, I confess. I agreed to advertise for that specific American company for exactly one reason. And that was...

Cheese.

Yes, the company I had a side contract with was called "Land O' Lakes". A Wisconsin-based company that produced, well...

Cheese.

I couldn't help it! They asked me to do it! They said I was the perfect candidate to connect their company to Asia! And they said they'd let me sample their cheese whenever I did commercials.

So I agreed. 

"We're so happy that someone debuted in Korea that's from Wisconsin!" One of the coordinators exclaimed, fluffing up my hair. She was the first person with naturally blonde hair that I'd seen in person in over a year. The closest person was John, and his hair was red. 

I was quite enjoying myself. I felt bad for completely forgetting about it. "Why's that?"

She clicked her tongue. "Not many people here can really get the emotion we want about real Wisconsin cheese. You're a long way from home, aren't you, dear?"

I bit my lip, earning me a poke in the jaw from the second coordinator. "I guess I kind of am. But... I haven't felt like I am for a while. It feels... kind of like I am home."

She stopped, looking at me. "But you still know what it's like to be in Wisconsin, right?"

I smiled and nodded. "Don't worry, I'll do the commercial. I'm just a little nervous. I mean... I'm still new..."

The blonde one stood up and put her hands on her hips. "New or not, people here know who you are. Now come on, the director's going to talk to you about the commercial."

I hummed happily to myself as I climbed into the taxi with Jung Ah, munching on cheese. She gave me a slightly annoyed glance. 

"Stop eating, Queen Be!" 

I frowned and swallowed the cheese in my mouth. "B-but... fine. I'm just so happy that they gave me a basket to take home!" I grinned, letting her see the remains of cheddar cheese stuck to my teeth.

She sighed. "Take us to the SM Entertainment building, please, Ahjusshi." The taxi driver started his engine and the cab began rolling down the rode, while Jung Ah frowned at me again. "It's just cheese."

I made a face at her, then popped a cube of marble cheese into when she opened it to say something. "Shush. It's not just cheese."

Jung Ah glared at me, then began chewing, facing forward. "Hmmm... this is actually pretty good."

"Now you see why I like it? Cheese is a part of every Wisconsinite. I volunteered to work with Land O'Lakes because it meant a lot to me. It's a little connection to home. you might not get it, but whenever I take a bite of this stuff, it makes me think of the place I used to live. Otherwise, I'm always afraid that I'm leaving it behind. Now that I'm doing this, I feel like I'm keeping that connection alive."

Jung Ah fell silent for a moment, thinking. Finally she sat back in her seat, frowning. She was quiet for a while, until fnally complaining, "So cheap..."

"Huh? What's cheap?" I asked.

"The company. Here were are, almost a full month since they decided to let you become an artist, and we're still taking taxis to your schedules. We don't get a car?"

I shrugged. "I'm not exactly hugely famous yet. The drama's only released a single episode."

She was quiet again, before sighing and looking back at me. "Minsung, I know you hate me. Because I make you do things you don't want to do, and always follow the company's rules, and complain about what you do, but please try to understand. I really don't know what I'm doing. Before I got eliminated, you were my friend, just like the rest of the trainees. But then I got eliminated. When I got the management position, I thought that I could make up for not getting my dreams by helping someone else's come true."

I was staring at her. I couldn't help it.

"I'm just trying to help, Minsung. I'm sorry, I'm not very good at it. I'm a little lost. Please try to understand."

I bit my lip, looking down at my cheese. Suddenly I sat up, tapping the driver on the shoulder. "Ahjusshi, can we change the place we're going to?"

Jung Ah sat up. "What? Where do you want to go?"

I smiled. "If Jung Ah doesn't know how to be a good manager, then I think we should go talk to the awesomest manager I know!" I ran off an address, then gave the driver some landmarks to go by.

"Isn't that-?" Jung Ah asked. 

"Of course," I grinned, "the coolest manager I know is Super Junior's manager. If he can control those fifteen completely crazy boys, he can definitely teach you how to handle me."