The day before the anticipated showcase, BoA reveals some disheartening news to Taemin. “I’m not performing with you onstage.”

“But-what about my performance? It’s too late to find a replacement,” he says, raking his hands through his hair.

BoA just watches him, chuckling at his anxiety. “Don’t worry, Taemin. I was only the stand-in for the actual dancer.”

“How will they learn the dance in time? The showcase is tomorrow,” the vampire replies, not satisfied by this.

“Oh, she’s a quick learner,” the petite teacher says, turning to the door.

“She?” Taemin asks, confused, as he also watches the door. He is surprised to see Vera walk through it, putting her bags on the floor.

As if ignorant of his existence, Vera walks up to BoA. “Yes, Kwon sunsaengnim? You called for me?”

BoA smiles at the overly formal honorific, she was more used to her students calling her “BoA unnie” or “BoA noona”. “Yes. Vera, one of my students needed a partner for his dance routine and I figured since you’re a quick learner, you’d be the best fit for the job.”

“Are you sure?” Vera asks, nervously, while trying to ignore Taemin’s attempts to grab her attention.

BoA nods. “Of course I am. Don’t forget to lock up,” she says, grabbing her things and walking out, shutting the door behind her.

“Well, looks like we’re all alone,” Taemin smiles.

“And it looks like time to start teaching this dance of yours,” Vera suggests, ignoring his comment, as she walks over to the stereos. She meant business.

“Aww. You’re not even surprised to see me,” he says, walking over with her.

“I see you everyday,” she reasons, picking up a stray music sheet. ‘Only One’? Hmm. “Do I have to learn these lyrics?”

“Only if you want to,” he answers, a small smile on his face as he presses the appropriate button on the stereo. The music starts to play and Taemin walks to the corner of the room. “Now to teach you the dance,” he says, now in dancer mode.

Confused, Vera follows him over to the corner. “What?”

He corrects her and tells her to go stand in the center of the room.

She complies, but looks to him for his next instructions. “What do I do know?”

Silently, Taemin strides over to her, as elegant as a ballerina. Stopping inches in front of her, he places his hands near her hips. When she looks at him confused, he makes eye movements signaling her to match his hands. The second their hands touch, he raises them up and she follows his lead.

Over the course of a half an hour, he shows her the steps and what to do with her arms. By the end of the hour, he’s finished teaching her the dance and they run it once without any mistakes from either.

The music stops and as the two gasp for breath, Taemin walks over to Vera and wraps his arms around her thin shoulders. “You were great,” he says, between breaths.

A smile forms on her face as she allows his cold body to hug her, cooling her down faster than her body naturally could. “You’re a great teacher,” she says, spinning the compliment back on him.

The vampire blushes lightly and pulls back a bit so he can look at her. “Are you going to tell me now?”

“Nope! :D You’ll see tomorrow night,” she says, escaping from his grasp and sprinting over to her stuff.

“Fine. Then I won’t tell you about my 2nd performance,” Taemin says, with a teasing smirk, as he watches her grab her stuff.

She stiffens. “You’re doing another performance? With who?”

“Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the annual Showcase at KSPP. This evening you will watch our talented students perform for you. There are 4 girl groups performing, 7 boy groups, and 3 solo students. We will start with 2 of the solo artists and then will go on to our groups and will finish with our last soloist. Please enjoy the performances and applaud for our first act!” the principal announces.

The crowd applauds as the first and second soloists perform and come backstage. Vera walks around, nervously, as she sees them walk backstage. As she paces back and forth, the students tend to ignore her and deal with their own problems. She happily accepts being ignored and is startled when someone touches her shoulder. “Key?”

Key looks her up and down, a look of disgust on his face. “What are you wearing?”

Vera looks down at her ensemble consisting of tight ripped jeans and a oversized shirt, all in black, and shrugs her shoulders. “What’s wrong with this? I thought I looked fine.”

“Who are you performing with?” he asks, crossing his arms over his chest.

“miss A,” she says, pointing to the tro slowly approaching her.

“That will not do. Come with me,” the vampire says, grabbing her hand and pulling her towards some racks without a second glance.

Vera stands there awkwardly and watches him look through racks so quickly, she was surprised he could actually tell the difference between one blur and another.

In seconds, he stops and hands over two hangers, some heels, and accessories. “Put this on.”

“But we’re about to-”

“Put it on,” he repeats, a bored look on his face.

She sighs, but obediently takes the items, and quickly goes to change. A few minutes later, Vera walks back out. “Is this better?”

