s were right, Dongwoo had to deal with his "problem" because he found himself exposing his abs on "Weekly Idol" just for a piece of beef, but an expensive delicous piece of meat. He didn't regret it. But if he still had the hives, the MCs would have taken notice, and in their lovingly-joking manner, they would have proceeded to made a segment out of it. Articles would later ensue of how overly hard INFINITE works or how they live in unsanitary conditions (you could never guess what the reporter might write). And Dongwoo would have regretted that.

Today, he found himself grateful for two reasons. One, to have gotten rid of that god-foresaken itchy mess on his back. He could never quite scratch it either, and when the members where understandably unwilling to help. Dongwoo had to pull rank to get his dongsaengs to help. Even then, they would touch him without gloves on. It got to the point where every member had gloves specifically to scratch Dongwoo until the hives had faded. Second, after weeks of constant schedules, he miracuously had a day off, and he knew just how to spend it, by sleeping away the entire morning and then to escape the dorm a bit for lunch.

Unfortunately, all of the members had different plans. By the time Dongwoo woke up, they all had already eaten or were at their individual schedules. "Sorry, hyung," Sunjong said with his eyes glued to the tv. Many girl groups had come out with songs lately, and he needed to learn their choreography for variety shows. "We didn't want to wake you."

"We probably couldn't anyway," Hoya quitely remarked. He was sitting next to Sungjong watching the girl groups too, but for entirely different reasons. Dongwoo laughed, knowing full well that he was nearly impossible to arose from bed.  Hoya then looked up from the tv to his hyung, "Try Myungsoo. I haven't seen him all day."

"Sorry, hyung," Myungsoo yawned. He was still in his bedroom, lazying about. "I woke up early today for...something. I don't know. I can't remember. And now I just want to sleep," he finished, pulling up his black hoodie and laying back down on his bed.

"That's okay. Maybe some other time. Sleep well," Dongwoo responded, making sure to shut off the lights as he left L's bedroom. 

With a sigh, Dongwoo pulled out his phone and began to flip through his contacts list. His heart still set on eating lunch outside of the dorm. But who was free? Dongwoo could barely remember his own schedule let alone his friends. But the better question was, who would be willing to buy him lunch? His wallet felt light in his pocket. He had been spending a lot of money lately, too much. Since he felt guilty for not going home in months, he sent his parents a box of assorted luxury items, including lotions and various health supplements. He had also been impulsively buying trinkets here and there. Did he really need a new cover for his cell-phone? No, but it was green so he bought it anyway. Money was burning a whole through his pocket, and he needed to patch that hole up quickly before he became flat-out broke.

Then the answer came to him: that American girl he met the other day. He had not really thought about her too much, except for when he passed by the convenience store or ate ramyeon...or used toothpaste. But that's not a lot, right? The girl puzzeled him. How could a stranger feel so comfortable, so familiar? He wanted to know if that feeling was a fluke caused by stress, or not. Besides, she owed him lunch, and it was time to collect her debt.

After getting ready, he walked up to her apartment building and was struck with the sudden realization that he had completely forgotten her room number. It was 40-something. He assumed that once he reached the fourth floor and saw the numbers, it would come back to him...it didn't.

"Well, there's only one way to solve this," Dongwoo muttered to himself. The only solution was to knock on all the possible doors until he found her apartment. He had a 1 in 9 chance of getting it right. He's faced similiar odds playing rock-paper-scissors for the shower order or for food. He could handle this.

He knocked on 401's door. An elderly man answered. "Oh, hello," Dongwoo greeted respectfully. "Is there a young woman living here too?"

The elderly man nodded and left, only to return with a woman only slightly younger than him. "Who is this?" the woman asked sounding slightly irritated. "Did you order take-out food again? Is my cooking really that bad?" she nagged her husband.

