He had been watching her.
All this time, ever since the first step she took into his life, he had been watching her. She wasn't extremely beautiful, nor did she seem to be anything special in particular, but he couldn't take his eyes off of her.
He's caught her watching him as well.
Sometimes he felt like a zoo animal, being observed by her provoking eyes. Sometimes he felt at ease, knowing that someone was watching over him. Other times he would feel annoyed, thinking that he wasn't the only one she was watching.
His thoughts came to a halt when he was interrupted by a disturbing cell-phone alert.
They were all still sitting in the car, riding back to their company.
Rainie flipped out her phone to read the text message she had received, as she silently closed it and placed it back into her pocket she heard Kyuhyun take a deep breath; she knew he was about to question her about the text message.
She turned around, looking at Kyuhyun who was sitting in the seat right behind her. As their gazes met, he swallowed his breath and shifted his gaze outside of the window. The rest of the members watched them silently, Shindong lifting an eyebrow. Shindong payed more attention to Kyuhyun, who seemed to be feeling more awkward than Rainie was, and noticed that Kyuhyun began pouting his lips.
“Are you guys hungry?” Rainie asked, throwing Shindong out of his trance.
Ryeowook and Sungmin looked at each other. Ryeowook usually cooked for everyone at the dorm and Sungmin would help out every now and then, but ever since Rainie arrived she liked to prepare their food for them, even though it was take out most of the time.
Shindong nodded his head violently, the hours of recording must have taken up a lot of his energy. Ryeowook and Sungmin started laughing in agreement. Kyuhyun stayed silent.
Rainie thought to herself quietly before answering them again, “I'm going to drop you guys off at the company. You guys can settle everything you need to and then just head back to the dorms, I'll take a taxi.”
Kyuhyun returned his gaze to her, confused by her orders. “You're not going with us?”
“No, I'm going to head to the dorms first and cook,” she replied, sitting back in the correct seating position.
“You're cooking?” asked a bewildered Ryeowook. Rainie had never really cooked for them before, even though she's only been around about a week, it was a bit of a surprise to him.
“Yup,” she answered simply.
The boys didn't know if they should feel flattered or worried. She seemed like a person who was clueless about house chores and such; she was the type that needed to be taken care of instead of taking care of others.
“Wow, this is the first time! I didn't know you could cook,” Sungmin added, smiling softly at her. He always used his cute voice with Rainie, or rather, he always used his cute voice when speaking with any female.
Rainie smiled back at Sungmin through the rear view mirror. “Not many people do, I don't cook that often.”
“That makes it all the more special,” said Shindong, leaning back in his chair.
Kyuhyun became extremely curious about what was in the text message. He didn't think that Rainie taking the initiative to cook for them was on a spur of the moment, there had to be a reason behind it, but he stayed silent the rest of the car ride.
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Rainie began preparing the meat and vegetables she would use in her dishes. To be completely honest, Rainie hated cooking but she cooks very well. It was required of her in order for her to take care of her family members.
Hankyung stepped out of the shower, clothed in a black tank top and sports pants with a towel wrapped around his neck. He spoke to her in a familiar language.
“Thank you, really,” he said softly. He stepped over and helped her clean some of the vegetables but she pushed him away.
“No problem, don't get yourself dirty, just sit and wait to eat,” she insisted, smiling while motioning him towards the couch.
It was Hankyung who sent her the text message earlier. He really missed China and hasn't had any true Chinese food in a long time, therefore, he asked Rainie if she could make some for him tonight.
They first met the day before Rainie and Kyuhyun went out alone. They were practicing their dance moves and Hankyung arrived a little late due to filming. They immediately clicked and were able to get along very well, probably because they were both away from home and spoke the same language. They were comfortable together.
“Have you ever visited home after you came to Korea?” asked Rainie while slicing the beef.
“I have, but that was a long time ago,” he answered solemnly, drying his hair with the towel; his medium black hair rattling.
