Hannah sends a dazzling smile to the Chinese fan in front of her, quickly signing the book. She has a person on each side of her who are moving the books over the table; the first person slides the book to Hannah and the second person hands the signed copy to the fan if Hannah gets too slow to do it herself. She came to Shanghai last night for her book signings today; the first book signing starts 10:00, which is where Hannah at the moment is, smiling at the fans and signing the book dressed in a navy blue cotton blend a-line top, a patterned long scarf in dark blue and a pair of denim shorts to a pair of high-top sneakers (she managed to avoid wearing high heels).

There is nothing wrong with the weather in Shanghai beside from that it’s raining. They are inside a big bookstore (three floors!) and it is crowded with people all out to the street. Not even news reporters have the space to come inside because of the amount of people there. With a good security, Hannah doesn’t feel crowded inside a corner; maybe because this is work, where she has a table to sit behind and she is there for a purpose and everything is organized.

“You okay?” Manager Lee sneaks up behind Hannah to ask in a low voice.

She just nods in answer, too busy to smile at each fan between the signings. The fans speak in English to her, but there are those who speak in Chinese and Hannah just says ‘thank you’ as that is the only useful Chinese she knows. She keeps smiling when Manager Lee puts down a bottle on the table, letting her know she can take a few seconds to drink water in the middle of the book signing. Hannah signs a few more books before she takes off the lid of the bottle and takes a sip, smiling at the fan staring at her from the other side of the table.

In Korea during any kind of signings, the fans are really talkative. Here it is more the eye contact and tears; Hannah guesses it is because she can’t communicate with them in their language, but there has showed up so many people for her book signing that she tries her best either way.

A boy appears in front of Hannah, a cute boy in glasses who Hannah smiles up to before she looks down to give her autograph in the book.

“Is it true you are single?” the boy asks in broken English, leaning a little forward for her to hear him. Hannah looks up, surprised by the question. “It is a rumour saying you and SHINee’s Jonghyun have broken up, I just want to know…”

She smiles softly at him, very much aware of the rumours going around since she didn’t visit SHINee backstage during their comeback weekend. She had planned to go there on Saturday, but she was in the recording studio all day. And after the weekend, rumours started to spread online that they have broken up. It all started because Hannah didn’t go support them at the music programs, but then it suddenly was someone who had commented as a good source “due to their busy schedules, they decided to stay as friends”. It was silly and SM Entertainment denied it all in a statement to say that the couple is still going strong. SM came out with that statement yesterday, so Hannah did definitely not expect to be asked about the rumours.

“The rumours are not true,” she tells him with a pout, giving him the book. But to her surprise, he smiles.

“That is good. I want you happy. Stay happy, okay?” he tells her while slowly being pushed to the side and Hannah smiles wildly back, telling him to be happy too. She laughs when turning to the next fan in line, happily greeting her.

An hour goes by quickly, and before she knows it, the first book signing is over. It is half an hour break before they will continue, and normally during those thirty minutes, Hannah would go to another room where she can get some rest, eat something and maybe use the bathroom. Now, Hannah disappears to use the bathroom and she eats some bread on the way before she goes back inside the bookstore that stays crowded with people waiting for the next book-signing. Hannah smiles at the attention she get when coming out twenty minutes too early, all eyes are on her when two of the shop-assistants starts talking to her. They speak in Chinese, so it is good Hannah has a translator with her, and Manager Lee is like always next to her. The shop-assistants want to give Hannah a gift and a discount for anything she buys there, just as a ‘thank’ for her having the book signing there. Hannah doesn’t really want it, but during this break still ends up buying two books to Emelia and one to Carolina, and she manages to talk a little to some fans in English (one of them were actually the one suggesting the book she bought for Emelia) before she sits down to do another hour of signing her book.

 

The time in Shanghai is over right after the third book signing. Hannah, her manager and the translator take the fast train to go to Beijing. The ride takes five hours, which lets Hannah eat and go through the songs 5 Pieces will perform (only six songs, it isn’t much at all) at tomorrow’s SM Town concert, and she gets some rest too.

The other artists are already at the concert arena when Hannah comes there; they have been rehearsing during the day for tomorrow’s concert and the other members of 5 Pieces have been waiting for Hannah to come so they can complete their rehearsals too. The only group not present today is SHINee, who will come tomorrow morning – their comeback schedules didn’t let them come today. When Hannah first comes to the arena, she becomes the shy magnae of 5 Pieces; she bows deeply when spotting members of Super Junior wherever she goes backstage and they for her book signings and whatnot, she bows the deepest she can when BoA comes out from a room and further away she bows again when members of SNSD appears. Only when meeting the other members of 5 Pieces (the talkative ladies they mix their greetings while talking about the songs they will perform) and Hannah just enters the room and quietly melts in with them. She is tired after the ride and to enter the world where everyone is warm and already familiar with the arena and Hannah is just completely lost with the surrounding, arriving hours after the others.

After she had gotten on the train she changed from the sponsored clothes to her own; a scarlet cotton blend t-shirt, dark skinny jeans and a black faux-leather zip-up jacket, so Hannah doesn’t have to worry about keeping her clothes clean as she only need them for the rehearsals and then they will go to the hotel to sleep.

“EXO is done with their rehearsals, so they are the ones getting food for everyone,” Emelia randomly mentions to Hannah. “Mostly everyone has rehearsed according to the set list, but we were told to wait for you so … here we are. Maria did her solo song rehearsal though…”

“You haven’t eaten yet?” Hannah is surprised; she ate on the train, but it is around 8PM now.

“Snacks, snacks,” Manager Kim repeats for Hannah, just to not make any misunderstandings. Emelia smiles widely, telling Hannah it is only snacks they will eat now as they have had dinner already.

“I asked for ice-cream,” Maria calls out from across the table. Hannah smiles, quietly wondering when they will go up and do their rehearsals, but she doesn’t ask just because she knows her group has been waiting for her just so they can do their rehearsals.

