Hey friends, please read the author's note at the bottom! Thanks ^.^

(Also, apologies to those who have already read the chapter and it looks like I updated again OTL) 

“And you’re done for today!” Oh seongsang-nim announced just as Sunhwa felt herself begin to sweat through her third change of clothing. She felt a moment of relief – then an absurd amount of disappointment as she remembered that she had scheduled extra rehearsal time. With Key.

Said boy was grimacing as he wiped a towel across his forehead. Sunhwa found her eyes drawn to the damp strands sticking to his forehead. Somehow she found it…kind of attractive.

No! Stop! What the heck do you think you’re doing? she berated herself, fighting the urge to actually smack her head like Hyun Jin. These sorts of thoughts are not allowed. Get your priorities straight!

Sulli waved cheerfully as she and Luna made their way out the door. “Annyeong, Sunhwa yah! Have fun!”

“Call me after you’re done!” Hyun Jin made a telephone motion by her ear, grinning all the while. Sunhwa stuck her tongue out at her, secretly glad to see that her friend looked recovered from the awkward incident earlier with Taemin.

Soon the other members of SHINee had also left, probably to go take a nap or something, and it was just Sunhwa, Key, and Oh seongsang-nim in the room.

“Well then.” Oh seongsang-nim appraised them both and inwardly smirked. “I know you two don’t have the best relationship, but I don’t care. Replay is about wooing a noona – or a girl – and you have to deliver that to the audiences. Now,” he said, checking his watch, “I want you two to go through the song three times, carefully paying attention to the interaction of your bodies, while I go get a coffee. Arasso?”

Key glared at their choreographer through his bangs. He and Sunhwa both muttered lowly, “Arasso.”

Then they glared at each other for speaking at the same time.

“Good. Now get to it.” He stepped out of the room, shaking his head as he started towards the coffee room. Those kids.

Sunhwa eventually won their stare-down. “Well?” she said, tapping her foot. “Are we going to start, or what?”

Key groaned, running a hand through his hair and making it stick up in places – that was not cute, dang it, Sunhwa thought to herself. “I can’t believe I’m doing this with you.”

It was basically the first time Key had spoken to her since the photograph incident. He had given her the cold shoulder ever since, and she had been thinking about it more than she would have liked to. But now it seemed that since they were forced into this situation, he was opening his mouth.

Sunhwa rolled her eyes. “Believe it, pretty boy, and get your moving. Or Oh seongsang-nim will have both our heads,” she snapped back.

Even as he walked over to the stereo, Key sneered, “You’re lucky this is mandatory, or I would have been gone a long time ago.”

“And you think I want to stick around?” Sunhwa growled. Key got back just in time to slide an arm around her waist as the music started.

“Noona neomu yeppeoseo…Namjadeuri gaman an dwo…”

“You idiot! That’s wrong,” he snapped halfway into their second run-through. “You’re supposed to lift your left leg, not your right.”

“What are you – ” Sunhwa started to reply before the steps played back in her mind’s eye. Crap, he was right.

A light blush dusted her cheeks as she hissed back, “Fine. Start over.” Park Sunhwa did not make mistakes. At least not in front of arrogant pretty boys.

“Try not to ruin it this time, will you?” Key threw over his shoulder along with a devilish smirk as he went to restart the music.

He was nothing if not thorough, Sunhwa admitted to herself. She gritted her teeth as the opening beats sounded again.

-

“No, closer,” Oh seongsang-nim said as he practically shoved the two together. Sunhwa yelped as she felt her chest collide with Key’s and jumped back.

Key didn’t miss the movement. “What’s wrong, Sunhwa yah? Afraid of a little physical contact?”

 “Of course not,” she defended. The truth was, she had never danced with a male partner before. In high school she had mainly gone solo, with occasional collaborations with other girls.

Oh seongsang-nim raised an eyebrow. “Alright, then. Again. Five, six, seven eight…”

Sunhwa mentally cursed as she slunk back into Key’s arms, twisting her body around his in an innocent dance. Key’s infamous smirk was on his lips again as he brushed his hips to hers – a move that definitely wasn’t in the choreography. Against her will, her body shivered. Sunhwa fought against her instinct to flee as she kept going, moving her body more sinuously through the steps than before.

“Good! Very good,” Oh seongsang-nim commented as the two finished, both panting heavily in their exertion. Sunhwa could have sworn his eyes twinkled as he said, “Now do it again.”

Suppressing a groan, Sunhwa soldiered on.

-

“Really listen,” were Oh seongsang-nim’s last instructions before he left them in the  practice room…again. He had instructed Sunhwa and Key to listen to “Noona Neomu Yeppeo” twice and then discuss what the lyrics each meant to them.

Sunhwa was beginning to hate that practice room. Sure, it was new and shiny and had non-squeaky floorboards and an awesome sound system, but she would have traded it all in a heartbeat if that meant she wouldn’t have to see Key every day for their dreaded special rehearsals.

He took every opportunity to call her out on her mistakes and humiliate her as much as possible. Sunhwa usually wasn’t usually the type of person to pick on others’ faults, but Key’s incessant bullying made her even more angry and snappy than normal. It reminded her of how he acted towards her at Paradise.

“Yah, you got the counts wrong. Are you too dumb to know how to count properly?”

