Everyone is familiar with stress. Whether it came from work, school or personal lives, it is something everyone must deal with from time to time.

     Some people choose to deal with it in the healthy way - taking breaks whenever they felt too stressed out, doing things they enjoyed in between the stressing chore or even taking naps.

     However, there were people who thought they could handle the stress, choosing to ignore it and push through, but it was inevitable that those people would end up breaking - and hurting themselves or others in the process.

     Park Chanyeon related to the second description much more.

     She was part of the beagle line, supposed to be happy and excited and bubbly all the time - even if she was probably the most sensitive out of the three of them.

     The burden of carrying that label sometimes got to her, adding to her stress even more. But she pushed through, putting a big smile on her face and being her loud and silly self even if inside she was struggling to keep it together.

     And it was when she was drowning under deadlines, practice, songwriting and protecting her image, that Chanyeon did something she would regret forever.

     They were all stressed, it was clear by the frown on Lijing’s face, or the far away look on Kyungsoon’s eyes. They had been through so much without food or rest in order to perfect their comeback stage, and all they wanted now was to rest.

     And yet, Chanyeon found herself at her studio, trying to flush out more and more songs but getting no farther than a few notes. She was tired - exhausted beyond measure and even then, all she could think about was work.

     The tall girl could hear the faint sounds of Junyeon sending the rest of the members to bed. It was not late yet, but they had a schedule very early in the morning.

     Chanyeon knew that soon the older woman would ask her to go to bed too. And Chanyeon would ask for a few more minutes - it was part of their routine. But today she was reaching her limits, too easily irritable.

     “Chanyeonie…” came the ever so soft voice. Any other day, Chanyeon would have had smiled brightly and blushed at the other’s voice. Her crush on her leader not obvious enough for all members to notice but enough for her closest friends - Baekhee and Jongda - to do so and day and night over it.

     “What?” Her reply was dry and harsh as she didn’t even spare the older girl a look. Her big eyes focused on the computer as she continued to work.

     Junyeon was surprised and a little hurt by the tone in which Chanyeon replied to her, however she made no mention of it, deciding that they were all too stressed. “W-we have a schedule early tomorrow, don’t go to bed too late, okay?”

     Chanyeon heard the same kind and soft voice she always did every day, but this time it didn’t make her heart skip beats and her stomach fill up with butterflies. No, this time it just made her angry.

     “Right.”

     She heard Junyeon leave the room with a soft sigh, and paid it no mind. Going back to work.

     Three hours and two visits from her dearest leader later, and Chanyeon was a hair away from blowing up. It was way past midnight now, and she still had not managed to make any progress. Still stuck staring at those few notes she had written when she first started.

     The puppy eyed girl, took a deep breath when she heard a soft knock on the door.

     “Chanyeon-ah…” the older woman began, but didn’t have time to finish, not before Chanyeon exploded.

     “WHAT?! WHAT IS IT?!” the younger screamed, getting up from her chair and towering over Junyeon. Her usually loving eyes now sparkled with anger.

     Junyeon was shocked, her eyes wide and her body shaking. She…didn’t know what was wrong.

     “WHY CAN’T YOU LEAVE ME ALONE, JUNYEON?!” she asked, her voice far too loud for that time of night, her hands gesturing wildly. “SOME OF US ACTUALLY HAVE TO WORK, AND I CAN’T DO THAT IF YOU KEEP ANNOYING ME!”

     Junyeon looked down, her eyes filled up with tears at the insinuation that she didn’t work. That she did nothing for the group. She was scared and hurt and a minute away from breaking down in front of her dongsaeng.

     “I-I was just…never mind. Sorry.” She mumbled, quickly exiting the room. A sob escaping her lips as she ran into her room, ignoring Saehyun’s worried questions and as she climbed into her bed, hiding under the covers.

     Chanyeon sighed running a hand through her long hair, maybe Junyeon was right, she should go to bed.

     In her heated state, Chanyeon didn’t even register the way she had treated the older girl, didn’t even think about it until she was confronted the next morning by a very angry eldest eonnie and a very tall Chinese member ready to deck her.

     Chanyeon woke up feeling more tired than she had felt yesterday, but she did have a schedule to fulfill, so she got up and got ready - albeit tripping and almost falling asleep twice as she did so.

     Once she sat down at the table to eat a quick breakfast with the rest of the members, she noticed that three of them were missing.

     Upon questioning where were Minseon, Yuewan and Junyeon, she got worrying answers.

     “Hm…Minseonie left the room last night and didn’t come back.” said Luhua, calmly drinking her coffee.

     “Kris jiejie also left pretty late last night, I didn’t see her this morning.” Zixiao provided once she had swallowed her food.

