When I walk into the kitchen again, the boys are mostly done eating. Remember Choi, ‘strong and confident’ I repeat like a mantra  and waltz into the pantry to pull out some cereal. The owl eyed boy is loading some of the dishes and tenses up as I approach the fridge. He guards the stove top area and peers in to see what I’m taking out, monitoring my every move. I kind of feel like I’m in his territory, not a communal area. ‘Good morning, I’m Ahri,’ I say as I pour milk out into a cereal bowl. He looks at me briefly, and goes back to stacking the dishes. ‘I’m Kyungsoo. Nice to meet you,’ he says in English. He must have realised my Korean is really weak. The other boys don’t acknowledge my presence and I don’t want to sit down at the dining table and interrupt their chatter so I eat my cereal next to Kyungsoo. He’s a quiet guy from what I can gather, not indulging in small talk. He silently dries his hands with a towel and begins bringing out some flour and chocolate chips. ‘What are you making?’ I enquire. He looks at me up and down again, hesitant to answer. ‘Muffins.’

‘Oooh great, I love muffins!’ I put my cereal down and bring out some eggs and the milk I had just put back in the fridge. A bit surprised, he nods appreciatively and begins to make the batter. ‘Let me help.’

‘No.’ One word to reject me. No excuse as to why. But two things were clear. The kitchen was his domain and the boy didn’t trust me. Yet.

‘I promise you, if there’s one area in cooking I’m confident in, it’s baking. Please, let me help.’ Kyungsoo stares at me for a couple of seconds. ‘Here, let me prove it to you.’ I say as I start cracking open my eggs and begin to make a separate batter. ‘If it’s then I promise I won’t bother you again.’

‘And if it’s good?’ he crosses his arms over each other.

‘Then you become my friend.’

‘Blackmail by baking huh?’

‘Please, just give me a chance,’ I plead. He finally eases up and moves his mixing bowl to the side so there’s more space for me on the kitchen bench. I grin as I start collecting some cinnamon powder from the pantry and pick up some bananas. Time to work some magic.

‘The muffins are done people, get ‘em while it’s hot.’ Kyungsoo announces. I go back to my cereal (now soggy but still good) as all of the boys jump up all excited and pick a muffin from the two trays in front of them. We don’t tell them that I’ve made the one on the right and Kyungsoo just watches their reaction. Rainbow haired boy took one from my tray and bites in, both Kyungsoo and I on the tips of our toes to see his reaction. ‘Omg hyung, did you try something different today?’ Kyungsoo glances towards me and asks him, ‘Why, is it bad?’ We both hold our breath as we await his response. ‘No, it’s so good!! I didn’t know you had this killer combination up your sleeve hyung, make it more often.’ The other guys also follow suit and leave the muffins they picked from Kyungsoo’s tray and opt for my ones instead. ‘Omg, Sehun’s right. These are bomb.com.’ Inner me implodes with victory as Kyungsoo sighs and starts unpacking his muffins from the tray to a container. I go up to assist and finish cleaning up the baking area. ‘So I guess we’re friends now,’ he says with a smile. ‘You don’t look disappointed about that.’ I tease.

‘Maybe I’m not.’ He says with another smile. ‘I was planning on being friends the minute you expertly took the ingredients out.’ I beam at him. Yes, yes, yes. Choi makes her first friend. First friend in Korea. Checked off the list and popped the friend-making cherry weheeeee. ‘Thanks Kyungsoo, I’m honored. You’re my first friend here.’

‘Really??’ He actually looks surprised. I nod enthusiastically. ‘Maybe you can help me make more? Can you tell me who everyone is?’ I wave in front of me to the strangers munching on my muffins. I brace myself for a ‘As if you don’t know who we are?’ ‘Are you kidding, you don’t even know our names and you think you can manage us?’ but he says nothing of the sort.  ‘Sure.’ He points to the left of the table, and looks at me. ‘Okay, so from starting from the left of the table. This person is Jongin, he is my roommate and is one of our best dancers.’ I nod as I see a tall, lean boy who is way too good looking for someone who woke up at 6 am. ‘The person next to him is Sehun, he’s the youngest in Exo-K, so sorry if he hurt your feelings earlier.’ Ah, the rainbow haired boy. I nod no and laugh it off as he continues. ‘Luhan is the one next to Sehun,’ he points to the deer looking boy. ‘He’s from China and is one of the older ones here. He’s in Exo-M.’ I try to follow on, but I don’t know why there are letters attached on the end of Exo. I thought they were just called Exo?? Kyungsoo catches my confused expression. ‘Exo has sub units. Exo-K releases songs in Korean and Exo-M is based in China, releasing songs in Mandarin. Before we used to be be more divided but in our new debut we’re releasing songs together so that’s why everyone is here.’ I nod in understanding as I mentally take all these notes down. ‘Now next to Luhan is Xiumin, he’s in Exo-M but he’s Korean.’ ‘Woah, so does he sing in Mandarin?’

‘Yeah.’ One word replies as always. Get’s the point across.

‘Omg, that’s so cool,’ I say in awe. He smirks and nods, ‘Yeah, Xiumin’s really cool. Beside him is Jongdae, same story. Born in Korea, based in China.’ ‘Holyyy.’  He now points toward the middle of the table to a guy sitting with a guitar. ‘Lay is sitting next to Jongdae. He’s like Luhan, from China and as you can see, trying to learn the guitar.’  Lay strums the strings a few times as we move on to a tall boy with a mop of hair, currently poking the cheeks of the person next to him. ‘That’s Chanyeol and the shorter one is Baekhyun. Watch out, they’re the jokesters  in here. Sometimes I feel like their sole purpose is to troll everybody.’ I smile nervously, hopefully I won’t be a victim of their pranks.  ‘‘Thanks for the heads up. I’ll keep it in mind.’ We’re now at the end of the table, and up to the strong jawline guy, currently dressed head to toe in black. ‘That’s Tao. He’s also from China, is the youngest here and is a martial arts master. Also huge Gucci enthusiast.’ I’m not surprise, those cheekbones are so sharp they could cut a bish. ‘You already know Suho I guess, so that leaves the last person. Kris.’ I’m about to say I don’t need an introduction but I decide against it. Kyungsoo is delivering the goods, telling me key facts about everybody and I’m hungry for all the deets. ‘Kris is the leader of Exo-M. He’s from China but he grew up in Canada. His whole family is still back there. You probably won’t see him much, he’s always travelling to either China or other countries on behalf of Exo because he’s fluent in English and Mandarin.’ So that explains why he was coming from Canada, and why he was so prepared during the flight with his stupid ‘noise cancelling’ headphones and galaxy patterned neck pillow. ‘Woah, that must get tiring. He must be very busy.’ Kyungsoo laughs a little and finishes wiping the bench.

‘Welcome to Exo Ahri.’