“No, your ugly body isn’t supposed to be bent like that. Stick your fat legs out more!”

“You need to look cute, not constipated.”

Sunhwa was beginning to wonder how on earth she could have liked this guy.

As the last beats of the song faded in their second play-through, Key remained strangely silent. Is he sick?

“…well?” she asked at last, turning to him. Sunhwa would have been content to let him sit there silently for the entire day if possible, but she couldn’t afford to get on Oh seongsang-nim’s bad side. Besides, she may have even been a little curious about his answer…

“What do you want?” he snapped.

Sunhwa rolled her eyes. “Oh seongsang-nim told us to discuss this. What does the song mean to you?”

Key folded his arms, and suddenly Sunhwa felt pinned to the wall by the intensity of his gaze. “You go first.”

She scowled at him. “No.”

His sneer challenged her. “Or are you scared?”

“I’m not scared!” she said quickly.

He lifted an eyebrow, waiting.

“Fine,” she sighed, and looked down at her shirt – the faded blue logo of her dance club at high school – as she spoke.

“I think this song is about first loves. Even if the guy is singing to a noona, it’s a pure, innocent love that he is offering to her. The noona is tired of the other guys and uncertain about him, but he’s…reassuring her.”

“And what do you think of when you dance to it?” Key prompted her, his voice surprisingly lacking venom.

Sunhwa thought for a moment. “I don’t know. I’ve…never really been in that position before. I guess I think of my brother, because I think he would be the type to seduce a noona. And his heart is as pure as I’ve ever seen.”

Key barked out a laugh. “Never been in that position? No wonder, with that face of yours…”

He stopped laughing as she punched him in the shoulder. Hard. “Ow! Yah, that’s going to bruise and the makeup noonas are going to be after you!”

“No, they won’t,” Sunhwa informed him smugly. “Notice how I did it on your shoulder. Your clothes will cover it.”

Key glowered at her, rubbing his injured shoulder. “I could sue you, you know. This is the body of an idol.”

Sunhwa rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Minho punches you harder than that every day and I don’t see you complaining about it.”

“That’s because Minho could eat me if he wanted, that beanstalk freak,” Key muttered under his breath.

Sunhwa was about to laugh, but hurriedly stopped herself. Nope, that was definitely not funny.

“So…your turn.”
 

“I don’t want to,” Key turned his back to her, looking for all the world like a child refusing to eat his vegetables.

“Oh, come on,” Sunhwa sighed, exasperated. “Are you going to be a scaredy cat?”

It was almost the same line he had used on her, yet Key rose to the bait. He turned back around. “Yah, watch who you’re talking to! I’m Kim Kibum!”

“Then does the mighty Kim Kibum have an answer?”

“If you must know about the details of my life,” he started, and held a finger to her lips to silence her when she opened .

Caught in a rather compromising position – what was he even doing? – Sunhwa had no choice but to nod.

Flipping his hair, Key continued. “The only thing you have ever been right in, my dear, is that this song is about true loves. But not in the shallow way that you have no idea of, since no one would love you. But I digress.” He sighed. “When I was still young and naïve, I had my first love. It was everything I had ever dreamed of.” His expression suddenly turned wistful.

Sunhwa tried to contain the plummeting feeling in her stomach. Oh my god, stop it! This is the same guy who makes fun of you all the time, yet you still want to chase after him?

Key seemed to snap out of his trance, face forming an unreadable mask. “There. Are you satisfied now?”

Sure, Sunhwa thought just as Oh seongsang-nim walked back in.

“Alright, kiddos, let’s get cracking!”

-

“And he’s so mean to me,” Sunhwa complained to Hyun Jin and the others.

Luna sipped at her sparking water thoughtfully. “Have you ever considered that he might be just teasing you?”

The girls were currently at Paradise, Hyun Jin’s treat. The other waitresses had immediately cowered when the heiress demanded Sunhwa as her server.

Sunhwa shook her head vehemently. “Definitely not. This is not just teasing.”

“I still say he likes you,” Hyun Jin piped up. “There’s just so much chemistry between you two.”

Sulli nodded. “You might not notice it, Sunhwa yah, but we do.”

Sunhwa grumbled, unconsciously tugging at her uniform dress for Paradise, and mumbled something about “not showing it very well”.

“It’s okay, Sunhwa yah,” Luna soothed. “Not all boys are very good at expressing their feelings. He’ll come around eventually.”

“I don’t even know if I want him to like me, though!” Sunhwa huffed, crossing her arms.

“Whatever,” Sulli waved an authoritative hand that indicated the end of the conversation and opened the menu. “So tell me, Sunhwa yah, what's the best dish in this little dump of yours?”

Hey, friends! Happy New Year!!! :) <3 What are you guys' resolutions? One of mine is to be more productive and sleep more and spend less time watching/reading/looking up k-pop stuff. We'll see how that one goes.

I definitely was going to post this earlier, but I'm working on my first one-shot and got a bit sidetracked. Please please take a look - it would really mean a lot to me! Here's the link. Thanks so much! 

On another note, yay for Sunhwa/Key interaction. Please comment, people! Nothing would make my day happier ^.^ And also thank you to all my subbies! Hope you all have a good week~

- tigress