Before going to the stage, the group is in their room where they go through what songs to sing and slightly planning it as they haven’t had the time to practice before coming here, they also put on the headset microphones when their manager comes inside with it before heading out to the stage for their rehearsals. Hannah yawns behind the paper where the set-list for tomorrow’s concert is written; she has marked the performances she will do with 5 Pieces, which only is six songs, but she is all satisfied with that. Maria will perform her solo song with EXO’s Chanyeol and Julia will perform her song with SNSD’s Yuri, other than that the ladies will perform six of their own songs for the concert.

“How does the greeting go like?” Hannah quietly asks Maria when they walk up on the stage, slightly bowing to the staff up there. Maria slowly says their greeting in Chinese, and as Hannah repeats it the leader says it again. Hearing some staff members from their left side begin to talk to them, Hannah grabs on to Maria’s arm to make them turn that direction instead of walking by them. Maria laughs when noticing they were passing by the staff and she hugs Hannah’s arm when listening to what the staff tells them.

“We’re doing the concert version or the original…?” Maria asks when the staff has said what they wanted.

“The original version, we said that backstage,” Emelia is fast to answer but the staff looks a little confused.

“It’s the version you do for your concert,” a female staff tells them and Hannah feels how the energy in Maria just leaves her.

The staff turns to each other, and Hannah just quietly stands there, hugging Maria’s arm and looking at the arena behind the staff. It’s enormous – but that’s what SM Town is capable off after all. It has been raining in Beijing today too, but not much at all, and Hannah isn’t sure if the stage is slippery because of rain or if it just is like that. While Hannah is lost in other thoughts about the arena and stage, the others around her are having a big conversation about which [Black & White] version 5 Pieces will open up their performance with. Even their manager comes up on the stage with some papers to solve the misunderstanding, and even with that it takes a few minutes until they decide to take the concert version – Hannah is blank at first when hearing that decision as she can’t really see herself doing the concert opening at their SM Town concert, it somehow seems like their amazing concert opening does not fit among the other brilliant artists under SM.

Maria pulls Hannah along with the others to go through the performance, waking the youngest from looking around on the stage. 5 Pieces will make their appearance from the lift in the middle of the stage, come up from there, so that is the first thing they practice. And with 5 Pieces standing on the lift, doing poses for their first appearance, Hannah starts laughing when Emelia hits Julia on the . Julia thought it was Carolina, and Carolina runs away from her position when being blamed which makes them all complain at her.

They go through two of the songs before Hannah takes off her jacket, yawning behind her hand. She is tired, she can admit that, and the rehearsals are going slow today for some reason, when she really looks forward to go to the hotel and sleep. But the girls make it easier; always fooling around with each other. Though they had their solo concert recently, and have gone abroad on their Samsung events a lot, it feels like it has been a while since they were together. Maybe because they work more apart than together recently, the weeks are long when they don’t spend it together, the weekends goes by fast because that seems to be the only time all five of them are together and the girls seem to secretly know that by the way they are secretly teasing each other a little too much than usual.

“Have you decided about the rooms?” Manager Kim asks when 5 Pieces are heading backstage, their six songs rehearsed and good for today.

“I’m sharing room with Julia this time,” Carolina happily answers, “Us two and Yuri.”

“Yuri?” Hannah asks, looking at the side at Carolina, who is smiling with her whole face.

“Yeah, SNSD kicked one out so we took her in,” Julia is the one answering; nudging Hannah on the side with a smirk to let her know it is just a joke about kicking a member out. Not that Hannah would believe it though. Hannah smiles at Maria who says that it means she will share room with Hannah and Emelia (Emelia gives a sarcastic cheer in the back), and they get inside the room backstage with smiles. The first thing Hannah does is to check some papers on the table, still her Chinese is bad than worse and their manager, the translator and Emelia are all going through it too.

“How did your interviews go in Shanghai then? They all spoke in English with you?” Emelia mentions and Hannah knows she is slightly preparing to tease Hannah for understanding really well in Korea and Japan, but in China she is hopeless – at least Hannah feel hopeless and helpless.

“It went well, actually; I spoke in English for most interviews and they got their words translated for me to understand,” Hannah calmly answers. “But it’s annoying how everyone asks the same questions.”

“What question?”

“If the character Joe represents me in the book,” Hannah rolls her eyes and tiredly sits down around the table standing in the centre of the room. “I answered those questions last year.”

“I know you did; you complained about it then too,” Emelia chuckles and sits down on the table, grabbing the paper from their manager. “It’s a good thing you speak English then.”

Hannah forces a smile at her. Somewhere outside in the corridor she can hear Carolina and SNSD’s Tiffany’s bright voices. Hannah looks over at Maria, who is drinking some water over by the wall where the make-up table is, “How is your solo concert preparations going, Maria?”

“Oh my gosh! Amazingly perfect!” Maria’s voice goes up several octaves, causing the stylist next to her to burst out laughing and Maria finishes what she was doing over there to come over to the table and talk out about her concert preparations, extremely happy someone asks her about it. but truth is that she has talked to f(x) and members of Super Junior about it already, and backstage at the music programs she has talked to SHINee about it (not boasting, just expressing her ultimate excitement for the concert) and now when telling Hannah about it she ends by mentioning that it is okay if Hannah can’t come. Just those words, to tell her it is okay, makes Hannah disappointed in herself; she want to go, she really want to go and sit there with the others in the audience and be the leader’s crazy fan and then go backstage to hug, cheer, celebrate and scream at how really great their princess captain is. Especially the first day, the first two concerts that is in just two days; Hannah can’t believe how their leader will pull that off, two concerts on Sunday and then tomorrow on Saturday it is their SM Town concert.

The disappointment that she won’t be there for Maria’s first solo concert is put in the back of her mind when SNSD’s Yoona sneaks inside the room and walks up behind Hannah to embrace her for a hug.

“Why haven’t you come to say hi to us?” Yoona complains cutely to Hannah before gliding in on the seat next too, still a skinny long arm around Hannah’s shoulders and she laughs at something Emelia says but Hannah can’t catch what it is as she is too busy saying she did greet them. Hannah did greet SNSD; not all of them though, but she hadn’t planned to run around and greet everyone as she had to go prepare for their rehearsals. Yoona is just teasing with her, giving Hannah a half-hug to which Hannah hugs back. Yoona sits there and talks with them, even pretending she is part of 5 Pieces when Jessica walks by outside the room, but Jessica of course just comes inside the room to talk to them, not getting the joke at all.