Her husband started to wave his hand back and forth, "No, he said that he was looking for a young lady. So here she is," he said turning to Dongwoo. The elderly woman began to blush at the sweet notion that her husband thought she was still a young lady. "Please take her. Her cooking is awful," he remarked with a sly smile. The wife became visibly angry. Her chest was rising up and down as if she was a cartoon volcanoe about to explode.

"I must have the wrong room. Sorry. Have a nice day," Dongwoo quickly said, wanting to get out of the situation as quickly as possible. The elderly couple had closed the door shortly afterwards, but that barrier hardly muffled their angry nagging match.

Moving onto 402, Dongwoo knocked on the door and was quickly greeted by a girl in her early teens. "OHMYGAWD! Dongwoo-oppa! What are you doing here?!" She looked to be on the urge of a huge fan-spasm.

"Uh, yea. Hello. Nice to meet you. Is there anyone else in there with you?" Dongwoo asked politely, not wanting to give a rude impression to a fan.

"No why?" the teenager asked. Then a coy look appeared on her face, "Do you want to come in?" She winked at him. Sungyeol was right; their fans aren't entirely innocent.

"Uh," Dongwoo had to quickly think on his feet. "No thank you. We're doing a new door-to-door promotion. I just wanted to tell your whole family to please buy our album."

"Oh," she responded. "I already bought one."

"Thank you," Dongwoo said, giving her a huge smile. He reached in his pocket and pulled something out. "And in return, on behalf of INFINITE, I would like to give you...this piece of gum?" He said unsurely, handing over the slightly crumpled up gum to the fan.

She didn't seem to mind it's unseenly state. Taking the gum with both hands, "Thank you, oppa! I'll treasure it forever."

"No, thank you for being fan," he responded. "Bye!" He bid her farewell, while throwing a heart or two at her until the fan closed the door. Dongwoo let out a huge sigh of relief. He wouldn't be surprised to find a fanaccount of this encounter later online. At least there wasn't any photographic evidence to back up the claim.

Then he knocked on 403, and when greeted with middle-aged woman, he decided to change his tactic. "Hello, do you know where an American family lives on this floor? I seemed to have forgotten their apartment number."

"Ah! The girl and her father?" The woman asked. Dongwoo nodded. "They're right across the hall. Room 404." Of course, the next room.Dongwoo thanked her profously and proceeded towards apartment 404.

He started to become nervous as he finally reached the door. Knowing that he would soon confront the girl left him feeling muddled. He tossed aside those nerves and went with his implusive behavior. His impulsive behavior knocked on the door too loudly. It sounded as if he was trying to break it down. After waiting what he felt like was ages, he decided that the girl was not at home. He kicked at the carpet on the hallway and made his way to the stairwell.

As he was opening the door to the stairwell, "Is anyone there?" someone called out in a thick-American accent. He turned around the corner and saw the girl he was looking for. She was wearing pink, ducky pajamas, and her hair was in disarray. She was also holding out a spoon in front of her, as if she was brandishing a sword.

Dongwoo couldn't help but laugh, "Oh! You speak Korean?"

The girl made eye contact with him and dropped the spoon. "Donwoo? Woon?"

"Dongwoo" he corrected her. She had forgotten his name. He couldn't help to hide the sadness in his voice. But then, he realized that he couldn't remember her name either. Jamie? Jenny? Jemie? He bent over to pick up her spoon. When he handed it to her, he inspected her face up close. Janie! Her name was Janie! He felt proud that he could remember.

"Thank you," she said, carefully taking the spoon out of his hand. "Uh, how are you?"

"Hungry!" Dongwoo responded as cutely as he could muster. He stuck out his stomach and rubbed it. He rationalized that if he gave her enough aegyo that she would buy him lunch.

"You want me to buy you lunch?" she fell into his trap. He nodded. "One moment please," she responded, heading back into her apartment. Dongwoo followed her inside. She seemed surprised that he came in without an invitation, and Dongwoo was surprised that he did the same thing. His impulses were getting the better of him again.

