My birthday party was beautiful, to say the least.  I can tell that Key paid some assistance to the decorating.  Surprisingly enough, when I asked him if he secretly set everything up, he shook his head violently.  “You really think I would throw you a surprise birthday party in a restaurant?  More like a surprise birthday trip to Paris.  You know my style is more extravagant.”

“That explains the chocolate sculptures of Jackson and me at our wedding…” I said thinking out loud.

Kris walked over to me and engulfed me in a hug.  I placed my head on Kris’ shoulder and saw Key, Taemin, Onew, Jonghyun, and Minho all winking at me.  I lifted my right hand from the back of Kris’ neck and flipped them off.  Onew and Minho started laughing while Key mouthed, “excuse me?”  I felt Kris’ mouth wander to the side of my face where he whispered, “Happy birthday Effie Moon, I’m so lucky to be with you.”  He then kissed my temple, pulled away from our hug and handed me a velvet box.  I looked down and felt the velvet on my fingers.  I felt nervous for some reason.  When I opened it I saw a beautiful white gold necklace with a cursive E pendant.  It was so simple but so pretty that way.  Kris’ face was awaiting my response and all I could do was kiss him.

“So you like it?”  Kris questioned, looking a bit surprised by my sudden action.

“No, I kissed you because I hated it…” I spewed sarcasm.

“Wait, what?”  Kris stared back at me all confused.

“She’s just messing with you, dude.”  I heard Jackson say as he came up behind me.  When I turned around I saw Jackson and all of his friends standing behind him.

“Guys!”  I cheered as I ran up to all of Jackson’s friends and hugged them.  They all straightened up their posture when they saw Kris.

“Mr. Wu it’s an honor to meet you!”  JR said shaking Kris’ hand.

“Mr. Wu it’s so cool to meet you!” Bambam said shaking his hand after JR.  The formal greetings continued with JB, Youngjae, and Yugyeom.

When it came to Mark, he just waved, “Hi I’m Mark.  Anyways, happy birthday Effie!”  It wasn’t hard to sense the unexplained cold tone in Mark’s voice when he was addressing Kris.  I ignored it, as I guessed Kris did also and thanked him for coming to my party.

“Where do we put our gifts?”  JB asked interrupting the increasingly awkward moment.

“Over there by the bathrooms, I’ll walk with you guys I need to go tie my hair up real quick.”  I answered leading the way to the other side of the room leaving Jackson and Kris together.

They both turned to each other and waited for who was going to start the conversation first.  “Thanks for inviting me, I know it must be weird… considering the situation.”  Kris began.

Jackson just nodded in response.  “You know, I invited you because I care about Eff, and she likes you so I just wanted to make her happy.”  It was Kris’ turn to nod in response to Jackson.  “But if you hurt her, I won’t hesitate to kick your .”  Jackson threatened.

“I care about Effie too…” Kris admitted to Jackson.

“Good…” he encouraged while giving a hard pat on the back to Kris, “then we shouldn’t have any problems between us, right Kris?”

Kris wasn’t used to people calling him by his first name at first meeting or getting patted on the back by someone younger than him.  He was always addressed with the utmost respect, but he understood why this situation might make Jackson a little annoyed.  So Kris held his tongue and nodded receiving a grin from Jackson.  Kris knew how much Effie loved and respected Jackson so he didn’t want to say anything to him that would make her mad.  Kris secretly had a great fear of Effie leaving him for Jackson.  He knew it would be so much easier for Effie to just date Jackson, but he couldn’t deny that he had quickly fallen for the girl with the elf name.  She was so different than the other girls he had dated before, she was so cool. Effie wasn’t interested in all the business junk that had filled his previous girlfriends.  She was creative, she loved art, and she was so expressive.  Kris had found nothing more beautiful than when he witnessed Effie writing.  The rare time that Kris was late to one of their dates; he had seen her finishing up one of her chapters of one of her many book ideas.  She was so content just staring at the screen, watching her mind unfold through her keyboard.  Kris was intrigued by the idea of all the possible things that were going through her mind; beautiful things.  He kept all this to himself though, as he didn’t want people to think of Effie as is weak spot.

                The party ended all too fast for me, I wanted to be surrounded by everyone I loved forever.  Kris had to leave a little early because he had a flight to catch at 6 in the morning to Hong Kong.  I was slightly upset but I didn’t show it because I didn’t want him to think I was mad at him.  Eventually everyone left except for me, Jackson, and his friends.  We were all collecting leftovers and presents to put in Jackson’s car when Mark walked over to me.

