Morning blinked by rather quickly as she stretched, like a cat actually, as she rolled around at least three times before proceeding to push herself off the bed. She was drop dead tired the day before and had fallen asleep way before her bedtime but still, she made no effort in setting an alarm to meet…

.

She reached for her phone to see the time, 8.10a.m. and then the flooded messages she’s received from Minseok saying he’s reached there safely and he didn’t call because he was afraid she’d be sleeping so thank God… and a message from Kai saying…

She dropped her phone onto the bed and moved to the door, gently tugging it open to indeed see, a lanky looking boy on his back against the wall, head tilted to the side and she just knew how badly it’s going to feel sore especially when today they have a dance session and today was their pretest to show their piece they’ve been working on for roughly a month. She got down to a crouching position, eyes staring his features and how is it possible for someone to look this angel-like in the morning, when they’re sleeping?

Her eyes traced almost every outline of his face, from his hair covering his forehead and part of his eyes to the brows above his eyes, to the eyelashes that curled up shortly to his nose, that slender jawline and then to his pouty, somewhat nice looking pair of lips. She found herself staring longer than she intended to before sinking herself back to when she—

“Jeez… if you didn’t want to eat with me, you could’ve told me,” A voice snapped her from her memory, her eyes blinking hard at least two times before she realized that he’s awake, lightly from the sore parts of his body, the tensed up nerves from sleeping in such position and he didn’t even notice that she was this close until he turned his head to the side, eyes slightly wider than when he just opened his eyes from being awake and his throat forming a lump there to prevent him from speaking.

The two had a mutual feeling of just staring at one another, noticing the change of air around them and she didn’t know exactly what the hell to do either apart from just blinking at him. One, two, five, fifteen, thirty seconds too many that went by later, she was the first to give him a nudge on his shoulder, “There’s a thing called calling, you know,”

He huffed and rolled his eyes at the atmosphere she switched this up to, standing up after whining a bit and then looking down on her when the two stood up, “And there’s something called ‘reading’ your text messages.”

She mirrored his actions earlier with the rolling of her eyes and he flicked her forehead, “Let’s get breakfast, then. I know just the place to burn your money,” He snapped, already making his way towards where he had in mind but her voice halted him with the words saying she needed to change and he’s dressed and looking normal doesn’t mean that she was because she’s still in her sleeping clothes and there’s no way she’s going to walk out of her dorm looking like she allowed a five year old to pick out her pyjamas.

He looked over his shoulder and smirked, “You look cute in that, so why not?”

With the slamming of her door, he chuckled and waited for her outside, a few steps already down the corridor but not too far away with just a note in mind, maybe this is the way things were for now.

And that was completely fine with him.

“There’s nothing to be nervous about, just dance like how we practiced,” He whispered softly in the midst of their other classmates performance, slow and mellow, breathtaking and incredibly good. They were somewhere between the last and not the last but not the first, either. About the fifth out of the eight pairs that would perform for the first half of the class and the other half would continue then on. They can choose to stay or they can choose to leave—whichever is fine with Mr. Kang because all he needs is to evaluate before the big day next week—the real test.

Hee Young rubbed her hands together in anxiety, totally unsure if she can pull this off. Technically (hopefully), she can but… emotionally?

Dancing a ballad song means that you need express the emotions behind it and this song was specifically about a girl trying to break free and Kai’s role in this song was to try to stop her from doing so before in the end of the song, he’ll let her go because she’s free. She was confident a week ago that she would be able to pull this off because this was a piece of cake but after many unexpected turns had happened in her life, after many things that popped out of nowhere, things that should remained hidden have appeared to the surface once more, it made her doubt herself if she could truly get along with this. If she had Minseok here… maybe things would be different. If she had her father and her younger brother around, maybe things would not turn out this way. If her sister wasn’t busy with all the new projects she’s been flooded with, maybe she’ll have a boost of confidence but no one else remembers.

“Listen to me,” He breathed, the only person beside her as they were next in line, his hands on her shoulders as he gently shook her, “We’re going to do just fine—and if we don’t, this is just the pretest. We have a week after this to practice,”

She shook her head when all the familiar stares came back to her, looks of how badly she’s done, after years of practice and standing on the big stage like a professional, spraining her ankle in the middle of the song and unable to continue dancing was humiliating and it’s been etched in her mind ever since. She closed her eyes and Kai could actually feel her trembling as he gripped onto her, shaking her, “Hee Young—“

“I can’t… I don’t want to fail this,”

“And you won’t,” His tone was firm, his grip tightening as he made her face him when her eyes opened, “We’re going to be just fine.”

