After Shimshimtapa, 5 Pieces head to the agency to practice for their Beijing performance. The first thing Hannah is told is to go practice a special dance performance to join the other ladies after an hour; all five ladies will do duets or solo performances in Beijing of their solo activities from 2013, so they all will practice on their own for an hour before joining up to practice all together for the rest of their stage. So Hannah goes to one of the practice rooms, her make-up as perfect as before but the locks in her hair has started to fall a little (she love the strong hairspray their stylist uses, it works) and she changes into a pair of washed skinny jeans that are easy to move around in and a lettering long-sleeve top, feeling ready for a night in the practice-room.

Not having a clue about what kind of dance performance she is expected to do, she do expect to be met in the practice-room by their dance teacher, but when opening the door to the room she stops halfway inside to glance around. The person who had been dancing stops at her small entrance, and Hannah finds herself frowning when glancing through the room.

“Nuna, you’re here,” EXO’s Kai smiles politely and stands up with his hands firmly together in a polite position. Always tall and handsome, Kai is wearing a simple grey sweater and dark jeans, hiding his hair under a black cap, but no matter how handsome he is it doesn’t change the fact that he was expecting Hannah when she was expecting her teacher.

“Am I supposed to be here?”

It sounds completely stupid when the question is spoken, but Hannah doesn’t know how else to ask, too surprised to not see her dance teacher stand with hands on her hip and ask why Hannah is late with her small eyes judging her for not coming in time. Instead, Kai is smiling at her.

“No one told you we will dance together?” He is smiling as if her question is amusing him; Hannah doesn’t know he is amused by her way to look out behind the door and look like she is entering class late and is waiting for the opportunity to sneak inside without being noticed.

“You and me? They expect me to learn a new choreography in an hour?” Hannah frowns again and stands up straight, stepping inside the room. She knows that EXO will also perform at the festival in Beijing – Maria will perform her song [A Better Day] with Chanyeol and the ladies will also sing their song [Someone who is stupid over love] with Chen – but she had no idea she would be performing with Kai.

“We’re doing [It Girl], we have done it before so we are just going through it,” Kai explains to her, that smile still printed on his lips as he keeps his eyes on her. “I went through it earlier with the teacher, but she went home to sleep before we will go to China in the morning.”

“So…” Hannah says while slowly breathing in, glancing around the room again, “it’s just you and me doing the dance?”

“A dance duet,” he nods. “They really told you nothing?”

“They told me place and time,” Hannah mutters, sighing when realising she is going to perform Jason Derulo’s [It Girl] once again.

“You don’t like it?” Kai asks, and that smile is growing handsomely in his face that when Hannah glances at him, she can just smile back.

Shaking her head in response, she instead asks if he is going to be her teacher as she has a very bad memory. Kai smiles widely and she thinks he smiles because dancing is something he is good at. He tells her they will go through the song step by step together and he will show her the changes – since they have before performed the song with other SM artists it is shaped to fit more people, so Kai and the dance teacher had gone through some changes for it to fit a dance duet – and slowly, without any music, the two of them starts to dance while facing the mirror. Hannah copies Kai too much the first time, making him laugh when reminding her she has the female role.

“Can’t we do it with music first? To see if I can remember something,” Hannah suggests with a pout, only feeling bad that he is a great dancer and she is not. Hopefully, his laugh will not become annoyed within an hour; and hopefully, Hannah will remember the choreography.

Kai walks over to the stereo where his cell phone is connected to start playing the song, and right away Hannah can remember by the sound. He is smiling when coming back to stand with a meter’s distance between their arms; maybe he saw her face ease up a little by the music. They start dancing again, Kai keeping an eye on Hannah who lightly is doing certain parts while she remembers others more, and he notices she remembers the points and flow of the dance, which will make it easier to go through it and learn it anew.

She was right that the music brings back her memory, and after practicing with the song two times they start doing it step by step without the music; Kai directs her for the changes and they repeat the parts she does wrong. The song has been cut off to fit the two minute length, but two minutes dancing can be enough. After just ten minutes, something else distracts Hannah. She keeps seeing Kai lift up the cap, take his hand through his hair to the back and put the cap back on, and she think he does it in a habit because he seem to do it every other second even when dancing and it is really annoying when looking in a mirror and you are supposed to focus on following his movements.

Eventually, Hannah really can’t stand it. They are still dancing without music, slowly going through each step from the beginning with Kai again doing that bad habit with the cap, when Hannah abruptly grabs his cap and throws it to the side where she earlier saw his jacket lying. Kai just stares at her, not of annoyance or from getting upset, but just pure surprise that she suddenly threw his cap away; big eyes looking at her.

