"Breathe would you? You look like a suffocated goldfish right now and I can tell you it's not really a pleasant sight." Sunji wrinkled her nose as she commented. I was on the verge of having a mental breakdown and I started hyperventilating, all thanks to the second round of auditions that was due in 5 minutes.

4 minutes, 55 seconds and 78 milliseconds to be exact. Since knowing that we had made it through to the second round, I had been counting down to my doomsday.

"I am breathing! It's not my fault I look like I'm dying! And I just don't get it! How do you manage to stay so calm?!" Panic and desperation was evident in my voice. "You'll do fine okay? Trust me. And yourself of course. You can do it." Sunji held me by my shoulders and looked into my eyes as if to make her encouraging words have a bigger impact on me. It was one of those rare moments, when Sunji would let her emotions show and truly remind me how thankful I was for such a friend. Closing my eyes, I took in a deep breath.

"Really?" I peeked at Sunji.

"You bet! Now you better get in there and kick some and show 'em who's boss! Well, except me. You know I'm definitely better," Sunji joked, successfully lightening the atmosphere and my mood. As I let my eyes scanned around the room, I was pleasantly surprised to find that only 10 people had made it through. What was I expecting? Auditions really do screw people up. I still can't believe that I could actually perform a proper piece during the first round and not die simply due to nerves.

"Hye Sun! Back to Earth! Stop spacing out! Let's go, they're calling!" Sunji snapped her fingers infront of me to get me back from my thoughts before tugging me along into the room.

What?! What happened to the 4 minutes 55 seconds and 78 mi-

"Please stand according to the pre-given positions." The coordinator told us. Being the ninth auditionee, I was three places behind Sunji. As soon as we were in place, the judges wasted no time in getting the first person started.

They were all really good, but I knew that Sunji would still be way better.

As expected, Sunji wow-ed everyone in the room when she sang, it was hard to comprehend the judges' expressions but even so, I could tell that they were impressed. Well, the fact that Sunji had been the only one so far to have been allowed to finish performing a whole song should've said something. She bowed and thanked the judges after her piece and turned to return to her place, but not before mouthing a 'Fighting!' and pumping her fist my way. I smiled and reciprocated her action.

Being the second last person had its pros and cons. The pros was that I would be able to listen to everyone perform and I'd be able to roughly tell where I stood. The cons was that listening to auditionee after auditionee just got me even more nervous. The butterflies beating wildly in my stomach did nothing to help whatsoever. Despite being in an air-conditioned room, my palms were clammy and cold beads of sweat had formed on my forehead.

I nervously walked to the front of the judges before starting to sing. Albeit being a little shaky at the start, I quickly lost myself in the song and soon, my voice filled the room. When I sang, I tended to pour all my emotions into the song and I hoped that my emotions would be conveyed well to the judges. After ending on a high note, the room remained silent.

Too silent. No sound of pen scribbling nor the heavy breathing of the nervous auditionees.

Unsure of where to look, I stole a glance at the judges and saw that they still had their pokerface on. Embarrassed at the lack of reaction, I bowed and hurried back to my place with my head hung low.

When we were told to leave the room, I was so close to sprinting through the door. It took every ounce of my self-control not to when I remembered that I was clearly still in the line of sight of the judges and I certainly did not want to make a further fool of myself or further jeopardise my chances. Once I was out of the room, Sunji appeared beside me. She always had a knack for reading moods, especially mine, which meant that she probably be knew just how terrible I was feeling at that moment. With my eyes plastered on the floor, I couldn't see the smile spreading across her face.

"All the other contestants were so lame! That was the fifth time I've heard someone attempt to sing a Mariah Carey song. Gosh my ears were bleeding. Why did they even try to sing a song that they so obviously could not manage? You know what I'm saying right or is it just me?" she said, looking completely unimpressed..

"What?" I looked up at her, confused.

"Not that I care though. Anyways, you were great! I knew you could do it. But why the hell are you crying?" Sunji freaked out when she saw my tear-stricken face.

"I *sniff* I thought I *sniff* screwed up*sniff*" Sunji rolled her eyes at me and said, "Silly girl! What's wrong with you?" Sunji wrapped her arms around me and I merely cried harder in her embrace.

After we left the building, Sunji had suggested some ice-cream which explained why we were currently sitting in a cute booth in the ice-cream parlour.

