The manager hyung's hand brushed off my cheek as he fell asleep with me still watching him. I silently wiped the tears that were still on his face with the cuff of my sleeve. I couldn't believe I'd hurt him enough for him to do such a thing.

I just knelt by his bedside and just watched him for a long time, silently crying. He was such an emotional support for me all the time that I guess I'd forgotten that he, of course, had emotions of his own, and he was always such a strong person that I didn't even imagine the possibility that he would break down.

But here he was, having drank until he couldn't walk.

Because of me.

I rested my head against the bed and sighed.

"Why did you put yourself through that?" I whispered. I closed my eyes and frowned at the pain in my chest. "And how did I believe even for a second that you'd do that to me because you wanted to?"

I sighed again.

"You're right," I said quietly. "You're so right. I'm still so young and so immature, and I can't believe I'm going to be of age in a month and a half." I laughed a little. "But I guess I'm lucky that you're here to watch over me, right? Hopefully you won't suddenly treat me like an adult in the new year... because god knows I still need you."

I just stared at him for a few more minutes, then I started worrying, not about his health or anything, but of the next morning. The only person that I knew of that had ever been as drunk as he was tonight was probably myself, when I first joined the team and apparently had went to Ryeowook's room to cry, and I hadn't remembered what happened the night before.

But what if the manager hyung remembered what he said tonight tomorrow morning?

Almost being able to feel the awkwardness that would most certainly be present, I buried my face in my hands. Did I make another mistake? Was I just supposed to leave the manager hyung alone to get to bed on his own? And should I just have put him in his own room so that he wouldn't be so confused the next morning when he woke up?

I sighed again. I guessed I would just pray that he wouldn't remember what happened tonight the next morning, and I'd pretend that I wasn't the one to take care of him. Even if he remembered, maybe he'd think he dreamt it if I pretended that nothing was out of the ordinary the next morning. I knew nothing would explain his waking up in Yesung's room, but I guessed I would leave that up to the manager hyung's imagination.

I turned out the lights with another sigh that never seemed to leave me, then silently left the room.

It was only when I got back into the kitchen that I realized that I didn't have a place to sleep for the night. I headed into Donghae and Sungmin's room and laid down on the floor next to Yesung. And as troubled as I was about the incident, I fell asleep right away as the tension of the entire day flushed out of me.

However, I was awakened in the middle of the night with something tickling my upper lip. I brushed it off carelessly with my hand, not really caring what it really was, but the tickling persisted. Frowning in annoyance, I opened my eyes a tiny bit to investigate when I saw a face less than half a foot in front of mine.

"AHH!" I screamed on the top of my lungs.

Then I heard the face also frown and yell, "What the hell!"

I quickly sat up and put my hand on my mouth, appalled.

What just happened?

"What's wrong?" slurred Donghae, also sitting up in his bed.

"Wait - some - someone just - " I stuttered.

I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to understand what had happened, when a hand reached over to touch my lip again.

I gave another horrified shout and grabbed at his wrist. I opened my eyes widely and looked into the offender's face; it was none other than Yesung.

"What are you doing?" I shouted.

"What's wrong with you?" rebuked Yesung, his dark eyes sparkling in the faint light coming through the window.

"God! You were awake, too!" I said, rubbing my mouth as hard as I could to rid myself of the ligering feeling of his hand tickling my lip. "You did that on purpose?"

"Yeah, of course," said Yesung with an innocent smile. "I'm just really proud of us, you know? For doing well on our K.R.Y. debut stage, so I was just showing it."

"By tickling my lip?"

"I wasn't trying to tickle, I was just - ," he said. As my mouth dropped open, Yesung shrugged as if he didn't find anything wrong with the idea. "Don't feel too special though, I do that to everyone."

I let my mouth hang open for a second, then I shook my head.

"That's just weird," I said, squinting. "You're so weird."

Then suddenly, Yesung stopped smiling and put on one of the most serious faces I'd ever seen.

"Cho Kyuhyun," he said, glaring at me with the most intense stare I'd ever seen.

Flustered, I responded with a formal, "Yes, hyung."

"That's enough," he said charismatically.

Still somewhat bewildered, I lied back down uncertainly and whispered a small, "I'm sorry."

"God, such an insolent kid, teasing a hyung. I don't know what to do with him," he said to himself angrily, making me flush at having heard such criticism.

It was only a few seconds later that I realized that I hadn't actually done anything wrong.

I still hadn't been able to fall asleep after Yesung's supposed exhibition of affection, and I was still awake when Ryeowook came into our room to wake us up. I sat up as soon as he entered the room, but Yesung was still asleep.