“It was annoying,” Hannah defends her self lightly, nudging his arm for him to turn back to the mirror. She is muttering. “Let’s continue…”

When she starts to go through the steps he follows her, and through the mirror she can see how he is smiling again. In the choreography, they are both supposed to make a twirl and shift positions (Hannah tends to lower her head and hold in her arms as she a long time ago always bumped into him) and this time when twirling she spots Kai just stepping to the side to take the position (where did the twirl go?), and it makes her keep her eyes on him while they continue dancing.

“You’re not focused,” Kai laughs lightly in his deep voice, as he knew the reason for her confused look at him.

“Are you focused then?” she jokes and pushes him back to their first positions, to do it over again.

Kai laughs in his hoarse way, making the twirl this time just because he knows she will repeat it until he does it right, but it is funny for him that she focuses on small things like that when she knew he was still thinking of the cap she threw off him. They are both smiling when continue with the dance, their focus on their movements but they are still smiling.

Hannah think Kai is a very talented dancer, and he is passionate about it too; which is why she likes him. He is tall and handsome and just with a smile he gets really cute, he has this outer charm about it, but he is also very shy so with the shyness and cute smile he becomes like a junior you want to show how to do things for. Hannah remembers around the time when EXO were about to debut, EXO-K had appeared as guests on the variety game show 5 Pieces were doing and they were at an amusement park; the members of EXO did anything 5 Pieces said because the ladies are their seniors. Hannah laughed after the fan-cams of that day were seen online, fans noticing how Kai and other EXO members would either bow or wave whenever Hannah did it – even on the stage after that, he has done as she said. If she waves to the fans, he follows.

Though Hannah is charmed by Kai, she has no idea of all the things going through his mind when he is around her. Like any other person around her, he is amazed by Hannah, surprised when she does something suddenly. As a senior she is someone you can easily ask questions to, someone you can stand behind and follow because she always knows the right way to treat others. She is fun to be around with too, a person who it is easy to smile around. What Kai really likes is that Hannah is awkward in a cute way, she fits perfectly around him and Taemin in many ways and like exactly every other person in Korea, he can’t stop looking at her. Anything Hannah does it worth to see. He likes that she only jokes about the junior-senior thing, and she doesn’t mind letting him lead and be bossy. He personally thinks they have a lot of things in common to be friends, but with both of them being shy he tends to just follow her instead of actually talk to her, which makes it a little awkward yet comfortable to practice together today.

Both focused on practicing the song, repeating it a few times and Hannah getting a hang on it, forty minutes passes by very quickly. Kai hasn’t put the cap back on, but his hand automatically goes through his hair a little now and then. It isn’t annoying at all for Hannah; she was just annoyed at the cap before.

“Are you supposed to hold my hand or … what are you supposed to do?”

They have repeated the song too many times to count, but only now Kai dares to ask what to do. Kai hadn’t pointed it out earlier and Hannah kind of hoped he wouldn’t as she isn’t sure either while she still does the part differently each time as she doesn’t know where to keep her hands. It is a part in the song that goes *if I get your body close not letting go*, Kai will glide up behind Hannah and hold his hands at the front by her waist, and Kai asks the question when taking a few steps away after going through the choreography again. Hannah can not remember if they did this part before when performing it with SM Town.

“Um…” Hannah pulls out on the answer when he steps up next to her, scratching his head and looking like he is imagining the different ways they have done it so far.

“Nuna should decide,” Kai offers it to her.

She pouts up at him, noticing the height difference when he is so close. Again she admires how handsome he is. “You’re the great dancer; decide what looks best,” she tries to put it on Kai, and he closes his eyes in a smile, taking a step back but step back up, motioning for her to do the part.

Too awkward, Kai glides up behind her, his hands on her waist and eyes piercing in the mirror in front of them. Hannah gets aware of how his body touches hers when his hands feel to glide around her, and awkwardly she puts her hands on his while they are together in synch moving right to left with their bodies with the melody going through their heads individually. Kai stops moving and looks over her shoulder, Hannah leans her head on the side as if his head is too close to hers while Kai tries to focus on their hands.

“It looks …” Kai starts to say, looking up at their mirror reflection and something in what he sees makes him back away, the space between them gets wider and his hands leaves her waist. He gives out a cough to distract himself.

Hannah looks at him in the mirror, waiting for him to continue while completely ignoring how weird it just felt. Her heart is beating through her whole upper-body, not sure why when they have been dancing a lot together before. She is usually very good to dance with others; it’s only Jonghyun who makes her feel weird and embarrassed.

“If I have my hands like this,” Kai quietly says and steps up next to her, coming up on her left side and glides his left hand around her waist with his fingers lightly spread. “So you can put your fingers between mine a bit.” He isn’t standing closely behind her, more next to her so he can lean forward to see when Hannah puts her left hand on top of his, none of them smiling anymore even if her short fingers look cute when slinking in between his. “It looks more intimate, which … is good, for the performance. The song.”

