FINALE

 

“This is Kim Jongdae, how are things going backstage? Over.”

 

The transmission took a while to return, but Jongdae was content with what the assistant’s reply was, “Going perfectly.”

 

Jongdae smiled as he heard the reply from the other line. He gazed upon his surroundings that night and saw the huge smiles of people in front of the stage, enjoying the performances of each act that went onstage.

 

“Yes! Another round of applause!” The host said as he took the stage. “Now, we’re moving on to the highlight for tonight.”

 

The crowd suddenly cheered and a loud applause emanated from this multitude of people.

 

“Whoa, whoa!” The host laughed as the screams became louder. “Alright, without further ado, please welcome, So Nyeo Shi Dae!”

 

Luhan and Minseok laughed as they entered the vicinity. Minseok was a huge fan of So Nyeo Shi Dae.

 

“Just in time!” Minseok tapped Luhan’s shoulder. They both just shouted and cheered as the nine girls took the stage.

 

While Luhan was staring at SNSD performing onstage, his eyes caught a familiar blonde bulb at the left side of the sea of people. His eyes focused at the person who was a couple of feet away from him and it just hit him.

 

“Sehun!” Luhan shouted.

 

“Sehun-ah!” Luhan shouted again. He wanted to patch things up with him and somehow get back with him soon.

 

Sehun wandered his head as he thought he heard his name. He turned his head again when he clearly heard ‘Sehun’ being shouted.

 

“What is it Sehunnie?” Joonmyun asked as he noticed Sehun fidgeting and being uneasy.

 

“N-nothing… it’s just…” Sehun heard his name again. “There it is again! Someone’s calling my—”

 

“Sehun!” Luhan shouted. “Ah… Minseok, stay here, I’ll just go somewhere.”

 

“Oh okay Luhan, I’ll be fine right here,” Minseok smiled as he looked back at SNSD and cheered them on.

 

On the other side of the event, Kyungsoo and Jongin watched but kept their composure unlike the other audience members. Jongin held Kyungsoo’s hand and smiled as he did. Kyungsoo felt Jongin’s hand and looked at it. Kyungsoo’s eyes trailed upward until he saw Jongin’s face staring at the stage, smiling. After a few seconds, Jongin looked back at Kyungsoo and their eyes met.

 

Kyungsoo smiled shyly as Jongin’s tantalizing look captured his heart immediately. They were in love again.

 

Inches away, another couple squeezed in the crowd, arms intertwined. The shorter guy leaned on the taller guy’s shoulder. Kyungsoo clearly saw this past Jongin’s face. He knows that small cowlick anywhere.

 

“Yah! Byun Baekhyun!” Kyungsoo shouted and Baekhyun turned. “Haha, Baekhyun!”

 

Baekhyun smiled and raised his hand, holding Chanyeol’s, showing off the rings on their fingers. Chanyeol looked immediately at the place where Baekhyun was looking at and saw Kyungsoo. Chanyeol gave of a huge smile and proudly waved his and Baekhyun’s hands together.

 

Kyungsoo gasped and he exploded in a huge happy expression. Baekhyun laughed.

 

“Someday, we’ll follow them,” Jongin said smiling at Baekhyun and Chanyeol.

 

Kyungsoo looked at Jongin and just marvelled at how amazing he thinks he is. Given months of taking a break, Kyungsoo’s feelings grew exponentially that day. He realized how much he missed out.

 

“Congratulations!” Jongin shouted and then he turned to Kyungsoo.

 

Kyungsoo was just getting lost into Jongin’s eyes when he realized Jongin was signalling him to greet Baekhyun and Chanyeol as well.

 

“O-oh! Congratulations Baekhyun! Chanyeol!” The couple laughed at Kyungsoo when he shouted this.

 

“Thank you Kyung!” Chanyeol shouted as he waved with his other hand.

 

Jongin’s hand made its way on Kyungsoo’s waist as he pulled him closer. They spent the rest of the concert like this.

 

“Just this once, please?” On the corner of the event area, Kris pulled and positioned Zitao in front of him.

 

“I told you I can’t model, Kris,” Zitao said as he frowned into Kris’ camera lens.

 

“Please? For me?”

