EXO-M's promotional period in China wouldn't take until the end of summer.

Life got busier as the work from school and training piled up together. I struggled through the days, desperately trying not to drown under all the pressure. The days were passing by in a blur; the same meaningless routines every day. School, lessons, extra practice, homework; everything blended together, day into night, night into day.

Quitting at this point would be too easy though, it would only show how incapable I was, of finishing something that other people could do for much longer. Besides, I was almost done anyway, with a little over a month left, so I might as well try my best until it was time to leave.

What was able to make this bearable and become my light at the end of the tunnel, were memories of the time I had spent with him. I found myself missing his warm eye-smile, his soothing voice, and his charming laugh.

EXO-M's short promotional period in China meant that they would be back before it was my time to leave.

That might not be a good thing, but I found myself anticipating the day that they'd get back, hanging onto the tiny thread of hope that I'd get to see him one last time and leave with some good memories.

EXO-M members were very busy with all kinds of events, from photo shoots, to performances and interviews over there, and EXO-K was working just as hard here in Korea. Because of all those events, they stopped working with us trainees for our weekly variety lessons. Instead, we started training in smaller groups of trainees, mixing with the other trainees from the same level. It wasn't nearly as fun, but trying out a different style of training was an interesting experience, and I also got to see everyone's cool talents.

It was a warm but gloomy morning, the cloudy skies and rain outside making me almost unsure if it was still night or just really dark outside. When my alarm went off, I was immediately brought out of my dreams, wanting nothing more than to continue sleeping and hide from the world. EXO's song continued to blare at me, so I tried to convince myself that it's not so bad, that I should really get out of bed and face another day.

Hearing my phone vibrate beside me on the bed once I turned my alarm off, I grabbed it and glanced at the much too bright screen glaring back at me.

"Happy birthday, Yoonmi! I hope you have a good day, and be happy! ^^" The text message read, showing the sender's name at the top, Hyojin.
I couldn't believe that I had forgotten my own birthday. I had been so busy focusing on training that I wasn't even aware of what date it was at all. The only date that I had in mind was...the day that I'd be leaving.  

Which meant that they should've been back yesterday.

"Don't worry, we'll be back before you know it," Chen grinned, that charming eye smile appearing again as the dance came to a conclusion.

I was still hesitant, a little frightened that all of this would just disappear when he left, that it wouldn't ever come back.

He could probably feel me tense up for he held me closer, reassuringly. "I'll definitely make it back in time for your birthday," he whispered into my ear, teasingly ruffling my hair. "I'll be back to celebrate with you."

I got up from my bed, and climbed down the ladder, finding the room empty. It wasn't much of a surprise, as they sometimes choose to visit the gym early in the morning before classes at their universities. The silence was nice, leaving me to my thoughts as I got ready for school.

Once on the bus, the fan-girl sitting behind me was there once again.

"Hey hey, how do you feel about EXO-M's promotions in China right now? I personally prefer the Chinese version of the song more, but maybe that's because I'm biased. Hey, you're Chinese, aren't you?" She squealed excitedly, being much too energetic for such an early morning. I could see the wallpaper on her large phone, changed to a different photo of Chen singing, against a black background filled with silver lights.

I found myself smiling at it just for a second, before realizing that she was still staring at me expectantly. I stared back at her, thinking about what to say, when I realized that I actually hadn't been keeping up with EXO besides what Chen had chose to share. "Yeah, it's a pretty good song. Oh, shouldn't they be back already though?"

"No, I wish they were! Their promotions got extended by a couple of days so they might be back at earliest tomorrow. So I'll probably be off to the airport for pictures soon."

"Oh..." I frowned, remembering his words from before.

Feeling my phone vibrate in my pocket, I fished it out in anticipation, heart doing somersaults in my chest. Maybe, just maybe, it was a text from him telling me that he wouldn't make it back today.

As soon as I saw the name of the sender, disappointment rapidly sank in. It wasn't from Chen, but actually from Jiwoo. 

"Happy birthday Yoonmi!" it said, "play hard tonight!" It made me feel a bit better that she remembered my birthday even though we have only been friends, or housemates, for a short period of time. I smiled a little, feeling touched, yet at the same time, I also felt a slight sinking feeling in my stomach.

"Oh, it's your birthday today?" The fan-girl commented, peaking from over my shoulder. "Happy birthday! It that there's still school, but I hope you get to have some fun later!"

"Thanks, I'll be sure to!" I replied, putting a smile on my face.
 

I half expected the EXO-M members, or at least managers, to be hanging by the company building by the time I got there in the late afternoon, but it was all quiet and they were nowhere to be seen.