“Ah,” Hannah breathes out, taking her hand away and steps back, showing she is prepared to try it for real and Kai takes a deep breath when doing the same.

They try just that part, both of them moving slowly and holding their breaths when doing the same thing with Kai standing behind Hannah and both of them looking at their mirror reflection. The feeling between them is awkward, but their hands look good as they want it to be. Quickly Kai moves away from her when the part is over, suggesting them to take the song from beginning again.

Ignorance. Hannah does her best to ignore how nervous she is to practice the dance now, not sure what changed all of a sudden and with the music the choreography is faster and they are more focused on moving than anything else. It would be easier to ignore the weirdness if Kai didn’t look so guilty for the next ten minutes. He won’t look at her, nor smile like before either, definitely not making things easier.

With ten minutes left, Maria peeks inside the room, smiling widely when coming inside and she sits down at the back to watch them finish their practice. She doesn’t interrupt other than waving for them to not mind her, and Maria keeps smiling as the duet finishes the song and she then claps her hands tiredly.

“Well done, babies,” Maria says and gives the thumb up. “It looked great. Are you done now?”

“It’s ten minutes left,” Hannah reminds her, but on the inside she can’t wait to actually start practice with her members. Automatically when the song ended, she and Kai took a small step away from each other. He isn’t talkative when Maria is around, but he still looks guilty like he did before she came inside.

“Who cares? It’s three in the morning, I’m tired and hungry and I really want us to start practice so it can finish,” Maria says with the logic only working in her head. Hannah looks at Kai, leaning her head back a bit and feeling her eyelids almost closing when asking if it is okay for him.

“It’s okay… We could always practice more before the performance,” Kai quietly says and walks over to his things when Maria cheers that it is great.

“Sleep well!” Maria shouts after Kai when he leaves the room bowing at them. As soon as he has left, Hannah walks over to the leader to help her up on the feet so they can go to the other practice-room. “He has such a big crush on you.”

Maria’s blunt comment makes Hannah stare at her in shock. “What?”

“Kai. The pretty boy. He has such a big crush on you,” Maria smiles as they walk down the stairs, “But I guess that’s obvious when you two are practicing alone in the middle of the night.”

“He doesn’t have a crush on me,” Hannah quietly says, at the same time as a voice in her mind comments something alike; ‘I have a crush on him’. She shakes the voice away, finding it ridiculous.

“Baby, it is-”

“Not everyone I am around have a crush on me, Maria,” Hannah mutters in annoyance, taking a few faster steps to get inside the practice-room first, ignoring the face she knows Maria got at Hannah’s tone.

 

Four hours are spent in the practice-room with 5 Pieces before the ladies head home for a quick shower and then they head off to the airport. Hannah dresses up in sneakers, skinny jeans, the same lettering long-sleeve top she wore at the agency because she had taken it off during 5 Pieces’ practice to wear the tank top underneath and she finishes off the outfit wearing the warm faux-fur hooded drawstring-waist coat in black that she has been using under the winter. She is ready to go abroad in the outfit.

“Then I’ll sleep on the plane,” Carolina is saying next to Hannah in the van. Hannah hasn’t been listening to the conversation other than knowing Carolina thought they would go home and sleep for an hour or two before leaving, just to head straight in the van when she had showered which upset her a little.

“You know it will take less than two hours to get there, right?” Julia asks from the seat in front of them, not optimistic about getting some sleep in some hours, “Including the take-off and landing.”

“Well… I’ll still get some sleep,” Carolina is the only optimistic one. According to Julia and Emelia, she is the stupid one.

Hannah looks back down at her cell phone when noticing Carolina glancing at her, maybe waiting for someone to back her up and say she will be able to get some sleep, but Hannah is not in the mood to talk about sleep. She has the list of songs they will perform written on her cell phone as well as a play list with the songs that she through her earphones is going through one by one. Twenty songs in total, six of them are solo/duets, and the last song is [(Dare to) Face Me]; 5 Pieces’ new international track for the single coming out this month. It will be their first time performing it, the music video came out last month and Hannah is super happy they will not perform the song live as she is too busy remembering the choreography. Though she think it would be truly amazing to get some hours of sleep, her mind is thinking of too much for her to relax enough on that. Her mind is pretty much only about these songs they will perform, a little thought is of the schedule after tonight’s performance when they will rush back to Korea to pre-record their performance for Music Core that will air tomorrow on Saturday, a little more than that she is thinking of what time it is to know when she can call her boyfriend who wants her to call before leaving.

