It was 7 AM in the morning when suddenly Rainie received a phone-call. Half asleep, she reluctantly tugged the phone off of its charger and answered it.

“Annyeonghaseyo,” she breathed.

“Where are you?” the voice on the other line questioned.

Puzzled, she replied with a simple “Hmm?”

“What do you mean “Hmm?” you were supposed to be here over thirty minutes ago,” the voice demanded.

‘Oh, it’s KyuHyun’ she thought to herself. “What do you mean I’m supposed to be there? You don’t have a schedule today; I thought I would sleep in.”

“Assistants don’t get breaks, especially new ones,” he replied arrogantly which annoyed Rainie a little.

“Are you allowed to speak so informally to me? I am your noona after all,” Rainie refuted, ‘I shouldn’t make things harder for myself’ she thought. Finally she broke the silence, “I get it, I’ll be there in a bit.”

“I don’t want anyone to know that I’m your dongsaeng, that’s just embarrassing. Get here quickly.”

‘Psh’ Rainie thought, ‘it’s not as if the fact can be reverted if he refused to speak formally to me’. She hung up the phone and prepared to leave. Her phone started vibrating as she reached the door; KyuHyun sent her a text message:

We’re going to be out for a while, be sure to put on a few more layers, it will be cold. Don’t forget to bring your manners too!

“Manners? Who is he to speak of manners?” Rainie laughed as she headed out.

It’s been about a little over a week since they started working together. They spent almost every day side by side but things seemed to progress pretty well.

Rainie entered the 11 floors dorm which housed SungMin, EunHyuk, RyeoWook, YeSung and KyuHyun. YeSung, who opened the door for Rainie, greeted her immediately.

“Rainie-noona!” he shouted. He called Rainie "noona" even though she was only a few months older. He had an urge to touch her face - he’s had a weird habit of touching faces ever since he was a child - because her skin looked so soft, but refrained from doing so. When the other members heard Rainie’s name, they rushed over to greet her as well.

“Noona!” they all called out to her. Everyone had huge smiles on their faces, she felt as though she had been surrounded by a bunch of kids who spotted candy.

“Hey boys! I brought you all some breakfast~” she said as she spread the food across the table, she stopped by a breakfast lounge before heading to the dorms, somehow predicting that these boys were waiting for her as well.

“Wow!” they all cheerfully exclaimed as they dug through the food. YeSung stood aside and followed Rainie to the couch.

“Are you here to get KyuHyun?” he asked as they sat down.

“Yeah, he called me this morning asking me to come over.”

“It seems he hasn’t been in such a good mood today.”

“Really? Why?” Rainie asked, thinking that he seemed fine the day before and sounded fine over the phone.

“It’s because he lost a duel in Star Craft!” EunHyuk called from the table, food stuffed in his mouth. “Hey, that’s mine!” he cried as he slapped SungMin’s hand away from the food on his plate.

“I’m not in a bad mood!” KyuHyun clarified as he stepped out of his room. He was dressed in casual clothing, make-up less with a baseball cap on. “Let’s go”

“Where are you two going?” asked YeSung.

“Just going out for a bit, Hyung,” KyuHyun abruptly replied as he opened the door and motioned for Rainie to follow. She grabbed her bag and ran over to him.

“See you boys later!” she yelled as KyuHyun pulled her out and shut the door behind them.

'What’s wrong with him?’ she wondered. They didn’t say anything while KyuHyun led the way, but they didn’t seem to be going anywhere specific.

“Where are we going?” she finally managed to ask.

“Nowhere”

“Then why did you make me come with you?”

“I needed to get out”

“You could have done that on your own”

“What if I needed a cover?”

“A cover? For what?”

“Anything”

‘Ugh’ Rainie thought, ‘he is the hardest person to communicate with’. “Now what?” she asked.

“What?”

“That’s what I’m asking you!”

“What?”

“Exactly that! What are we going to do now?”

“Nothing.”

“You are the hardest person to work with, ever! I have never worked with anyone as difficult as you before. Give me an answer that’s longer than five words, please!” she couldn’t control her temper anymore.

KyuHyun tried to keep his laughter in and took a deep breath. “Why?”

“Why? What do you mean why? I’m the one who wants to know why! Why are we out here doing nothing?”

“Who said we’re not doing anything?”

“Well then, what are we doing?”

“I don’t know.”

Rainie started scratching her head. She pat her chest a few times and took a few deep breaths. She never realized she was so short tempered.

“Noona, are you hungry?” he randomly asked.

“No” she replied angrily, somehow those words seemed to calm her down a bit.

“Well, too bad. I am. Let’s go in there” he stated and pointed at a traditional ordinary noodle shop. She rolled her eyes but obediently followed closely behind him.

They sat down and ordered a couple of things.

Suddenly, it struck her and she gasped “…you called me noona.”

“Yeah, I did”

“That’s the first time! I thought you didn’t want to be my dongsaeng”

“Well, you’re old. I can’t help it.”

Rainie turned her head to the side, she was dumbfounded. ‘Old? I’m not old!’ she thought to herself, ‘he’s just way too young for his own good!’

“You know, you could have just eaten the stuff I bought earlier before we left. There was plenty,” scolded Rainie. Her older-sister instincts were becoming more apparent.