Ryeowook looked surprised, and he started shaking Yesung awake.

"Hyung!" he yelled. "Why are you sleeping here?"

Yesung turned his head, opened his eyes, and looked at Ryeowook. He then smiled the most delightful smile I'd ever seen on him.

"Hey," he said.

"You slept on the floor?" asked Ryeowook with widened eyes. "I'd have given you my bed if I knew!"

"It's okay. I'd never ask my dongsaengs to do anything like that for me," said Yesung.

I just stared at their interaction for a second, then I shook my head.

"You were never this affectionate when I shared the room with you before," I said quietly.

"I didn't really like you back then," said Yesung simply, then he got up from the floor and walked out of the room, leaving me in the dust to figure out what had just happened.

I followed Yesung out of the bedroom a few minutes later, still dazed, when I saw the manager hyung walk out of Yesung's room with his hands on his head. I stiffened up, hoping, just hoping, that he wouldn't remember.

I didn't meet his eyes and pretended nothing happened; if all had been normal, I would still have been mad at him and probably wouldn't have greeted him too enthusiastically, and in accordance to that, I glared at him for a split second before bowing a tiny bit with a drop of my head.

The manager hyung looked at me for a second, and I felt my heartbeat speeding up with anticipation as he opened his mouth.

"Cho Kyuhyun, you're getting more and more disrespectful," he said coldly.

Assured that he didn't remember what had happened the night before and breathing a sigh of relief, I ignored him and went into the kitchen to pick up my breakfast, admiring the manager hyung for being able to get himself out of bed.

The manager hyung spent the entire day with us, driving us to our interviews and performance, and as far as I could tell, he hadn't changed from the day before, except he seemed to be having an intense headache for the entire day.

We made a short trip to the office after the day was done to pick up our schedules for the next day, and we were all on our way out of the building when there was a loud, "HEY!" behind us.

The four of us turned around to see a company representative taking big strides towards us with a frown on his face, and the four of us bowed.

My stomach suddenly tightened, wondering whether we'd done something wrong again, but the representative was looking only at the manager hyung as he crossed his arms.

"Where are the papers that I told you to have done by this morning?" he demanded.

The manager hyung didn't say anything for a second, then he bit his lip. "Something unexpected came up last night, and I didn't get to it. I'll - "

"What is that something, exactly?" asked the representative coldly.

There was a silence, then the manager hyung shook his head. "I'll get it done by tomorrow morning," he said with his head down.

"Do you know what happens if you don't? We will have missed all of the deadlines for all of the live stages for the next two months, and that means no promotions until the end of the year! No K.R.Y., no SM Town, no - "

"I know, sir," said the manager hyung through clenched teeth, cutting him off. "Like I said, I'll definitely have all of it done by tomorrow morning."

"If the papers aren't on my desk by 7:30am tomorrow, if they're even a second late, don't expect your job to still be there," said the representative, then he turned around and effectively stormed away as the manager hyung bit his lip and visibly suppressed a sigh.

The four of us didn't speak to each other for the entire ride back to the dorm, and when we reached it, Ryeowook and I sat down at the kitchen table to study while the manager hyung went into the living room with a stack of papers in his hands.

About four hours later, Ryeowook got up from his chair with a yawn, and then he walked around the table and squeezed my shoulders.

"I'm off to bed," he said.

"Okay," I said without looking up.

There was a silence, and then there was another squeeze of my shoulders. "Why aren't you stopping me today?"

I turned my head to look at Ryeowook. "Sorry. Why don't you stay and study a bit more?"

Ryeowook shook his head. "Too tired."

I snorted and looked back at my work. "That's why."

"It's still nice when you say it, though," said Ryeowoook.

I laughed a little. "Stop bugging me and go to bed."

Ryeowook laughed too, then nodded.

"Okay. Good night, Kyuhyun," said Ryeowook with a smile, then he walked past the living room. "Good night, hyung!" he said brightly.

"G'night, Ryeowook," said the manager hyung warmly.

I felt a pang of annoyance at the amount of warmth in his voice, but then shook my head. What was I thinking? I knew the manager hyung cared about me more than anyone else.

I sat there, twiddling my pencil in my fingers for a few seconds, then dropped it on the table, having made a decision. Maybe it was time to try and make peace with the manager hyung that I knew he was. I got up from the kitchen table, craning my neck a tiny bit around the corner to see what he was doing. He was sitting on the end of the couch, rubbing his forehead and poring over his stack of papers.

I made some tea at the counter, and poured out two mugs of it. I then slipped my notebook between my arm and my side, then taking a deep breath, I carried both mugs to the living room.

