They have been 'dating' for the last few weeks and Seohyun is slowly warming to the idea of being a virtual couple.

It's not too bad after all. She thinks. Not bad at all.

In all honesty, however, the topics they touch upon are nothing different from those before they established this 'relationship'. All they talk are still their daily worries, troubles or humorous incidents. They share with each other about their families and friends but those are things you would speak of even with a normal friend. Occassionally, 'Deer' throws in some flirtatious talks, yet she never falls for it. 

They were like, "Did you miss me, baby?" or "You're my y Keroro, you know that right?". 

Maybe it is because she has zero dating experience or she simply could not imagine how Keroro could possibly be called y (or herself in any case), she just can't take his words seriously. She likes it more, way more, when he speaks of his everyday happenings or consoles her on hers. He always sounds more genuine during those sessions and she feels that they are true friends. They always understand each other and are frequently on the same page as if they have been acquainted for years and not weeks. Even when they aren't, they can always bear and respect the other's opinions. 

As much as she denies it every time Deer asks whether she has been anticipating his calls, she knows in her heart that it is not true. She gets nervous when the phone does not ring at the designated hour, her hearts tingles when she hears his voice, her palm sweats when she can't think of anything to say (which rarely happens). All in all, she cares, she cares a lot. 

These days, her phone is occupied with nothing but Deer's calls. She has asked for a break from the phoneline operator since Christmas was approaching and the university was holding a Christmas Celebration. Being one of the committees for this event, she has to be in charge of the celebration's preparation and often stays behind after school to either decorate or attend meetings. Being this busy, she rarely even has time for those "dating" sessions she often shares with Deer. However, she was not all to blame since he too seemed busy with his own life. 

It just so happened that the doe-eyed boy who sits behind her in classes is a member as well. Naturally, they see each other more often and it was quite impossible for them not to exchange even a single conversation. The quiet guy, she learned, is called Xi Luhan, a Chinese student studying abrorad. She is not one to judge a person by his/her looks but she has to admit that his personality and attributes most certainly match up to his handsome face. They would often chat about or comment on the characters or story of their required literature when they had a few minutes to spare, which truly fascinated her, knowing that a man with such gentle and harmonius features could have such a strong opinion when it came to something he was passionate about, which coincidentally, was equivalent to hers. 

Unlike Deer, with whom she knows just by how he presents and describes himself to be, Luhan is of blood and flesh, allowing her to really see as he truly is — funny, kind, playful and intelligent. She finds herself enjoying more and more the time they spend together, whether it is for work or just casual chatting. Even when it is just him doing all the talking, she does not mind, just staring at him, hearing his soothing voice, is all that takes to bring a smile to her face. 

“Do you know why Polar Bears do not eat penguins?” He asks as they settle at a cafe for a drink after a long hour of planning and budgeting.

“That’s easy,” She smirks, taking the sofa seat opposite to him, “Coz they are from two extremes of the earth. You should really try to think of something more original, you know?”

Luhan feigns a surprised look. “How could you have known? That’s impossible.”

“Nothing’s impossible, just saying.” She rises from her seat, “What do you want?”

“If you’re paying, I’ll take the most expensive drink.”

“You’re such an , you know that?” She comments lightly, digging her wallet from her bag.

“Since birth.” 

She giggles at his answer and hops off to buy drinks for both of them. In the end, she ordered a gingerbread latte for him and a goguma flavoured one for herself. 

“Not the most pricey but your favourite,” She says as she places his coffee in front of him while taking a sip of hers. As she sets hers down, he snatches it right out of her hands and gulps down a mouthful of her drink.

“Hey!” She yells at him, hitting his shoulders when she has recovered from the shock. “You’ve got yours you know?”

“You do realise that you ask if I know something quite a lot?” He says, her cup still in his hands as he takes occasional taste from it.

She blushes at his words. “Well… It’s just that I’m fascinated with the different things I learn about you with every day that passes.”

Not waiting for him to react, she grabs his gingerbread latte and begins drinking it. “I’ll have your drink then. I’m not up for sharing your saliva.” She sticks her tongue at him.

“That’s not fair! It’s not like I resisted your saliva in the first place!” He retorts. Then after a short pause, he looks up from the table right at her with a look of realisation. “Did we just kiss indirectly?”

She blinks a couple of times, digesting his words while he watches the porcelain skin on her face turn a shade of rosy pink, then darker into a tomato red. 

“I forgot I promised my mother that I’ll be heading home early tonight.” She blurts out as she stands up abruptly and picks up her purse, her fingers whitening from clutching on it too tightly. 