After a while, Hannah walks arm in arm with Yoona, heading to a bigger room where other artists are sharing the snacks. It is members of SNSD, EXO, Super Junior, DBSK’s Yunho is coming and going every other minute and Tiffany is trying to keep an eye on her own members. Hannah smiles when Kangin from Super Junior shines up when she and Yoona enters the room, loudly across the room he waves happily and then comes over to ask when Hannah came and asking how it was in Hong Kong – Hannah was in Shanghai – and he laughs, apologizing when saying everyone is going everywhere so it is hard to keep track. She knows what he means. The SM family is close; she knows a lot of people think they aren’t and she really doesn’t understand why. Sure, not all of them are close, but you are either super close or just know each other. What Hannah likes about them all is that they show respect to the seniors (Hannah can never be disrespectful to Super Junior and DBSK) and because she at times can make mistakes, they don’t get furious if she does that; they just correct her to let her know ‘til next time.

“What are you doing?” Hannah asks when leaning down to look over EXO Kai’s shoulder where he is sitting at the corner of the table, doing something on his cell phone instead of eating like most of the others there. She smiles when he looks up at her with an innocent face, and she laughs when his face-expression changes as he sees it is just Hannah, and he tells her he is playing some game. Hannah knows absolutely nothing about games, but she can watch it at times, so she stands there and looks for a minute or two before Yoona throws a bag of chips to her.

 

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“Good morning!”

Hannah laughs on Saturday, comfortably wearing leggings, sneakers and a wine red oversize round-neck t-shirt, as she is backstage to prepare for the final rehearsals when the iest voices on earth greets her in the corridor. She laughs as she runs over to him, hearing his voice and seeing him makes her life the best there is, and she giggles when finally being embraced by her boyfriend who just has arrived from the airport. She loves being with SM Town, because they all know about their relationship and though they love to tease the couple they don’t take too much notice of them. Like now, when they hug each other and Jonghyun kisses her on the cheek several of times just because he can do it here and none of s’ comments on it or teases them for it because everyone always misses someone.

“I missed you,” Jonghyun whispers in her ear before letting her go, smiling widely down at her. “You didn’t answer my text before.”

She smiles at him. “I saw it five minutes ago; and I thought you were almost here by then,” she answers. She can’t help but to have that teenage-crush smile in her face when looking at him. He is such an idol with the sunglasses on; he is classy from top to toe in a long-sleeve black t-shirt, fancy black pants and white big sneakers and a cap face backwards. He always looks so good.

“Excuses,” Jonghyun grimaces charmingly and kisses her on the head, smiling as they begin to walk after the others.

Hannah had woken up too early, excited that SHINee is coming today. She don’t want to count the days since last time she saw Jonghyun, to count the weeks because that just shows how silly she is, for missing him so much that she even counts the days. She had tried to not show her excitement, but Emelia was half awake so Hannah was sitting on her knees on the bed and jumping, quietly telling her friend that the concert is today and that Jonghyun is coming. Emelia and Maria both had thrown pillows at her, making the youngest laugh happily. Emelia had to tell the members of SNSD that; how crazy in love the youngest is.

Though being in love and Jonghyun just arrived, they part ways after a few minutes because of the rehearsals. Sure she has missed him, but not even love makes her blind for 5 Pieces; for their music and the feeling of performing together. The day’s rehearsals go well; everyone seems to be in a good mood backstage, focused on the rehearsals on stage and relaxing backstage.

In the middle of rehearsals they all take a break for lunch, some sitting in the big room together while others are sitting in their own rooms backstage. Hannah sits with some of the other members, mixed with SNSD and f(x), though she can’t say anyone really sits still for the whole meal. Sunny and Tiffany keeps running back and forth chasing each other, Jessica almost throws food at Emelia for teasing her with the food and Luna can’t stop talking with Carolina. Hannah just quietly eats her food; just half of it before she goes to another room to sneak the rest of it to Yoona and Donghae.

“I really don’t get you,” Donghae mumbles with his mouth filled with food; he is taking big bites of Hannah’s leftovers so Yoona won’t take it all. “This food is delicious.”

Hannah smiles while watching them eat her food. “I’m full,” she quietly answers, secretly taking glances at the door to make sure no one from her team enters. She has really been doing well with her eating schedule and finishing all meals (most of them anyway) but there are so many artists here to keep an eye on that she manages to sneak away with it; eating too much makes her feel sick and no one around her seem to understand that.

She looks guilty when seeing Jonghyun walk by the door. Just the glimpse of him passing by makes her feel guilty, worried he would catch her giving her lunch to others, but since he just passes by she quickly calms down again. She picks up a paper with questions for an interview later, sighing for herself while listening to the others talking. She is doing book signings tomorrow here in Beijing, interviews too, which is why she won’t make it for Maria’s concert. Hopefully, she can catch a glimpse of the second concert tomorrow.

Out of nowhere, Jonghyun moves a chair to sit next to her. It was his voice that made Hannah look up from the papers, and she looks terrified at the food as he asks Donghae and Yoona about the food they are eating, and she looks quickly down on her papers when Yoona answers that they are helping Hannah to finish her lunch. Jonghyun only nods at that, not saying anything to the others but he places his hand at the back of Hannah’s neck, something very natural for others but Hannah feels his fingers pressure lightly as if he is giving her a neck massage so she looks up at him, blinking in a try to not look guilty but personally knowing he is not happy about her giving away her food. He is just as annoying as her manager about that.

Slowly he leans closer to her, still his fingers massaging her neck, and with Hannah being nervous he moves his head next to hers to whisper in her ear; “I will tell the ladies.”

