Juliette didn’t want anything else in the world than what she had at that moment. All of her up to her nose under the comforter, not quite warm enough if Jinki hadn’t been there. Jinki, in the wife beater that had been underneath his waterlogged sweatshirt, clinging to her like a pillow. He looked silly, underneath the pink comforter, curled up around little Juliette, bed-head all over the place. She looked over his shoulder at the clock. 10:08. What time did classes start, she wondered to herself groggily. 10:30? Yeah, 10:30. 10:30.
    Juliette leapt out of bed, nearly falling off, and panicking.
    “Jinki.” She snapped. “Jinki!” She shook him violently, but he was legitimately catatonic.
    She called his name repeatedly, shaking and pinching him, to no avail. At one point, after a particularly nasty smack to the shoulder he opened his eyes and raised his eyebrows at her, then fell back asleep.
    “오빠!” She shrieked at last, exasperated.
    Oddly enough, he responded immediately to her ill-spoken Korean, and sat up.
    “What?” He asked, eyes rolling as he got dizzy from sitting up too fast.
    “I have to be in school in 20 minutes.”
    “Breakfast. Make it. I will, I mean.” He said, and shuffled out of bed.
    She usually didn’t have breakfast on school days, but her preference was only that he be out of the way, whether that be off making breakfast, or anything else. She didn’t have time to shower, but she did run her face under some cold water before throwing on whatever she could find laying about. This turned out to be a green dress, leggings, boots, and of course, one of her assortment of hideous oversized sweaters. She rarely forgot to set her alarm, and had never been late to class. At least Kate was driving her this morning, she thought, which would be faster than the bus. She brushed her teeth, and then realized that that was a silly thing to do before breakfast. This angered her, and in her stomping around and rushing the heel of her right boot snapped halfway across the kitchen hallway. She stumbled, and cursed, and pulled at her hair, before realizing she had just done the braid and now it was messy all over again. That was it for Juliette. She burst into tears right then and there.
    Jinki pulled a double-take looking back at her, and upon realizing her situation dropped all he was doing by the stove to run and hold her. He wiped away the tears with the pad of his thumb and pulled her to his chest.
    “There could be worse mornings, I think. You could have hair like mine, for instance.” He said.
     Juliette looked up to see the porcupine of his bed-head hair spikes. She laughed out loud, and he did too, until they were both laughing so hard and holding each other so tight they didn’t hear the door open.
    Kate gaped at the pair canoodling in the kitchen, Jinki in his wife-beater and jeans and no socks or shoes, Juliette's hair half-braided. Juliette noticed Kate standing there, with her key in one hand, a cup of coffee in the other, her eyes wide as saucers. Jinki, still mostly asleep, shot her a lethargic grin and held his hand up in something of a wave. Juliette just looked her sister up and down. Kate smiled charmingly, stepping forward into the kitchen and rubbed Juliette's arm.
    "Ready to go, Sissy?" her pat had turned into a clutch, and she dragged Juliette by the sleeve into the other room. "Come here." She cooed, pulling Juliette into and closing the door to her room shut, leaving Jinki to go back to his cooking.
    "What if he has herpes." She hissed as soon as they were alone.
    Juliette blinked dumbly. "What?" She finally asked.
    "Or AIDS!" Kate proclaimed. "You ."
    "What?" Juliette was taken aback, and suddenly her expression dawned with realization. "We didn't sleep together! I mean we did, but not like that!" she cried.
    "What if he has syphilis!" she screeched, and Juliette plugged her ears.
    "What if he has Tay-Sachs!" Kate said forebodingly.
    "That's not even an STD, and it's only prominent in orthodox Jewish communities." Juliette snapped. "And even if it was, I wouldn't have it. Because we didn't have . Are you jealous that you thought we did?"
    "Really? What? No!"
    "He came over and it rained so we played Scrabble until we fell asleep." Juliette shrugged.
    "Prude. I'll be waiting in the car." Kate pouted.
    Juliette knew she just couldn’t win with a jealous Kate, so she didn't take any of it to heart. Kate trudged through the tiny apartment and walked in to tell Jinki not to give her little sister any STDs, or possibly that she‘d enjoy his STDs fully, unlike Juliette. He was bent over the stove, with three of the four burners on its highest setting. Only one was occupied by a pan, inside which a single, whole, uncracked egg rolled around. Fully awake now, his grin was much wider and cheery. Kate slipped on an oven mitt, picked the egg up, and threw it on the floor, then walked out in place of her speech. Jinki stared after her. Juliette had found a new pair of shoes, and now she followed her sister, pausing at the door to say goodbye to Jinki. And after she left and he cleaned up the mess of the egg, because he knew she wouldn’t mind him using her bed, he went back to sleep for three hours.
    Jinki made a point of calling all his band-mates when he got back to his apartment. Minho told stories of almost getting shot twice, writing raps about the poverty in Harlem and the importance of brotherhood.  Jonghyun, the avid and sensitive poet he was, hadn’t written just one song in NYC, but three, all about various stunning women he came across in his travels. He also mentioned he bought a car, and was perplexed as to how he was going to ship it overseas when the time to go home came around. Taemin had had a rough time in Texas it seemed; his bubbly demeanor and bright red hair translated to mean homoual there, and he was teased quite a bit. So he migrated up to Oklahoma, where he had learned to square-dance and written songs about cattle and chickens and corn and cowgirls.
    Kibum had spent his afternoons and evenings drinking and partying and consequently getting laid, and in the morning was too hung-over to write, so he had minimal writing done. He and Jinki were the only ones not done with at least one song. Jinki told him of his troubles, his growing love for Juliette, her mysterious dancer alter ego, and her inability to let her out with him. Kibum suggested detachment first and foremost, which Jinki had expected, his comrade being the king of one night stands. When Jinki said he had not decided on the matter yet, Kibum snorted.
    “That’s the only matter.  Everything else is semantics. You want to see this girl’s dancing abilities, take her dancing. Whether she likes it or not. Grow a backbone, Hyung. I have to go. It’s mid-afternoon and I’m sober. That’s against my ethics.” Kibum said, and the line clicked dead.
    Jinki had to admit he had a point. That was when he went to see Kate. She was happy to see him for the wrong reasons, and not happy when he explained his visit was about Juliette. Indicating that the plan may involve Kate tying Juliette down and dressing her up, however, Jinki got not only Kate’s blessings for the relationship, but an agreement to collaborate.