“Yurim, watch it!” Sehun said as he came to Yurim's side to spot a few boxes she was carrying around the store. “Mom’s going to be so pissed if we drop another box. I don’t want to see her mad again. That’s a little too scary for my tastes.”

“Don’t worry, Sehun-oppa, I’m being careful.” Yurim replied in a cheerful, singsong-y tone.

It had been a year since Jung Yurim moved into her auntie and uncle’s house. Yurim’s parents had moved overseas to be with her grandparents, but Yurim wished to continue her studies in Korea. Her mom’s younger sister agreed to let Yurim stay with her as long as she would help in the family’s general store every so often.

While Yurim was technically older than Sehun by two years, Sehun had always taken good care of her like an older bother would. Over the years, the two had bonded and Yurim jokingly called Sehun “oppa”. Somehow, it stuck and he forever became “oppa” in her eyes.

Now that Yurim’s school was on break for Christmas and New Years, she and her cousin Sehun were in charge of the store while Sehun’s parents were on a vacation of their own. Most of the time, it was either just the two of them working, or Sehun’s boyfriend would come down to help the two out. While Yurim didn’t mind Luhan’s presence, she would have greatly appreciated it if they would be less handsy and kissy in the back rooms while she was still around.

Other than the occasional eye-scarring event that is Sehun and Luhan being…Sehun and Luhan, everything runs smoothly.

“It’s okay that I leave early, right? Just by half an hour?” Yurim asked as she put down her boxes. They contained more medical supplies like bandages and medicine that needed to be logged into the inventory, but she decided to leave that to Luhan when he came in, along with the other shipments that had come in over the course of the last two days.

Sehun gave Yurim dead-pan look – which, honestly, was hardly any different from his normal expression. “Why do you always have to leave early? It’s Friday! You already get out on Mondays and Wednesdays at least a half hour before closing. I know Luhan comes to help out a lot now that he has more time and doesn’t have classes in the afternoon, but it’s still nice having a third set of hands around.”

“I have extra practice because we have a schedule coming up next week. I’ve told you this a million times, silly.” Yurim jumped up on Sehun’s back, gripping his shoulders as she lifted her legs off the ground and around his waist. Despite Sehun’s protests, Yurim kept hanging onto him like a monkey.

Yurim and Sehun tended to customers who came in as they always would. As the daily noon-time rush hit, Sehun sent a message for Luhan to save the day and come to the store. His arrival couldn’t have been any more perfect as people crammed and pushed their way through skinny aisle and walkways.

It took a awhile, but the crowd died down as people returned to work and left to take care of other errands. Luhan worked on the inventory Yurim set aside for him while Sehun reorganized the shelves, leaving Yurim to work the register and manage the remaining customers. The down time between customers was long enough that Yurim was able to pull out a book and get a few pages in between check-outs.

A shopping basket was carefully placed onto the counter. “Hey. How you been, Yurim?”

“Oh, hi.” The painfully familiar voice belonged to Yurim’s friend Joonmyun. “I’ve been good. You?”

“Same. Kris okay?”

Yurim quickly shoved the items over the scanner and into the bags. She blushed a bit at the mention of Kris, lips curling upwards as she bit at her lower lip.

“I’ll take that as things are going well.”

“Yeah, they are. That will be $18.29 unless you want to buy anything else? Or forgot to grab something?” Yurim tried to change the subject away from Kris. Joonmyun took the hint and shook his head.

“Who do you think I am? Yixing?” He pulled out some money from a slightly tattered wallet and dropped the coins into Yurim’s hand. “Just keep the change.” Joonmyun picked the grocery bags off the counter and walked out.

Yurim watched him leave before returning to her book.

“Wasn’t that Joonmyun?” Sehun asked as he brought some empty boxes by. “How’s he doing?”

