~Chapter 6

Amy and Paige waited for about a half an hour. They knew the house had been emptied, but they still stayed quietly in their room until they felt they had some freedom. They had no clue when the boys would be back so they were going to play it safe and avoid the larger areas of the house, and mostly the first floor.

“Did you see Tao pulling me up the stairs? I thought I was going to trip about a dozen times,” Amy laughed.

“I did, but only in between Luhan trying to get me to let him piggyback me.”

“Oh my God! Did he actually carry you upstairs?”

“Yes,” Paige blushed. “He’s carried me, piggy backed me, and been my crutch.”

“Wonder if he likes you.”

“I’m sure he’s just being nice, like all of them,” Paige denied.

“Except for Kai.”

“He hasn’t been mean to me today,” Paige was quick to defend. “I apologized and he asked me a few things and told me not to touch his stuff. And just a bit ago, he asked if I was okay when I was limping in the hallway.”

“Maybe Kris put him in his place earlier when he told the guys that we were staying,” Amy pondered. “When I asked him about Kai, he told me not to worry and smiled about it.”

“Poor Kai.”

“Yeah, poor Kai,” Amy stated, dripping each word in sarcasm. “We’re stranded in a foreign country with missing luggage and you got hit by a car. All he has to do is sleep in another room. He’s got it SO bad.”

“I didn’t get hit by the van. I technically ran into the van myself and then fell over.”

“Well if they hadn’t taken our luggage, and then let them get stolen…”

“Yeah, I know,” Paige cut her off. She was sitting on the bed unwrapping her ankle to take a better look at it.

“Yuck. You’ve got a decent bruise there,” Amy said while pointing at Paige’s ankle.

“No kidding. I’ll just wrap it tight before we go out later. I think I’ll try to find some ice.”

“Let me get it. That bruise is never going to go away if you keep putting weight on that ankle.”

“Yes, but I can’t stay off my feet completely. At least I can somewhat walk on it. Thank goodness it hadn’t completely broken.”

“I’ll be back,” Amy stated, walking out the door.

“Just don’t stay down there for too long. You never know,” Paige warned.

“Yeah, but they should be gone for a few hours.” Amy left the room and went down stairs. She successfully found a few icepacks. It was probably standard in a house where people were constantly physically rehearsing the way they did. She walked back up to the room and gave them to Paige.

“Feel free to do whatever you want. I’m going to rest and listen to some music. I want this dumb ankle to heal up quickly. It’s quite a drag hopping around everywhere.”

“Not when you have hot guys to carry you around,” Amy winked.

“Oh, I hope that doesn’t have to happen again. I mean, it’s cute and all, but I feel like an invalid.”

“I’d like to be piggy backed,” Amy replied.

“By which one?”

“Whoever is willing,” she said lightly. Paige laughed and the music on her phone again.

Around 3 p.m. there was a knock on the girls’ door. Amy had heard voices for a few minutes already, but not knowing whether a manager was around was reason for them to stay put. “Yes?” Amy asked. Chanyeol’s ever-happy face poked through the door. He gave a short nod and then smiled.

“Coast is clear. We should be ready to leave in a little bit,” he explained.

“Sounds good. I’ll wake her up and we’ll be down shortly,” Amy replied. Paige had fallen asleep an hour ago, mostly from boredom. Chanyeol looked at her and noticed the icepacks.

“Is she okay?”

“Yes. She thought it would be best to ice it while we had some down time.”

“I see,” he replied and smiled once more before giving another short nod and leaving the room.

“Paige.” Amy shook her friends shoulder. “They’re back and getting ready to take us shopping. Get up and wrap your ankle.”

“Mmmmm,” Paige mumbled. She sat up and shook her head to wake up. She wrapped her ankle and pulled socks on, making sure the bandage on the bad ankle was covered for the most part.

Their four escorts were waiting in the main room for them when they had come down the stairs. All of them rose at the same time and nodded. The formalities were a bit much to get used to, but both of the girls thought it was cute. Each of the boys wore attire that wasn’t too trendy and wouldn’t have alerted anyone to who they could possibly be. Each of them had a hat on as well. They still all looked unbelievably attractive. But, no amount of dressing down could change that.

“The stores are not that far, but we’ll take a taxi,” explained Chen. The girls nodded and followed them outside.

They rode the taxi for a few minutes until they pulled up in front of a pretty intimidating shopping center. Paige felt so out of place walking in the middle of them. They were obviously in an expensive mall, and both her and Amy were in clothing they had to wear for the last 2 days. Tao stopped in front of a women’s department store and smiled brightly while motioning for them to go in.

Neither of the girls knew quite where to start. They both eyed a few items on display, but still weren’t sure with what they should be picking out. Chanyeol, seeming slightly impatient, grabbed Paige’s wrist and towed her to a section of clothing and started trying to guess what size she was. Paige turned bright red and started laughing, but agreed on 3 things that Chanyeol had picked up and went to try them on. Luhan and Chanyeol followed her to just outside the dressing room. They had left Amy with Tao and Chen.

