Somewhere between Shanghai and Guangzhou I end up in the aisle seat closest to the boys, trying to watch something that has nothing to do with me on my iPad. I can’t help but overhear their conversation when I’m forty minutes into the movie, trying to remember the male lead’s name.

“Has anyone seen Luhan?” Kris asks. “He went to the bathroom and never came back.”

“Maybe he has a little problem,” Chen suggests with a sly smile, wiggling his eyebrows at Xiumin. “You can be quiet now,” Xiumin says, thumping Chen on the forehead.

“Don’t look at me,” Tao yawns, turning over in his seat.

“I’ll go look for him if you want,” Lay offers, and attempts to extricate himself from the tangle of Tao’s limbs. The climb over the rest of the boys is intimidating, and he grimaces.

“I was just going to the bathroom,” I say, standing up. “Sit down, I’ll go look for him.”

“Oh, thank you, Hyosoon noona,” he says, sitting back down.

“No problem,” I answer, setting the iPad on my seat and cracking my back.

I walk down the aisle to the bathrooms, glancing around for Luhan. I don’t see him on the way there, but while I am waiting to use the bathroom I spot him sitting in a vacant seat, chatting with an older woman. Our eyes meet and he lifts a hand in greeting, smiling. I smile back and point at our seats, trying to tell him that he’s been missed. He frowns in confusion though, and the bathroom door opens. I motion for him to wait while I use the bathroom, and when I am done he’s waiting outside the door.

“What’s wrong, Hyosoon-ssi?” he asks.

I give him a sheepish smile. “I’m sorry. I only meant to tell you that the others are looking for you. You don’t have to come back or anything.”

“Oh.” He laughs. “That’s okay. Yunji-ssi was boring me with tales of her grandchildren anyway.”

I laugh back. “Okay. Let’s go.”

I wait for him to pass, but he motions for me to go first, so I go, smoothing down the front of my sweater as I do so. As I sit down, he turns and glances at me, biting his lip.

“Your hair smells nice today,” he murmurs quietly before wedging himself back in between Kris and Xiumin.

I feel my cheeks begin to redden and I touch them with the cool underside of my hand. What brand of shampoo was it that I had used last night?

…

Backstage I dust bronzing powder in a daze, exhausted mind swirling with interpretations of that simple compliment.

“Pass me that brush, Hyosoon?” Minji asks as a hair stylist comes in to tsk at the state Kris’s hair has gotten into.

I pass it to her and call over my shoulder for the dancing machine. When Chen comes prancing up Lay doesn’t even bat an eye in the next chair, completely engrossed in the cartoon he’s watching in the mirror.

“How are you, Chen?” I ask as I look through my bag for his things.

“Fine, noona, and you?” he replies, adjusting himself in the seat.

“Fine,” I say. “Have any Chinese for me today?”

Carefully, his eyes searching for an answer in the air, he pronounces, “Dao luan fen zi. It means a goofball, someone that messes things up. Kind of like Tao.”

“Be nice,” I scold, turning his face towards me so I can check for imperfections. “Dao luan fen zi, was it?”

“You’re really good at this, noona,” he complains. “It took me forever to learn that!”

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I’ll pronounce it wrong just for you.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

I laugh. “So when do promotions wrap up for you?”

“A week or so. Thank God. We have an entire day and a half of free time while EXO-K is finishing up promotions and we’re going to spend all of it doing nothing at the dorm in Beijing. You’re invited if you want, you know. The stylists are staying in Beijing too because there’s a concert afterwards.”

“Isn’t that a bit much?” I ask, eyes squinted as I scrape away a clump of dried eyeliner from the container. “It’s kind of that whole mixing work with play thing.”

“No,” he says, frowning. “We’re filming a variety show and we all said we want you to be the makeup person.” 

“You call that free time?” I finish lining his eyes and pat him on the shoulder. “Off with you.”

“So are you coming?” He squints his eyes and I know my eyeliner has been smudged.

“You’re annoying!” I pause. “But yes.”

“Score!”