“Good? He isn’t my boyfriend. I don’t keep tabs on him all the time. Ask him yourself the next time he comes in.” Somehow, the words slipped out of Yurim’s mouth in an angry tone. She didn’t mean it to sound that way, but Joonmyun was a messy topic for Yurim.

“Yeesh, don’t have to get all mean about it.”

Yurim flipped through the pages of her book before she read the last few sentences. That was Sehun’s cue to kick her off register duty and let her have a break. “Calm down and quit scaring people.” He said as he pushed Yurim into the back room. Yurim grumbled to herself as she backtracked a few pages to read what she had skipped over.

Luhan looked up at Yurim with his innocent, doe-eyed expression. “Everything okay?”

Yurim nodded. “I don’t know, just a bit stressed after the rush and with some of the stuff I’m working on, I guess?”

“The thing you have to leave for all the time?”

“Yup.” Yurim sat down next to Luhan and offered to help go through some of the boxes. They pounded through the rest of the inventory by 3, leaving more than enough time for Yurim to relax or do more work before dipping out. “Can I ask you something Luhan?”

He nodded as he gave you that gentle smile that Sehun had become very attracted to. “Has to do with Suho, doesn’t it?”

“Er, who?”

“Sorry, I forget that you don’t call him that. Joonmyun.”

With a sigh, Yurim looked Luhan in the eye. Luhan had known Joonmyun growing up, and they had only recently reconnected now that Luhan had been helping out in the shop for the past couple of years and he had a chance to see Joonmyun more often. “It’s not weird that we’re friends, right? I mean, he basically set me and Kris up!”

Luhan just laughed. “You two have a lot of the same friends and hangout places, so it makes sense that you two talk. It’s almost more weird for you guys not to talk.Does it really matter to you that you guys are friends? Does it bother you that much?”

“No! It doesn’t bother me at all. It’s just…I don’t know how to explain it.” Yurim juggled her thoughts as she tried to compose her ideas into a coherent sentence. “We are close. We’re as close as ever. I just feel like it’s a little weird sometimes because of everything that happened.”

“Maybe that just means that things aren’t quite finished.”

Luhan laughed as he saw Yurim try and figure out what his cryptic words meant.

“You’ll have your closure soon enough. And who knows, maybe the door you close now will bring you back to a door you didn’t try hard enough to open before.” He patted Yurim on the head before walking to the storefront. Yurim was left with empty boxes around her feet and a head full of Luhan-induced confusion.

A vibration went off in Yurim’s pocket. “Crap! I have to go!” Yurim grabbed her bag and gave both Luhan and Sehun a hug as she ran out the door.

As Yurim was waiting for the light to turn in her favor, a car honked at her. “Hey, Yurim, get in the car! I’ll drive you to the studio.” Said a deep and calm voice. Yurim turned her head and smiled back at the smirking face she had the pleasure of kissing.

“Thanks, Kris. But isn’t it out of the way?” Already in the car and with her seatbelt on, Yurim knew that Kris wouldn’t let her walk the rest of the way now that he had spotted her.

Kris just laughed. “Whatever, it isn’t that out of the way.” The car ride was relatively quiet. Yurim stole the occasional glance at Kris when she was bored of looking at the -end of the car in front of them. When they reached their destination, Yurim gave Kris a kiss on the cheek before jumping out of her seat. “I’ll pick you up. Baekhyun and Chanyeol wanted to hang out tonight, remember? What time are you done?”

Yurim just put her hand to her ear, mimicking a phone. “Sorry if I call late. I’ll try and give you a heads up if I can.”

“Don’t worry about it, Yurim. If we have to, I’ll ask if the two of them don’t mind taking a rain check and rescheduling for next week.”

Kris waited at the curb while Yurim walked up the stairs to the door. He caught the shadow of a person running up.

“Yuu!”

Yurim turned around and waved at the boy. “Hey, Kai. You do know you’re not late and that you don’t have to run, right?”