Amy had no problem whatsoever picking up outfits and then standing in front of the boys asking what they thought. They agreed on about five outfits and encouraged Amy to try them on. Paige knew that she could probably get away with a conversation with Amy in English despite the boys being just outside.

“Amy, I’ve never worn stuff like this. It’s so weird.”

“Yeah, but when would we have a chance to do this again? Embrace it!”

“Well I need clothes but I’ve just never worn anything like this,” Paige paused while trying on a pair of pants that went with the top she’d been given. “Oh, wait, this is … nice.”

“See!?” Amy encouraged. After a few more minutes, both girls had tried on each thing and picked out a couple items they liked. However, when they walked out of the waiting room, there was more waiting for them to try on.

“Are they trying to supply us with an entire winter wardrobe?” Paige wondered. “If they grab much more, it’ll be more than everything I packed for the trip.”

“Oooh! I really like this one!” Amy exclaimed from inside the changing room.  “I’m wearing this one out of here!”

Paige tried to follow suit and pick one out that she liked the most. When they left the rooms, the delighted looks on all four of the guys faces made up for everything they’d been through in the last 2 days. Chanyeol walked over to Paige and locked his arm with hers. “This is fun!” he said while smiling.

She laughed and looked at Luhan who was smiling, but not quite as much as he had been a moment ago. The clothes that each of them had picked out were folded and bagged. Neither of the girls had to deal with the bags, however, as each of the guys grabbed a bag from the woman at the cash registered and ushered the girls to follow them out of the store.

Further into the mall, Paige smelled something wonderful. “What is that? It smells great.”

“The restaurants are that way,” Chen pointed.

“I didn’t realize how hungry I was,” laughed Paige.

“Lets eat,” Tao encouraged. He started to talk about what kind of food they had and which one he liked the best.

Amy smiled at him, “Pick something for us to try.” Tao’s eyes lit up and he directed everyone to one of the restaurants.

“That was very good,” Paige exclaimed after they left the restaurant.

“No kidding,” Amy turned to Tao. “Thank you.” He smiled in return.

Paige looked at Luhan who was walking just behind her. She paused a step to walk next to his side. “Tao seems happy today. I had the impression that he was very shy.”

Luhan laughed. “He’s actually quite the show off once he gets the chance.”

“Really?” Paige suddenly had a fun idea. In a loud enough voice that the group of them could all hear she stated “Amy’s jealous that I got a piggy back ride from Luhan this morning.”

Paige stifled a laugh when Amy whirled around with a look on her face that very blatantly said Why did you just say that?

Chen quickly volunteered. “Hop on! I’ll take you to the next store.” Amy paused feeling slightly embarrassed.

Tao grabbed Amy’s wrist. “I’m stronger, I’ll do it.” Amy laughed.

“Whatever, I volunteered first,” Chen argued.

“You know I’m stronger than you!”

Paige couldn’t hold in the laughter. Luhan had been right.

“Come here,” Tao tugged on Amy’s wrist. Amy flashed a bright smile at Paige, who in return gave her a that’s-why-I-said-it smile. Amy wrapped her arms around Tao’s neck, he hopped up slightly settling Amy perfectly on his back. She stopped herself from squealing with delight. She did catch Chen rolling his eyes.

“Alright then, what store is next?” asked Luhan.

“Wait, Wait!” Chanyeol approached Paige. “You too!”

“Oh no no no no no,” Paige adamantly declined. “I’ve been carried enough.”

“Come on!” and Chanyeol stooped down so Paige could climb on.

“This is just getting ridiculous,” Paige whispered to herself. However, she climbed on and soon it became a race to see who could carry whom to the store the quickest.

“Don’t drop them!” Luhan shouted while powerwalking behind them. Chen had run ahead to the store to officially see who would get there first. “Yes, because this won’t attract any attention,” Luhan muttered to himself.

Tao and Amy had beaten Chanyeol and Paige. Both of the girls were let down and tried to seriously compose themselves while going into the store. “I can’t believe you did that,” Amy whispered to Paige.

“I don’t think it’s over.” Paige had distinctly heard Chen say it was his turn to Tao when they were done at this particular shop.

“Well lets get the last of the things we need and then they can see who gets us out of the mall first.” Paige laughed at Amy’s suggestion.

Sure enough, Chen shoved all the girls’ bags into Luhan’s hands and waited for Amy to get on his back. Chanyeol took Paige, and at an even starting point the race began. Tao kept up after the two with Luhan straggling behind, only because he refused to run. Both girls tried not to choke the guy carrying them but they held on as tightly as they could. At the stairs in the front of the mall, both boys stopped and let down their rather hysterical passengers. Tao had been behind Amy as if he needed to catch her, but instead he held her hand while she burst into a fit of giggles.

Luhan finally caught up and laughed despite himself. He continued through the doors to get them a taxi. Once the girls were done initially laughing, they loaded into the taxi with the shopping bags they’d filled during their visit to the mall. During the few minute ride back to the dorm, the girls kept laughing about the ride through the store. For the most part, each of the guys seemed pleased with the success of the outing.

A/N

Not sure if that was too short or not. I just barely made it over 2000 words. Ah well... how cute would it to be piggybacked through a mall? Right? :D