"Hi, hyung," I said, sitting down on the opposite end of the couch to the manager hyung. He glanced at me and gave a tiny nod, but within the second, he had ignored me and had turned back to his work. I held out the mug of tea in front of him, and he shook his head.

"No, thanks," he said, not looking at me.

Well, that was only to be expected.

I set it down carefully on the tea table in front of him and held my own mug in my hands. "It's there if you change your mind."

I took a few sips of my tea, then I looked at the manager hyung, who was just looking at his papers without paying any attention to me or the tea whatsoever. However, I just smiled a little; it felt good to see that he was being his normal self again. I'd been so scared for him last night.

I read through my notes for a few minutes, just sitting there without doing anything else, then I looked at the manager hyung.

"Only nine days until the entrance exams," I said carefully.

The manager hyung didn't say anything and ignored me.

"And then you and I won't fight so much anymore," I said with a small smile.

The manager hyung ignored this, too, and kept working.

"I've come so far, it seems almost silly to use celebrity status at this point, doesn't it? Now that I've fought with so many people about it to have everything my way, but I honestly don't see how I'd be ready against every other senior student in the country who are studying day and night without having to worry about... you know, work."

"I don't want to hear it," he said, turning away from me pointedly and looking back to his work.

"I'm not complaining," I said hastily. "I have opportunities that they don't have. I'm just not sure whether I can get the scores I need, but I guess I can choose whether or not to use celebrity status after the scores come out, right? The only problem is that I'd feel like a cheat, because all of my other classmates don't have that option, and I - "

"Kyuhyun. I don't want to hear it."

" - feel terrible doing it. But do you think I deserve to? Because in the end, I worked just as hard as they did. Just on different things."

I saw the manager hyung clench his teeth and gather up his papers to leave the couch, and I suddenly felt a twinge of guilt. Was I torturing him by doing this?

"Okay, I'm sorry," I sighed, then I got to my feet. "I'm going to bed."

I picked up my mug from the table, then I looked at him one last time and smiled.

"Hyung, I'm really lucky to have you," I said.

The manager hyung looked at me with his mouth open for several seconds, then evidently deciding that he'd misheard, he shook his head and returned to his paperwork.

I made him another mug of tea the next night, but he just frowned in annoyance as I sat down next to him.

"No, thanks," he said again.

I gave him a small smile. "Come on, hyung, I know I can't cook, but I can boil water," I said with a smile. "It's not that bad."

"I don't want it, Kyuhyun," said the manager hyung, frowning.

"But - "

The manager hyung glared at me, then he grabbed the mug out of my hand. He then got up from the couch and stormed into the kitchen. As soon as he did, I heard him pour the tea into the drain and drop the mug in the sink, and when he came back into the living room, his hands were empty and he still wasn't looking at me.

I tried to hide the hurt on my face, but then gave up.

At the same time that I knew he was doing this because he cared about me, I still couldn't pretend that it didn't hurt.

I bit my lip, then I put my hand on his shoulder. When he looked at me and draw in a breath, probably to tell me to take my hand away, I spoke.

"Hyung, I don't have to hate you to be close to everyone else," I whispered.

There was a silence as he just stared at me.

"And I don't think I could ever hate you anymore, no matter what you do," I said with a small smile. "I've found out that you're really important to me, hyung. And I'm so, so sorry about telling you otherwise. I was so wrong."

"You cheeky little - " said the manager hyung angrily, then he raised his hand high above his head and struck me across the face, making my head turn. I felt my eyes water with pain, but I just looked at him in the eyes.

And then I smiled.

I saw the manager hyung looked like he couldn't believe his eyes, and I laughed a bit.

"That's okay. It's okay, because I know that hurt you more than it hurt me, hyung."

"Oh, believe me, Kyuhyun, it didn't hurt me," said the manager hyung with an incredulous laugh.

This took me aback a little; he seemed so sincere. I looked at him with sad eyes for a second, but then I smiled again.

"You know how you told me before that I was a bad liar?" I said, looking into his eyes. "You're a really good one, hyung."

I saw the manager hyung's mouth drop open, but he closed it very soon. "Enough with your disrespect," he growled. "I'm getting so tired of you."

He got up from the couch again.

I felt myself shrink at the amount of anger in his voice, but soon regained my confidence and got to my feet as well. "I still depend on you so much, you know that," I whispered.

"ENOUGH!" shouted the manager hyung, then he pushed me away. Taken by surprise, I stumbled backwards and fell to the ground. The manager hyung just glared at me as I sat there on the ground in shock. He then walked away, leaving me to watch his retreating figure.