I took the CD from Donghae's CD player before turning out the lights and wandering out of my room with it. I was supposed to have the whole team listen to it, but I wasn't sure how to ask them to. As I hesitated in the hallway, I realized how pathetic I was being; it's been seven months since I've been with the team and I was still afraid of going into their rooms?

I shook my head at grabbed the door of the room that Kangin, Eunhyuk, Siwon and Yesung shared. It wasn't until I'd walked into their room that I realized that I didn't knock.

I just stared at everyone blankly for a few seconds, worried, but Kangin roared with laughter as I stood awkwardly at the door.

"Our little maknae!" said Kangin, smiling his widest, then to my relief, he beckoned me into the room.

"Hi," I said cautiously, returning the smile. "Hyung, I was wondering if you would - "

But before I could ask him to listen to the recording, Kangin cut me off.

"Do you know what's really funny? He doesn't bow to us anymore," said Kangin with laughter mixed into his voice.

I flushed, realizing that I was being criticized, but then I also realized that he was laughing... again.

It was the second time this was happening, but I still wasn't sure whether to apologize or not. Hoping to avoid the confusion that I had been overcome with last time, I decided to clarify once and for all. "Do you want me to?"

Kangin looked surprised at my response, then he laughed again. "Well, if you ask like that - "

I waited, but he didn't finish the sentence, which put me in an even bigger turmoil. Was I supposed to decide for myself, then? After a few seconds of contemplation, I nodded.

"Okay. I won't then," I clarified with a small smile of satisfaction. I was quite serious, but there was laughter, not just from Kangin this time, but from everyone in the room.

"It's okay, it makes us closer," said Eunhyuk after a few minutes of laughing into his hand. I smiled appreciatively.

Kangin choked with laughter, then continued seriously. "Then why don't you let Kyuhyun drop honorifics with you, too? It'll start making you guys much closer."

"Should I?" I offered genuinely.

Then Eunhyuk started laughing so hard that he could barely catch a breath. He had tears of laughter in his eyes as he choked out his laughter. After he calmed down sufficiently, he shook his head in what seemed like exasperation, or maybe disbelief. I was afraid that I'd made a big mistake, but when he spoke, it was in amusement.

"Kyuhyun, you can do whatever you want," he said.

As I smiled widely with happiness that I could finally speak to a hyung in informal speech, Kangin laughed again. "By the way, you wanted something," said Kangin.

"Oh, I did," I said, just remembering. I held up the CD a little. "The director wanted everyone to listen to the recording I did this morning and get feedback, so - "

"Sure," said Eunhyuk, then he got up from his bed, took the CD from me and started walking towards the stereo in his room. As he fumbled with the wires, I rushed towards him.

"Hyung, I'll do it," I said, reaching for the CD again, but this only drew more laughter from everyone else.

"He's actually using informal speech," choked Kangin, wiping tears of laughter from his eyes.

"Oh, you didn't mean it?" I asked Eunhyuk, bewildered, returning to honorifics.

Eunhyuk squeezed his eyes shut and lowered his head as he laughed. "No, Kyuhyun, really, do whatever you want."

"Okay," I said informally. Everyone was rolling around on their beds in laughter now while I just stared. Was I being made fun of, or was there something I wasn't getting?

I shook my head. No, Eunhyuk explicitly gave me permission to speak to him in informal speech, so I shouldn't have to tiptoe around. And who really cared whether they were laughing at me? As long as I was surrounded by laughter as opposed to frowns, I was happy.

I shook my head and put the CD on, and the recording finally started playing. I wasn't sure if its solemn mood would be able to transcend the laughter, but as soon as it started playing, the laughter died down.

As the jazzy tune played, the rest of them were quiet and were listening quietly, finally with serious faces. As the run ended, Siwon got up from his bed, then to my surprise, he walked straight towards me with his arms open.

"Hyu - "

"I can tell you worked really hard," he said, then he squeezed me into him in a hug.

