Chapter Three

    The next morning, everyone was dragging. They had stayed up late editing the footage from the day before and everyone was sore from the rehearsal. By the last run through, everything had gone smoothly and looked almost effortless. However, the way the girls were walking looked anything but. 

    Briley was complaining, but it was nearly incomprehensible with how thick her accent had become in her pain.

    Nik sighed out loud as she sat down. “I haven’t felt this sore in ages. It feels good, like we had a real workout.”

    “You’re psychotic,” Briley groaned.

    “Took you this long to figure that one out?” Lily asked. “She’s a taekwondo instructor and works out for fun. She would have to be a bit psychotic.”

    “You say psychotic like it’s a bad thing.” Nik yawned. “We should go down and rehearse before the show tonight. Once we warm up and stretch, I’m sure the soreness will ease up.” She got up and walked around the room, doing a few squats and jumping in the air, then lifting her legs and making a pleased sound. “Oh, it burns.”

    “You make me sick. This does not feel good,” Briley complained more. Nik rolled her eyes and went back into her room. She returned a minute later with some pills and a water bottle. Briley took them happily as Nik turned and gave some to Lily as well.

    “What is it?” Lily questioned.

    “Ibuprofen. I brought it just in case my back decided to try and go out while we were here.”

    Lily gave Nik a knowing nod. “How’s your back doing, anyways? You haven’t mentioned it since you arrived.”

    Nik shrugged. “Tolerable. Oh, what are your plans for next weekend?” The other two just shrugged. Briley’s flight was scheduled for Monday, but Nik had a thought. “Would y’all want to go down to Little Rock with me for Worlds? I already have the room booked for Aaron and me, and while I’m training, y’all could explore there and possibly spend some time in Hot Springs. I’m competing for the Worlds title, it would be cool if y’all came with me.”

    “My flight?”

    “Can be rescheduled. You don’t work next week. I’m sure we could find you a flight for the next Monday.” Briley made a face as she thought about it.

    “Well, I can technically just bring my laptop to work. I don’t have to be in the office.” Lily sat and thought. 

    Nik got up to grab everyone some more water as she let everyone consider her proposition. When she sat down on the floor to stretch, she was expecting to have to wait a while longer. “Yeah, I’m in.” Nik gave a little cheer and then turned to look at Briley who was scrolling through her phone.

    “Looks like there is actually a cheaper flight that Tuesday,” she said, grinning as her two friends whooped loudly.

    “AAAARROONN!” Nik yelled from the floor. “We’re about to head down to practice, turn off your game!” 

    “Seriously? I still can barely move my legs!” Briley whined.

    “You’re the youngest of the three of us, buck up!” Nik laughed when she heard her friend mumbled ‘psychotic’ under her breath. Nik stood up and helped her friends to their feet and grabbed the speaker. “We don’t need the rest of the equipment. We took care of placement last night. We just need to run through the dances a few times.” Aaron came out of the room a minute later dressed and offered to carry the camera and speaker. They had larger ones for performance, but this small one would suffice for their practice. Nik thought to throw a few extra water bottles into her panda bag as they walked out the door.

    When they got downstairs, Nik shot a glare to the blanket that was still covering something that was ‘a surprise’ before climbing up on stage. “Could you imagine what it would be like if every seat was full? There’s no way...but man. I think my heart would stop.” She sat down on the stage to stretch a bit more while her friends did the same.

    Aaron cued the music when the girls signaled and they started working through their dances, singing out during their parts. Briley and Lily took all of the singing parts, and Nik took the rap lines. The girls always laughed that they were attracted to the opposite of what they did. Most of Briley and Lily’s biases were rappers, and Nik was drawn to the singers and balladeers. They could all dance, though. Lily was very fluent in her dancing and Briley picked everything up quickly, making it look effortless. Nik sometimes had to fix things, being trained in taekwondo had its advantages, but sometimes she struggled with not turning every dance into a fight. 

    Two hours passed and they had run through each song three times. They were all drenched in sweat and chugging water. Lily splayed out on the floor beside Nik, attempting to soak up the coolness from the tile. “I think we have gone over everything.” She was still breathing heavily.

    “I agree. Can someone carry me upstairs?” Briley asked. “I don’t think I can make it to the elevator.”

    “I can help you off the floor, but there is no way I’m carrying you.” Nik looked at her phone. She quickly sat up and let out a loud squeak. “OHMYGOSHY’ALLWILLNEVERBELIEVEWHATOURFANSAREDOING!!!”