The drive to the airport goes surprisingly fast, maybe because Hannah is in other thoughts so she doesn’t notice all the conversations Carolina tries to bring up with a fail since no one else is talkative or interested in being social at the moment; the ladies are tired, and even if Julia wasn’t on her best side when telling Carolina about the short flight, she will most probably take a nap once they board too.

Arriving at the airport, Hannah follows Julia’s advice from when they were at the apartment to put on a pair of dark sunglasses. Without any make-up and knowing there are people at the airport, the ladies are often told to either put on a light foundation or cover themselves somehow when they go to the airport because of the trend ‘airport fashion’. Hannah never really cares about that, she finds it annoying since they at times spend twenty hours on the plane and she has no interest in wanting to look her best when boarding or getting off – it’s silly for this sensitive idol. But she puts on sunglasses, when being out of the van stretching her legs she hugs the jacket around her and the shoulder-bag hanging down her shoulder; the bag has everything she need for this flight.

“Be prepared,” Julia whispers to Hannah when linking her arm to start walk inside the airport together. “Oppa will soon remind us of our passports.”

And seconds later as they all head towards the doors together, Manager Lee is reminding the ladies to have their passports ready so they can check-in right away. Hannah smiles at Julia, the short-haired girl smiling brightly as if that is the funniest thing happening for this morning. Julia has neither make-up nor her sandy-blonde hair styled this morning after the shower so instead she is hiding under a cute beanie and sunglasses, also wearing a winter jacket on top of the knit top and maxi tank dress. From time to time, it is fun to dress up at the airport, but just today the ladies are okay going comfortable since they were practicing the whole night.

The airport is crowded. Why? Because a lot of people seem to know that 5 Pieces and EXO are both heading to China in the morning, and that means the noise grows louder when 5 Pieces enters the airport. On a distance, fans stay away while some photographers try to pass by in front of the ladies to catch their pictures. It goes fast. The ladies go up on the escalator, and Hannah’s hand holding on to her cell phone in the jacket pocket starts to vibrate – perfect timing.

She picks up the phone with her body turned towards Julia standing closest to her in the escalator, picking up the pink phone case hugging her phone and sees that it is who she expected calling her.

“Hello,” Hannah answers in a low voice, covering her free ear as there are some people screaming behind her. The soft voice on the other line is barely heard, but as soon as she hears it, she smiles. “I’m at the airport, it’s a little loud.”

Jonghyun couldn’t care less that it’s loud as they keep talking for several minutes, he tells her to be careful though. Hannah holds on to Julia’s arm when she is on the phone, looking down most of the time. Julia teases her one time when they wait to go through security, putting her passport by Hannah’s free ear and smiling at Hannah while imitating Hannah’s way to try keeping the conversation private in a low tone. It is soon after that she hangs up, promising Jonghyun to text him as soon as they come back again and with the phone in one hand and passport in the other; Hannah wraps her arms around Julia. Julia laughs at it, not sure if the youngest does it because Jonghyun ends the call with “I love you”, if she is tired or just revenge that Julia kept listening to the conversation.

“If you’re planning on using your cuteness on me to let Jonghyun come by the apartment when we all want to sleep; I won’t fall for it,” Julia warns Hannah in a smiling voice.

“I’m not,” Hannah whines, putting down her arms with a pout at her friend. “I’m not doing that…”

“Using your cuteness, you mean?” Julia jokes, imitating Hannah’s pout that makes Hannah laughs and nudge her arm.

Yesterday when they were doing their promotions, all from interviews to radio appearances, Julia had been talking to Emelia the whole time, laughing and joking the same way she used to do with Hannah when the two of them stood next to each other. Even when going through security, Julia is imitating Hannah so the youngest can’t stop laughing. The two of them get through first and without waiting for the others they walk through after putting on their jackets again, knowing where to go wait to board the plane. With their arms linked, they try to find somewhere to sit and Hannah is putting her sunglasses away too, but they both spots something else instead of a bunch of empty seats that makes Julia shine up and fasten her steps.

“No wonder it is chaos out there,” Julia says when walking up to where EXO’s twelve members are relaxed sitting on two rows of seats. Hannah follows her to take a seat with the boys. “Have you been here for long?”

They all greet each other, the junior-group polite when greeting and answering Julia’s question but Hannah just sees how Kai sitting further down the line of seat take off the cap he had been wearing, taking his hand through his hair and keeping the cap in his hand, not putting it back on since he saw Hannah. Maybe he thinks she doesn’t like caps…

Hannah turns to look somewhere else, unlike when she was at Shindong’s radio last night she has no intention to be the talkative one here – especially since Julia seem to manage that very well herself – and instead watches the other members come up to them, Emelia giving some comment about wolves leaving their cave and Manager Lee sighing when telling Hannah and Julia to not walk off alone next time.

