You sat in the van, your earphones in. This time you were listening to B2ST for a change, being too fed up with how the boys of Teen Top had seemed to be pulling your friends away from you. Sure it wasn’t their fault, they were attractive, talented, lovely, and irresistible to most girls - yourself included – but now that they had the interest of your friends, it seemed as though no-one cared about you anymore. It was a silly thought, but your friends were clearly more interested in members of the opposite than they were you.

Eventually the doors swung open, and in climbed your co-members, who were still all busy chatting amongst themselves, Cho-Hee came and sat next to you, then the door shut and you set off.

All of the other members seemed to be very excited about going to the restaurant to eat with the boys, as they wouldn’t stop talking about it. In all honesty, you didn’t care that you were going, and you sat quietly with your hood up, feeling sleepy as you listened to the conversation between your co-members. As you listened, you began feeling more and more annoyed at them, not one of them had said anything to you since Cho-Hee had told you that you were going to the restaurant, and they were still ignoring you. They hadn’t even asked you where you had gone when you left earlier, and it was most likely that they didn’t care either.

You turned your head towards the window, yawning a little as you were feeling slightly tired after your performance.

“Hey, Mélodie...” Cho-Hee nudged you, just as you were falling asleep. “Where were you a little while ago? You just... left.” She frowned, looking a little concerned for you.

Not wanting to tell Cho-Hee about how unhappy the other members of Popcycle had made you, you just sighed.

“I just didn’t want to be around the boys.” You lied “They’re too...noisy.” Of course, they boys weren’t that bad. You had seen them on variety shows and they looked like a lot of fun, but the way that all of the girls were getting so much attention from them made you feel a little jealous, especially of Jae-Hwa who was getting all of Niel’s attention without even trying. She probably didn’t even like Niel.

You let your thoughts wander as you looked back out of the window.

“You need to be more sociable.” Cho-Hee proclaimed. “Maybe you wouldn’t think the boys were that bad if you actually got to know them. You know, they might talk to you if you tried being nice to them, but at the minute, they just see you as a boring girl that doesn’t want to be a part of the groups, like you’re just... tagging along with us.”

You scowled out of the window, not wanting to show Cho-Hee that she had hurt you with what you said, but at the same time feeling completely crushed. It wasn’t your fault that you were shy and couldn’t talk to them. That’s just the way you were. You sat thinking about what Cho-Hee had said to you on the journey to the restaurant until you fell asleep.

The van pulled up in the car park of the restaurant, you were still asleep in the back and didn’t realise that you were there. Your co-members got out of the car and went into the restaurant, forgetting that you were asleep and to wake you up. Leaving you in the van. Alone. Sleeping.

***

The members of Popcycle walked into the posh restaurant, and noticed Teen Top already sitting at a large table near a window, which was draped with velvet red curtains, matching the table cover and napkins.

All of the boys stood up from where they were sitting, and began bowing at the girls, who returned them politely.

“Cho-Hee.” Chunji smiled, walking over to her, “Would you like to sit over here?” He asked, gesturing to a seat nearer to the window. She smiled and accepted his offer, allowing him to pull out the chair for her before she sat down.

The other boys followed what Chunji was doing, and asked the girls to sit with them. Niel grinned at Jae-Hwa and asked her if she’d join him at the table. Ricky smiled at Ae-Sook shyly and she blushed, walking past him and sitting down, smiling at him from where she sat and using her aegyo. Soo-Min grabbed Chanjo’s arm and pulled him towards two chairs, where he reluctantly sat down next to her. Young-Mi and C.A.P looked at each other and smiled.

“Well, the leaders might as well sit together.” He raised his eyebrows as he pulled a chair out for her and gestured for her to sit down.

The members of both groups began conversations, and L.Joe sat down awkwardly by himself.

“So, how’ve you been?” Niel asked, turning to Jae-Hwa.

“Not much, just the usual.” She sighed, crossing her legs, twirling her hair around her fingers and looking up at Niel, her eyes shining irresistible.

“The usual? And what’s that if you don’t mind me asking?”

“Just... band stuff.” She waved her hand around like it wasn’t at all important.

“Oh, you’ve been busy with your co-members then eh?” He asked, “I’m guessing that means you haven’t had much chance to see your boyfriend then.”

“Boyfriend?” Jae-Hwa gasped, not knowing whether to be flattered or disgusted with Niel’s comment.

“Oh, you don’t have a boyfriend then?” He asked, frowning and looking shocked, but at the same time feeling a little overjoyed that he might have had a chance with her.

“No... but I have my eye on someone.” He smiled, looking down at her hair as she flirted with Niel.

“Ooh.” Niel smirked, shifting around in his seat and leaning a little more towards Jae-Hwa. “And who is it? Anyone I know?”

“Maybe.” She teased. But left it at that.

The conversations around the table continued and L.Joe felt uncomfortable sitting by himself, he would have rather been talking to someone than sitting by himself, listening in on other flirty conversations that were going on. Then he realised, he was the only one who had noticed that Mélodie wasn’t there, everyone else was completely oblivious to it, and this made him feel slightly irritated that no-one cared about where she was.