“I doubt that,” Hannah whispers back, and she smiles at the others in the room when patting him on his leg. Jonghyun chuckles, leaning away from her and when their eyes meet he looks very happy. He always seems so comfortable. She can’t help but to be amazed as he leans back in his chair, his hand resting on her back, and he puts one leg over the other, looking out over the room.

“Ay, did you hear the rumours by the way?” Donghae brings up, pointing his chopsticks at Jonghyun. “You two have apparently broken up.”

“That’s a false rumour, Oppa,” Yoona mentions the same time Jonghyun say’s he has heard about that.

“I know, but that’s what is being said,” Donghae smiles towards Yoona. “Even if SM came out with a statement, people don’t seem to believe it.”

“Fans asked me if it’s true at my book signing yesterday,” Hannah comments quietly. Jonghyun mutters something, and though she can’t hear what he says it makes her smile, and Donghae is talking about the articles and saying they are the most popular couple and so on. Hannah looks down at her papers and Jonghyun takes up his cell phone from his pocket, joining the conversation while Yoona and Donghae finish eating. While Hannah is looking at her papers, Jonghyun moves his chair closer so he can rest his head on her shoulder. He takes a picture with his cell phone from above of them; Jonghyun resting against her shoulder with his eyes closed and Hannah looking down at her papers so her face barely is seen. After taking a decent picture, Jonghyun glances down at Hannah’s papers. Donghae has left, and Yoona has joined the conversation of someone else.

“You didn’t eat your lunch?” Jonghyun asks in a low tone. He turns his attention to his cell phone when she takes a deep breath at his question.

“I ate most of it.”

“Do the ladies know that?”

“I do not think it is their concern if I finish eating my lunch or not,” Hannah mumbles, obviously showing she does not like the conversation. Jonghyun rubs his cheek against her shoulder, like a puppy wanting some affection. He shows her his cell phone, showing the picture he just took of them, and it takes seconds until Hannah sees that he has uploaded it on twitter.

“I don’t want people to think we have broken up,” Jonghyun whispers to her. To the picture he had charismatically written ‘still together’, and Hannah smiles at it, lightly kissing his head before she hits him extremely lightly with her paper as if telling him she has to focus. She don’t want people to think they have broken up either, but the picture doesn’t really show them in their happiest smiles exactly, though when she later looks on twitter she sees that the response is really good; saying it is a sweet moment in the picture between them, very natural. Someone even asked if Hannah knows he was taking that picture as she looks to not know about it.

It doesn’t take long until Manager Lee pops up by the door, calling out for 5 Pieces, and with only Hannah there he waves for her to come to their room. Hannah pouts but she gets up on her feet, cleans up the lunch, and when she is trying to pass by Jonghyun’s legs he is pouting out with his lips for a kiss. She gives him a quick one before embarrassedly leaving. Kissing in public is not something she is used to.

5 Pieces is starting to slightly prepare for make-up and change of clothes after lunch, preparing a little here and there between the rehearsals like the others are doing. Before the concert, they will do a press-conference (Maria is the chosen one from 5 Pieces doing it with SM Town’s leaders of the different groups) and interviews with all five members. Hannah barely says anything in all the interviews, and that is how it should be like. She is sitting on the side, just happy to be there with her members and knowing they will perform with SM Town in two hours. Because she isn’t talking anything, Hannah really tries to hold back her yawns during the interviews and she is stretching her back when she thinks no one is watching. Several of times, Julia sitting next to her asks if she is alright, and Hannah just nods; her back is aching a bit, uncomfortable when sitting down and horrible when standing up.

The group is wearing a black chiffon-trim symmetric-hem top for their first performance together and to match the top, Hannah is in a pair of y mash-panel leggings that matches the long top and the group is wearing the same pair of high heels. She feel tall and y in the whole make-up, even if her back is a pain, and as soon as the interviews are over she become the not-so-y member when lying down on the floor (without the high heels) and a trainer working for the concert is helping her to stretch out her legs and back by holding her legs straight up. She is lying on the floor in 5 Pieces’ room backstage, trying to stretch while listening to the ladies talking, singing, and preparing for the concert. The trainer asks about her back, Hannah mumbles low answers, not liking that she is lying on the floor – she is very aware of the door, not wanting anyone to catch her lying like this.

Carolina accidentally sings the Korean version of [Black & White], while they will do the English version, so Emelia sings the same part but the right version. Maria ignores everyone, being busy talking to the manager about something that Hannah can’t hear because of the other two singing louder and louder.

“Ya!” Maria eventually fires up, turning to Emelia and Carolina with a glare. “Shut up, will you? I am trying to keep a conversation here. Idiots.”

5 Pieces’ two first songs for the concert go really well. Hannah’s back is so-so but it doesn’t disturb the hot performance of [Black & White] and [Switch], and she makes one mistake during the second song after not performing it in a while, but it goes well that too as she just bumps in to Julia briefly and they both can’t hide their smiles for a few seconds. During their greetings between the two songs, Hannah gets surprised at the ladies fooling around with each other; Emelia keeps pinching Carolina on the , and then Julia does it on Carolina too and Maria out of nowhere kicks Emelia on the (for fans who didn’t see it can be thought to be out of nowhere, while she in fact saw the rapper pinch the mascot on the ). Fans maybe like it, but Hannah is surprised by it all as the ladies don’t go overboard – especially not at an SM Town concert. The other performances goes well too, in a good mood and a terrific audience, and in between when she is backstage, Hannah lies on her back to stretch it out.

For the final stage, with all SM Town together, everyone is wearing the SM Town family t-shirt, wearing it in their own way. Hannah wear sneakers matching her members to a pair of distressed skinny jeans, a tank top under the t-shirt like she has worn for almost every outfit and her hair is in two braids because her hair got too much in her face when she was dancing earlier that in her annoyance, she let her stylist braid it for her. While waiting next to the stage for the ending to begin, Hannah is just simply standing by herself, not looking anyone in the eye as she is in other thoughts; this will be the first time on stage together since they came out to be in a relationship – her and Jonghyun. They went on a music award program in the summer, but they weren’t really on the stage, mingling around other artists for one song where everyone is friendly and playful and doing as much fan-service as possible for their fans in the audience. She would lie if she said she wasn’t nervous, or worried, or troubled, by the fact that people will look at her and see “Jonghyun’s girlfriend” instead of “5 Pieces’ youngest”… Right? She got no idea actually, and the unknown part of doing the SM Town concert knowing that Jonghyun is somewhere near isn’t really something she wants to feel, as if he out of nowhere can be next to her when they are on the stage. What if she wants to hug him? Or hold his hand? She isn’t the kind who often wants that, but in a crowded place she has a habit to hold on to people.