“Hey birthday girl!”  He said while throwing a balloon at my head.

“You punk!  You’re just mean to everyone today aren’t you?”  I joked.

“Why?  Because I wouldn’t address your boyfriend as ‘your highness Mr. Wu’?”  Mark joked back but it reminded me of his previous cold tone.

“Yeah, what was that all about?”  I asked.

Mark looked around to see if anyone was listening to us, “he’s just not good for you.”

“Care to elaborate?”  I was starting to get confused about where this conversation was going.

“Effie just think about it… Jackson is my best friend… he was all upset yesterday… Anything ring a bell?”  Mark was searching for an expression on my face that read ‘oh I get it’ but all I could give him was ‘what are you talking about’.

Jackson then came over and put his arms around both Mark and me, “What are my best friends talking about over here?”

“Oh just about how tired Effie is, you guys should probably go home now.  We’ll take care of the rest.”  Mark ordered.

                At home, Jackson and I sat in our living room floor watching zombie movies and unwrapping my gifts.  Jackson would read off who gave me the gift and I would write down their name on a thank you card.  When we were done, I decided to write one for Jackson.  “Here weirdo” I said while shoving the card to his chest.

Jackson took the card out of my hands and read it out loud, “Let’s see here.  Dear Jackson, you’re loud, embarrassing, and smelly.  You snore ridiculously loud and never close the cabinets after you’ve opened them.  Even after all that, you still manage to be the best friend anyone could have.  How do you do that?  Thank you so much, love Effie.”  Jackson smiled while reading it and then gave me a big hug when he was finished.  “Eff, you didn’t have to make me a card.”

“Yes I did!  Everything today happened because of you.  And here I was, thinking that you had forgotten about me.”  I said, joking at the end.  It got quiet for a minute when we both stopped talking.  It wasn’t that comfortable silence though, it was building tension.  We were both waiting for one another to start talking because we knew we had some unspoken things that needed to be said.  I took it upon myself to start back up the conversation, “Why didn’t Erika come by the party?  You know I wouldn’t have cared.”

Jackson sighed a bit, “I broke up with Erika.”

Again that confused feeling came back, “what?  Why?  You love her!”

“Eff, it’s… complicated.  I did love her once, but things are different know then they were back when we were originally dating.”  Jackson explained.

“But you were so happy when you went out with her.  Why didn’t you tell me you were thinking about breaking up with her?”  I asked him, trying to understand more.

Jackson shook his head, “Let’s be honest for once Eff.  We’re not exactly open when it comes to our feelings.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”  I defended.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were upset about me going to see Erika?”  Jackson asked me softly not wanting to make me upset.

I looked at the floor trying to search for the answer.  “How did you know that?”

“I heard you on the phone with Key…”  Jackson answered.  “Eff, please tell me the truth.  If you felt that way, why did you ask Kris to go out?”

I wanted to just hide under my blankets but that was impossible considering we still share the same bed.  “I… don’t know…”

“I want you to be honest with me, please Eff.  Do you have feelings for me?”  Jackson finally asked the one question he had been dying to ask.

“This is dumb, I have a boyfriend…”  I said heading for the staircase.  Jackson pulled back my hand to get my attention. “Wha…” I started to say before I got caught off by Jackson kissing me.  Jackson and I had only kissed a few times; at our wedding and sometimes a peck for laughs but never had we kissed like this.  Like anyone would be, at first I was shocked but knowing that it was Jackson kissing me made me melt into the kiss.  I could feel my heart pounding like crazy in my chest.  Pulling away, I instantly wanted to be closer to him again.

“Now, please don’t lie to me.  Eff, do you like me?”  Jackson pleaded with me.

I couldn’t answer him though because right after he said that my phone began to ring and I saw that it was my parents calling.  I showed the screen to Jackson and he signaled for me to take it while he headed upstairs.  My parents wished me a happy birthday and said they were sorry they couldn’t call earlier.  They then asked me how my birthday was.

“My birthday?  Oh, it was… very interesting.”

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Author's Note: First off, thank you guys for all the support!  I'm on vacation right now so sorry if I can't update so fast for the next 3 weeks.  On another note, WHAT DO YOU GUYS THINK ABOUT GOT7'S NEW MV AND SONG.  BAMBAM LOOKS SO GOOD WITH HIS NEW HAIR COLOR!  I've also recently gotten into BTS (I know i'm late) but J-Hope is my bias.  What's been up with you guys?  Anyone else have a new found love for a kpop group this summer?