Deer Luhan,

Why?

Leigh

It was sheer force of will that got me out of bed the next morning to find Kai in the dance studio.  He was with a person I barely recognised, and the pair of them were popping and locking along to a hip-hop track.  They both whisked around in sync when I opened the door and ground to a halt like a pair of automated clones.

“Luhan, should you be up?” Kai asked me in concern.

“Hi, hyung!” the other guy said.  “What happened to your face?”

“Taemin!” Kai hissed, and it clicked: the guy was from SHINee – another of Abbie’s favourite groups.  But I could have sworn his hair was supposed to be much longer.

“Ah… sorry,” said Taemin.  “Nothing’s wrong with your face,” he added hastily.  I would have laughed, but I had more pressing stuff on my mind.

“The dance,” I said to Kai.  “You said you knew it.  I want to learn it by the end of today.”

Kai looked thoroughly taken aback, but Taemin cut in before Kai could say anything.

“Whoa, hyung.  What happened to your voice?”

“Taemin!”  Kai elbowed him in the ribs.

“Sorry,” Taemin automatically responded.  “Nothing’s wrong with your voice.”

“I feel like I’ve walked into Little Red Riding Hood as the wolf in disguise,” I muttered.

“I’m a wolf!  Awooo!” Taemin couldn’t resist, putting up the wolf ears, and to be honest, I couldn’t blame him.  I would have done the same.  Kai jumped on him and flattened him.

“Right,” he said, dusting his hands off as he sat on Taemin’s chest, the older guy laughing breathlessly.

“Ah, I love you!” I finished for Taemin, and Kai scowled at me.

“Ree Lee, Luhan?”

“No, but I will do if you teach me the dance.”

Kai opened his mouth, about to say something, but then glanced down at Taemin and wisely kept quiet.

“Wait, is this for Memory Lane?” Taemin asked, looking between me and Kai.  “I’ll help.  The other five were practising it yesterday and I helped them tidy up a few things.  Besides, it’s not a solo dance, so it’s better to learn it with more people.”

Kai cast me a worried look, but right then I was more concerned about learning the steps than I was about explaining, so I shook my head at him and mouthed “later”.

“You’ve got really rotten luck,” Taemin told me as we took a break for lunch, all three of us drenched with sweat.  “I heard about you hitting your head and forgetting everything, but now you get a virus on top of that?  It , man.”

“I’ll basically be better by the performance,” I told him around mouthfuls of pizza.  Sweetcorn flew everywhere, but I was too hungry to care.  “I saw the doctor yesterday evening and he says it’ll take some time for the throat infection to go, so I won’t be able to sing for a couple of weeks, but I can still perform.”

Kai was still shooting me sideways glances, clearly burning to know what was going on, but he didn’t dare ask without somebody else around.

“Oh, Yunho was asking after you, by the way,” Taemin said, his fingers.  “He was worried because he hadn’t seen you in a while.”

“He’s been in Japan,” Kai pointed out.  Taemin shrugged.  Neither of them noticed me staring, the pizza gradually dropping out of my mouth.  Yunho as in… you know, U-Know Yunho?  You-Know-Who Yunho?  I was supposedly friends with somebody from Dong Bang frikkin’ Shin Ki?  My God, if I bumped into Lord Voldemin sometime, I’d probably implode from happiness.  Sure, I wasn’t up to date with the K-pop scene, but I knew who Dong Bang Shin Ki were.  Everybody knew who Dong Bang Shin Ki were.

“He still wanted to know how Luhan was.  Anyone would think you’re dying, from the stories that are going around.”

My jaw shut with a clack and I snorted.  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Kai grinning broadly.

“You still look like death,” Taemin went on, stealing a chicken leg from Kai.

“Oi!” Kai protested, trying to snatch it back, but Taemin stuffed it into his mouth and stuck his tongue out at him.  It looked bizarre: the chicken leg was sticking out as well.

“The rash was worse.”  I cocked my head to one side.  “My fever’s gone, too.  It’s basically just my throat and the fact that I haven’t eaten properly in a couple of days.”

“Yeah, you sound like death too,” Taemin told me.  “No offence.”

“None taken.”  I shoved the last of the pizza into my mouth.  “Can we go from the top?”

Kai remained on the ground, hugging his chicken and shooting Taemin reproachful glares, but Taemin got to his feet, removing the chicken leg from his mouth as though it were a lollipop.

“For God’s sake, Kai, you’re like Onew,” he muttered around a large mouthful.  “Let’s hit this, Luhan.  Might be a good idea to get the others in later to do it with them.”

It must have been because I was ill, but I picked up the dance moves much more easily than I had done the simpler dances in EXO’s choreography, and Taemin gave me an encouraging thumbs up and “almost polished!” as I collapsed into a chair at eight o’clock that evening and Kai rang the others up.

“I’m just going to hang around to see how this all fits together,” Taemin said, plopping down on the floor beside me.  “Kai’s very biased in his opinions of his own team.”

Before long, Baekhyun, Sehun, Chen, D.O. and Lay filed in, and I noted with some surprise that it was going to be an even split between K and M performing my… Luhan’s… song.

“What the heck are you doing here?” D.O. asked me when he saw me sitting with Taemin.  “You can’t perform this with us if you’re ill.”

“He’s going to be fine.”  Taemin patted me on the back.  I cringed inwardly.  I still hadn’t mentioned to any of them that Luhan wasn’t going to be coming back.  And from the accusing glare Sehun was shooting me, I was going to have to do it soon.  Sighing, I got to my feet and beckoned him over.  D.O. came with him.

“Hyung, do you mind?” he asked Taemin.  “We need to speak to Luhan quickly.”

Taemin gave a small shrug and a smile.  “Sure.”

D.O. and Sehun cornered me immediately.

“Just what the heck is going on?”  Kai had joined us.

“Luhan can’t make it back in time,” I said.  “I’m basically better now.  It’s only the throat infection.  I’m going to have to perform.”

Sehun looked like he might explode, but D.O. grabbed his shoulder.

“Not now, and not here,” he gritted.  Sehun controlled himself, but barely.

“I’ll dance instead,” Kai offered.

“Kai, short term fix to an ongoing situation.”  I sighed.  “It’s not going to work.  Memory Lane’s not the only thing on the