Chapter Two

    Morning came early with Aaron having ordered breakfast while his mom and ‘aunts’ slept in some. When breakfast arrived, he went to wake Nik up. “Mom, food’s here,” he said loudly as he opened the curtains wide, much like she had done to him several mornings when he had stayed up too late.

    “You’re a brat,” Nik moaned out as she covered her head back up with her pillow.

    “You love me. And you’re going to be mad at yourself if you don’t get your workout in.” Aaron was loving waking up before her for the first time in over a year.

    “Yeah yeah, you didn’t wake the others up, did you?” Nik asked, rolling out of bed to see what her son had ordered for breakfast. He shook his head and they sat down for a peaceful meal. They spoke only occasionally, mostly about what all they had done the day before and what the plans were for the rest of the week.

    After breakfast, Nik and Aaron changed and went down to the hotel gym after leaving a not just in case her friends woke up before they returned. Nik started up the treadmill for her son and then hopped on another machine. Since they had already eaten breakfast, she told her son to take it easy so that he wouldn’t get sick. An hour and a half later, they returned to their room with the girls still asleep. Aaron and Nik took turns turns showering and getting ready for the day.

    Nik was on the floor working on the girls’ dresses, towel wrapped around her hair, when Lily stumbled into the living room of their suite. “Coffee is made, kettle is hot if you would rather have tea,” she said, not looking up at her friend.

    “How long have you been awake?” Lily asked through a yawn as she poured herself a cup of coffee.

    Nik looked up at the clock, “Nearly three hours I think. Aaron woke me up because he had ordered us breakfast.”

    Lily looked around the room, not seeing the child in the room. “Did he go back to bed?” she laughed when she didn’t see him.

    “Nah, he’s set up his games so that he can play while we work.”

    Lily chuckled to herself as she lowered herself to the floor next to Nik. Nik handed her a plate with eggs and rice on it. Lily ate as her friend continued working. After she was done eating, Nik made her go try on her dress. When she came out, Nik led her to a stool so that she could look at it and make any alterations. Lily spun around, letting her friend put pins in. “It doesn’t have to be perfect, you know,” she laughed at the perfectionist mentality.

    As Nik was finishing up on Lily’s dress, Briley walked into the living room area looking just as tired as Lily had. “Coffee’s made,” Nik said as she took the dress back from her friend and sat back down to finish hemming. Briley grumbled about morning people ate the plate that was passed to her.

    When Briley had finally finished waking up, they discussed what needed to be done first and the plans for the rest of the day. “Did you film while you worked out this morning?” Briley asked. Nik nodded. “Figures, workaholic like you couldn’t take a morning off,” Briley grinned as she was playfully shoved.

    “Oh, speaking of our workaholic big sister, we have to go back to that bakery from yesterday. Nik asked the owner if we could come in and film,” Lily reminded them. They finished their plans and Nik made Briley try on her dress while Lily went to shower, and then released her to go get ready for the day as well.

    After everyone was dressed, the four headed out buy more supplies for their fanmeet and then groceries so that they did not have to eat out every meal. Once everything was dropped off at their temporary home, they headed back to the Chinese bakery to film. They ate with the owner, trying several buns and pastries, and then getting to go into the kitchen for Nik to try making one with the owner watching over her. The owner asked why they were there and they talked about KCon and their YouTube channel.

    “I’m stuffed,” Briley moaned out as they slowly walked back to the hotel. The other three groaned out an agreement.

    “Fine, you were right. I would have been ticked if I hadn’t worked out this morning with how much we just ate,” Nik wrapped her arm around her son as they continued walking. Aaron laughed out a ‘toldja so’, earning him a kick to the .

    They arrived back at the hotel exhausted, but went to working on editing what they had filmed from shopping and the bakery. As they worked, they talked about different places they could visit the next couple of days. It was only Tuesday and KCon didn’t start until Friday.

    “We definitely need to go see at least one show while you are here,” Lily said, and Aaron clapped and agreed. Everyone laughed and she continued, “I can get us good seats for Beetlejuice or Rocktopia for tomorrow night.” They discussed for a bit before deciding on Beetlejuice Wednesday night and they could try for Rocktopia Thursday night.

    Nik got up to start fixing supper while Aaron went back to video games. “After supper settles, we need to go down and figure out spacing. We need to run through as much as we can get rehearsed at least 15 or 20 times before the actual day. And y’all know we will be too busy Friday at KCon’s opening events to want to rehearse at all.” They all agreed as Nik plated up the food she had been cooking.