"I can't believe you actually cried over something so dumb," I threw Sunji a glare, but she just continued,"just because you thought you ." Placing emphasis on the word 'thought', she cracked up right after finishing her sentence.

This girl is never going to stop is she?

"Just shut up." I muttered as I stuffed a spoon of ice-cream into Sunji's mouth, which was wide open from the laughing.

"Yah!" She yelled, but it sounded more like a strangled cat. I smiled at her dorkiness while she wiped with a napkin.

The following few days passed like wind, being in an elite school, school projects kept us busy, to the point where we barely had time to eat. Finally we had both managed to dig out some free time to have a girls day "out" in Sunji's mansion.

"URGH. I HATE SCHOOL." Sunji complained for the nth time.

"Correction. you hate life." I retorted, unable to keep the sacarstic comment to myself.

"Just shut up."

"Don't worry though we still have our backup plans. Imagine if SM acce-"

"THE AUDITIONS!" Sunji and I yelled as we shot up from the couch we were lounging on. We quickly grabbed our laptops and logged into our email accounts to check for the results.

"Oh . I can't believe it completely slipped my mind. It's been something I've dreamt of forever and I so easily forgot it. Urgh. Did you get accepted?" Sunji asked as she typed furiously away on her laptop.

"Uh... Hang on. Let me check. You?"

"Right there... Hold up... Yep I did! Did you?" Sunji replied rather calmly, as if it was completely expected news, which it probably was.

"I... didn't receive anything..." While she was basking in happiness, I was thoroughly disappointed.

"What? Are you sure? Have you checked properly? Maybe it's in the spam or trash?" Sunji suggested.

"I doubt it though but a quick look couldn't hurt." I clicked on the 'Spam' mail button and to my absolute amazement I spotted an email sent by SM Entertainment.

What if I didn't get accepted? What if Sunji got accepted? Am I really selfish enough to hold her back?

"What are you waiting for? Click on it!" Sunji blasted into my ear.

"I'm scared..."

"Gosh. Can you stop being such a wimp? It's getting really old." She nagged before grabbing my laptop and literally taking matters into her own hands.

"Well, it says here that blah blah blah blah blah thank you for auditioning and more crap and you're..." My breath hitched as I anticipated for the news to come slapping me across the face hard.

"ACCEPTED!" Sunji cheered and I barely could contain myself. I glanced at the contents of the screen. I made it. Barely. But I did. I came in fourth out of the four chosen contestants to officially become trainees.

Holy . This isn't a dream right? Someone slap me.

"No this is not a dream and I would really love to slap you but I shall control myself." Sunji stated. It still scares me how well she knows me.

I scoffed at her words which earned me a slap on my arm.

We were required to report at the SM building at 8 in the morning.

"ARE YOU DONE HOGGING THE BATHROOM?!" I screeched at Sunji who was currently spending her 45th minute in the toilet.

As usual, we were late to wake up and thus the early morning commotion.

"Yup!" Sunji opened the door and walked out, casually dressed in designer garments from head to toe, acting as if she hadn't spent the last 50 minutes in the bathroom. I glared at her before rushing inside to get myself ready. Fortunately, we reached the building a few minutes early.

"Why did we even have to rush? What's the worst that can happen? We're late. That's it." Sunji complained as she wiped the persperation forming on her forehead.

"Let's try to make a good first impression Sunji ah." I breathed out and we straightened ourselves up before entering the building. It seems like Sunji and I were the only two to show up that day which I found really strange. Why would someone forgo the chance to train at an internationally known company? Unless we were the only two that made the cut...?

We were given a quick tour around the building and we were introduced to a few directors and idols that we met along the way. I was literally fangirling inside and I swear I almost died when Eunhyuk smiled at me. Sunji knew about my fangirling issue and just stood at the side, trying to keep in her laughter.

"Just wear a T-shirt that says 'I've loved Eunhyuk ever since I've seen his abs in Suju's No Other MV and I want him to marry me and have my babies.' It'll make you seem less desperate." Sunji mocked me as we were told that we were free to leave the building. Our training didn't start until 2 days later which gave us just enough time to pack up and move to the trainee dorms as well as speak to the school admins about shifting us to the special idol courses they had. (Since my school was known and catered for idols and trainees, there were special arrangements made so that they wouldn't miss too much school whilst training.)

"Do you wanna die?" I asked brusquely.

"I used to but not anymore because I AM IN SM ENTERTAINMENT ES!" Sunji replied happily.