"Um - " I started, but I didn't know what to say. I stiffly patted him on the back, unsure of what else to do. When Siwon let go, Kangin had his face in his hand in exasperation, shaking his head. He was clearly unwilling to offer feedback right now, so I looked at Eunhyuk instead.

"Let's hear it again," said Eunhyuk with a nod. "That was really good."

I played it a second time, and when it was over, Yesung cocked his head.

"Did you make a pronunciation mistake?"

My heart dropped.

"You heard it?" I asked, looking at him worriedly. Yesung nodded.

"I already know the lyrics though," said Yesung.

I sighed and put my head back. Would I have to do the recording all over again?

"I didn't hear anything," said Eunhyuk, then he looked at me. "Play it again."

I did as I was told, and I saw Yesung smile when we reached my mistake. I cringed, but after the third play through, Kangin nodded.

"I think I heard it," said Kangin. "It was towards the end, right?"

I nodded with my head down. "Damn it," I muttered with a sigh.

"Did you two hear it?" asked Kangin, looking at Siwon and Eunhyuk in turn. Both shook their heads. As I bit my lip, Yesung looked at me.

"Do they want you to record it again?" he asked.

"No," I said quietly.

"I'd agree," said Kangin. "It's really not such a big deal. And besides that tiny mistake, this is perfect. Everyone else would be listening, not scrutinizing, so this should work."

"And it's not even being promoted, right?" asked Eunhyuk.

"Yeah, it's not," I said.

Eunhyuk smiled again at my informal speech, then nodded. "It's fine. I still don't know what you pronounced wrong."

I nodded uncertainly, but assured that the mistake at least wasn't obvious, took the CD from the stereo and left the room with a wave and a smile instead of a bow.

The next few days were simply blissful. I spoke to Eunhyuk in informal speech all the time, cracked all sorts of jokes, and he accepted every single one. Ryeowook stayed up with me every night to study for the entrance exams until 3am. And although we had K.R.Y. practices until late into the night after those cable performances all the time, I was always happy to be doing it; it was enough to make me wonder whether I had my passion back.

It was like every other day. The three of us had finished practice at around 1am that night and Jinsoo hyung had driven us back to the dorm. We stepped inside pleasantly after an excellent practice when we realized that something wasn't right. Everyone was standing in the living room, shoulder-to-shoulder, facing the manager hyung. We hesitated a little at the doorway when the manager hyung saw us.

"The three of you, get over here, too."

Without even knowing what was happening, the three of us shuffled ourselves on the end of the line and faced the manager hyung. I was just staring up at him when he glowered at me. Flustered, I lowered my head without even having done anything wrong.

I took a glance at my side and saw that even Heechul was standing there; he had been getting rehab treatments for his leg, and I guessed he was working hard to get healthy again.

"Does anyone think that you shouldn't have to be here?"

I stayed silent and looked at my feet although I still didn't know what was happening.

"Me, hyung. I'm not sure why I'm supposed to be here," said Heechul. He crossed his arms while I marveled at his audacity. "I wasn't involved in this."

"You're still part of the team," growled the manager hyung.

"If Donghae and Siwon had thought about the team, they wouldn't have fought over such a small thing."

"Heechul, do you know how selfish you're being?" said the manager hyung with an incredulous laugh on his face.

"I'm only being as selfish as they are," retorted Heechul. "It's not fair that they're the ones that didn't think about the team, and I have to think about the team when it comes time for them to face the consequences."

There was a silence, then, to my shock, the manager hyung nodded.

"Okay," he said, then he gave a wave of dismissal at Heechul.

Heechul gave a tiny bow, then turned around and limped into his room while I just stood there, dumbfounded at what had just happened.

"Anyone else?" asked the manager hyung.

No one else said anything.

"Do you realize how terrible the teamwork's been since the beginning of this U comeback? Do none of you know how to separate work from personal life? Donghae, refusing to go to practice because you had a fight with Siwon? What is this?"

I had finally pieced together what had happened and stole a glance at Donghae, who was teary-eyed already. But before I could even think anything more, the manager hyung continued.

"Even if you have personal feelings against someone, you have to think about the team with everything you do. A team is still a team, and you're all together in this. Is that clear?"