She breathes in deeply and looks up at a frowning face looking back at her. EXO’s Kai looks so young and cute even if he is taller than her, and he makes her smile widely as she in embarrassment pushes his arm so he turns away from her. He laughs adorably, turning around back at her and looks like he is going to say something when s lead him up the stage as the music has begun. Hannah follows them, all artists going up to the stage from two sides and standing up in a line. Hannah hides behind some members of EXO, trying to see where her members could be. It’s easy to see the tall Maria, and Hannah looks the other side, not seeing them there and when looking again further away she thinks she can catch a glimpse of some of her members; it is Julia coming hand in hand with f(x)’s Luna.

Kai turns around from standing next to Luhan, seeing Hannah looking further away so he lightly holds out his hand as if he is going to touch her but when she looks at him he takes it down again.

“Why are you hiding?” he asks, his hand slightly waving next to his hip for her to step forward – obviously she can’t be seen behind the members in EXO.

She is pretty sure he was going to say something else before, but now on the stage when he asks that she just slinks behind him, moving his shoulder for him to face the front, without a word letting him know she has no interest to be in the spotlight. She can’t see how Kai is smiling wide like a child at her turning him away from her, and he smiles towards Luhan too who is innocently looking at the seniors being in control at the centre of the stage; those who are singing [Hope], that is. Kai looks over his shoulder to smile at Hannah, who grimaces at him. He keeps turning around at her.

Kangta begins to sing, and he is walking over to their side of the stage to follow it out on the extra stage, and the members of EXO are fast followers of him. Taemin comes hurrying up next to Hannah, and with an arm around her shoulder and the other around Kai, he is bouncing forward to follow the rest, telling the two under his arms that they are the three musketeers. Hannah laughs at it, but moves her head along to the music while lightly bouncing out with Taemin and Kai along the stage. She waves to her left at the audience, waving a little more, and Taemin waves his hand too by her shoulder, waving crazily so his hand almost hits her and Hannah jumps up and down just to make him groan because of the arm around her. She laughs by herself for it, laughing even more when Kai starts to jump too when noticing Taemin didn’t like it and Taemin gets away from them both, actually pushing Kai away from wanting to hurt him and Hannah is just laughing at them, stepping away to not be in the reach for their childish friendship fight.

She hits Taemin on the arm when he is walking backwards, moving his fists as if challenging Hannah and Kai, and Hannah just hits him when passing by, letting them continue whatever it is they do. Yoona comes jogging up next to her, happily linking arms with the blonde girl and they are taking turns waving to the right and to the left, turning to face fans on one side to the other to wave and bow to the audience. The music is loud, but the crowd tries to be even louder.

It takes a few seconds at the end of the stage before Hannah is alone waving to the audience furthest far away (it’s weird to say she is alone because the stage is crowded with artists, but no one really stands with her), stretching her arm out as if she will reach those who are hundred of meters away. Emelia drops by next to Hannah just briefly to wave but keeps going after that. Hannah continues to smile and when noticing everyone is going back to the big stage she gives a bow and starts going too. She only comes a bit before stopping on the side to wave to some fans on the side shouting her name in choir. And she smiles widely as they look very satisfied to get her attention. She is just about to keep walking when a pair of hands appears on each side of her head, stretching out to wave to the fans and in a reflex to have someone suddenly stand behind her, Hannah squats down and looks around with huge eyes. She laughs behind her hand, both for her weird reflex to squat down and for the one behind her.

“You have a bad habit of scaring me,” she laughs at Jonghyun, who looks super happy standing behind her, almost satisfied that he scared her.

“It’s your bad habit to easily get frightened,” he chuckles when helping her stand up, moving to still stand behind her to wave his hands like he did first, and Hannah just smiles and holds out her hands to wave too. When Jonghyun feels like he is done, he pulls her along to not get left behind by the others, his arm warmly around her shoulder and the closer to the main stage the reach the further down his hand gets; going from her shoulder down her back until he lightly holds on to her arm as they join in the crowd of SM Town’s artists.

 

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The third day in Beijing, Hannah is tired. They were up half the night at the after party with the SM Town family and now when everyone has gone back to Korea, Hannah is doing book signings and interviews. She is wearing a black v-neck long knit top fitting her figure to a black pleated plaid skirt showing off her legs that she gets to hide a little in a pair of sheer tights and today she couldn’t get away from the black patent panel stilettos chosen for the outfit, with a 13cm high heel – the good part is that she sits most of the time. Today she can’t hide behind her members or the other artists at SM Town; she must do the interviews alone, answer the questions and smile and be polite and really answering the questions well. Being tired makes it a little hard, especially when the one interviewing is annoying.

“In the first book ‘Joe – Under Seoul’s Streets’ the two characters Eli Salizar and Kun Yu got a lot of attention for their very cute interactions and now in the second book ‘Déjà Vu’ they continue to rise the scale of giggling fans. What everyone is probably asking is why you have not come clear about them being in a male to male relationship; is it your agency not wanting it to come out or are you planning some big reverse in up-coming books?”

His English is really good; it is just his tone that Hannah doesn’t really enjoy. The way he says ‘male to male relationship’, something about it goes on her nerves.

“I haven’t come clear about the two of them because readers can imagine it for themselves – I have met a lot of issues of readers not liking the hints of two men liking each other while others ask for more of it – so in a try to please everyone, including myself, I decided to write it in this way and let the readers decide for themselves what they want it to be like,” Hannah is answering, holding in her annoyance with a smile.

“But when you wrote the book, did you write the two of them as gay men?”