    Lily rolled over and sat up quickly, worried by her friend’s exclamation. Her and Briley limped their way over to where Nik was just staring at her phone. Lily and Briley leaned in gaping. Their viewers had started posting all over Twitter and Instagram, tagging Shinhwa, VIXX, and F.T.Island in posts with where the girls had reacted to their music videos and lives as well as spamming everyone about their upcoming fan meet in a few days. “What are they doing?” Lily couldn’t believe her eyes.

    “It’s like every single person that follows our channel got online to post at the same time,” Briley said in awe.

    “Should we go on and post asking them to stop? I mean, it’s very sweet that they want the groups to see us, and it would have been fine with one or two people. But this is a lot…” Nik trailed off.

    “Maybe we could thank them for supporting us but not to bother the artists as they are getting ready for K-Con just like we are?” Lily asked. The trio took to their SNS accounts asking everyone to calm down. There were hundreds of posts tagging K-Con and especially Shinhwa, telling them about the Fangirl Friday girls. After five minutes, the posts slowed down. Everyone was now apologizing and then talking about how excited they were to come by and see them or how sad they were that they couldn’t make it to New York. “That’s better,” Lily said after everyone had calmed down.

    “That was insane,” Aaron said, scrolling through his mom’s phone. Everyone agreed. “Well, who knows. I may have a new dad after this.” Aaron ran quickly as his mom lunged at him, eventually being tackled was being held in a rear choke. Lily and Briley were laughing loudly as Aaron tapped. 

    Nik swung her arm around her son’s neck as they walked back over to the other girls. “Ugh, why do I even keep you around?” she asked, even leaning over to kiss him on the top of his head. “So, who’s up for a shower and some lunch?” Everyone raised their hands. Nik reached out to pull Briley up as Aaron did the same for Lily.

    When they reached the room, Briley and Lily headed into the showers first while Nik started chopping vegetables. They were going to have supper out after Beetlejuice, so lunch was better to do at home. When the two got out of the shower, everyone ate and then Nik hopped in the shower.

    “We should dress up for the play!” Briley said excitedly. “Then we could go somewhere nice for supper.” Nik groaned. That was not her style at all. “Oh, come on. It will be fun!”

    “Are you in on this?” Nik looked at her other friend.

    “Of course. I wanted to take you to this upscale Korean barbeque restaurant and we should totally dress up.” Lily and Briley were grinning ear to ear. Aaron seemed pleased as well. Probably just because his mother was suffering.

    “I didn’t bring anything ‘nice’ to wear.”

    “SHOPPING!!!” Lily and Briley yelled together. It took another twenty minutes, but they were finally able to persuade Nik to go shopping.

    Aaron and the girls headed out of the hotel and took the train into New York to go shopping at this beautiful shop Lily liked going to. They all tried on lots of clothes, much to Nik’s dismay, but after only a couple of hours they had found what everyone was going to wear. Aaron had a nice black and red button up with black slacks. Lily found a gorgeous white dress with a pink and black splatter pattern. Briley had a black and blue wrap dress. Nik, much to everyone’s joy, found a black dress with green and white lilies embroidered into the skirt.

    After changing back into their regular clothes and paying for their fancy clothes and shoes for the night, Lily dragged them over to a cosmetology place that does make-up for cheap. Aaron sat playing on Nik’s phone while the girls got facials their makeup and nails done; pink for Lily, blue for Briley, and Black for Nik. The store allowed them to change into their dress for the night and then they made their way to the play.

    A few hours later, everyone was seated at the table waiting on the meat to be brought out so that they could start grilling. “It was so cool!” Aaron was still on a high after the show and hadn’t stopped talking about it since they left. The only plays they had been able to go see were put on by the colleges and high schools in their town in Texas. He loved music and acting.

    “I’m glad you enjoyed it, baby. It was really good.”

    Lily nodded. The meat arrived and Nik started grilling for everyone. “You are such a mother,” Lily giggled.

    “I’m the oldest and I actually have a kid. Do you expect anything less?”

    “Don’t lie. Kari and Kashi say that you’ve always been an overbearing mother to everyone you adopt. And you adopt everyone.” Aaron smirked.

    “My own son, the traitor. Such a pity, I was considering getting a dessert from the bakery down the street. I guess I don’t really need anything, though,” Nik bit her lip trying not to laugh as she started passing out the cooked meat.

    “Mommy, I love you. I promise I will be good. We should get chocolate cake. It’s your favorite. Please?” Aaron began to beg. Everyone else laughed as Aaron pleaded with Nik until she finally agreed.

    As they walked out of the bakery, a chocolate cake in tow, Briley asked, “Should we skip posting tonight? We really didn’t get much footage today.” Everyone else agreed. They had posted the past two consecutive nights and would post another video Thursday and Friday night. So, they took the train back to Newark, had their fill of cake, and passed out.