“You must really miss your parents. How's the dumpling store doing?”
“Pretty good. We're about to open another one, but what's most important is that my mom is happy. She really enjoys it,” he answered with a grin of his face, a childish grin.
The door opened and the rest of the members filed in one by one. The first to enter was Donghae, following him were Kibum, Shiwon, Ryeowook, Sungmin, Shindong, Eunhyuk, Leeteuk, and lastly, Kyuhyun. They all headed to their rooms to change into their pajamas and put away their bags, aside from Shiwon who didn't live at the dorms, and after they finished most of them headed over to the couch and the TV. Hankyung greeted them with warm “welcome homes”, handshakes, and hugs.
Ryeowook and Sungmin tried to help Rainie out with her cooking, but ended up sitting at the edge of the table, watching her as she cooked seriously. They were surprised that she could cook so well, or at least looked like she could.
Loud video game noises could be heard coming from Kyuhyun's room, but he wasn't entirely focused on the game.
That night, all eleven of them dined together. They were grateful for Rainie's cooking, that actually turned out to taste extremely delicious. Kyuhyun never found out what the text message Rainie received harbored, but he could pretty much guess it had to do with Hankyung, who he could hear so relaxingly converse with Rainie before entering the dorm. He set everything aside and enjoyed this meal that brought most of the members together; Heechul was absent due to filming, Kangin and Yesung both still recording their respective Radio broadcasts, with this new member of the big group, and ate with much satisfaction, almost forgetting all the desire to discover who and what was text messaged to Rainie hours before.
It couldn’t have been any simpler of a day.
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KyuHyun, along with his Super Junior members, were supposed to perform at Inkigayo and then return to the dancing studio to practice a new song but events took a turn when things went wrong at the recording grounds and the performance had to be canceled. In the end, they decided to just practice at the studio all day.
Rainie watched the eleven members practice, half seriously and half playfully. KiBum and HeeChul apparently had to film their respective films and couldn’t make it to practice.
One hour passed, two hours passed, and when the third hour came creeping up, Rainie couldn’t stand it anymore and whipped out her laptop.
A crunched napkin flew at Rainie, she raised her head to see KyuHyun sticking his tongue out at her, and then he lipped the word “focus”. Rainie ignored him and turned back to the laptop.
Yesterday night she had already begun outlining some characters for her story. She still didn’t know what direction she should take for the actual plot, but she decided that carving out the characters and their qualities would make things easier and she, of course, started with Joanne.
With Joanne’s bubbly and outgoing personality, it wasn’t hard for Rainie to decide that she should give Joanne a challenge. Therefore, Joanne’s character was designed to be more introverted with deep emotions, yet, at the same time she had to be able to manipulate certain aspects of her straightforward and easy-going persona.
“Is that an outline?” she heard a voice whisper to her in a familiar language. She looked up and found HanKyung sitting beside her, taking a drink out of his water bottle. His narrow, single-lidded eyes squinted as he tried to calm his breathing; sweat perspiring down his forehead and cheeks, his cheeks flushed a light tint of pink.
“Sort of,” she answered, handing him some tissues, “it’s more like a character developer.” She didn’t whisper since she figured no one else aside from HanKyung could understand their native tongue. “You look spent,” she added.
“Haha, it happens,” he laughed, a little embarrassed.
Rainie suddenly remembered something from an interview she saw on HanKyung and turned to ask him, “you want to be an actor, don’t you?”
He looked at her and grinned, “I want to be a lot of things.”
“Don’t we all,” she said, shoving him softly with her left arm, “but seriously” she insisted.
“Yeah, I’ve wanted to be an actor, but I like being a singer too. Only when we’re singing and dancing can all thirteen of us be together, that’s when we’re strongest,” Rainie noticed he sounded a bit hesitant when he said those words.
“Ahh, I see,” Rainie replied, returning her gaze to the laptop. She started tapping some things on the keyboard. Not wanting to impose on her privacy, HanKyung turned his focus to watching the members, moments later he felt heat on his lap, it was Rainie’s laptop.