…

Over the course of the next week, Luhan compliments me once on my necklace and twice more on my hair (one of which occurred on a day I didn’t shampoo on), so I decide the airplane thing wasn’t an isolated incident. I begin to dread the whole variety show idea, having a feeling it’s going to be awkward and tedious.

I’m so distracted that I forget to brood, but I know I’ll sink into a funk again once we get back to Korea, and I am resigned to my fate.

On the night of EXO-M’s goodbye stage the staff elects me to deliver a small chestnut cake frosted in both Chinese and Korean. They crowd outside the dressing room door while I enter back first, holding the cake in two hands.

“Surprise, everyone!” I call as I turn to face the room.

As luck would have it, Luhan is the closest one to me, and when I call out he turns in his chair and his face lights up.

“Chestnut cake!”

The call sends both the rest of the staff swarming in and the rest of the boys crowding around the cake.

“Dibs on the slice with the flower,” Xiumin whispers to Lay as they read the characters: Good job! You’ve worked hard!

Good leader he is, Kris immediately thanks us and glares at the others until they do too, but nobody will leave until they see the cake cut. Someone produces plates, a knife, and forks. The tables are crowded with hair products, so Luhan steadies himself on my shoulder (I freeze) as he cuts the cake into six obviously unequal slices. Then a cheer goes up, there are hugs all around, and all of a sudden I’m standing alone with an empty plate and frosting on my jacket.

“That’s not fair!” Tao complains when he finds out that he has the smallest slice.

He looks at me for some assistance, but I shrug. “They took the knife with them.”

“Privilege of the maknae!” Chen cackles, mouth full of cake. “Thank you so much, Hyosoon noona!”

I laugh nervously. “It was Ahri’s idea.”

The rest of the members are too distracted to say anything else, and each of their slices are devoured in a few moments.

“That ended way too soon,” Xiumin sighs, rubbing his stomach. “I’m still starving.”

“You’re chubby enough already!” Lay teases. “Baozi.”

Xiumin frowns and Luhan laughs.

“Jisoo, Minhee, and I were going to have some barbeque,” I suggest suddenly. “It’s not too late; why don’t you all come along? We can even take the subway.”

“The Beijing subway?” Luhan is skeptical.

“Okay,” I amend. “A taxi. Or two.”

“Manager hyung does have a big crush on Minhee,” Lay muses. “It could work.”

Everyone turns to look at Kris. I twist my heel on the floor.

“I like barbeque,” he says, picking up his jacket.

…

I was tired of barbeque two weeks into EXO-M’s promotions (Korean barbeque restaurants being the only place I didn’t have to struggle with my elementary Chinese), but tonight is different in a way. I still can’t bring myself to eat more than a few bites of the sauce-saturated meat, but I spend half of the time watching amused as the boys stuff themselves anyway.

“Slow down or you’ll choke,” Jisoo teases. Nobody answers.

My insides are still a tangled mess, but seeing everyone so happy makes me happy somehow. It’s like I’m glad that I could be part of someone else’s extraordinary success, that it’s enough to be an onlooker.

“More water please!” I call when the pitcher is empty.

By then most of the second helping of meat is gone and everyone is comfortably full, even me. Tao sits back and lets out a huge belch, and Kris glares.

“Sorry about that,” he smiles, though it ends up looking like a grimace.

“Now I want kimbap,” Chen decides. “Let’s get kimbap.”

“Don’t you dare,” Lay says. “If you get kimbap, I’ll get kimbap, and if I get kimbap, I’ll never stop eating.”

“You can have all the kimbap you want when we go home,” Minhee assures. “I make kimbap in large quantities after a breakup.”

“I want mochi,” Xiumin says.

“I want sticky rice balls,” Tao says.

“I want bubble tea,” Luhan says.

It takes another hour of lazing around for us to decide that it’s time to drop the boys back off at the dorm, and another fifteen minutes to actually pay the bill and crawl into the taxis. I somehow end up with a sandy blonde head asleep on my shoulder and then of course I have to go and fall asleep on top of it.

I decide that whatever this fluttery feeling in my throat is, it's stupid. But I kind of like it.