Before he could say another word, she was out the doors, leaving him amused and appalled. 

“Didn’t she say that her parents live outside of Seoul?” He wonders with surprise.

For the next week up to the day of the celebration, both of them just pretended that the event at the cafe had not happened. Yet, a blush still crept up her cheeks whenever she was reminded of their conversation that day. 

“Is that considered flirting?” She thinks as she twirls the pencil between her fingers. 

“Yes!” That voice which she has begun to familiarise herself with these days suddenly breaks her trance.

“Ye…yes?” She stutters, adjusting her eyesight to focus on the handsome face that is inches away from hers. 

“Thank God I’ve not completely lost you to the ZhouGong!” He moves back and turns his gaze back to the computer screen. She suddenly feels empty from the lack of closeness. 

“What? The Zhou what?” She tilts her head to one side, trying to control her speeding heart rate and getting her mind off their previous closeness. She doesn’t think she’ll survive another shock from him.

“It’s ZhouGong! He’s like the Chinese God of Dreams. You have probably met him in one of your dreams, you just don’t recall.” Telling that Seohyun has not caught a single word from her confused look, he stops his blabbering. “But enough of that and back to my excitement. Guess what? It’s gonna snow on the day of the Christmas party! Even nature is lending her hands to us!”

“That’s great news!” Seohyun says excitedly. “After all, what’s Christmas without snow! We can now save our efforts for cutting up paper to fake snow.”

“Yeah! Another task cut out for us! I guess we only have the big tree left to decorate then.”

The university is famous for their big Christmas Tree which is the focal point of each year’s winter. Even though South Korea is not big on christianity, people still celebrate that one day when everything is about giving instead of taking, and their school has a long-holding tradition of putting up a humungous tree, adorning it with glittery ornaments, metallic tassels and bright lights, along with a list of celebratory events and performances. 

Being heads of the design team, Seohyun and Luhan are of course most concerned with the tree. The committee have already settled on the theme of an eco-friendly Christmas (thanks to Seohyun’s well-prepped and convincing presentation to encourage everyone to take up their responsibilities in conserving the earth) and so, instead of spending a huge sum on decorations, they are now digging up old stuff from the store room and reusing them. They were actually considering cutting up used paper and newspaper to simulate snowing in case mother nature refused to do so that day but luckily she seemed to be extra kind to them these days. 

The two spent the rest of the day decorating the tree. They even had to take out the long ladder, which was never used on other occassion except for allowing people up the giant pine tree. Being a perfectionist, Seohyun was never happy with the placemements of the light bulbs or ornaments and even after the sun had gone down and all the helpers had gone home, she was still balancing herself on top of the shaky ladder, trying to make the star as upright and centre as possible. 

"I think that's good enough!" Luhan shouts from the ground, holding the ladder to prevent it from moving too much. He had insisted on staying behing, joking that Seohyun would probably get herself hurt if he didn't keep an eye on her. 

"Do you see it from downstairs? 'Coz I feel it's a bit small for such a big tree." She asks and hears his lovely chuckle echoing in the empty square. 

"How do you expect me to give a fair comment when I'm right underneath the ladder and have no clear view of the star?" He reasons with her. "Especially when there's a brighter star shining up there next to that dull plasticy thing?" 

She feels her cheeks warming up a bit. "Don't you tease me Luhan-ah!" His laugh once again reaches her ears like music. 

"Ok, ok! Hold on to the ladder! I'm going to move back a bit to check out the star."

"All right!"

The moment he releases his hold on it, a sneeze kicks in and before she can try to push it down, it rushes out of her system with an impact, shaking the flimspy wooden structure beneath her. With a terrified "AH", she comes falling down from the top of the stairs. She squeezes her eyes shut, imagining herself hitting the hard ground with a loud crack and the blood splattering. Time seems to pass in a hauntingly slow speed as she falls and just when she braces herself for that sickly deafening crack, she feels as if she has fallen on a safety net, wrapped around securely. Slowly, she opens her eyes, and thinks she is still alive.

"Thank god you're light." A man comments and she realizes it was Luhan who has rescued her.

Even in such a critical moment with her mind bursting with all sorts of emotions-- fear, gratitude, relief and more-- she feels an immense warmth and sense of security right in his arms.  

Well, that was a long hiatus that I did not see coming :P Hopefully you're not angry at me for being such a bad author... This story is slowly coming to an end as I have promised and there should only be at most 2 chapters left. But if I can help it, I'll try to end it with one so that procrastination will not get the better of me XD Anyways, thanks for the subscriptions, comments and upvotes, they are surely a motivation for me to continue on especially with my annoying state of writer's block ><