A couple days passed by without hearing anything from him, and I could only fret and worry about what went wrong. The unreadable look on his face when he passed by in the hallway that time was an image permanently engraved in my mind, haunting me.

Had I done something wrong? Was he mad at me?

I didn't want to lose one of my closest friends here, didn't want everything to just disappear behind us, like nothing happened.

ChenChenChen: Have you finally gotten onto the fun parts of theory yet? :D

Me: Depends if you think melody writing is fun?

ChenChenChen: ...I can think of worse. So when's our next theory lesson~

Me: Whenever you're free~

But just like that, we went on like nothing happened.
 

I had lost track of how many tutoring sessions I had with Chen. The theory book seemed to never end, and for once, I could actually say that I was glad about that. It wasn't just for the excuse of getting to spend more time with him, but these sessions had greatly helped and was much more effective than me struggling through it by myself.

But, as with anything, the last chapter in my theory book was quickly approaching.

My heart was pounding anxiously as I came up to the door, knocking before going to open it because everything still felt really strange. I was scared that he might be mad at me but...he couldn't be, right?

"Hey look, my favourite girl in the world is here!" Chen opened the door even before I could reach for it, looking much better than I'd last seen him. He had a smile on like usual, no hint of anything being different at all.

I put a smile on as well, feeling the slightest bit relieved, and walked into the practice room carrying my books. He quickly cleared his stuff from the piano but I could tell that he seemed to be working on some sort of a composition.

"Oh, did I just catch our newest composer at work?" I teased,  trying to get a better look over his shoulder.

"No, of course not!" He exclaimed quickly, moving swiftly and blocking my view. "I mean, it's not much, uh, just stuff that you'll have to do in this chapter of theory. It's about melody writing this time right?" He took my books from my hands and pulled out the piano bench for me. I sat down, wondering if he seemed to be acting just a bit strangely, but pushed that out of my mind. The atmosphere between us was light as it was before all that happened, and it was comforting, so I wanted to keep it that way.

"Yeah, the section on melody writing." I replied, flipping to the page and turning towards him. I noticed how he sat in the chair beside the piano bench today, instead of on the bench with me like he often did, but I didn't think too much of it.

Chen was relaxed, twirling a pencil mindlessly. "This section's actually the most fun; you can pretty much write whatever melody you want, but within a certain set of rules."

"So just use an imperfect cadence at the end of the first phrase, a perfect one at the end of the second while modulating to the dominant key, then modulate back in the third phrase with an imperfect cadence again, and finally end the piece with a perfect cadence. Is that correct?" I asked, watching his expression.

He froze for a moment, almost surprised to know I already got all the rules down, but then broke into a grin. "100% on point. That's my girl!" He gave me a thumbs up.

Flashing him a small smile, I brushed off the comment and quickly turned to work on the one that's on the page, drawing each note on the staff. I counted out the beats needed to fill the bar, adding in a dotted eighth note prettily. Then came time to modulate to the dominant key, so I had to be sure to add the extra accidental.

The room was quiet with the fan humming in the background and the sound of my pencil scratching at the page. It wasn't an uncomfortable silence, but felt almost hesitant, like we wanted to say all too much, that neither of us really knew what to say.

"So how are your Korean classes coming along?" Chen finally asked, not looking up as he doodled on the corner of one of his papers.

"Um, they're okay I guess, I can pretty much read now, but understanding and speaking is a different story." I said, looking up to see what he was doing.

He stopped drawing on the page and looked at me, eyes twinkling. "Ah, don't worry, you'll be fluent in no time." He elbowed me lightly.

"Faster than you learning Chinese?" I shot back, feeling the corners of my mouth rising. I finished filling in the third line with a rising melody that ended back in the home key, with an imperfect cadence.

"Definitely faster, I believe in you!" He raised his fist, cheering me on. "I mean, as long as you have some inspiration for wanting to learn new things then it can be done easily, right?"

"Did you...have a difficult time with learning Chinese?" I asked hesitantly, feeling like he had another meaning behind his words.

He sighed softly, a distant and bittersweet smile showing. "To be completely honest, I hadn't wanted to be in EXO-M at all. I hadn't trained for very long, and didn't know any Chinese at the time either. There are other members who have learned Chinese as they've trained for much longer, but it was no use. They said that it would either be EXO-M, or I wouldn't be able to debut at all.

"It was really difficult at first with the language barriers, and I was very awkward around the other members, at first, unsure of how to communicate with such horrible skills. But it quickly got better; it always does."

"Wow," I said, unable to find anything else to say. "That's tough."

"But now I'm actually really glad that I got put in EXO-M. Because that led me to y--" he cleared his throat, "--our beautiful Chinese fans." He waved an arm dramatically.

I laughed, lightly smacking him. Once our laughter gradually died down, I turned to finish the last question on the page, completing it easily since it was in an easy key.

That's when I noticed that it was getting close to the end of our lesson. It was the second last one, the last session being next week, but I didn't want it to just end like this before I left for good. It took all I could to muster up the courage and ask him to meet up outside of class.

"Hey it's almost dinner time, maybe we could go get something to eat?" I asked casually. "Or do you want to grab some coffee sometime? I believe I still owe you for all these lessons." I shrugged nonchalantly, laughing it off. "Pay a friend back, you know?"

He froze for a bit, expression unreadable, and in that moment, I swear we could both hear my heart pounding loudly in my chest over the stretching silence forgotten in the background. It was a suffocating feeling; especially when he then frowned ever so slightly, sitting oddly on those feline lips.

Why is she so easy to forget about?

I wanted to ask him for confirmation, I just needed to hear it, but how would I possibly ask without making it seem like I like him myself?

"Um, I--" He started uncertainly.

I quickly cut in before this got out of hand. "Oh it's okay, never mind, just forget I ever said anything." I shook my head. "Sorry, I didn't mean it that way. I know you already have her..." I trailed off, abruptly standing up and starting to gather my notebooks.

"No no, it's fine, uh," he checked the schedule on his phone then sighed, "I just have a schedule to go to in ten minutes".

He didn't deny what I said at all.

"Aw that . Maybe next time then." I shrugged, hoping I was covering my disappointment.

Of course he had something to attend to. Why are you trying to take up even more of his time?

"Hey there's always the next set of theory lessons, like once you pass this course. You can't get rid of me that easily yet." He tried to tease me, but it was missing the usual glint in his eyes. "I'll see you next time, Rachel."

Chen picked up his stuff then gave a little wave as he left the room. I waved back and plastered a smile on my face but as soon as the door closed, I buried my face in my hands and heaved a sigh.

Here was my first time even attempting to ask him to hang out, but was already rejected right away. Well it was only natural that he's busy with EXO's comeback and all, so I shouldn't feel too bad. Maybe I should have waited until next time, our last lesson, to ask him. Then I wouldn't have to face the awkwardness of seeing him so soon after.

I forced a smile on my face and stood up, gathering all my books. That's when I noticed the extra page sitting on the piano. It must've been one of Chen's sheets that he'd been doodling on, that he forgot when he left so hastily. I slowly flipped it over, curious to see what he'd been drawing or writing.

On the page, I could see some random Korean characters, each set in a slightly different font, with some more block looking, and some smaller and neater. There seemed to be the same three characters all over the page though.

Ra...i...chel...

Rachel.

Sorry for not updating in a while! 
Thanks for the support <3 love y'all~