When Taeyeon entered her room later that day, her forehead wrinkled in bewilderment. The room was as spotless as it had never been. The desk was polished until it gleamed under the light without any sign of the speckle of water she had accidentally dropped there this morning. Her bed was made up, with new sheets and new plumper pillows. She stuck her head out when she heard somebody walked past her room and saw one of the upstairs maids. “Sorry, Lisa, but did you know if someone entered my room today?”

The maid nodded lightly. “Today is the clean up day, so I guess they must have entered it to scrub it down today. Why? Is there something wrong?”

“Clean up day?” Taeyeon asked casually.

Lisa nodded again and explained. “Every year the house was cleaned top to bottom by us maids. We’re divided into two teams of three maids for upper level and two teams for lower level. Madam Dara said that the three maids have to work together so they could supervise each other. Is there something amiss, Taehyung? You didn’t lose something, did you?” She started to get an alarmed look on her face as her thought traveled further.

Taeyeon shook her head and smiled to calm her down. “No, no, nothing’s wrong. I’m just asking because my room is cleaner than I’ve ever seen it. Thanks, Lisa. And give my thanks to whoever cleaning my room too.”

Trusting that the staff wouldn’t be so nosy as to go through her stuff, she went to take a bath. The matter was soon forgotten as she started to speculate what Jiyong was going to talk about shortly.

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A knock on his door almost made Jiyong yelped like a little girl. Heart still beating erratically from the jolt, he unearthed his head from the pile of discarded papers he buried himself in. From outside, he could hear the voice of a maid. “Master Jiyong , I’m sorry to disturb you. But you said I’m to told you when Taehyung has come home.”

He swallowed profusely and rapped his head once more on the desk. Four hours, and still nothing. For four hours he had tried to put in writing what he planned to say to her, but the results were there on his desk: countless crumpled papers where he had buried his head in frustration. In his desperation, he had even tried to lay unmoving under his bed, thinking that maybe staying in the dark and looking up at his mattress would help him finding inspiration. Weird idea, but God knew he had tried everything else that were considered normal. Banging his head on the desk had only given him a bump the size of quail egg on his forehead and circling stars around his head. Standing upside down hadn’t helped either. Instead of a light-bulb moment, he had almost had a light-out moment when the blood had rushed to and pooled in his head because he had refused to give up and stand upright again. He had tried to submerged himself in water, thinking the water would somehow seep into his head and refresh it, but it only managed to make him wet. No matter what he had tried, the idea of what and how to say it all was still as out of reach as before.

Sighing in defeat, he let out a loud grunt, signaling the maid outside that he had heard her. He shook his head, not unlike Satan shaking his body to get rid of unwanted things, and picked up his pen again. But a couple words later, he crumpled the paper he was writing and tossed it away, again. Shooting up from his chair, he started prowling around the room, tousling and yanking his hair in the process.

He glanced at the clock and squared his shoulder. Since he couldn’t prepare for it, then so be it. Maybe it’s better not to be rehearsed anyway. It would sound more sincere, wouldn’t it? He comforted himself with the thought as he ran downstairs.

In front of Taehyung’s door, he paused. From inside he could hear the blaring sound of rock and roll telling him to get down and dirty. A humorless smile curled his lips. Oh, he’s down all right. Way down to the bottommost of the pit if he couldn’t get her to hear him out. As for dirty, it would all depend on how Taehyung would react to his confession.

Taking a deep breath, he knocked on her door, although he doubted she could hear him. Heck, it was so loud that she probably wouldn’t hear cannons going off. Hearing no reply, he slowly turned the knob. It was unlocked. He pushed the door open and stuck his head inside. The engaging grin he had fixed on his face faltered when he saw nobody in there. He stormed into the room and stood in the middle of it with his hands on his hip and an annoyed scowl on his face. Now where would the girl be, he wondered. Without warning, he squatted low enough to peer under the bed. He wouldn’t put it past her to pull such a trick on him.

But nobody was hiding there.

He was ready to bellow the house down when he suddenly heard the sound of water running in the bathroom. Only then that he found he could breath easily again. Waiting for his heart rate to settle, he paced around the room, mentally ticking up the points he wanted to say to her.

He didn’t know how many lifetimes had passed when he finally heard a soft click and the sound of the bathroom door got opened. Smiling charmingly, he turned around to greet her. And felt as if the bottom dropped from his stomach. Instead of a warm and cheerful greeting he planned, only a small choked sound escaped his lips. He stood rooted to the floor just as Taehyung stood there astounded, clad only in h