As we murmured our understanding, the manager hyung spoke again. "So from now on, if one person does something wrong, the whole team gets punished. Hopefully, this will make you realize that your actions do have immediate consequences on the team. Do you understand?"

We muttered, "Yes, sir," under our breaths. The manager hyung didn't seem quite pleased at our answer, but he nodded.

"Right. Then I want all of you to get down," he said, then he took out the broom from the closet as the rest of us got on the ground in a row to take three hard hits each.

It didn't take long until we got ourselves another scolding; just the next night, as Ryeowook and I were doing a timed practice test at the kitchen table, the manager hyung banged opened the door to the dorm and stormed inside while Leeteuk and Eunhyuk followed him cautiously inside, their heads down. I looked up in time to hear him yell, "Everyone in the living room!"

I felt annoyed and frustrated before anything else. I understood that the manager hyung wanted to emphasize that we were a team, but this was going too far. It wasn't fair that he was scolding everyone, waking everyone up, taking away precious study time -

I took a place in line and put my hands together, but I was so annoyed that I was shaking with anger. After everyone had gathered in the living room, he looked at me.

"Kyuhyun, you look unhappy," remarked the manager hyung.

"I'm not," I snapped, but there was so much resentment within the words that even a five-year-old would have known that I was unhappy.

There was another pause, then the manager hyung crossed his arms. "You don't think you should be here?" he asked.

No, of course not. I've done nothing wrong. In fact, I didn't even know what anyone had done wrong.

I almost said these words, but I held my tongue and stared at my feet.

"If you don't think you should be here, you're free to leave," said the manager hyung.

I looked up and glared at him. "I said I wasn't unhappy," I said through gritted teeth.

"Then change the expression on your face," he said coldly.

"Yes, sir," I enunciated with contempt on each syllable, although I was still glaring at him. The manager finally turned his head away from me and looked at the rest of the team.

"So, all of you," he said. "Do you not understand the consequences when you don't prepare for a broadcast? Leeteuk and Eunhyuk, leaving dead air on radio for so long - how do you think this is acceptable? Just in case you've forgotten, this is your job. It's your job to prepare for these."

So that was all this was about? They left a few seconds of dead air on radio?

There was a brief silence, then he looked at Kangin. "Do you have something to say?"

"No, sir," said Kangin, his words equally as contentious as mine had been. I looked to my side, and I saw him glaring at the manager hyung as well.

Soon, everyone was glowering at him as one, but the manager hyung paid no attention and continued the scolding. It lasted at least half an hour before he wrapped up the whole thing with three hits for each person again.

The manager hyung really meant it when he said the whole team would be punished for one's mistakes from then on. When Kangin and Kibum had an argument, when Shindong and Donghae underperformed on a variety show, when Ryeowook and I were late to practice after lunch, we were all scolded together and we all took a few hits.

In a lot of ways, the manager hyung's strategy worked as he said it would. The knowledge that our mistakes would have immediate consequences on the whole team as well as the fact that the whole team would know about what we did wrong made us think twice about our actions.

At first, we resented whoever had made the mistake for getting all of us into trouble, but as we each made mistakes and had gotten the whole team into trouble at least once, the resentment towards each other faded and we simply started supporting each other. On the other hand, we resented the manager hyung more than ever. During this time, the manager hyung never went easy on us, and this was probably when the members would harbour hard feelings against him. Even so, he continued.

I hated having hard feelings for the manager hyung that I trusted and needed so much, and hoping to sort it out, I was waiting for a school day when we would be alone in the van and free to talk. When the day finally came, I launched into the conversation as soon as the manager hyung started driving.

"Hyung," I said, looking at him from the passenger seat. He glanced at me briefly, but he didn't say anything. But at least assured that he knew I wanted to talk, I continued. "I wanted to talk to you about what you've been doing, in terms of the team, and how - "

"I'm not talking about it," said the manager hyung without even looking at me. "I know you want to dispute it, but I'm not going to retract it, no matter what you say. So don't waste your breath."