"Hold that thought, isn't this EXO?!" Sunji exclaimed as she peeked into the small opening of the door of a training room.

"Shh! Not so loud!" I whispered to her while pulling her away. At the moment, the door opened and we came face-to-face with someone's chest. With my 5'3 stature and Sunji's 5'5, we never felt short. We usually even towered over the average Korean woman. However this wall of a man standing in front of us was huge. We looked up and saw none other than Chanyeol, all sweaty and smiling like the angel he was and right behind him stood Kai. 

"Are you two lost or something?" Kai voiced out and Sunji nudged me to break the stare I had on them while answering that we were merely walking around.

"Walking around? I remember the times when we were actually free enough to walk aroun- Ah! I get it! You two must be the newest trainees of SM!" Chanyeol said a little too excitedly.

"Hyungs! Come here!" Kai called as he turned his head to shout into the training room before turning back to face us, "We have actually been wanting to meet you guys! We heard that there was a fantastic participant who literally left the judges speechless, but we didn't know who it was." He whispered to us and sent a wink my way.

"Well well. Look who we have here. May I ask who these two gorgeous ladies are?" Baekhyun asked while wiggling his eyebrows. "Did it hurt when you fell from heaven love?" He questioned Sunji and his lips. Despite the question not even being directed to me, I flushed and watched as Sunji rolled her eyes and replied, "Nope, but I did get a tiny scratch crawling up from the depths of hell." The loud booming laughter I heard shocked me and I looked up to see the EXO-K members.

"Baek, I think you've met your match!"

"How does the sass master feel getting sassed?" s joked as Baekhyun scoffed. We both laughed and introduced ourselves to all the members of EXO-K.

"Where is EXO-M? Aren't they supposed to be training with you guys?" I couldn't help but ask. I really missed seeing him after so long.

"They'll be coming around later. Why? You like them more than us?" Chanyeol ended with a pout, which totally contradicted his deep voice.

"N-no! I like both groups equally!" I stuttered like an idiot, my face flushing.

"Nope. You definitely don't. You like Kai the best." Sunji said with a knowing smirk and I only turned redder.

"What! Your bias is Kai? Why~?" Baekhyun latched onto my arm, surprising me at the sudden skinship. "Isn't it obvious hyung? I'm the most handsome and talented." Kai replied, making the other EXO-K members gag, while Sunji rolled her eyes once more. "You know if you keep rolling your eyes that they'll stay that way right?" Kai taunted. "Well looks like it's too late for you then." Sunji retorted without batting an eyelid. Kai's eyes widened in surprise and he smirked, clearly impressed.

"Do you wanna watch us train?" Kyungsoo suggested out of the blue.

"N-"

"Sure!" Sunji replied without hesitation and sent me a look that said 'don't-try-to-deny-it-I-know-you-want-it'.

Minutes later, we found ourselves bobbing our heads along to the song that EXO-K was freestyling to. As the music came to an end, my excited applause filled the room.

"That was fantastic!!" I complimented. 

"Yea I know." Sehun said complacently which earned him a smack on the head by D O.

"You brat. Don't talk like that." D.O chided.

"Why not? It's not like they're older than me," Sehun looked at both of us, "Are you?"

"Nope. We're not. We're 3 years younger actaully." Sunji sighed in defeat.

"Then you have to call us 'oppa'." Chanyeol interrupted with that ever-creepy grin on his face.

"What? No." Sunji scoffed and immediately rejected the request.

"Too bad. Both of you ARE younger than Sehun, which makes you guys younger than all of us. So I don't see a reason not too." Kai added with a smirk.

"Well I think it's the mental age that counts and the looks of it seems that we're much older than all of you." Sunji said as she gestured to Suho and Sehun playing a game of catching in the background. "Besides, I've barely met you guys and you're already my oppas? Well maybe Chanyeol, since he's so tall and actually looks like he could be my oppa. But you Kai-ssi?"

Immediately, I could sense that Kai and Chanyeol had taken an interest in Sunji with her straightforward personality. I mean, how often could someone say 'no' straight to their faces even after knowing that they were members of the world's hottest K-pop boy group?

Just as I was about to say something, the door opened and a deep husky voice was heard.

"MEI?!"

*Mei is what a older brother calls a younger sister in Chinese.

a/n: Who's that calling Hye Sun?! ;)