“You always create trouble for each other,” Chanyeol tells them with a smile when hearing the Manager mention Julia and Hannah walked away. Maria has no idea of what he is talking about but she just sees the small candy bag in his hand, asking if she could try one.

Emelia sits down on Hannah’s lap, not caring that the youngest groans at it, and Hannah is now hidden behind Emelia’s thick jacket, which only makes Hannah lean her head against it and close her eyes tiredly. The ladies that were quiet in the van are now talkative, Carolina stays the quiet one and the EXO members seem happy with the company too. Sehun has been sitting with a tablet next to Julia, playing some game that the short-haired lady has gotten very interested in and Emelia too is leaning to the side to see it. Hannah keeps resting her head on Emelia’s back, blinking as she can see beyond the other’s heads where Kai is sitting, not seeing much with Lay sitting straight in between.

She can’t help but to wonder what happened during their practice, if she was just filled with emotions that has come with the New Year and great promotions, she sighs when thinking of how nervous she had gotten last night. She can’t understand it. It was really weird.

“You really went straight here from practice?” Baekhyun looks fascinated at Emelia who said they haven’t gotten any sleep because they were practicing. Most of the EXO boys are interested. “You look really pretty even if you haven’t gotten any sleep.”

Hannah is smiling behind Emelia’s back, happy no one can see her. Baekhyun love to compliment them, she has heard him many times saying they are pretty and that he can not see they are tired because of how pretty they are – the fan-boy in him can’t help it. Hannah glances down by the seats again, still smiling over Baekhyun’s comment; her smile stiffens when seeing Kai looking at her. He had leaned back in his seat, looking like he just glanced around when their eyes met and while Kai didn’t look away at first, Hannah lowered her gaze right away to look at Julia and Sehun instead. Too weird

“What game do you have?” Sehun asks Emelia who is picking up her tablet from her bag. Julia sitting between them leans back, smiling at Hannah.

“Geeks,” Julia tells Hannah, them both smiling now.

“A second ago you were emerged in it too,” Hannah tells her friend, blinking tiredly against Emelia’s back. Julia laughs tiredly, admitting she did just a few seconds ago have her eyes stuck on Sehun’s game and giving him advice.

They sit there, talking and exchanging snacks, Hannah’s legs hurt from Emelia’s bony and she doesn’t really follow any particular conversation but to rest her head on Emelia’s back is really comfortable. Julia nudges her on the side when they are able to board the plane, everyone getting up. Hannah pouts when following them all to get in line to board, her body tired because she has been resting on Emelia.

“Are you sleepwalking?”

Hannah looks up over her shoulder at the person walking up behind her, seeing Kai putting on the cap again with a small smile in his face. “Why? Jealous I can do two things at the same time?” she jokes with him, hugging on to Emelia’s arm while looking at that handsome face. Their practice might end weirdly, but the smile he gives her, the question he asked, the weirdness from practice has completely disappeared.

“Yes, very jealous,” Kai chuckle, not for a bit taking her joke more than a joke and it makes Hannah smile.

“Did you sleep well?” Hannah asks him kindly. Kai nods and a smile grow in his face when Luhan quietly says that Kai was playing games all night. “I’m sure he did.”

Boys are always playing games, everyone she knows like the same things and Hannah can not understand it at all. Her members like it too, playing games on their tablets and playing online with other idols – Emelia and Sehun did it just a few minutes ago – and Hannah just spaces out whenever others are playing. Kai tries to tell her that he didn’t play all night, saying he was practicing the song before going to sleep too, but Luhan is saying Kai was playing all night. Why one of them would change the truth, Hannah really has no idea, so she just smiles and turns to the front to know when they will board.

For the one hour and forty-one minutes in air, the five members of 5 Pieces ignore their surrounding to get some sleep. Who knows when they will get time to sleep next time, but they all are woken up to prepare for the landing and Hannah looks next to her, seeing Maria sleeping with open wide.

“You ladies seem to have been busy lately,” Kai mentions, sitting in the double seat next to them. “Carolina is even snoring.”

“Carolina has a cold,” Hannah defends her friend, but she smiles as she had woken up earlier because of Carolina snoring. She feels bad to Carolina though, whose cold doesn’t seem to change at all. But she can understand Kai’s comment; the ladies became their unsocial selves when boarding, knowing they needed to get some sleep if they want to manage their day. She still wakes Maria up, so when they land the leader can be ready without any drool going down her chin and she their manager trying to make sure the ladies are awake and looking decent once they have arrived at the Beijing airport.

Hannah is standing up as soon as she sees the EXO members around them do the same, putting on her jacket and checking so she has cell phone, sunglasses, chewing-gum, passport and earphones in her jacket pockets while the other necessary things are in her bag.

“You’re so slow,” Hannah pouts as Maria is still sitting down.