“Much better,” Key says, with a knowing smile.

Her performing group, who are collectively known as miss A, start to walk towards the two. “Wow, Vera, you look great,” Suzy says, smiling widely, as she hooks her arms with Vera, who smiles at the compliment.

“Looks like Key’s handiwork,” Fei points out.

Key smirks. “You should’ve seen what she had on before,” he shakes his head at the memory.

“That aside, we have to go onstage now. Bye, Key,” Jia says, waving at him, as she hooks arms with the other 3 girls and walks toward the stage.

“Good luck! And tell Min I hope she gets better soon,” he calls, waving to the girls.

“Yes, Key?” Min asks, popping out from behind him.

“Yah! Don’t sneak up on me!” he says, laughing at his fright.

“Mehrong,” Min sticks her tongue out at her friend. “Well, have to go watch my girls. See you later?”

He nods. “Don’t forget to cheer for me and my members!”

“Of course,” she smiles and walks off into the audience.

miss A + Vera performance: Song - Lips by miss A Dance: (mix of) Touch by miss A, WILD by 9Muses, Day by Day by T-ara

The music plays and the quartet stride in, model walking the entire way with microphones in hand. They introduce themselves and then get into their starting positions. They dance powerfully and bow when they’re finished. The crowd cheers, even Vera’s haters can’t help but notice how well she did. The four girls hug each other and can’t help but smile as they walk offstage. “We did better than I thought,” Vera says, a bright smile on her face as she lets her arms drop from Jia and Suzy’s shoulders.

“Of course! You’re such a great dancer and it was good that you were able to fill in for Min!” Suzy raves.

“Exactly. It surprises me that you don’t take any dance classes,” Fei notes, nodding along with the other girl.

“May I ask why you don’t?” Jia, the dancer of the group, asks.

“Couldn’t fit into my schedule. I might take one next year. It was fun hanging with you guys and Kwon sunsaengnim,” she says, smiling.

“I’ll put in a good word for you,” Fei says, smiling at her.

“Thanks,” Vera smiles.

“Well, we should probably go meet up with Min. See you around?” Jia says.

The American nods and waves at her new friends, happiness radiating off her. In her bliss, someone comes up behind her and wraps their arms around her. “Yah-!” she starts, before she recognizes the person.

“Vera!” Taemin calls from behind her as he loosens his grip. “I saw your performance.”

“O-oh. Really?” Vera looks down, embarrassed. “What did you think?”

“It was...different. But good different. I really enjoyed it,” he says, smiling at his embarrassed girlfriend. “It was interesting seeing this side of you.”

Vera blushes lightly, pink furiously covering her cheeks. “Well thank you. I learned the routine in a week.”

“Jinjja?” Taemin asks, with wide eyes. “You really are a quick learner.”

“Thank you,” Vera smiles widely.

“And next onstage is....SHINee! Give it up for the shining SHINee!” the principal announces, breaking in their conversation.

“So I see you’re next. I’ll be watching your performance,” she says, with a playfully haughty tone.

“Hope you like it. I’ll be looking for you,” Taemin says, smiling at her.

“Hwaiting!” she raises her fist to chin level, a natural smile on her face.

He laughs and nods, walking out with his 4 other hyungs, who Vera discreetly waves to, onstage, all the fangirls pretty much screaming without taking a breath.

SHINee performance: Song: Lucifer by SHINee (GDA version)

The music plays and soon enough blue lights fill the a great bit of the audience as the group strides on stage, decked out in black vests and black skinny jeans. As the boys performed, screams could be heard from the fangirls, causing Vera to laugh behind her hand. Are they dying? XDD Before she could finish her laughter, Taemin sends her a smirk that silences her. ..... >.>

Five minutes later, the boys come backstage and everyone starts cheering them on. Vera, who’s already gotten backstage before they came up, just watches them with a proud smile on her face. Once they finally walk towards her, she gives them each a tight hug. “You guys were so great,” she says, giving the 4 of them, even Key, a big hug.

Taemin pouts, feeling left out. “Where’s my hug? I was performing, too...”

The hyungs laugh as Vera slowly walks over to him and Taemin hastily pulls her over to him the second she gets close enough to him. “You were only onstage for 4 minutes,” she says, laughing, as Taemin practically crushes her in his tight grip.

“I know, but still,” Taemin says, finally letting go with a wide grin on his face.

“So did you like our performance?” Onew asks, still full of adrenaline from the performance.