“I didn’t want it.”

“You didn’t even look at it,” Rainie retorted.

“I did.”

“Did not.”

“Did too.”

“Did not.”

“Did too.”

“I’m not going to argue with you over this,” she shook her head, and then an idea struck her, “sing something.”

“…why?”

“Just do it.”

“…why should I?”

“Because I asked.”

“So?”

“What do you mean so?”

“Why should I sing just because you asked? Do I look like a CD player? An iPod perhaps?”

She rolled her eyes again, “because I’m your noona! Come on, sing some SuJu songs! I need to know about you guys a bit more, music is a good way to start.”

“We’re in public… the whole reason I brought you with me was to hide me, now you want me to sing?”

“Yeah… sing…” she insisted.

“No…”

“…Please?”

KyuHyun wanted to reject her, but the softening of his heart began to accumulate and eventually he just gave in. He sang the song U very, very softly until the food arrived, then they quietly ate and spent the rest of the afternoon together wondering ‘now what…?’

--------

As if everything hadn't been confusing enough.

Rainie had a hard day at work. Of course, she was already accustomed to the life of working in the entertainment industry due to previous experience, but Kyuhyun always made things a tad bit harder than it had to be.

"It's not right," he complained.

"What's not right?" a fazed Rainie would ask.

"You should know," he would reply.

By this time Rainie would already be annoyed.

"I don't."

"Well, then you should figure it out."

Rainie knew he was doing this on purpose. She knew he wanted to mess with her, but she was also afraid that there might truly be something wrong. She couldn't see the grin on his face that appeared after she had turned around and rummaged through artifacts with a loud groan.

"Nothing's wrong," Rainie would finally state after a while, tired and cranky.

"Oh, is that so?" Kyuhyun would reply simply, heading to the filming court.

Rainie reminisced on a few days back when Kyuhyun took her out on a long and endless walk. They practically walked until the soles of her feet started to feel as if they would explode and what was worse was that they didn't speak much at all. Only endlessly walking.

He replied to her questions with simple and short answers, she accepted his short answers and continued to follow him. In ways more than one, Rainie preferred this side of him a lot more compared to the difficult and prankster side but she still wondered what the meaning of that day was.

She stood aside and watched the boys film the TV show; the show MC running around and making jokes while the boys sat in the row of seats watching many talented people perform their specialties. He would sometimes smile while watching children seem at a loss of words when the MC interviewed them, he would laugh when someone made a small mistake, it was all very natural. He had a childish smile, although he was very skinny he still had baby fat on his cheeks. His eyes would go blank and his teeth would show as his lips spread among his face, he seemed so relaxed.

They began wrapping up the recording; Rainie grabbed several of the boys’ bags and headed towards the car. She expected them to be very tired by the time the filming truly ended, it lasted several hours. Suddenly, someone reached out to help her with the bags.

"Wow, that's a lot for a small lady like you to carry."

Rainie turned to look at the familiar voice and saw a familiar face.

"Jungkyu! What are you doing here?" She shouted excitedly, her voice echoing in the parking lot.

"I was just helping out another one of our celebrities on another level of this TV station and I heard Kyuhyun was filming so I thought I'd see you around here," he replied, as gentle as ever. He gave Rainie a very steady, relaxed feeling. He was easy to be around, she felt safe with him

"Ah, has work been hard on you?" she asked, heading towards the car with Jungkyu following closely behind.

"Not any harder than before, and you?"

"Uhm... well, works work. Not much more to say about it."

They continued to converse as she heard the boys voices coming closer. She quickly opened the trunk and threw all the bags in, including the ones Jungkyu held, and was about to head back to the court when Jungkyu grabbed onto her.

"Why don't you just wait for them here?" he asked, pulling her a few steps back. Being as weak as she was, compared to this man who was much taller than her, she could only obey.

"I was just afraid they didn't know I was here," she replied, leaning on the truck. Jungkyu let go of her arm as she rested her head on the back window. She closed her eyes as she listened to the rushed footsteps surrounding her. Unconsciously, she let out a small sigh. Jungkyu realized that she was exhausted; he knew she had a lot to think about and this huge workload probably doesn't help much. He slid her bangs off of her eyes and patted her head when suddenly several voices called out to him.

"Jungkyu hyung!"

Jungkyu turned to find Ryeowook and Sungmin running towards him, he smiled and straightened himself out. "Hey, boys."

Rainie immediately stood in proper position, she spotted Kyuhyun throw a glance at her but when their eyes met he instantly turned away and opened the backdoor to the truck. She walked over to him and took his bag off his shoulder.

"We didn't know where you were," he managed to say, letting the bag slide off his shoulder.

"I was going to go back to get you guys, but Jungkyu-sshi insisted that I stayed here and wait." She placed the bag on the ground beside him.

"Hey," Kyuhyun whispered.

Rainie lifted her head to look him in the eyes; he gave a quick smirk before he started rubbing her bangs into a big mess.

"Hey!" Rainie gasped, trying to straighten her bangs.

"Yeah, that's exactly what I was going to say."

She turned back to look at the others who were still busy catching up with each other.

She looked at Kyuhyun again, who stuck his tongue out at her before leaning back and closing his eyes. Surprisingly, she wasn't truly mad at all, even a little relieved. But why?