I acted as if I never received that message that night. Why, I couldn’t really answer that myself, but I thought maybe Key was right. Maybe I really was in denial with my feelings. I couldn’t help the way I felt about him though. He brought me happiness unlike any other, he made me smile, and Key said that I would blank out and have a dreamy look on my face after talking to him. Of course every time I would deny it and act like he was crazy. The night after my mom got out of the hospital Donghae and I would text often, and we saw each other quite often, inside and out of school. Sometimes he drove me home and visited my mom, bringing flowers the first time and other times bringing food his mom made. According to Mom, he told Dad that he would keep an eye out for both of us as his schedule was getting busier and busier. Dad couldn’t really object since Donghae did have a point, and he knew Mom didn’t mind him at all.

The stress and fatigue was from when Yunho had passed away, and I guess my mom never really dealt with it. She would go to bed with my Dad, and then sneak away to do other things. She confessed to us that sometimes she’d feel so restless that she couldn’t sleep. However she was taking it easier and Dad and I both picked up a lot more chores in the house, but it wasn’t overwhelming. Mom would cook, we’d do the cleanup, Mom would sort the laundry, we’d wash and fold them. She insisted on cleaning the house, but we found compromise in doing our own rooms and the bathrooms. I never thought how exhausting it was for my mom to take care of everything at home base, and still hide her worries and problems from us. Things were calming down at home, but we still insisted that my mom go for regular health checkups and not to hesitate to let us know if she’s feeling weird.

“Hey J.J.!” I turned around and smiled at who the call came from.

“Hey Hae” he smiled back at me, all dressed in his dance gear.

“I was gonna practice with Eunhyuk for final show case, could you come watch and critique?” I felt arms wrap around my waist.

“Just as long as you watch hers! It’s really something” my eyes grew as big as saucers at what Jonghyun said, and I looked to Key who had his arms around me.

“Yeah, yeah, don’t let it go to your head” he let go of me as Jonghyun wrapped one arm loosely around Key’s waist.

“It’s really good Jaemi, the whole team thinks so!” I blushed, I wasn’t confident in the first place, but I knew I wasn’t horrible. It was strange to hear a compliment coming from someone other than my family.

“I’d love to see it Jae. I’m gonna go meet up with Eunhyuk and try to find Leeteuk. Wanna meet up in say… fifteen minutes? At the practice stage?”

“The one with the cloud blinds? She’ll be there” Key winked at me.

“Why don’t we all just show each other?” Jonghyun was quickly elbowed in the side by Key.

“Good idea! See you guys in a bit” With that Donghae was off and we’d meet again in fifteen minutes.

“Way to ruin it you stupid dinosaur… it was supposed to be a little intimate time with Donghae”

“Key, what intimate time? Eunhyuk would be there, and besides why would I need intimate time with Donghae” I scoffed as I gathered my things from my locker.

“So you’ve gotten in his pants? Tell me, how big is he?” Jonghyun’s eyes were wide looking back and forth between the two of us. Obviously he wasn’t used to our banter yet.

“I haven’t been in his pants nor do I want to”

“Lies. We totally know you like him. Just admit it Jae” I jumped hearing a female voice.

“Seriously, Tiffany stop popping out like my fairy god mother.” I shook my head and closed the locker.

“I’ll stop popping up once you finally admit to liking him” she gave me the eyebrow look.

“Hey guys!” Sunny and Taeyeon greeted us, walking up to us. “What’s up?”

“Fany’s trying to get Jae to admit her love for the East Sea, and we’ve all just been invited to share our routines with each other” Key took Jonghyun’s hand in his.

“You still haven’t admitted it?” Sunny’s eyes were huge.

“What is it with everyone bugging me about Donghae?!” I grumbled and started walking away.

“You do know we’re all going the same way right?” Key hollered after me.

*

“I’m starving” Eunhyuk complained sprawled on the floor. Everyone had shown each other their routines, and had practiced a bit more. We fooled around, blasting music from the speakers and having a cheesy dance battle that started serious, but ended in us dancing some messed up version of the hokey pokey. We were all pretty tired and sweaty, but smiles still adorned our faces. We all sat on the floor, some of us lying down on our backs or on our chests like me.

“Let’s go for snacks!” Sunny suggested, popping up like a daisy.

“Sorry, but I’m stealing Key tonight” Jonghyun blushed sitting up beside Key, who was lying on his chest. “I promised”

“Yeah same goes for us” Donghae piped up from beside me.

“We had dinner plans?” Eunhyuk shot up, confused.

“Nope, him and Jaemi” Taeyeon winked at me, and I buried my face into my arms, hiding my blush. Nobody pushed it any further as we all started groaning and getting up from where we were stationed, and grabbed our things. They all left in groups, leaving Hae and I alone in the room. He lightly nudged my side, and I looked up, saw he was ready and had my stuff in his hands.

“We have dinner plans?” I squeaked not moving.

“We do now. I hope you don’t mind” he smiled offering me his hand. I took it and stood up with his help. Taking my stuff from him, we headed out of the practice room and headed to the parking lot. I sent my mom a quick text and looked up to see Donghae no longer in front of me. I looked around and heard him clear his throat. He stood beside a red car, leaning on the roof of the car staring amusingly at me. I blushed and rushed back to him. “Pizza?”

“Sure” and we drove off silently, comfortably, but I couldn’t help but think Donghae had something he wanted to say. We arrived at the pizza parlour and Donghae ordered takeout. “What’re you up to?” he winked at me, and said nothing. We fought to pay for the bill, but he ended up winning, and then grabbed our pizza and got back in the car. Ten minutes later we found ourselves in the parking area of the Han River. He smiled at me and got out of the car, and opened my door for me. I got out with the pizza and he took the pizza from me and started walking. We found a nice bench and sat down and quietly ate our pizza together. The weather was getting better and better each day. The snow was nearly completely melted, and the wind wasn’t as frosty as it normally was. I shivered a bit as a breeze blew by, and Donghae wrapped one arm around me, eating pizza with the other. He acted so casually about it and I couldn’t help but blush. “Hae?” he stopped munching and looked at me. “What’s going on?” confusion swept over his face. “between us. We text nonstop, we have nicknames, we see each other frequently…”

“What do you think we should be?” I was taken aback by this answer.

“I’m not sure” I looked down into the napkin on my lap.

“You’re not sure or you don’t want to say it?” he turned to look at me. I didn’t answer him, and I guess he knew my answer. “Don’t be afraid of admitting your feelings J.J…. if you think it makes you stronger, it just makes you more vulnerable” I nodded quietly, feeling selfish for having him go along with my feelings regardless of what he felt.

“What if you don’t agree with me?” he pondered for a second.

“I highly doubt that” he gave me his killer smile and I blushed. “You need to stop being so afraid of people. People will leave and people will hurt you, but you need to see that people want to stay and want to care for you” I didn’t give him an answer back, but I did understand what he meant. He wanted us to be on the same page and to be open about it. That was fair, and a simple request, I couldn’t get angry at that. On top of that he wasn’t pushing anything on me. “I’m here Jaemi, I’m not going anywhere… I really like you” we now sat slightly apart, looking at the river in front of us.

“Well I guess the cat’s out of the bag for the both of us” he snapped his head to look at me. A smile crept up to both of our faces.

Bing!

Message from K-K-K-Key

‘he totally asked you didn’t he?! You better have said yes!’