I barged into my music literature classroom a minute before the screechy 9pm bell aka ‘go back to your f****n dorms, right now!!’ bell that sounded like one of Solbi sunbae’s tantrums.

“Ah, just in time, Miss Jo,” my professor scanned the score and mysteriously smiled, “the title is ‘A Playlist of Reasons Why I love you’…very quirky…I like it!”

I smiled in relief. Naming the title was one of the hardest things in writing a song and I was glad she liked it, “Good night, professor.” I waved and exited the room. I lightly skipped all the way back to my room.

“Ara Jo, what’s going on with you?” Yeona was sitting on her bed crosslegged with her eye brows raised at me. She had a playful yet ‘you better spill it, girl’ grin.

‘Your oppa kissed me and I kissed him back’ I thought but refrained from saying it out loud.

“I handed my music literature assignment in and I think I have a chance on being chosen as the winner because my professor liked it.” I went on and on with the excuse.

“Oh…ok…I’ll take it for now…” she grinned wickedly.

I sighed internally. How was I going to keep this elephant sized secret from my roommate slash his sister?

***

The first few weeks of the school year were filled with endless Mozart’s life stories, music theories, sight reading, ear training and so on. I spent my second and my third weekends at home with my dad who surprisingly was dealing this whole ‘daughter wants to go off and become a hobo aka stripper aka musician’ situation. Finally, on the fourth weekend, I was allowed to go to Yeona and oppa’s house.

I couldn’t spend much time with Chanyeol oppa because our schedules were the complete opposite due to our grades and our majors. We would bump into each other between classes in the halls from time to time but all we could do were smile at each other and hope that no one would notice us holding hands for a brief fraction of a second. After all classes were over, Yeona was always with me which meant no alone time for oppa.

“Just to warn you, all of my oppas and unnies are here today since it’s our monthly reunion. Well, except for number three. He’s in Belgium probably stuffing his face with chocolate right now,” Yeona explained, “It’s going to be really loud in there so good luck.” Well, some alone time with oppa wasn’t an option today either.

With a short warning from number seven, she dramatically pulled me through the front door as if there was a civil war happening in the house. And there was. At least half a dozen of tall fully grown adults screamed and charged towards us. They swallowed us with their overwhelming love and gave us literally breath taking hugs that squeezed the life out of me every single time.

“Number seven, who’s the babe you brought over?”

“*A guy whistling* Damn, number seven actually did us a favor for once!!”

“Please ignore those immature animals. We starved the boys for a few hours so that they could fully enjoy dinner. Just part of the side effects.”

 “It’s so nice to meet you, honey!! I’ve heard so much about you!!” said someone as she embraced me.

The hug was from Yeona’s mother. It was warm and fuzzy. She smelt like banana bread and vanilla scented laundry detergent. Home. It was a smell that I’d missed for years. I hugged her back tight, not wanting to let go of the short visit to my mom in the deepest part of my heart.

“Hey,” I pulled away from Mrs. Park when I heard the heart tingling voice that echoed in my ear.

“Hi, oppa,” I breathed as his broad chest was right in front of me. He tightly wrapped his strong arms around my shoulders. I shyly wrapped my arms around his narrow but muscular waist.

“ whistle…” Yeona growled at oppa.

“Yeona, how many times have I told you to leave that thing in your room? And you shouldn’t threaten your brother with that. You’ll make him deaf.” Mrs. Park scolded.

“C’mon,” Yeona grabbed my hand to pull me away from her brother and introduced me to her sisters.

***

Dinner was pure chaos. But very entertaining. I’ve never sat on one table with 9 other people. There were many big and small arguments going around, hands reaching for food, hands throwing food, the awakening of mama bear, hands picking up the food that they threw, etc. It was like watching several dramas at once.

Dessert was worse. The fight over who’s got the bigger piece, who deserves the one with the chocolate, who gets the last piece, who does the dishes etc. The one who started the ‘who does the dishes’ became the one doing the dishes for starting an argument.

While the dishes were being washed, everyone kind of scattered. Some were in the kitchen looking for more food, Yeona was somewhere up stairs, and some other were in the livingroom watching tv. I was about to follow the twin unnies to the living room, when…

“Ara,” Someone whispered in my ear, making me turn around.

I saw Chanyeol oppa walking away but briefly looking back at me signaling me to come. I checked to see if anyone was around me. The twin unnies were emerged in a deep conversation about croissants and everyone else was doing their own thing. I quickly shortened the distance between us and we disappeared through the back door of the house.

“After you,” Oppa let me walk up the stairs that ended at the rooftop of the house.

“Wow…this is so beautiful…” I gasped as I placed my foot on the roof top garden. The night view was beautiful the house was located at the top of a giant hill. I could see all the tall buildings, the mountain ranges decorating the edges of the city and of course, the Namsan tower that blinked every few seconds.

“Pretty nice, eh?” Oppa murmured as he slumped down on the pyeongsang (a bed like wooden platform usually situated on rooftops and terraces in Korea. Also a great place to sleep during the summer) and tapped the space beside him for me to sit.

I walked towards him and shyly sat down as he leaned back on his arms and looked at me with his warm brown eyes.

“What are you thinking right now?” he asked. He tucked a stray of loose hair behind my ear and lightly the ear lobe.

“No..nothing…” I mumbled.

His hand left my ear and glided across my cheeks to the edge of my lips.

We starred at each other as the faint electricity between us grew stronger. I could hear the faint sounds of car horns and the music coming from where the lights were at the bottom of the hill. With the distant city noise as our back ground, we leaned in and closed the distance. My heart thumped as I could feel the light breathes on my lips…

“Ehhhhhh!! Look who’s hitting on number seven’s cute friend!!”