 

Zitao sighed as he gave up. He gave a striking pose for the camera—he was just standing, looking straight at the camera, as if talking to it with his eyes. Kris clicked the button as he took Zitao with a huge crowd behind him.

 

Kris smiled. “Perfect.”

 

“What?” Zitao asked since the crowd was just too noisy.

 

Kris laughed as he approached Zitao. “I said, you’re perfect.”

 

Zitao suddenly looked shy and blanked out.

 

“I told you, you’ll be a great model. Can I be your official photographer?”

 

Zitao lightly smiled and tried to avoid eye contact with Kris as to avoid further humiliation. “Su-sure.”

 

Kris smiled a huge smile; one he hasn’t done in a while.

 

Back in the middle of the crowd, Luhan finally got to Sehun. He fidgeted at first, but his excitement to see the former was too much. Luhan tapped on Sehun’s shoulder. As Sehun turned, he was still smiling, but as soon as he figured that it was Luhan, his smile slowly disappeared.

 

“H-hey Sehunnie,” Luhan greeted shyly.

 

Sehun didn’t say anything but game a small smile. Incidentally, Joonmyun’s arm made its way around Sehun’s shoulders. Joonmyun then turned to look at Luhan with a serious face.

 

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Luhan said embarrassingly as he scratched the back of his head. “I didn’t know you had company.”

 

“It’s okay,” Sehun replied. “This is my hyung, Joonmyun.”

 

Luhan bowed as he greeted Joonmyun. Joonmyun kept his stern look and didn’t even budge or say a word.

 

“I guess… I’ll… go… now…” Luhan was really embarrassed with what happened as his fear of not getting back together with Sehun actually came true. He thought that he probably deserved it after everything that happened.

 

Joonmyun slightly nudged Sehun to say something as Luhan turned away. Joonmyun just really wanted the two of them to settle things properly. After a couple more nudges, Sehun shook his head so Joonmyun resorted to his own way.

 

“Yah! Luhan!”

 

Luhan was a bit surprised, but at the same time, not so surprised that Joonmyun knew his name. He turned around again and a confused look was painted across his face. Joonmyun nudged Sehun again but Sehun did nothing. He looked at Luhan apologetically and looked back at Sehun.

 

“Look,” Luhan replied just loud enough for them to hear without a lot of other people hearing him. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything. Can we please talk properly soon?”

 

Joonmyun smiled as he felt relieved towards what Luhan did. Sehun nervously looked at Luhan and slowly nodded.

 

“So are we good?” Luhan asked with all his hopes up.

 

“Hmm…” Sehun put on his mischievous look as he thought. “I’ll think about it.”

 

Luhan and Sehun laughed.

 

----------

 

A lot of people have already left the venue as the program had ended minutes ago. Yixing walked in the venue and looked at his surroundings. He found one of the open food stalls selling eomukbar (Korean fish cake). He ran towards it and ordered three.

 

“You’re late,” Jongdae said as he approached Yixing from behind.

 

Yixing turned around surprised and laughed, “Oh, it’s you, Jongdae!”

 

Jongdae gave a small salute and laughed as pulled Yixing in a hug.

 

“Yah, why were you late?”

 

“I visited my grandmother today.”

 

“Oh, that time of the year, eh?” Jongdae crossed his arms.

 

“Yep.” Yixing then got the eomukbar from the vendor. “Do you want one?”

 

“Nah, I’m fine. I ate a lot of food tonight.”

 

Yixing quickly bit one stick in hunger. He then started walking and Jongdae followed.

 

“So how was the event?”

 

“It went great actually!”

 

“Too bad I wasn’t able to catch So Nyeo Shi Dae,” By this time, Yixing finished the first stick, and started on his second.

 

Jongdae laughed. “Everyone came for So Nyeo Shi Dae. I guess I have to thank them only for putting such a big event.”

 

“Silly,” Yixing chuckled. “Thank them, but this event is all yours.”

 

Jongdae can’t help but to stare at Yixing engulfing the eomukbar, moving on to his third already. “There’s more eomukbar you know, we can go back and get more.”

 

Yixing glared at Jongdae. “I’m already fine. The travel just really made me hungry.”

 

“Ah…” As Jongdae surveyed his surroundings in front of him, he saw Kyungsoo and Baekhyun talking by the fountain. Jongdae smiled and approached them. Yixing followed. Suddenly, Yixing saw where Jongdae was headed. He hesitated a bit but proceeded anyway.