HanKyung looked from the laptop to Rainie but she pointed back at the screen, his eyes followed her fingers to the image and words that inspired him and lighted a fire within him. Rainie retrieved the laptop and took the water bottle from his hands; he smiled at her one last time and returned to practicing.
As Rainie began typing away on her laptop again, a shadow hovered over her. She looked up and saw KyuHyun standing in front of her; slowly she closed her laptop, lifted a brow and just stared at him.
“Something wrong?” she asked.
“What are you doing?” He was also sweating and breathing hard, his chest raising and falling in rhythmic pumps. Rainie handed him a new bottle of water after taking off the cap, he took it and started drinking, keeping his eyes on her.
“Nothing,” she answered simply.
“Then let me see.”
She turned the electronic to him; he should have known everything would have been in complete Chinese.
“I don’t understand any of that,” he complained, kneeling to press the keys on the laptop.
“I didn’t expect you to.”
“Then why did you show it to me?”
“Because you asked.”
“If only you could be this obedient every time I asked something of you,” KyuHyun mocked, taking a seat beside her.
Rainie rolled her eyes and started typing on the keyboard again. “Don’t you have to practice?”
“It’s called taking a break”
“It’s called taking too long of a break, also known as slacking.”
He looked at her as if he had been wrongly accused of a great sin and then jerked the laptop away from her.
“Stop typing,” he demanded.
Rainie pulled the laptop back and quickly saved her file before he could do anything to it. “Why? Nothing else is going on.”
“We’re practicing.”
“I’m not disturbing you.”
“Yes, you are disturbing us.”
Rainie turned to look at the other members who continued to practice and play. “They all look fine to me.”
“Well, you’re distracting me,” KyuHyun stated matter-of-factly.
“How so?” Rainie asked curiously, setting the laptop aside. She stood up and stretched her arms and legs, waiting for him to answer.
Seeing her stand up, KyuHyun also stood up. He hovered over her, a good eighteen centimeters taller, with broad shoulders and toned muscle under his tank-top. “You keep talking to the other members when you’re not watching.”
“I only talked to HanKyung and we were just chatting casually,” she stated, watching the members practice while moving to the beat.
KyuHyun moved to stand between her and the dancing members, crossing his arms. “I heard you. You two were speaking in Mandarin and then you showed him something on your laptop.”
“Yeah, I did,” she responded, crossing her arms and imitating his serious behavior.
He squint his eyebrows in frustration as he watched her imitate him, she tried not to laugh at his childish face, the baby-fat on his cheeks and his pouting lips. “What did you show him?”
“A picture.”
“What picture?”
“Just a picture.”
He was becoming very impatient. He handed his bottle of water back to her and asked once more, “what picture?”
“Just a simple, cheerful picture,” she replied sternly as she twisted the cap back onto the bottle. His sweat continued sliding down his cheeks; she quickly grabbed some tissues and wiped it off for him.
Shocked, he took the tissues out of her tiny hands and wiped the sweat off himself. Angrily, he turned to head back to the members who were staring at him.
“Are you having trouble?” asked EeTeuk considerately.
“Looks more like he’s having girl trouble,” teased KangIn with a smirk on his face.
DongHae glanced over at Rainie, and then wrapped an arm over his dongsaengs shoulder and asked, “is it true?”
KyuHyun immediately denied it. ShiWon walked over to him and rustled his hair, a grin on his lips. ShinDong, after noticing KyuHyun’s denial and uneasiness, laughed loudly as the others returned to their spots.
The music began playing again and they started dancing. The members all looked at each other when they heard KyuHyun mumble, “It could have been so much easier”. They were all fazed about what he was referring to, but waved it away as they continued practicing.
Rainie, still standing in the corner of the room, watched as the eleven men danced rhythmically to the music. She closed her eyes and sat down, opening the laptop once again. “Yes, this really could have been much easier.”
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