“Why being in a hurry? The fans will wait some more minutes for us,” Maria yawns and stretches out her legs as if making sure Hannah will not walk by her. Kai and Chanyeol both bows politely when saying they will go first, following their own members. As soon as Maria stands up, Hannah starts pushing her out from their seats. Maria laughs, not sure why Hannah has a hurry to get out with everyone else, and honestly, Hannah doesn’t know either. She doesn’t like being late, though she knows everyone else will wait for them to go through the airport together as they know it will be crowded with fans and journalists – EXO and 5 Pieces have come to Beijing, of course people are there – and the two girls leave the plane without being the last ones.

They come up behind Xiumin and Baekhyun, with no surprise they seem to be talking about a game Baekhyun had downloaded before the flight. Maria is talking about her nails, eyeing them closely and from afar before letting Hannah look at them to ask if she should fix them some more. Hannah just yawns, saying she doesn’t know but still smiles at Maria who can’t stop talking about her nails. Hannah takes a glance at her own nails, then sees Chen who came up behind them show them his and ask if his are worthy to look at too – making the ladies laugh.

The two groups walk together through the airport. 5 Pieces move to be at the front and EXO at the back, moving tightly together while security and managers around them and they work hard to walk through the tight crowd of fans and journalists. The noise is really loud, the shouts and voices, names being screamed, cries are heard, the panic in your chest as your heart beats as fast as a train rushing by on the rails. Hannah is walking behind Maria, the leader making sure to feel Hannah’s hand gripped her arm tightly as they are being pushed forward. Sunglasses and hair: that is what Hannah uses to cover herself when they are being pushed through the crowd, leaning her face down a little as if hiding behind Maria. Maria is hiding too, her long figure not able to hide her well as she is above most people, but she too is wearing sunglasses and she has pulled on the hood of her jacket to hide herself. It works well, covering their faces but the screaming around them is the same as if they would walk out with heads held high too.

Being thankful to be surrounded at the airport is difficult, because it takes four times longer to get out of there than how it normally would be. Being thankful to have fans wanting to catch a glimpse of you at every possible chance, that is something you don’t take for granted. The ladies have been doing this for five years by now, they know how to behave when rushing through an airport, to stick to what they were instructed before heading out, and they know that among all airports in the world, no place is as crazy to arrive in as Beijing’s airport.

Outside the airport, three vans are waiting. 5 Pieces get in the one at the back while EXO share the first two. Within seconds they get in the van, hurrying in to get away from the crowd following, but even when they get out on the road they are stalked.

 

Rehearsing for tonight’s New Year Festival concert, the ladies can’t stop practicing. Backstage they are polite, Emelia and Julia doing the talking in Chinese to the staff and other artists that will perform, but as soon as they can they lock themselves in some space to practice. On stage they are serious, rehearsing and speaking in English as only two ladies speak Chinese. What Hannah can’t stop laughing at – because she is tired she laughs even more – is when she is doing rehearsal on stage with Kai for their [It Girl] stage, and though he wears his cap the whole day, that is the only time he puts it on the side. Kai laughs at her reaction, taking his hand through his hair two times before they started their rehearsal.

“I keep saying that Chanyeol and I are the hottest duo for tonight,” Maria is saying while eating dinner, talking with food in and not caring at all that the door to their room is open. “But I think Hannah and Kai are challenging us a bit.”

“You’re imagining things like usually,” Manager Lee tells her from where he is also sitting around the table, eating his own food with the ladies. Maria is about to say she could be imagining they are challenging, but the manager continues calmly; “You got no chance up against the magnaes.”

“Huk!” Maria scoffs so rice almost spits out of , making Manager Lee scold her and Maria screams at him for saying such a thing and Emelia is calmly sitting between them with no care in the world that she has one person screaming on her left side and another on her right.

Hannah doesn’t really think this has anything to do with her as Manager Lee and Maria often fights like this; not really fighting, just screaming and complaining at each other. There is no end to it, so no one really cares about it. Hannah never really know how they can start screaming at each other so suddenly, and when they drag out on it, she leaves the table, only eating half of her dinner.

EXO have the room right next too, their room loud with voices of those eating too; not screaming like in 5 Pieces’ room, but with twice as many people it is just as a loud volume. Hannah walks by the room a little quickly to then slow down her steps as she really has no destination; she just wanted to get away from all the noise. She walks slowly, sighing and lowering her head whenever someone passes her because everyone is looking at her. 5 Pieces have fixed hair and make-up as they after rehearsals got ready for interviews, now they will eat and get ready for the concert. Her mind is almost spinning from all the songs they will perform, most of them are in Korean but they will perform the Chinese version of a CF song called [Panic] they have done, and then it is English versions of the songs too. She is happy they won’t do all songs live, but she still need to remember the choreographies for all songs. Her mind is all into the performance tonight that she doesn’t even notice someone coming up behind her.