The human nods. “Of course. It was really cool. The dance looks really difficult, though...”

“You look like you could learn it, though,” Minho says, smiling at her as if ready to for something.

“No way! That dance is so hard!” Vera shakes her head.

“The dance you performed was way harder,” Jonghyun points out.

“Not that hard...” Key says, emulating some of the moves, which involved some body rolling and some hip shaking.

She looks away, embarrassed. “You saw my performance?”

They all nod simultaneously. “Taeminnie told us to wait specifically for your performance,” Jonghyun points out.

“Wae~” she lightly jabs his side with her elbow.

“I wanted to see your performance! Is it so wrong for me to want to see your performance?” Taemin says, a teasing smile on his face.

“Yes!” Vera says, and the 4 start to laugh.

“You two should get going,” Key points out, with crossed arms.

“Waeyo?” Taemin asks, confused.

“Your dance performance is going up after the next performance,” Onew answers as the umma of the group just shakes his head.

“Oh yeah! :D” Taemin says, his eyes smiling.

Key shakes his head at the youngest vampire. “Aish, how do you survive without me?”

“You mean without us,” Vera says, shaking her head with him, as she remembers the many times she had to remind him of simple things.

The remaining hyungs just laugh at the fact that their 막내 didn’t change a bit around his girlfriend.

“Well, we’ll be going then. See you onstage?” Vera says, as nerves start to settle in for the second time that night.

“What happened before isn’t happening again. Wear this,” Key says, handing a pile of clothes to both Taemin and Vera. “If you’re dancing together, you’re matching. No ifs, ands, or buts. Do it.”

“Ye!” they both say, nodding, as if to a military general, as walk off to the separate dressing rooms.

Only One by BoA Song: Suzy Dance: Vera + Taemin

For the dance: (http://youtu.be/BQmYoGGnnyI) but Vera = Shindong

Suzy sings the beginning of the song, as the accompanist plays on the piano, and as the bridge comes up, her mic stand disappears into the stage as she walks offstage with the mic in  hand. The crowd, confused, is now on the edge of their seats, awaiting to see what will happen. Suzy waves to Vera and quickly wraps her in a reassuring hug upon noticing how nervous she was. “Good luck,” she says, in English, her accent prevalent, but encouraging nonetheless.

Breathing in deeply, Vera nods and walks onstage, standing the center of the stage as they had rehearsed. The pianist plays the notes and in comes Taemin, walking as graceful as ever. Upon seeing her, a small smile appears on his face and when it comes to the dance, he decides to do something different. When Vera raises her hands to meet with his, he instead comes close to her and runs his hands through the ends of her hair, a smirk on his face as his cold fingers lightly graze her neck. Goosebumps cover her skin, but now her anxiety is far away, all Vera can think about now is making sure she aced every step. It wasn’t just for her, Taemin, or even SHINee’s sake, but for Kwon sunsaengnim, and the new friends she had met in preparation for the showcase. With every touch they exchanged, more adrenaline pumped through her veins, and it didn’t help that she noticed the smile that stayed on Taemin’s face the entirety of the performance. When Taemin comes up from the floor dance, he floats back up beside her and grabbing her hands, spins Vera offstage as they practiced, Suzy singing back onstage as the crowd cheers wildly.

“That was great,” Vera says, smiling ear to ear, as she tries to slow her breathing.

In the heat of the moment, Taemin starts to lean in, ready to kiss her, thinking it would be a perfect opportunity. When the SHINee hyungs appear almost out of thin air, putting their hands on the duo’s shoulders.

“That was wonderful!” Minho says, hugging Vera.

“You guys should dance together more often,” Jonghyun says, Onew nodding along.

“What about you, Key? Aren’t you going to congratulate them?” Minho asks, turning to him as he lets go of Vera.

“It was fine, ok? They dance well together. Yada yada yada,” Key waves him off.

“Really? You liked it?” Vera asks, still smiling from the adrenaline.

A smile appears on the blonde vampire face as he nods, opening his arms to give her a hug.

As Key hugs her, Taemin silently sighs before pouting. I was so close...

“Taemin-ah, gwenchana?” Onew asks, putting his hand on the younger vampire’s shoulder.

Noticing this, Taemin looks up and puts a smile on his face. “Gwenchanna. Just tired from all the dancing,” he lies.

“And for the last performance of the night, can everyone please give it up for Lee Hi singing Somebody (by 15&)!” the principal announces, as the crowd applauds her.