Time passed by fleetingly during my lessons today, and soon, I was out of the building and heading back to the dorm. I decided to skip out on my midnight practice today, wanting to study a bit more for the upcoming test.

I checked my phone again right before I left, but still, nothing changed from when I had checked it five minutes ago. No messages, no calls, nothing.
Could the time difference possibly be why there were still no messages? What if it had gotten lost in cyberspace? What if my phone had no signal? Was the battery too low?

I turned off my phone, trying to stop my thoughts swarmed around as I got back to the dorm. I refused to believe it, but... did he really forget?

"Surprise!" A chorus of voices shouted, as the lights came on, leaving me huddled against the door, heart pounding fast.

"Whoa, you guys did all this?" I took the in everything in front of me, seeing Hyojin holding a cake with candles placed neatly in a circle around the writing in the center. Jiwoo had her phone out, snapping photos of the scene, and Miyoung was playing with the balloons floating around in the living room. Even Minnie looked less cold and maybe had the slightest hint of a smile on her lips.

"Of course, our maknae is a year older," Hyojin said, placing the cake on the table in the center.

"Come on, let's celebrate tonight!" Miyoung came over and dragged me into the living room while Jiwoo brought my stuff into our shared bedroom.
The table was filled with various delicious looking dishes and snacks, a lot of which I had never even seen before. They sang happy birthday in a mixture of Korean and English, making me wish for something before blowing out the candles.
 

Chen's POV

Our flight had been delayed, yet again.

We had been in China for most of the past month, promoting as our separate subunits again. Today however, seemed to have consisted of more time in the waiting rooms rather than actually practicing for the performance. The set had been experiencing many technical difficulties, extending our final day in China for another several hours, and pushing our flight back as well.

In the airport, I clutched my dying phone in hand, trying to save the last of my battery power to send the special message to her. Rachel's birthday was today, in the time zone back home, and it was just my luck that we were delayed by nearly a day. I watched the clock count down until it was almost midnight in Korea to send the last message she'd get on her birthday. Saving the best for last since I couldn't be first.

"Flight to Incheon airport is now boarding." An announcement said.

"About time." Tao muttered under his breath. We grabbed our carry-on luggage and quickly made our way to the gate.

Once on the plane, I quickly put my stuff away and sat in my seat then sent the message before Luhan hyung sat down beside me.

"Ah, rest at last." He said loudly, putting on his chic shades and turning off his phone. I was about to follow suit, but when I checked my messages, expecting to see that my message was sent, I saw that it had failed, searching for signal instead. Then before I even had time to think of an alternative, my phone shut down by itself, running out of battery.

Ah, what am I going to do. I completely screwed this up.

A couple of hours of restless tossing and turning later, we finally arrived in Seoul. I put on my shades and pulled my hat low, expecting to deal with a lot of paparazzi as usual. To my surprise, there were significantly less people, probably because our schedule had been altered so many times within the past day.

The manager hyung came to drive us back to the company building but I asked to be dropped off at a little marketplace a couple of blocks away, saying that I had to buy something for my family. I waited until they left before walking a block down from the marketplace, coming to this little flower shop.

"Hello, how can I help you?" A voice said. I turned to see a small girl arranging some yellow flowers on the right.

"Um, I'm looking for something that would be suitable to give to a girl? Like a bouquet or something?" I asked, feeling rude for not taking my sunglasses off. But if she found out who I was though, this could go really badly.

"Something for a girlfriend? Sister? Mother?" She asked, moving on to pink flowers.

"Uh, something for a girlfriend..."

"Hmm, well roses are always nice, a classic." She suggested. "Or maybe some pansies or forget-me-nots?"

"Forget-me-nots?" There wouldn't be any harm in getting those; they're special, but not overly obvious.

"I'll show you where they are." She led me to a section at the back of the store and showed me the various bouquets and separate ones too. The flowers were a soft shade of blue which reminded me of the colour of her phone case, one of her favourites. There was this one bouquet in the corner which had a few other types of flowers along with forget-me-nots, the various colours complementing each other.

"I'll get a bouquet of these please."

Before going into the company building, I made sure to double check everything. I pulled out the small box from my pocket and opened it. The thin bracelet glinted in the sun, looking delicate but beautiful.

Everything had to be perfect, just like her.

Sorry for the late update! It's been a hella crazy week with midterms/assignments/getting sick/road trip/BIGBANG CONCERT 
(omg guise the bigbang concert was freaking amazing asdfghjlfdjhf MY FEEHRLS)
Anyway, thanks for the support <3 enjoy~