The person slinks up next to her, looking down at her face and smiles as it takes seconds until she reacts, noticing she is not alone.

“You didn’t hear me call you?” Kai asks her, sounding a little worried instead of amused as he was when he first came up to her.

“Ah, I’m sorry…” Hannah pouts, taking a deep breath to wake up her mind. “I’m a little lost in mind.”

“About what?” Kai asks, suddenly curious. “What were you thinking of?”

She shrugs her shoulder. “The concert,” she sighs, “You know we got completely transformed with [I Want a Man] – it has just been three days of 2014 and we are already back in old tracks.” The face-expression Kai shows tells her he isn’t completely following what she is saying even if he is all ear. It makes Hannah smile at how cute he is, but apologetic from rambling on at him. “My mind is a mess, don’t listen.”

“I’m glad to listen if you want to talk,” Kai tells her.

She can’t help but to laugh at him and Kai bites his lip when standing up straight to face the front. He clears his throat while Hannah shakes her head at how weird people are around her.

“Are you fighting with the other ladies?” he quietly asks, glancing down at their feet to match her small steps. “We could hear the loud voices…”

“Aaah, no. It’s actually … um … Maria and Manager Lee, just … being themselves,” Hannah smiles awkwardly at him, “they… do that.”

“Oh…” he nods to show he understands.

“What are you doing then?” Hannah suddenly remembers, glancing behind them. “Walking around on your own like this?”

Her question makes him smile, that huge smile of a child that makes Hannah smile too. “I saw you walk by on your own and since it sounded like you were fighting, I went to see if you’re alright. You’re the one walking around on your own, Nuna.”

Nuna… Hannah grimaces without even knowing when he calls her that. There is one person she can allow call her that, other than fans, and that is Kyung Ho her brother. But still, Kai is younger than her so it is basic to call an older woman nuna; Hannah is just not used to it. If Kai notices her reaction he doesn’t show it, instead he asks her if she wants to practice their dance some more before the concert will start.

“YA!”

Both of them turn around in shock over the sudden scream, and Maria is smiling widely when seeing their identical face-expression. Hannah whines at Maria’s way to scare them and Kai lowers his head politely at Maria. At times, Hannah wonders if he is more polite to the other ladies than her – no, she knows he is more polite to them. She don’t mind though.

“You have not finished your dinner,” Maria tells the youngest lady and grabs her arm with her eyebrows frowning. “Jongin, have you finished your dinner?”

“Maria… Are we your children or something?” Hannah laughs, turning to apologize to Kai while Maria repeats that Hannah has to go back and eat. “I have eaten.”

The glare Maria gives her makes Hannah pout again, and Kai is smiling when following them back. Maria’s grip of Hannah’s arm doesn’t loosen, as if she is worried Hannah will run away or something.

 

With big smiles they stand together, 5 Pieces and their dancers. 5 Pieces are wearing red/blue long-sleeve check peplum top, cool high heels and individual clothing on their legs; Hannah is in a pair of black faux-leather panel leggings. They all have the style that matches their image, the ladies dressed for the concept they had in 2013. Hands are held in the middle for the cheer; those in the outer circle are standing with arms around each other’s shoulders to lean in closer, 5 Pieces standing in the middle.

“Beijing is waiting,” Maria opens up the speech, looking at the smiling faces around her. “In 2014, we have now made our comeback in Korea. It’s the first abroad performance; it is not the new concept either. That doesn’t mean we should start cursing on the stage.” Low chuckles are heard at Maria’s joke. “I’m happy to say we are special invited guests for this concert, and we will do what we always do – rock the stage.”

“And rock the stage we will!” one of the male dancers is fast to cheer with a hand thrown in the air, making them laugh and Maria is almost jumping in sudden excitement.

“I’ll make it short. Everyone, let’s have a blast in Beijing tonight! Who are we?!”

“5 PIECES!”

Fans at the airport in Beijing are loud when spotting their idols, crowding and pushing themselves forward. Fans at this concert, of all ages, are chanting and singing along to 5 Pieces’ songs. When 5 Pieces starts off their long part with [Black & White] (English version), you can clearly hear the crowd chanting along to the song and at times burst out in screams during certain parts that are popular in the choreography. It’s a great start, and 5 Pieces (singing live) go just crazy with the concept they are the most natural to do. They move freely even when doing the choreography, they can flirt with cameras and the crowd without doing anything else but smiling or giving a special hand motion and China loves it. The fierce 5 Pieces can do any concept; the crowd cheers higher when their second song [I Love You] is performed, the ladies turning into cute girls while wearing their peplum tops. The third song is [Wanna Be], a cheerful song where the ladies are walking around on the stage and making the crowd move along to the rhythm with them, sing along to the simple lyrics. Even if it is in Korean like [I Love You], the crowd seems to know it. Not everyone, obviously because it is a huge outdoor arena with an audience there to celebrate the New Year with popular Chinese artists as well as 5 Pieces and EXO being the only foreign performers. The ladies are happy such a loud audience is still having fun to their songs.