 

“Hey Kyungsoo, Baekhyun!” Jongdae greeted as he shook their hands.

 

Suddenly, from behind Kyungsoo, Jongin recognized Yixing.

 

“Hey Yixing!”

 

“You guys know each other?” Kyungsoo asked surprisingly.

 

“Yeah, he’s my dance mate,” Jongin smiled.

 

Yixing bowed and introduced himself. “Hello, I’m Zhang Yixing.”

 

“Hey Yixing,” Baekhyun bowed back. “I’m Byun Baekhyun. This is Do Kyungsoo, and this is Park Chanyeol.”

 

Kyungsoo and Chanyeol bowed right after.

 

“Nice to meet you,” Kyungsoo smiled.

 

“Oh, Channie, this is Kim Jongdae, he’s a friend of ours,” Baekhyun turned to Chanyeol.

 

“Jongdae, Jongda—oh! The one who used to sing with you and Kyungsoo before?”

 

Jongdae laughed. “That was a long time ago.”

 

“So, this is Jongdae?” Jongin bent and asked Kyungsoo softly.

 

“Yeah, the one with the voice remember?”

 

“Ahh, I see, I see…”

 

“So,” Jongdae asked. “What were you guys talking about?”

 

“Well,” Kyungsoo paced around Jongdae. “We were just talking about someone’s marriage proposal.”

 

Jongdae looked at Baekhyun with a happy expression. “Whoa! Seriously?! Congratulations! With who?”

 

Baekhyun looked at Chanyeol and smiled. He held Chanyeol’s hand and raised their hands up.

 

“Whoa, those are lovely ri—”

 

“Jongdae!” Someone suddenly jumped on Jongdae’s back.

 

“Ack. Ack. Ack…” Jongdae struggled as he held on his ‘attacker’s’ arm around his chest area. “Who, who..?”

 

“Yah, is that how you greet me?” He finally let go so Jongdae can be able to look at his ‘attacker’.

 

“Joonmyun!” Jongdae’s expression suddenly changed to a happy one. He hugged Joonmyun and laughed. “Glad you made it.”

 

Suddenly, he saw Sehun, Luhan, and Minseok approach them.

 

“Wha..!” Jongdae pulled away and looked at Sehun. “Is this Sehun?”

 

“Ah, yeah, he looks different from the last time you saw him right?”

 

“He’s so… tall.” They all laughed.

 

In the midst of all the talking and laughter, suddenly, from out of the blue, everyone saw a bright flash of light. Everyone looked at the source.

 

“Beautiful. More natural please,” Kris joked as he put down his camera and smiled.

 

“Kris!” Jongdae, Minseok, and Luhan shouted as they greeted him.

 

“Oh, you know him?” Jongdae asked the two.

 

Minseok smiled. “Yeah, he usually comes over at the entertainment and takes pictures of idols and pre-debut teams.”

 

As soon as Minseok mentioned ‘idol’, Kyungsoo and Baekhyun gave looks at each other and looked like they were impressed.

 

“Zitao,” Yixing greeted. “It’s been a long time.”

 

Zitao stepped out from behind Kris. “Yixing, how’ve you been?”

 

And at that point was the start of new-formed friendships. The late night was full of introductions and greetings. Everyone became acquainted with each other as they shared their own unique stories.

 

Twelve souls coming together; twelve miracles working together. Twelve different experiences, but there is but one celebration: Christmas.

 

“Hey guys, let’s take a group picture!” Kris shouted as he brought out his tripod. Everyone seemed to agreed and had the same idea of having the fountain as their background with the huge Christmas tree visible behind it.

 

“Okay, timed!” Kris shouted as he ran back to the group who was looking for poses.

 

“Sam! I! Il!” Kris counted down.

 

One flash.

 

Twelve miracles; forever encased and remembered in a photograph. Twelve miracles; who carried on their miracles and spread it to everyone they come across from then on.

 

Find your own miracles. Bear the miracles. Learn from your miracles.

 

And have a very Merry Christmas.

 

Fin.

 

~Responsibility, Purity, Patience, Conscience, Courage, Honesty

Kindness, Happiness, Humility, Understanding, Love, Compassion~