"Breath in, breath out."

"Breath in, breath out."

"Breath in, breath —"

"Jia Li, stop. You're making me nervous." Ke Xin checked her reflection in the small St. Yves compact mirror. Her inner eye corner's shimmery white eye shadow had smeared just a bit. Taking a small blending brush, she packed some more of the hue onto her brush from the pale base eye shadow palette and dabbed at her tear ducts.

"Funny. You're never nervous. All the years we've had recitals, you've never been nervous." Jia Yi snickered as she swept a big fluff brush with translucent powder over her face.

In the dressing rooms, the girls were getting their last minute adjustments done. Fixing some hair flyways. Perking up loose false eyelashes. Touching on makeup. Once they were on stage, there was no more touching anything. It was all dance.

"Yeah," Jia Li pouted, crossing her arms, "You never get nervous. I do, even after all these years of ballet."

The twins were wrong. Everyone was. Ke Xin didn't look like a nervous mess. But inside she was. Most times, she would have a somewhat shallow pit in her stomach when it was time to perform but today, today was different. Father would actually be coming, though not for very long. He could only watch the first half since he had his monthly stockholders meeting to attend to. Still, she wanted to make him proud.

"Is Yi Xing coming too?" Jia Li tried to ask nonchalantly but the spark in her eye couldn't hide from Ke Xin's keen eyes.

Over the course of about a month, Ke Xin, Lu Han, Yi Xing, and the twins have been getting closer. When they first met (well, second time technically), Ke Xin found Yi Xing fun to be around. He's was curt as she was and the way he got his points across were comical. Jia Li though, laughed extra loud at his jokes and smiled a little too wide in his presence. Ke Xin couldn't really tell if Yi Xing knew Jia Li was like every time he was near. He was either ignoring it or was just really oblivious.

If it hadn't been obvious already, Ke Xin didn't have much of a family. Her circle of friends weren't any higher in numbers either. So she ended up inviting both Lu Han and Yi Xing, who were dancers too. All the more reason why she was nervous to make a mistake on stage.

"Yeah, he is." Ke Xin didn't look up at Jia Li. But glancing in the mirror, she saw Jia Li break out into a big, anxious smile. Jia Yi and Ke Xin exchanged a look of pity and awkwardly pretended that they hadn’t seen anything. Even now Jia Li didn’t get it. Yi Xing didn’t really look like he shared mutual feelings. As frank as Ke Xin was, a girl’s heart was not something you would want to break. Jia Yi didn’t want to be the one to tell her either.

“Now I’m even more nervous!” Jia Li declaimed as she smacked her hands to her flushing cheeks. Her stomach must have been fluttering with butterflies, her enormous smile and hyper movements were pure evidence.

“I think it’s about time we head to the stage.” Ke Xin interrupted. She needed to change the subject quick or one of them will tell Jia Li the hard truth. It was either that or risk going crazy by keeping silent. But anything was better than Jia Li being depressed minutes away from their big performance.

***

Mr. Cai glanced at his watch. According to the two hands, there was still five minutes until the recital officially began. He would have gotten into the auditorium sooner if it hadn’t been for the other business owning parents pretending like they really cared about how he was doing and not about striking a partnership deal with their family corporation.

His own personal guards, along with Justin, were stationed outside of the auditorium so Austin followed closely behind as Mr. Cai made his way to the seat that was listed on his ticket. He had expected to be sitting alone, which he had done for all the piano and ballet recitals years before.  When he saw that two boys around Ke Xin’s age were seated in the plush chairs next to his seat, his brows shot up in surprise.The purplish hue of the lilacs that one of them was holding popped out at him.

And just like how an old song brought back reminiscences of forgotten flames, the glow of the lilacs brought back the vivid memory of the one flame that never died in his heart, the mother of his child.

“My favorite flowers are purple lilacs.” Xue declared to no one in particular. She swung her feet mindlessly in the water, causing the ripples around the single boardwalk that stuck out into the lake.

A younger Yi Lin scrunched his nose up, bewildered. Purple lilacs? They were not as expensive or elegant as roses. Surely every girl would want roses. When he voiced this to Xue, she rolled her eyes.