Kai just laughed. He turned to wave down to Kris. “Don’t worry, I got her!” He jokingly called.

“Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of!” Kris just smirked like always. “I’m blaming you if she gets hurt.”

“Whatever, Hyung. Let’s go, Yuu. Seohyeon-noona called and said she needed to talk to us about some lineup changes or something like that.” Kai raced Yurim up the stairs and down the halls to a lit up room.

“Noona, I found Yuu.”

A taller woman stepped out from behind a curtain. “Hey!” She ran over to give Yurim a hug. “I’m so glad you guys got here before practice. Basically, I want the two of you to plan a show and work on a duet line-up for the final segment.”

“The last part? Isn’t that, like, twenty minutes we have to fill? Maybe more? Just the two of us?” Yurim asked. “And all by next week?”

“No, this is for the annual showcase we have at the beginning of every winter, so you actually have a little under 9 months to prepare everything”

Yurim nodded, still skeptical that she and Kai could pull it off on top of their other responsibilities to the group.

“But that’s still at least twenty minutes.” Kai noted, “we’re never going to be able to plan that without some help. Do you know how lame that would be if it was just the two of us for that much time?”

Yurim punched Kai in the arm as Seohyeon laughed at them. “Meh, you two can get some help. But I want you two to be the main parts since you guys are basically the second generation of leaders for the group. These twenty minutes are for you two, and that’s what Wonjoon and I decided.” Seohyeon handed Kai and Yurim a small piece of paper with little notes scrawled all over the place. “Some ideas that I came up with if you guys needed inspiration. Feel free to sit out for a bit while you guys think. You two know the choreography for everything already. You can skip a practice or two if you ever need to plan or something. I’ll touch base with more exact details later.” Seohyeon left the two to brain-storm.

“We need something that screams us.” Kai said as soon as Seohyeon had gathered the other twenty or so people together on the other side of the studio.

“Us?” Yurim looked at Kai, eyebrows raised in an almost disbelieving way. “You do realize that “us” is an emotional roller coaster filled with…with…”

“Awesome-ness?”

Yurim rolled her eyes, still looking for the right word. “I just don’t know how we can choreograph twenty minutes for the showcase. It’s one thing if we had everyone’s help and some sort of thing to follow. She didn’t even give up music!”

“That’s what’s going to make this fun…?” Kai snatched the paper from Yurim’s hands. “We just have to feel it.”

“Feel it?”

“Yeah. Listen to some music. Get into the mood. I don’t know. But you know what I mean, right?”

Yurim laughed at Kai’s borderline stupidity. “Oddly, I don’t think I do.”

*~*~*~*

Joonmyun walked into his apartment and was warmly greeted by his room mates, Yixing and Kyungsoo. He dropped the groceries on the counter before joining them on the couch for a short session of TV and talking.

“Let me guess,” Kyungsoo started, “You decided to stop by Yurim’s store. Again. When you just had to go to the corner store. Again.”

“Hey, we actually needed some other things that they don’t have at Opparz, so deal with it. A certain someone forgot to buy another box of bandages and toothpaste the last time he went.” Joonmyun looked at Yixing but he didn’t even bat an eye.

Rather, he just answered Joonmyun’s playful attack with one of his own. “You do know that Opparz sells both of those things, right?”

“Cheaper at Yurim’s place.”

“By, like 10 cents.”

“Still cheaper.”

Kyungsoo and Yixing simultaneously rolled their eyes at Joonmyun.

“Why does it even matter if I go shopping at Yurim’s place or not?”

Kyungsoo took the first jab. “Well first, it’s Sehun’s store not Yurim’s…”

“She has a boyfriend, and he happens to be one of your best friends…”

“You technically set the two of them up…”

“It was your fault to begin with…”

Suho slammed the palm of his hands against his friends’ mouths. “Jeez! Just shut up. I get it, I get it.” Suho proceeded to pout like a five year old before isolating himself in his room.