I sighed. There was a bit of silence, then I opened my mouth again.

"Hyung, I'm really worried about the solo song that I did. I'm not sure how my pronunciation mistake is going to go with - "

"I have to drive, Kyuhyun. Don't talk to me, please."

I stared at him in shock. He'd never reacted like this before when I'd asked him for a talk. He always listened. I was so surprised that I felt my chest starting to feel strained.

"Hyung, what's wrong? You - you never - "

"What part of 'don't talk to me' don't you understand?" he asked, cutting me off.

I felt my mouth drop open.

"Hyung, are you mad at me? I'm so sorry!" I said, then I felt tears in my eyes. God, if I lost the one confidant that I could always count on, I wasn't sure how I would let out everything that I needed to get out.

"No, I'm not mad at you. I just don't want to talk to you, Kyuhyun."

I just stared at him for a few seconds, then I turned my head away from him, feeling more neglected and betrayed than ever before.

The manager hyung's attitude towards me didn't change. He never put a warm hand on my shoulder anymore, no matter how hard things were for me, and he also never invited me to talk to him about anything. He never started conversations, and made to end them as soon as he could, using a cold tone of voice that I rarely heard from him until then. To think that just a week ago, I was telling him that he felt like a dad to me seemed silly beyond belief, and I almost felt embarrassed about telling him that.

Because the manager hyung no longer let me confide in him, I began to have an extremely hard time dealing with my emotions once the hard times hit. I had no one to give me advice on the exceptionally difficult task of preparing for promotions, those stages on top of my entrance exams. I found myself crying myself to sleep almost every night, unable to handle the pressure bearing down on me.

This heightened even more, when just one day before the Super Junior K.R.Y. tracks would be released, I received my bi-weekly pay. I'd gotten half of my pay in cash again when the manager hyung drove me to the bank, but I hadn't been able to ask him to drive me home to drop it off for my parents, not feeling brave enough. I tried to convince myself that this was a good thing; perhaps I could take the time to compose my thoughts when I was writing the note.

So at a time that I should probably have been sleeping, getting ready for the debut or studying for my entrance exams which were in two weeks, I found myself crying at the kitchen table, writing the note to my parents.

God, I kept on dropping money off for them, but I didn't know if they were taking it. I didn't even know if it ever reached them. Perhaps it didn't, and perhaps someone else might have taken it.

I didn't really care, though; I was never doing this for the money, and what my parents did with it was up to them. If they didn't want to take it and just kept it by the door to let someone else take it instead, that was okay. As long as they were doing whatever they wanted to be doing, and as long as I showed them that I cared, whatever they did was fine with me.

I found myself writing that I'd come home when I felt proud of myself again, but I wasn't sure when that was going to be anymore. When was it going to be?

It apparently wasn't when I debuted, it wasn't when we won our first award. It wasn't when I got the K.R.Y. offer, and it apparently wasn't going to be when my solo track was released. I doubted that it was going to be when K.R.Y. debuted a few days later, or even after my entrance exams. When was it going to be? When was I going to be able to go to my parents and tell them I wanted to come home?

At that moment, the manager hyung walked into the kitchen and opened the fridge, and before he could leave, I got up from the chair and wiped my eyes.

"Hyung," I said, then I took him by his arm. "Hyung, I really, really need to talk to you. Please talk to me."

The manager hyung barely even glanced at me before shaking his head. "Go to bed," he said, then after a drink of water, he walked into his room again. I was in so much distress that I had crumpled up the envelope and all of the money inside it in my hand and sighed.

I had to talk, and to someone that could listen and give me advice. I had to talk about my parents, the difficulties, the manager hyung -

Then without even knowing what I was doing, I found myself walking to and pulling open the door to Leeteuk's room.

As soon as I opened the door, Leeteuk looked up and frowned in confusion.

It took me a while to work up the courage to say the words, but when I did, it felt more liberating than any words that I'd said in a long time.

"Sunbaenim," I said, tears in my eyes. "Can - can we please, please talk?"

*Author's note: Happy birthday to Yesung!!!! <3