    “So are we going to treat our dance line up like a concert, start with the youngest and end with the oldest?” Briley asked after swallowing a bite.

    “OF COURSE!” Lily and Nik said in unison. “We have to end with Shinhwa! It’s the only way to close out the event,” Lily finished. Nik agreed as she reached over for their list of ‘Oh My Gosh We Are Singing And Dancing In Front Of People’.

    “I can’t believe Shinhwa are already here,” Briley said. “I wonder where they are staying. It would be hilarious if we ran into them while we were out. Nik would probably faint!”

    “I would do no such thing! I am not you, I do not cry or freak out when I see my biases,” Nik laughed out her defense. She reached over poking her friend in the hip and side tickling her.

    Briley squeaked from the attack, making Lily and Aaron laugh at her misery. “I don’t know. You barely talk about any other group lately. I think you would at least stutter if we ran into them,” Lily added.

    “Just because I love our legends does NOT mean that I would lose my composure.” Nik was now pouting like a child. Lily reached over to pet her friend’s head when she was suddenly attacked in the side the way Briley had. “Y’all are evil. Just wait, if by some miracle we run into anyone, I will be the most composed!” They continued their teasing, reminding each other of different times they had reacted ‘completely uncomposed’ to random artists music videos and lives.

    After supper was cleaned up, they sat and relaxed, talking mindlessly about different events that were scheduled for the convention and deciding which panels they would have time for and what they were going to have to miss. JRE was going to be there and they all agreed his panel was a must. They had all been fans of him for a while, but none more than Lily who had a small (read HUGE) crush on him. There were a few people none of them cared about, though, too. Sunday morning there was a KPOP dance class that sounded like fun, as well as a KTigers demo Sunday afternoon before the concerts started.

    They finally decided to pack up what was needed for rehearsal and headed back down towards the room that had been given to them to use by the hotel with Briley recording with one of their cameras. As soon as they walked in, she ran the screen across the entire room slowly then set it up on a stand Aaron had handed her. The space was much larger than they had imagined. It was sort of like a banquet room plus a stage. The entry doors were in the back with the stage on the opposite side. There were chairs lined up in 20 rows of 20 separated into 10 and 10 with a split down the middle about 10 feet wide. That would be great for during the question and answer part came up. The weird part about the room was that in the back there was a set of stairs that led up to dark glass doors.

    “I wonder what those are foor,” Briley pondered.

    “Maybe it’s for when they hold weddings here? You know, for the bride to come out instead of standing out in the hallway?” Lily speculated.

    “I think there are too many chairs. I don’t see us filling up half of these seats,” Nik said distractedly. She looked around the room again and noticed something up on the stage in the back. “What is under the blanket? It was here before we came in, but it has our name on it.”

    Lily grinned mischievously. “Ignore it. It’s a surprise for the show.”

    “Why does this feel like a trap suddenly?”

    “Because it is,” Briley’s grin matched Lily’s.

    “Oh great, so it’s just a surprise for me? I swear, I will get y’all back for whatever y’all do to me.”

    “We’d expect nothing less,” Lily called from their cart of supplies. “Do you really think we need all 10 clip mics?”

    Nik grumbled in frustration about not being allowed to check under the blanket then sighed. “You never know when something could stop working. Better to have too much than not enough. She pulled out the camera stands. “Aaron, you are in charge of supplies and all of the tech when the show starts, as well as making sure the songs play at the correct time.” He nodded as his mother went over how everything worked for the hundredth time. They walked around, turning on cameras after setting up the stands and figuring out the best angles for all 7 of the cameras that they were planning on using.

    After marking the floor with tape, they took their equipment down except the camera that was currently recording. They fit their mics and battery packs then started rehearsal. Three hours later, their cameras, mics, voices, and bodies were half dead and need of recharging.

    “Is it bedtime yet?” Briley yawned and the others groaned an agreement as they dragged their equipment up to their room. She leaned against the wall as Lily swiped her key over the lock to let them in.

    “Almost,” Nik said.

“We have a lot that filmed. Between the four of us it shouldn’t take too long to edit, though.” Lily agreed. Briley whined but plopped herself ever so gracefully onto the couch. Together, they worked diligently to finish everything and get it posted.