"I'm sorry there's no bed," the manager was saying. "There just wasn't enough time... or room."

"That's okay," I said.

"There are extra blankets in the closet in the living room that you can use."

I nodded but didn't say anything. Of course it wasn't okay. Why did I have to leave home to live here, only to find that there was no bed or closet space for me? But this was not my biggest concern right now. What I was afraid of was him finding out that Leeteuk and Sungmin had left the suite.

I stepped inside the apartment with the manager, feeling totally uneasy. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to tell him now, or what I was supposed to do. Inside, a lot of the members were in the living room, talking with serious faces. I looked down and couldn't say anything. The manager looked around and noticing the atmosphere, asked, "What's going on?"

No one spoke. I looked down at my feet as if I were the one being scolded. Everyone else just looked around at each other.

"Come out here, Teuk," said the manager, assuming that Leeteuk, being the leader, would take care of it. He opened the door to one of the bedrooms, and obviously finding that Leeteuk wasn't there, he asked the group where he was. Again, the group was silent. Then Yesung spoke up.

"He stepped out for a second," he said. Everyone looked at Yesung in surprise.

The manager looked like he couldn't believe his ears for a second, then picked up his phone immediately and started dialing.

"Hello? Jungsu, where are you? What do you think you're doing? ... So are you with him right now? ... Okay, both of you, just come back right now. We'll talk about it when you get here."

I didn't know what to do. I stayed standing with my head down. Within about 5 minutes, the door opened and Leeteuk and Sungmin entered. They both looked irritated as they walked in.

"What do you think you two were doing?" said the manager, yelling loudly.

Leeteuk and Sungmin both bowed. "Sorry, hyung," said Leeteuk seriously. The manager wasn't impressed.

"You're supposed to be the leader and this is how you deal with a situation like this? Do you even know what a leader is? Are you even trying to do it right?" said the manager, seething. Leeteuk just bowed his head and stood there.

"Sorry," said Leeteuk again.

"You can't keep the guys in line, so who's supposed to do it? It doesn't seem like you can handle it," said the manager. I wished he would stop - I felt like this was going overboard.

"I know I can do better. I'm very sorry," said Leeteuk.

"We need to talk. Come upstairs to the rooftop," he said. He went out the door, and Leeteuk followed. The atmosphere did not improve once they left. If anything, it got much worse. The members silently sat there, without saying anything to each other or even moving. Every once in a while, someone would glance at Sungmin, who was sitting on the floor with his face buried in his arms. After about about ten minutes, Leeteuk arrived without the manager. His eyes were a bit puffy, but he maintained a serious face.

"Manager hyung...?" asked Eunhyuk carefully.

"He left," said Leeteuk. "He only came to check up on how the move-in went."

I felt my face grow hot. So this was my fault too.

"Everyone come stand here," said Leeteuk, addressing the members. Everyone who was sitting got to their feet and moved to the middle of the room, and Ryeowook, who was sitting silently on the floor the whole time, went around to the different rooms to alert the other members. Within a few seconds, all of the members, including myself, were standing in a line, facing a tired and frustrated Leeteuk.

"So what do you guys think I'm supposed to do as a leader? What more do you need?" he said. "I dropped the beating policy for those of you who are of age because we're adults now. We should be old enough to understand the consequences of our actions. But it seems to me that this isn't working. Would you rather I go back?"

Sungmin hung his head. Sungmin was of age, and must have felt that the attack was directed at him specifically.

"If this happens again, I won't have any choice but to bring back that policy," said Leeteuk. Everyone looked at their feet. Leeteuk sighed.

"I'll let this slide, but you can bet that I won't next time," he said.

Leeteuk left to go to his room, not acknowledging the 12 bows that he received as he walked past. I started to move since Leeteuk had left, but then I noticed that everyone else had stayed put. Puzzled, I stopped moving. As soon as Leeteuk closed the door to his bedroom, Kangin stepped out of the line and faced the rest of us. "Get it right," he said, looking around at all of us in turn. "Our comeback is in a few weeks. We can't lose sight. All of us should be thinking about the team more than ourselves right now." This was also greeted by dropped heads and silence.

"Sungmin, I'll be speaking to you. The rest of you can leave," he said. Everyone except Sungmin bowed and shuffled into their rooms. Feeling extremely uneasy and scared about what might happen when Sungmin returned to the room, I followed Donghae into the room.

Donghae opened up his laptop again, but he still didn't speak to me. I sat on the floor with my textbook open, but I couldn't focus.

"Donghae sunbaenim," I said quietly. I was sure that he wanted to ignore me, but he had involuntarily glanced at me as soon as I said his name, although his eyes went back to his laptop screen in a millisecond. Assured that he had heard me address him, I spoke. "Did I do something wrong?"

Donghae looked at his computer screen and didn't answer. I waited a little for a response, but after a few seconds of silence, I asked again.

"Why does everyone -"

"Just keep your head down," said Donghae, looking at me. "It's hard for everyone with you here right now. It's hard for me too. So just don't cause any more trouble. Go back to whatever you were doing."

I was resentful that Donghae hadn't answered me more clearly, but I couldn't pretend I didn't understand what he was saying. Everyone must have been annoyed that they had gone through the hard times that a debut group goes through, and then to have me added to the group must not have seemed fair.

I had sat there in silence for a minute, and then Sungmin entered the room. Unsure of what I should be doing, I stood and bowed to greet him, but he just gave me an annoyed look. Then he turned to Donghae. "I'm going to go to bed right now. Let's turn out the lights."

Donghae closed his laptop. "Me too," he said.

I, on the other hand, had homework to do. I took my book in my hand and stood up. "I'll get the lights," I said. I turned them out as I left the room.

I closed the door and went to the kitchen where there was a table with a light. As I sat there in the deserted common area, tears started falling.