“No,” Hannah honestly shakes her head. “I don’t write any character based on which gender they like, I just let them … kind of, get along with the other characters differently…”

“There are no gay characters in your book then?”

“Use your imagination for that,” Hannah forces a laugh to not sound annoyed. “It’s a book you read and each person gets different messages out of it. That’s the fun with writing; no one imagines it the way you do.”

Hannah smiles, feeling a little proud over herself after those words because the interviewer gets quiet, blinking a few times and then nods, glancing down at his papers; she made him loose his words. She pulls through the interview, before shaking hands with him and getting to leave. She sighs and mutters when getting inside the car to go to the book signing, and Manager Lee just smirks, “A hard interview?” he asks even if he knows it was because he was there the whole time and saw the annoyance she tried to hide – she hided it well for others, but for her manager, it didn’t work.

“Painful,” Hannah mutters and throws a childish glare at him. “Oppa, do you have anything against men liking men? Is it something people really need to make a big deal out of? I mean, it’s not like I write about two guys kissing in the book; they hold hands and do things that I think is pretty normal after living in Korea for five years… It’s not being gay…”

Manager Lee is pretty sure she does not expect him to answer the way she mumbles on and on about it, letting out the frustration she can’t talk or ask during the interviews. In his note to Manager Lim, he will write that she is tired and cranky this Sunday.

During some of the interviews she has been doing today, she has really been struggling with the gay-questions.

Question: “Why do you write about two men having a relationship that is obviously gay but never mentioning that they are a couple?” Hannah: “Because they aren’t a couple”

Question: “Are they gay?” Hannah: “That’s for the reader to decide”

Question: “What made you decide to have a gay couple in your book?” Hannah: “Um… … Well… Their characters fitted in the story, I guess…”

She is tired explaining those two side-characters, over and over again saying that she has not decided if they are gay or not but that the readers can imagine it for themselves, that she didn’t think about it when writing and that she has no problem with the gay-assumptions readers make in it. Whenever she ends an interview, she turns to her manager, just looking at him to ask with her eyes if this is ever going to end. When they arrive at where the book signing will be held, they have prepared with photographers, a big poster by a wall for Hannah to stand there and be photographed and she answers some questions and it is really difficult to keep that smile by now. Ever since nine in the morning she has been doing interviews and book signings, now the final book signing in Beijing starts at 2PM. It maybe isn’t many hours, but to constantly have to smile, care how you look like and answer the same kind of questions over and over again, including the parts where she meet fans and smiles and writes her autograph; you get tired. And she is tired after last night, with the concert and enjoying the time with her friends afterwards. She likes to meet her fans; it is the interviews that annoy her.

The last book signing in Beijing is being held outdoor, and when Hannah’s car drives up on the side of the road she is for several seconds just frozen in her seat. The police have stopped them, first to confirm who they are and then to calm down the thousand of fans gathered, crowding out there for Hannah. She keeps leaning back and forth to try see as much as possible, but she has no idea of how big the crowd is, all she know is that the translator gets to speak Chinese to the police and then Korean to Manager Lee; they did not expect such a big crowd and the police need to re-arrange their positions for safety.

If the other members of 5 Pieces hadn’t already arrived in Korea, Hannah would think they would make a surprise appearance at the book signing or it could be a prank of some kind; why are there so many people? At the other book signing today it was also a lot of people. It’s insane!

Eventually she can get out of the car, Manager Lee leading the way and the audience is cheerfully and loudly singing 5 Pieces’ [Daze] (Hannah gets terrified they are expecting all five members to be here, will she disappoint them all? But the poster behind the table is of Hannah, to promote her book. They can’t expect 5 Pieces, right?). The crowd sings louder when Hannah walks up on where the table is, on top it is a bottle of water and three pens and some staff brings up two boxes filled with books that she will sign during the session. Hannah stands up behind the table, grabbing on to the microphone tightly with both hands when spacing out as the crowd before and around her is enormous. She looks a little lost at the translator next to her, and Manager Lee steps forward to see if her microphone is on before he tells her she can speak in English.

Slowly bringing the microphone to her lips, the whole crowd begins to die out, cheering but then dying out and she smiles in amaze at some people calling out for others to be quiet. She lets this whole place sink in for some seconds before she finds the words to greet them all in Chinese (greetings are okay in Chinese, her language isn’t that bad) and she pauses as the crowd screams loudly. Amazing! Hannah has no idea of how this could happen; she is in Beijing after being in Shanghai and what happened last week in Japan… this is just unbelievable.

She introduces herself in English, feeling much better than she had done during the interviews, and thanks everyone for coming, also explains a little about the book signing before cutely asks if they are ready to begin. She looks at her manager, not hiding how impressed she is with the loud crowd, and she smiles when taking a seat and waiting for it to begin. There are a lot of people walking back and forth around the table, and she has no idea of what they all are doing and neither does she really care as she is too busy trying to communicate with the fans closest to her. She waves and does hand motions, laughing when fans go crazy by her just taking notice of them. Manager Lee stands next to her, talking to her about what to do and what not to do and Hannah leans her head back to look tiredly up at him, pouting when he tells her to keep the smile for another hour. It probably won’t be too hard, because the crowd around them is too incredible to not smile and be amazed at.

Hannah picks up a pen, tries it on her hand to make sure it works right before the first fan steps up in front of her and the one hour of signing, shooting smiles and simple conversations with these amazing fans can begin. She smiles at every one of them, looks down to write her autograph and does her absolutely best to understand some of them when they try to speak in English but a lot of them are really fluent in the language and two girls really surprises Hannah when speaking in Korean (they are Korean students) and though they are a lot of Chinese fans there, she gets impressed by the many fans from other countries there are. One fan (Chinese) gives Hannah a post-it where it is asked ‘your favourite fan; Chinese or Korean?’ and she reads it while signing the book, and Hannah just can’t help but to glance up at the fan, seeing it is a girl biting her lip nervously with hands held together. Hannah hurries to write down ‘you’ with a heart on the post-it before putting it in the book, closes it and hands it to the girl with a big smile.