Her apartment was small, but suitable for two people. And slightly messy. On the low table were several open books. On closer inspection, they all appeared to be Korean grammar books. Pages of notebook paper were also strewn across the floor. Carefully drawn Korean characters were etched onto the pages. Some other pages seemed to be crumpled up in frustration. That would explain her sudden knowledge of Korean, Dongwoo thought. "Studying?" he asked Janie. "Good job!" he praised in English (wanting to show off his own language prowess) giving her a thumbs up. She blushed.

She then grabbed the remote and pushed him gently down into a chair, "Ah, sit. Wait, please." While pointing at the tv, "Watch." Her language skills had improved but it was still limited. Dongwoo was impressed by what she was showing and even felt a little proud. When he had met her a couple of days ago, it seemed like she knew nothing. But now, she spoke Korean with the vocabularly of a three year-old, which made her kind of cute, especially since she was wearing ducky pajamas.

Dongwoo listened to her commands and began to watch the tv. She had left him alon to go change into real clothes, not wanting to leave the apartment dressed in questionable clothes. Dongwoo looked around the apartment a little. From what he just learned from the lady across the hall, Janie was living there with her father. But the apartment had no traces of a older male's presence, reminding Dongwoo of what she said in their first encounter: "I'm alone all day and all night long." Then another phrase crossed his mind: "I have no future." It still puzzeled him. What did she mean by that? He shook those sad thoughts out of his head and turned his attention back to the tv. He was surprised to be confronted with INFINITE's Natuurpop commercial. Thinking back to that day and the fun time he had with the members, he laughed. He laughed even more loudly when he remembered that Sungkyu was caught by the camera when he was punching Woohyun. Finally evidence of their leader's "abuse." Then he started roaring with laughter when he saw L on screen doing a couple's dance with an ice cream cone, smiling with what he considered to be a chic smile.

"What are you watching?" a voice said from behind. 

Dongwoo quickly turned off the tv lest she catch a glimpse of him in the commercial. From what Dongwoo could gather, this girl had no idea that he was an Idol. And he wanted to keep it that way. It would be nice to have someone not to treat his as a celebrity. He quickly changed the subject, "Let's go! I'm hungry." Then he finally saw what she had changed into. It was just a plain pink dress, but what really struck him was how differently she looked. In his mind, he still imagined her with tear-stained cheeks and puffy red eyes. The ducky pajamas earlier did nothing to improve that image. But now, she looked...pretty. "Waah! Pretty!" he found himself praising.

Janie blushed. "Let's go!" she said, motioning towards the door. And so they left. When they reached outside, Janie grew anxious. As if she wanted to say something but didn't know how, "Ah, I don't know. Where?"

Dongwoo knew exactly what she meant. She was unfamiliar with the area and didn't know where to go. Thankfully, he knew exactly what his stomach wanted. "Do you want chicken?" he asked. She excitedly nodded.

Their journey over to the chicken shop was uneventful. Janie spent most of her time observing her surroundings. She doesn't get out much, Dongwoo concluded. But the lack of conversation didn't bother him as much as he thought it would. Watching her discover Seoul made him look at the city in a new light, seeing what a foreigner would be entranced by. It was enlightening. Not to mention that he also noticed how in sync their steps were. Both were rolling their wrists as they walked, kicking their foot at any loose object on the ground, picking at random things like taking the leaves off of branches, and sometimes suddenly breaking out into a stretch. Dongwoo finally saw himself as the world saw him. Calm down and act normal, he joked to himself.

The shortly reached the restaraunt and were seated. Seeing how little his companion knew about Korea in general, Dongwoo ordered for them. When Janie sat down, she let out a sharp gasp. "Are you okay?" Dongwoo asked.

"I pulled a stomach muscle. I should be fine. Let's eat," she said in English, wincing with every word. Dongwoo understood that she said that she was fine, but he didn't believe it. Sweat began to form on her brow, and she seemed a bit more flushed than earlier. But once the food came, her expression changed from that of an ill person to that of a curious child. "What's this?" she innocently asked pointing to the kimchi.