L.Joe was the sort of person who hated hurting other people’s feelings, and was a very kind and considerate person, he didn’t want feeling left out, especially not someone as shy as Mélodie.

“Hey, erm... Girls...” L.Joe started, looking around the table at the members of Popcycle. “Where’s your friend?” He asked.

“What?” Young-Mi replied, confused as to who L.Joe was referring to.

“Mélodie.” He continued. “Where is she?”

The girls looked around the table and then back to L.Joe, saying things like “I don’t know.” And “She was definitely here in the van on the journey.” They then sighed and looked at each other awkwardly, all of them feeling bad about leaving Mélodie alone in the van.

“I’ll go look for her.” L.Joe offered, standing up and sliding his seat back beneath the table, before turning to leave the restaurant.

Niel watched L.Joe as he walked to the restaurant’s exit; he thought that Mélodie was really making it difficult for the members of Teen Top and Popsycle. She always seemed to want some form of attention or causing drama, and it was constantly interfering with the two groups getting along well together. It seemed like whenever they Niel was trying to talk to Jae-Hwa and get to know her a bit better (as he thought that she was very pretty) Mélodie was always causing drama, leaving and having people ask where she was all the time and storming out when she wasn’t getting anyone’s attention.

Niel sat thinking about why Mélodie was causing all this trouble for a while, until Jae-Hwa asked him how he was enjoying spending time with the girl’s group. He smiled across at her and replied, forgetting for a while about Mélodie and how much trouble she seemed to be causing.

***

‘Knock knock, knock knock.’

You opened you eyes to a faint taping on the window. Feeling slightly dazed you sat up, realising that you must have fallen asleep on the way to the restaurant. You looked around the van to ask your-co members how far away you were, but then you realised, you were all alone.

No-one else was in the van with you.

You looked out of the window, remembering that someone had been knocking.

“L.Joe?” You thought, a little shocked to see L.Joe standing just outside the door, his hands in his pockets and looking up at you. He was moving his mouth around and nodding his head away from the van, obviously trying to tell you something.

You frowned, not understanding what he was saying. Then it hit you. L.Joe was nodding towards the restaurant. He was trying to tell you that the other members of Popcycle had already gone into the restaurant, and had left you in the van!

Tears pricked at your eyes, threatening to spill, but you held them back. They had just left you! In the Van! By yourself! Now you knew that they didn’t care about you at all!

Taking a deep breath to stop yourself from wanting to cry, you opened the door for L.Joe, who climbed in and sat beside you quietly. This was the first time you had ever sat so close to a boy, and you were feeling very nervous and shy. L.Joe didn’t say anything, neither did you, you just sat there quietly, thinking about how horrible your band members were, leaving you in the car without so much as waking you up to tell you that you had arrived at the restaurant, making you feel more angry at them than you already did.

“Are you hungry?” L.Joe said quietly, looking up at you after a long while of sitting in silence.

“It’s ok, I’m happy just to stay here.” You replied, not wanting to show your face to your co-members, or to the rest of Teen Top for that matter, even though you were feeling rather hungry.

“Come on.” L.Joe laughed lightly. “Just come in the restaurant and get some food, you shouldn’t stay out here by yourself.”

“Alright. I guess I’m kind of hungry anyway.” You shrugged smiling shyly at him.

L.Joe laughed at your cuteness as he climbed out of the van and waited for you to get out, before he shut the door behind you and you began walking to the restaurant together.

You walked into the restaurant feeling a little happier than you had done before. But that soon vanished as you and L.Joe approached the table that Teen Top and Popcycle were both sitting at, when you saw the other members of your group and remembered that they had just left you, and quite clearly didn’t care about you.

When the other groups noticed that you had arrived the table fell quiet, everyone looking at you and L.Joe, making you feel very uneasy and very embarrassed.

“Would you like to sit next to me?” L.Joe asked, noticing how you weren’t particularly keen on the attention that you were getting.

You nodded silently and sat down next to L.Joe, your head down so that you didn’t have to look at the others, who were all still staring at you.

After a small while of sitting there is silence, the other members continued their conversations that had been interrupted by your arrival.  Feeling that it was safe to look up and observe the restaurant now that the other members were all talking again, you did just that. As you observed the table however, you noticed Niel was looking at you, it wasn’t in a nice way, but he wasn’t frowning or scowling either.

You looked around, feeling a little flustered, surely Niel hadn’t been looking at you! But again you looked back up at him, and he was still looking at you! Maybe Niel had noticed that you weren’t at the table with the others, or had been looking for you when he had realised that you weren’t there. Just the thought of it made your heart skip a beat.

Eventually you noticed that Niel had been staring at you for quite some time, and you decided that it was best to say something to him.

“Is something wrong?” You asked timidly, looking across at Niel.

He frowned back across the table at you, and replied: “Do you think we need all your drama?”