“Thank you!” the girl happily squeals, not knowing what Hannah wrote on the post-it and she keeps looking at Hannah as the guard guides her away for the next fan in line to come.

The next fan is a boy (there are quite a lot of boys), and his first comment is to say that he really like Hannah’s eyes because they are twinkling and Hannah blinks extra cutely at him just for that comment, laughing when thanking him for the compliment. Fans in the back are bursting out in screams at her blinking and the boy gets just really cute at it that he just quietly stares for her the rest of the time.

One by one they get in front of her, wanting to give her a compliment or ask a question and Hannah reacts pretty well on most of them. She is happy to meet such excited fans, to hear the crowd roar if Hannah gives a special smile or shake hand with a fan. In the middle of it all, the fans begin to chant her name and Hannah just spaces out at them. Hannah laughs at the girl who steps up in front of her next, so impressed with the chanting that it takes second to look from the fan’s face down to the bag the fan holds out for her.

“What’s this?” Hannah smiles at the girl, easily sticking with the good mood around her fans.

“Some vitamins,” the fan answers and begins to show the things in the little box, “this is for throat, very good for singers… This is, when tired, very good…”

A lot of healthy little packages that is good for different things, and Hannah shows interest in all of it before the staff tells her to sign the book; they put the box on the side to let Hannah focus on the book signing and when handing the book to the fan she thanks for the gift.

“Hi,” Hannah smiles at the next girl in line, beginning to sign the book right away.

“Hi… oh my god, I have watched your drama; you look perfect! You are always perfect… I saw you at the concert yesterday!”

“Really?” Hannah giggles at the fan’s excitement. “What did you think of the concert?”

“It was really the best… 5 Pieces is jjang,” the girl giggles back. Hannah smiles, finishing the signing and gives the book to the fan. “Could I…?” The girl holds out her hand, and Hannah takes it to shake with a smile. Manager Lee touches Hannah’s shoulder, and she gets distracted just a little when smiling at the next fan. Her manager whispers to her, making her look up at him with a frown.

“It’s okay. Could you just ask everyone to be a little more calm and careful?” Manager Lee suggests and points at the microphone on the side of the table. Hannah takes a deep breath, finishing signing for the fan and picks up the microphone when the next fan pops up in front of her. In English she do what she was asked; telling the crowd to be careful. Manager Lee told her that someone has fainted. Fainted! Hannah couldn’t notice it because of the noise and the many fans and being busy signing, there is an ambulance arriving far away from the crowd where some security guards and two girls are bringing their friend. Hannah turns to her manager when she has spoken in the microphone, asking if the girl is alright and he just nods, telling her not to think about it.

Ten minutes later, another fan faints. This time, Manager Lee does not tell Hannah about it but more likely makes sure the security tightens up for fans to calm down. It is the manager’s job to make sure Hannah does not know how serious it actually is that this many people are creating chaos, even the traffic is held up for fifteen minutes because there are too many people wanting to see the youngest of 5 Pieces. Manager Lee plays it cool, making sure the whole book signing finishes without anyone getting hurt (both fans who fainted are okay, just little overheated with excitement) and to end it all, Hannah asks the crowd if she can take a picture with them all and before she has to go, Hannah turns her back against the crowd, for a photographer to take a picture of Hannah with the happy fans behind her.

Before she will run off to the airport, Hannah sits down for her last interview. It is with Mnet, the global version so the interview is in English even if most of the staff is Koreans and it is the most comfortable interview Hannah has done all day. Maybe because they don’t bring up any weird questions about the book, and they bring up questions about other things too. Like one question; they mention that 5 Pieces have had a lot of solo activities this year, and wondering if Hannah will release any more solo songs, other than acting.

“At the moment I am more focused on the drama that I am filming and 5 Pieces is preparing for a comeback too next year, so there are no plans for me to do more solo promotions than the things I am doing now. But it is a big possibility that maybe next year, something might come out,” Hannah answers the question well.

“As we have seen now when you have gone outside Korea to promote your best selling novel ‘Joe’, is there a chance you will go full-out on this whole author-theme to release more books in the future?”

“Maybe not full-out but definitely, I would love to release more books after ‘Joe’ if I have something I would want to share.”

“When can that be…?” the interviewer tries to slink in a quick question and Hannah laughs, so aware of the cameras.

“I’m not sure… I don’t even know how many books ‘Joe’ will have, so we just have to wait and see.”

“Are you writing another book? Fans are curious about a third ‘Joe’ and if you are writing more on the side.”

“I am always writing something on the side, I think. But I have several of ideas, but I haven’t put anything in action yet. About ‘Joe’ … I have written the third book, and I am in the making of the fourth,” Hannah nods to her own answer, smiling widely afterwards as she finds herself funny when talking like this.

“Oh… Which means the next book might come out next year?” The interviewer points at her with eyebrows raised, his whole body says he is hoping she can reveal that and Hannah smiles so her teeth are shown.

“You can look out for the book to come out in 2015,” she answers, continuing to smile as the interviewer asks if she can really reveal that – yes, she can.

“Continuing with the questions; this is 5 Pieces’ fifth year together, and I know from an interview we did at the beginning of the year that 5 Pieces said you will celebrate throughout the whole year. Have you done that? I am very curious to know.”

Hannah laughs; she can clearly remember how the girls at the end of 2012, beginning of 2013, kept repeating that they are amazed to celebrate five years since debut and since going to Korea that they would do it all year long. “Um…” she laughs, trying to gather her thoughts before answering; “I would say we have celebrated our anniversary whenever we have gotten the chance. I mean, we went on a Japan Tour at the beginning of the year and it was such an experience, and we met so many different fans and we had something to celebrate almost every day, and then we have started our BLACK & WHITE tour that I think we have really used as a gift for our fans to show 5 Pieces’ past five years since debut. We are really celebrating this year with the members, our fans and the crew. Yeah…”

“You were here in Beijing yesterday too, for the SM Town concert,” the interviewer mentions. “It is the first SM Town concert in a year; how was it to meet all the other artists, to have everyone under the same roof again?”