It is then the solo parts. Maria and Emelia performs [Classic Girl], a lot of the younger audience is cheering wildly. Hannah and Carolina perform the OST ballad [You are] as the drama has been popular in China and Hannah can see during their song that even the elderly seem to like the song. Julia and Carolina makes the audience jump around during [I’m Sleepy], EXO’s Chanyeol then makes a cool appearance to rap for Maria’s [A Better Day] and the last duet is Hannah and Kai dancing [It Girl]. On the stage they are professional, dancing with focused faces and feeling the music through their bodies, each part of the dance is done as practiced and they move well together after practicing backstage during the other’s performances. They do it well, Hannah is happy for that; no mistakes, no awkwardness or weirdness, just doing it well.

Hannah stays on the stage after the dance, the other members come up to have a small chat (Julia and Emelia talk in Chinese and they all say a few things in English) before they continue with their songs – they have only done half of it. Beijing is warmer than Korea. It’s in the evening and the air is chilly, but the ladies are warm from performing and moving, their necks sweating when they have performed [Original] and [-erase you-]. [-erase you-] is from their third album, promoted at the same time as [Black & White] but slightly forgotten because of the main track, but [-erase you-] still got a lot of attention when it came out because 5 Pieces were acting in it, fighting and going all-out on their concept for the third album. It is a great song, and Beijing seems to be surprised in a great way when they perform the song. Hannah is sad they haven’t performed the song as much as it should have been, knowing a lot of fans comment online to the music video that it is a song not receiving the attention it should – 5 Pieces’ message through the lyrics, choreography and music video is different from anything else, it has a deep meaning of being trapped in a relationship and fighting to get away. She loves the comments the fans have written, and she is happy over the response 5 Pieces receive when performing it tonight.

They go into the ballads, performing [Unable to Stay, Unwilling to Leave], [Beg] and then [Someone who is stupid over love] with EXO’s Chen. They had only sung the song once with Chen which was during the rehearsals, but he has been practicing his parts alone and the ladies know theirs too so it goes very well. The ladies go cute for [Oppa] after that, singing the remix of [Moon Child] that they had done at MAMA 2013, the crowd cheering for each song and loving each thing the ladies do on the stage. With four songs left, the ladies performs the English version of [Daze], then head backstage as if making the audience think they are done. They just go backstage, drink some water and wipe the sweats before the CF for [Panic] is revealed, and 5 Pieces head back up to dance to the song with the audience cheering just as loudly as they had done for [Daze]. [Panic] is probably the only Chinese song 5 Pieces has, and the audience seems to appreciate there is at least one.

[The rainbows colours] is a beautiful song sung as the second last, the audience waving hands and light-sticks in the air, everyone seem to know it is the end for 5 Pieces’ performance. There are still more artists to perform after them, but 5 Pieces will head back to Korea. While performing the ballad, the ladies are smiling at the audience, their faces showing how thankful they are to be able to come here and perform. Hannah hopes it is shown. She thinks through the evening, of all the songs they have done. She had worried of not being able to take on the charismatic concept after imagining herself being a lady for [I Want a Man], but like always, as soon as the song is played, she gets into character. Charismatic to cute, calm to excited. She like to perform the ballad at their concert because mostly everyone is crying at that time, and though no lady cries now there are fans in the audience crying, maybe because they don’t know when they will see 5 Pieces again, maybe because of all the emotions they are going through, maybe out of happiness it is a good start of 2014… It can be anything. Hannah is happy with the response, the smiles and waves she receives during their performance.

“We hope everyone’s 2014 will be filled with joy and happiness,” Emelia is saying in Chinese when the ballad has ended, “For 5 Pieces, we will end our performance with our newest song [Face Me], which will be available in stores on January 15. Thank you for tonight and … HAPPY NEW YEAR!”

“Happy New Year!” 5 Pieces cheers together. They hurry to take their positions for the new song on the stage while the audience is cheering, Hannah takes a deep breath, reminding her self it will not be live but just dancing – their first time performing the new song. It’s not in Chinese, but as an international release it will be available in China too.

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Headline 03rd: 5 Pieces Sings [I Want A Man] On Their Music Bank Comeback

Headline 03rd: Carolina Admits During Interview She Got Jealous With The Members’ Solo Activities While She Was Injured Last Year

Headline 03rd: 5 Pieces Performs In Beijing For Chinese New Year Greeting Concert With Previous Hit Songs

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X. devonalias