“Aren’t you supposed to be educated, city boy?” Xue snickered as her high ponytail stirred in the summer breeze.

“In flowers?!” Yi Lin asked as if she was out of her mind.

“Purple lilacs tell the feelings in my heart right now.” Xue smiled then looked away mysteriously “Hopefully you’ll figure it out.”

“Yi Xing!” The one holding the lilacs scolded, snapping Mr. Cai out of his flashback, “You’re going to bruise the flowers!”

“You have such little faith in me, Lu Han.” The one named Yi Xing rolled his eyes as his hands made their way back to his sides.

 Austin coughed behind Ke Xin’s father to get the boys’ attention. Mr. Cai tried not to laugh when the blood drained out of their faces as they got up to bow and introduce themselves. He wondered why everyone always seemed so fearful of him.

“You two must be Ke Xin’s friends.” He smiled to trying to ease them. If Ke Xin was actually making friends, he didn’t want to scare them off.

“Yes, she invited us to come.” Lu Han fidgeted with the bouquet of lilacs. Mr. Cai thought Lu Han looked a bit feminine. His features were quite girly and his voice was soft. Still, he admired how Lu Han seem to give off a confident aura despite it all.

“Thank the heavens, I was beginning to think that my daughter didn’t have friends at all.”

Yi Xing and Lu Han let out small, uneasy laughs. Their faces had loosened up a little, becoming less nervous.

“Your daughter is just a bit extraordinary. You shouldn’t worry.” Lu Han smiled. As he said his daughter’s name, Lu Han’s eyes seemed to dreamily daze off. Ke Xin’s father smiled. He didn’t think Ke Xin was just “friend” to this one.

Just as he was about to sit down and continue conversing with the boys, Austin coughed again. This time, not for attention.

“Sir,’ Austin interrupted from behind him, “The secretary called, it seems that something came up so the stockholders’ meeting has been moved up earlier.”

Sighing, Mr. Cai pinched the space between his brows with his index finger and thumb. “How much earlier?”

“Ten minutes from now earlier.” Austin grimaced.

Great. He couldn’t even attend his only daughter’s ballet recital because of work. Had it been something besides a stockholder’s meeting, he would have cancelled it.  But Ke Xin was understanding. She had always been.

With a tired sigh, he turned back to Yi Xing and Lu Han. The two wore confused expressions.

“Enjoy the performance, boys. Unfortunately, I have something to attend to so I must go.”

The two bowed, this time less shaky than they were the first time. “It was nice meeting you, sir.”

“You two should come over for dinner sometime.” Mr. Cai suggested while the two vigorously nodding their heads as he was turning to leave.

“Sir,” Austin began to ask, “Am I to bring Ke Xin home right after the performance is over?”

“No,” Mr. Cai shook his finger as they walked up the aisle, “If the kids want to have some sort of celebration afterwards, do not stop her. Nothing happened to Ke Xin the other time right?”

“No sir, Justin and I will just trail behind like before.”

“Good, good. Do not keep her out too late.”

Austin nodded obediently. 

Though they were almost out of the auditorium door, Mr. Cai could still see the soft, bright purple of the lilacs Lu Han were holding. He smiled.

“Oh, and Austin?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I want a whole background check on Lu Han on my desk as soon as possible.”

***

“You guys need help with that?”

Three pretty heads that struggled to carry several bags and bouquets at the same time, turned in sync towards Yi Xing’s voice. While his best friend was leaning against the door frame, Lu Han was to his right, waving awkwardly with one hand, hiding the purple lilacs with another behind his back.

Their changing room was a bit untidy, with some coats and other girl stuff lying around. Ke Xin smiled when she saw her two (and only) guys friends but seemed curious to find out what Lu Han was trying to hide. Jia Li didn’t even seem to see Lu Han, not in the rude way that she was ignoring him. She was just all eyes for Yi Xing at the moment. Jia Yi just rolled her eyes at her sister. 

“Yi Xing!” Jia Li ran over excitedly then jokingly huffed, “You didn’t bring me a present?”