     “Must be something to do with Junyeon eonnie…” Saehyun mumbled, still half asleep. “She ran into our room crying last night, I asked her what was wrong but she didn’t answer”

     Chanyeon had yet to remember last night’s events, so she had no idea what would have caused Junyeon to cry like that.

     “Park Chanyeon what did you do?!” an angry accented voice came from the hallway, and a tall blonde woman marched into the kitchen, she stood right in front of Chanyeon, dark eyes burning with rage and Chanyeon could see that Yuewan was ready to hurt her.

     “I-I don’t know? Eonnie, what’s going on?” She asked shyly, not daring to look at the older girl.

     Minseon walked in, looking incredibly tired and disappointed - a look Chanyeon was not used to seeing on her.

     “Chanyeon-ah, do you want to explain to me why did you yell at Junyeon last night so much that she cried herself to sleep?”

     And with that question, Chanyeon was able to remember. She saw herself screaming at Junyeon, her heart breaking as she was able to picture Junyeon trembling and looking down before bolting from the room. Still, the tall girl couldn't remember what she had said to the older, she only remember being so angry.

     God what had she done?!

     “Oh god, oh no…” she whispered, getting up from her chair, almost letting her plate fall on the floor. “I need to...I need to see her, I need to say sorry” she was rambling, feeling their eyes on her as she trembled and shook with the weight of her guilt.

     Kristina let out an exhausted sigh, shaking her head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Junyeon only stopped crying about an hour ago and she’s getting ready to leave now.”

     “You're right. Wait until she's had some more time to process things, Chanyeon-ah, she was pretty shaken up.” Minseon gave her a tired smile, and that did not make Chanyeon feel any better.

     They went back to eating they breakfast, but the tall girl could feel eyes on her, some judging and others pitying her situation.

     Suddenly, a impeccable looking Junyeon emerged from the hallway, already with makeup on and carrying their bags.

     “Let’s go girls, we can’t be late.”

     She used her leader voice, the one no one dared to disobey - not even their eldest members. However there was a softness there that usually did not exist, almost as if she was hesitating to speak.

     As usual, Chanyeon watched as Junyeon got them all to their schedules on time, dropping them off with wishes of good luck and a little bit of nagging.

     Still she hated the way Junyeon clung to Luhua throughout their schedule - it was rare for the three of them to be paired, but there were always schedules that required their skills.

     And while usually Junyeon would stick to Chanyeon, giggling and playing around trying to make Luhua join them, today the leader stuck to the eldest girl - acting like the dongsaeng she never really had time to be: cute and clingy.

     “She’s avoiding you.” Luhua said, after Chanyeon had whined to her about Junyeon and the situation they were involved.

     “I know that, eonnie!” She pouted, leaning her head on the older’s shoulder. “The worst thing is that I don’t even remember what I said to her to make her so mad, how can I apologise properly?”

     She heard the Chinese girl sigh, and suddenly she was being hugged. “She’s not mad at you, Chanyeon-ah. I don’t even think she knows that this isn’t her fault.”

     “What? What do you mean?” The puppy eyed girl exclaimed. That was absurd, of course Junyeon eonnie knew this wasn’t her fault - she was probably furious at Chanyeon right now….right?

     Luhua ran a hand through her long brown hair and bit her lip, looking a bit unsure of herself. “Look, Chanyeon, the Junyeon you know is different from the Junyeon Minseon, Yuewan, Lijing and I know.” She began, and Chanyeon was left even more confused.

     The eldest girl took her silence as permission to continue. “You and all the others see her as Junyeon eonnie, the one that can fix everything, the one who’s all smiles and dad jokes, the one who has the answers to everything.”

     Chanyeon nodded. That was Junyeon, their strong and lovely leader. The one they all went to when things got hard and they needed help. The reason Exo was what it was today.

     “But Minseonie, Yuewan and I know her as our dongsaeng. Our scared, insecure and confused dongsaeng, that cries herself to sleep most of the time, whom Yuewan and Lijing have had to help through dozens of panic attacks. The one Minseon and I worry about nonstop.”

     The younger girl was shocked. That did not sound like Junyeon at all. Insecure? Confused? Scared? Not her Junyeon. But like Luhua said, maybe she didn’t know Junyeon as a whole.

     “So she’s not angry…” she mumbled, looking down at her shoes.

     “No, she’s not angry. Whatever you said hit her close to her biggest insecurities, and she’s avoiding you, because she’s thinks it’s her fault.”

     Chanyeon had hoped to be more at ease after her talk with Luhua but all she felt now was guilt. Guilt and sadness.

     She planned on speaking to Junyeon when they got back to the dorm but she never did get around to it. And during the course of the next two months, Chanyeon kept postponing their talk. Sometimes because she was too nervous, but most of the time because Junyeon was so busy.