“Um…” Hannah starts off and laughs for herself. “It was really fun, actually, we always have fun when we meet and everyone were really … we fooled around a lot and it was fun to bring it to the stage too for our fans to see.”

“Is there any artist you look forward to meet the most when SM Town gathers, someone who you have gotten close to but can’t often meet? This is actually a hot topic, you got no idea of how many fans wanting to know this one, as we all know you are dating one of the members under an SM group (I won’t say any names, but everyone knows it still)… But yeah, any friend you look forward to meet when knowing SM Town is gathering for a concert?”

“Wow… that’s difficult,” Hannah smiles, taking it all lightly because this interviewer really knows how to talk and stay the energy up. She touches her hair when thinking of it, biting her lip while smiling. “Um… For this concert, I was actually very excited to just perform with my members because we have worked a lot apart lately. Other than the members, I was really excited to just meet everyone and to get this usually feeling we all have when meeting up.”

“Yeah, but there must be one person you had in mind, someone you think of when I bring this up? Is it someone special?”

“Fine. If I have to say someone, it is SNSD’s Yoona. I could bring up all names of all teams but I will say her name,” Hannah laughs.

“Why Yoona? Is there a special friendship between you two?”

She can’t help but to laugh at him repeating to say ‘special’. “It’s nothing special, it’s just … I don’t know. Ha-ha, this is making me look so weird. It’s so fun just to meet everyone and talk backstage and hang out, you know…”

“So we know you are close to the other female artists such as SNSD… I’m maybe going too far out on the edge, but I will take the risk. 5 Pieces is very popular as supportive seniors of SM’s latest hot artists – EXO. Who are the most handsome members in EXO?”

“The most handsome? Well… hi-hi, most of them are very handsome and they are all very charming, but … oh jeez… um… I’ll say Kai. EXO’s Kai.”

“Do you have a reason for that? What makes him handsome?”

In the middle of his question, Hannah laughs behind her hand, shy about the conversation and especially since she has met the interviewer and crew many times before. “I like his smile. He is really handsome but when he smiles he looks like a little kid,” she answers when she is done laughing but begins laughing again when commenting that she must seem so weird but she know it is normal questions in Korea; it just feels weird to say it in English.

“If we go back to your book, one thing that has been getting a lot of attention since the first book came out is the characters. Do you really write full stories about each character that appears in the books? That must make you very organized…”

“I’m not organized,” Hannah shakes her head with a smile. “I mean, I am more of a controlled person; I need to know everything about everyone so when I started off writing and I was focusing more and more on details I ended up writing the history of the characters, so I have like … three pages of each character in the books, those who appears in more than one scene.”

“But how do you come up with all that? The whole book is a lot about fantasy and the characters grab a lot of attention because each character is so sorted out and detailed, but how can you come up with all of that?”

“With time, it works,” Hannah calmly says while nodding, then smiles. “I don’t write everything at once. The characters kind of grow the more I write in the book, some characters are easier to write than others and I mark the questions to remember them… I ask people for help too, you know, I couldn’t have done it without hearing a lot of other people’s perspective.”

“What question have you asked the most to these people who have helped you out?”

“Um… About reactions, I think. It should be that… because the book is about vampires and, yeah, a lot about fantasy, so I asked help to know how these characters would react to different things. When I write, I kind of depend the rest of the scene on how the characters react to things. So if I don’t have that clear, it can all go wrong, so I depend a lot to ask for help.”

“Is it the members in 5 Pieces who you ask mostly?”

“Yes, it is. Emelia know a lot about the fantasy part, so she has crazy ideas and she is really good with details and she loves to read through what I have written to help me improve and the members really know how I want it to be like so it is really helpful to have them helping out,” Hannah answers.

She blinks when a staff raises her hand when stepping forward, and from behind the camera she says in Korean; “’Joe – Déjà Vu’ has made a record in ASIA to be the most inspiring fantasy novel of the decade! Best Selling in China on number 7, too”

Hannah just smiles widely, looking to the back where Manager Lee is standing. She is about to cry, her head just repeating what is happening? It is something out of reach what the woman just said. Two days ago, ‘Joe’ was on Best Selling list on number 168; in two days she is on number 7? As soon as this interview ends, she takes the picture they had taken of her and the crowd at the book signing to upload it on Instagram and twitter – SM uploads it on their pages too.

{Instagram, bunny92hannah: Was just told that ‘Joe – Déjà Vu’ is breaking records? Most Inspiring Fantasy Novel!! It’s all thanks to you all! This is amazing, YOU are amazing, thank you so much. I am speechless after today, You are really something out of the ordinary, thank you~~~~~}

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Headline 18th: 5 Pieces’ Hannah Reveals Japanese PV Teaser For Hit Song [I CRY]

Headline 18th: 5 Pieces’ Maria Is A Classy Girls In New Instagram Pictures

Headline 18th: Emelia Makes Her [Missing] Comeback on Music Bank

Headline 18th: Maria Performs [Princess] + Wins On Music Bank

Headline 18th: SM Entertainment Shows Lovely Pictures Of 5 Pieces During SM Town Rehearsals In Beijing

 

Headline 19th: EM 2nd Solo Single [Missing] Released!

Headline 19th: SHINee’s Jonghyun Uploads Couple Picture To Calm Worried Fans About Recent Rumours

Headline 19th: 5 Pieces’ Maria Scales Her Voice On TOP10 Among Female Idols

Headline 19th: Maria Performs [Princess] On Music Core

Headline 19th: ‘We Got Married’ Airs Episode 49 With The “Model Couple”

 

Headline 20th: Hannah Make Two Fans Faint During ‘Joe – Déjà Vu’ Book Signing In Beijing!

Headline 20th: ‘Joe – Deja Vu’ Make New Records As The Most Inspiring Fantasy Novel Of The Decade

Headline 20th: EM Is [Missing] In Her Comeback Performance On Inkigayo + Maria Performs [Princess]

Headline 20th: Maria Wins On Inkigayo With [Princess]

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X. devonalias

Thanks for commenting wintertmm =) Yeah, just imagine a police out from a mall xD