Lu Han’s best friend smiled, then ruffled her hair playfully, “Don’t worry about it, kiddo. I’d rather be a gentlemen.” He then took the heavy looking gym bag from her shoulder and tossed it on his own. At first her smile faltered at being called ‘kiddo’, but the hair ruffling and the bag thing only made her smile grew wider and wider. Lu Han, along with Ke Xin and Jia Yi sighed. Yi Xing really didn’t know that he was leading her on.

“Well? What are you guys just standing there for?” Jia Yi’s voice filled with mock annoyance, “Help us, will you?”

Just as Yi Xing and Lu Han were going to make a move in helping, Austin and Justin came barging in, saying that they could handle this. Yi Xing jokingly bared his teeth at them, something that he did with the twins as a joke.

“You guys want to go eat? You know as a congratulations thing?” Yi Xing suggested. “My treat.”

“Hm, we can go,” Jia Yi shrugged, “Our parents are out of the country anyways so they couldn’t come today.”

“What about you, Ke Xin?” Jia Li asked.

Ke Xin glanced over hopefully to Austin. He shrugged and nodded with a smile as he and Justin began picking up the remaining belongings in the room.   

“Sure thing. But I still have to organize all this” Ke Xin motioned to the makeup products that sat on the table that she was beginning to put back into a three tiered box. “You guys can go on and wait for me outside.”

“Good idea!” Jia Yi exclaimed. Why did Lu Han not like the way she glanced at Yi Xing? It was almost like her eyes were trying to signal something. Yi Xing and Jia Li seemed to get it and began smiling evilly as well.

“The three of us will be outside in the parking lot if you need us! No, Lu Han, you stay!” Jia Yi dragged away the other two after rebuking Lu Han from leaving with them. Austin and Justin seemed to get the drift, following after the three with similar smiles on their faces.

For a while there was a silence. Well, it would have been a silence if you didn’t count the clicks and clacks of Ke Xin’s makeup products returning into the box and the ruffling of the flower paper.

“You got me something, didn’t you?” Ke Xin laughed, her back to Lu Han.

“Now who’s the fun killer?” Lu Han huffed as he took the lilacs out of their hiding places. 

Lu Han grinned widely as he could see Ke Xin’s smile stretch from ear to ear. She looked over the lilacs affectionately until Lu Han noticed her smile quiver.

“Lu Han, you didn’t have to . . .” Ke Xin slowly began, her pretty features contorting with guilt.

Lu Han his teeth with disbelief. “Ke Xin, I know you’re not a materialist. Now stop making that I-just-stepped-on-a-puppy face.”  He used his thumbs to smooth out the worry line on her forehead, right before she burst out laughing.

“What?!” Ke Xin stopped as she began gasping from her fit of laughter, “You couldn’t come up with a better name for this guilty expression?” After she set the flowers on the table, she pointed to her face, while using her other arm to hold her stomach, shaking with laughter. Well, her guilty expression was gone like Lu Han wished and now she was laughing. At him.

“Oh shush.” Lu Han flushed with embarrassment. He gave Ke Xin’s head a little flick. But she was unaffected, seeing that she was still clutching her sides and silently laughing to herself.

“It wasn’t that funny. Geez.” He blew up at his bangs but still smiled because of the fact that she was laughing. Lu Han picked up the last makeup product, a small eye shadow palette, and dropping it into the last tier of the box.

Even as they were leaving the building, Ke Xin continued to laugh, her hands shaky as they held the lilacs. Lu Han rolled his eyes and chuckled, carrying the large makeup box.

He couldn’t quite describe it, this feeling. It was warm and fuzzy, like the first sip of hot chocolate. It was the very thing keeping him awake, tossing and turning. It was the very thing that caused him to smile uncontrollably around Ke Xin. The very thing that made him wonder if he was right in the head. He was totally crazy. But the secret was that all the happiest people were.

(A|N)

I know, this chapter long overdue. I'm so sorry >.< But I promise some action and heartbreak soon!  Yes, I'm hinting at a possible side couple. Lol, not really.  .

(Other:)

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