     They all noticed how their leader got more and more busy, always working till early morning, never really resting more than two or three hours per night. They all worried as they watched their already tiny leader wasting away. Junyeon was pushing herself even more than she already did, and she was bound to break soon.

     It happened when Chanyeon and her were paired for a photoshoot. The younger girl was excited - this could be her chance to talk things out with Junyeon and have the older girl stop avoiding her.

     Chanyeon realised something was wrong when the stylists ushered Junyeon into the makeup room in the middle of their schedule. Everything in her was begging her to go check on the older girl, but she still had three more pictures to pose for. Once she was done, the tall girl ran to the makeup room - not even thanking anyone for their hard work. She'd do it later, after she knew that Junyeon was okay.

     "Eonnie!" she exclaimed, loudly walking in, her eyes trying to find the girl. As soon as she spotted Junyeon lying on the couch, seeming too pale to be healthy, Chanyeon gasped. With only a few steps, the younger girl was sitting next to her leader. She brushed the other's hair from her face, softly touching Junyeon's skin in the process.

     The older girl woke up with a start, scrambling to sit up. "What happened?" she asked softly, worry already making her frown. The makeup stylist briefed Junyeon in on what had happened and Chaneyon watched as shame and hatred made themselves present on Junyeon's face. "I-I'm sorry Chanyeonie, eonnie is annoying you again, huh?" Junyeon tiredly asked once she looked at the younger girl.

     "W-what? Eonnie, no. W-why would you say that?" the puppy-eyed girl asked, her hands cupping the other's cheeks. Chanyeon looked back at the stylists, and politely asked them for a minute alone with Junyeon, they complied since the photo-shoot was pretty much over. "Why do you think you're annoying me, Junyeon?" she asked again, much more softly this time.

     "Because you said I do." the older girl replied, a tear running down her cheek. "I'm once again not working hard enough, and because of me the photoshoot ended earlier than it should." Junyeon whispered, her eyes closing as if she was embarrassed to look up at Chanyeon. "I'm being a burden again."

     "What?! No, no, no, eonnie, that's, no, that's not true at all!" Chanyeon squealed, desperately trying to wipe the tears from the older's face. "You're not a burden, and you're definitely not annoying me, god, Junyeon what did I say to you that night?" the taller girl pulled the smaller one into a hug, burring her face into Junyeon's hair and mumbling shaky apologies while she rocked them back and forth.

     Chanyeon felt the older girl melt against her body, and that just made her hold Junyeon tighter. The pain of knowing she had hurt Junyeon so much made Chanyeon herself cry, but she tried her best not to show the older girl that she was crying. She had no right to cry right now.

     If there was something the rapper was not good at was turning feelings into words, so it was not surprising when she started rambling wildly about how she hadn't meant to hurt Junyeon, and how whatever she had told her probably hadn't come out right in the first place, and that she was a fool. The taller girl spent a few minutes talking about how amazing Junyeon was and how much she was sorry for hurting her.

     "...And you work so hard for us, eonnie, so so hard and I can't picture what we would be without you! You've been carrying us on your shoulders all this time, and I would never, ever deminish your efforts and hard work." Chanyeon's deep voice was trembling, and her eyes were filled with tears, she needed to make Junyeon understand that she never meant to hurt her, that she loved her.

     "Eonnie, I love y-" before Chanyeon could finish her confession, Junyeon interrupted her in the most unexpected way.

     Junyeon had kissed her.

     It wasn't really a kiss, it was more like a brush of lips. A barely-there touch, that managed to steal Chanyeon's breath away more than a full blown kiss ever would. The act so gentle but so charged with feelings that it shocked the taller girl into silence.

     "...Sorry" the smaller girl whispered, looking up at Chanyeon from under her lashes. "You were rambling" Junyeon's cheeks were coloured with a beautiful shade of pink, and Chanyeon could not help but giggle.

     She pulled Junyeon closer to her, loving how it felt to hold the older girl in her arms. "I love you, eonnie. And I promise I'll never ever hurt you again." Chanyeon mumbled, resting her forehead on Junyeon's shoulder.

     The older girl chuckled, running a hand through Chanyeon's long black hair. "I know, and I love you as well." Junyeon was still hurt by what Chanyeon had said, and she would probably need more time to fully heal, but she understood now that the younger had not meant to hurt her - she probably didn't even know how those words would sound to Junyeon.

     " I forgive you, Chanyeon-ah."

     Chanyeon regretted many things in her life. She regretted not standing up for herself and her friends back in kindergarten when boys would pick on them. She regretted not keeping in touch with her friends from high school. She regretted not being able to spend as much time with her family as she should, and regretted not having gotten as much sleep as she could have gotten last night.

     But as Junyeon and her headed back to the dorms, the older girl taking a nap with her head on Chanyeon's shoulder, she knew out of all her regrets, hurting Junyeon would always be biggest one.