Dongwoo laughed. This girl obviously knew nothing about Korea. It was cute. "Kimchi," he answered gently. She then began to inquire about everything on the table and even about the celebrities in the alcohol advertisements on the wall. Questions then began to pour from Dongwoo's mouth. Here was his chance to improve his English before he went on his world tour. He began to ask the English term for words that he was unfamiliar with or had forgotten. It was fun quizzing each other, feeding one another's insatiable curiousity. But they began to run low on items to point at. "What is...this?" Dongwoo asked picking up a little white dish.

Janie took it from his hands. "It's a..." she studied it for a bit and then placed it on her head, "a little hat!" She responded with a goofy smile.

Dongwoo laughed. He wasn't expecting their conversation to take this turn, but he was more than happy to follow her lead. "No no no!" he said coyly. He picked up another dish and placed them on his ears. "Headphones" he said while he was bopping to an imaginary beat.

She laughed and took the dishes away from his ears. "Nope! They're glasses!" Then she grimaced and fake whined, "I'm blind! I can't see!" Dongwoo giggled and removed them from her eyes. Her expression became overly happy. "It's a miracle! I can see!"

Not wanting to lose to her acting, Dongwoo decided to kick it up a notch. "Look!" he commanded, placing the dishes behind his head until they looked like ears peeking over his har. "I'm a lion!" He proceeded to growl like baby Simba in the "Lion King." She laughed more loudly than he ever heard her before. It only encouraged him to continue with his impression. Suddenly the laughing stopped, and he heard retching sounds coming from across the table. He stopped what he was doing and looked over at Janie. Her head was hanging down, and she was wiping with the back of her hand.

"Are you okay?" Dongwoo asked. His eye widened with concern.

Janie looked up at him. Her face was gaunt. Sweat was dripping down her cheeks, and there was something strange stuck on the corner of . "I'm..." she began to weakly say. Then all he could see were the whites of her eyes. She fell out of her chair onto the floor.

Dongwoo quickly ran over to her and asked somebody to call for an ambulance. The other patrons at the restaraunt began to take notice of what was going on, adding to Dongwoo's growing anxiety.

What was wrong with her? "I have no future," that phrase ran through his mind again. Is this what she meant? Was she terminally ill? He grabbed her hand and called out "Janie! Wake up!" He began to fan her face, hold chicken up against her nose, anything to help her regain consciousness.

The ambulance arrived quickly, given that the hospital was nearby. While she was being placed on the stretcher, Janie's eyelids finally fluttered open. She had finally regained some of her consciousness. She made eye contact with Dongwoo. She squeezed his hand, "Dongwoo...don't go...please...I'm scared." She shut her eyes tightly. "It hurts."

"Okay," was the only thing that Dongwoo could manage to choke out. He could feel his emotions wanting to get the better of him, but he wanted to be strong for Janie. She had no one else but Dongwoo to lean on at the moment. She was alone.

As Dongwoo began to climb in the back of the ambulance with Janie, he was confronted with an EMT, "What's your relationship with her? Is she your girlfriend?"

"No!" Dongwoo said. It was an immediate response to the question that he had developed over the years. Then he racked his brains. How could he describe their relationship? He hardly doubted that the EMT would let him ride with them if he said that they were friendly strangers. He decided to go with how he felt about her, "I'm her oppa. She's my dongsaeng." The EMT shot him a confused look, the two obviously not being blood related. But the titles were vague enough that it could describe several possible links between them. In the end, he let Dongwoo ride with them.

As Dongwoo slid into the ambulance, the EMT scrunched his nose and shot Dongwoo a dirty look. After seeing the idol's confusion, the EMT pointed to his pants. And Dongwoo saw the yellow, slightly chunky stain on his pants for the first time. Sliding away from the idol, the EMT said, "You have vomit on your pants."