“Ready?”

With a nod she managed to give, the two remained in the center of the stage as Kai stood behind her, arms around her waist as the beginning pose before the music cued in, the song Break Free by Ariana Grande featuring Zedd had slowly filled the room but it was the melody that had played first—it was a piano version accompanied by an orchestra arrangement from the university that were so kind to arrange the song for them along with one of the singers to sing this for them.

Here it goes.

She entrusted him with everything she had, allowing him to catch her through the tosses in the air, the flips and turns, the gentle, delicate moments where the two would hold hands and then let go to repel from one another. Those spins he’d do before he runs to her with both arms tangled around her waist, attempting to pull her back and she’d manage to break from his grip and continue resisting him from time to time as the music grew louder, louder and louder. Until it reached that part where it all fell silent and there were quiet gasps in the room when Kai slowly fade to black, moving further and further to the back to leave Hee Young in the center stage with the light shining down on her.

Then when the light died down, there were applauses and cheers but the feeling was not right, it wasn’t satisfactory and she could feel it, Kai could feel it, Mr. Kang could feel it.

The two stood side by side on the stage with Mr. Kang’s gaze still intensely on the two. It moved from Kai to Hee Young and then back to Kai. He clicked his tongue and put the clipboard down on his lap, “Techniques and synchronizations… they were perfect,” But then he had this lopsided frown, “But emotions?” He turn to look at Hee Young, “They were not intact,”

He used the pen to point at Kai, “I believed Kai’s emotions in the song, though there were certain parts that you were behind the beat and you nearly didn’t catch Hee Young,” Kai nodded twice silently, well aware that he hadn’t been quick to his feet and half a beat behind and something horrible could’ve happened if he was late by just one second.

“But, I believed in your role more than Hee Young’s,” Mr. Kang noted, turning his gaze to Hee Young the same time Kai shifted his stare to the girl beside him. She couldn’t even look at Mr. Kang as she was hard in catching her breath, trying to hold herself together because it’s been so long since she’s danced on the big stage, be it with or without major flips or a huge audience—it was hard for her to get used to it again.

“What happened to you?” Mr. Kang asked, questioning as he put the board aside to the seat next to him before he crossed his arms, a look of disapproval, “You were doing perfectly during practices but on stage now… you’re too worried about delivering the techniques that you forget about something,” He used a hand to place it on his chest, above his heart, “You forget about the emotions—you forget to entice us in, reeling us into your world and you forgot to make sure we felt what you were feeling,”

Hee Young gave a mere nod, not realizing Kai had been holding onto her hand this whole while to relieve some of the tension burying on her shoulders, weighing her down so much that she can’t even look up. He almost felt bad as he stared at her with uncertain lips, noticing how she squeezed his hand so hard that he thought she was aiming to break off his bones but he allowed it, feeling such pain inside when she couldn’t even look at Kai, or lift her chin up.

“This is not your best, Hee Young-ah,” He sighed, leaning back against the chair, “I think you two need a lot of more practice before the test because if this is the real test and not the pretest, you both may not have get the grades you want to get,” He summarized it up, picking up his clipboard to easily flip to the next paper where another pair of candidates appear on the paper, the next assessment sheet for the next couple, “You two may leave,”

The two on the stage gave a bow out of respect and before Kai could even process what was happening, she slipped her hand away from his to hurriedly get off the stage, to the other side when usually, people would leave through the right side but she ended up going to the left. Without a doubt, he went after her, seeing her push through the black curtains and he followed quickly behind, only to grip onto her wrist when she wanted to run, “You did the best you could,” He breathed, tugging her back only to spin her around to see that the tears were already down her cheeks as she shook her head, violently trying to rip her hand from his, “It wasn’t my ing best,”

“Then we’ll make it your best,” He deadpanned, tugging her closer until she had no other choice until she was in his embrace, his warmth and comfort as he held onto her tight with both arms by her frame to limit her movements and she had no choice but to remain like that as she allowed the tears to trickle down—at least, Minseok won’t be here to see her cry and… Kai wasn’t seeing, either.

“We’ll practice every night from now until next week. It wasn’t your best and it wasn’t mine, too but we’ll make this work,” He murmured softly, feeling her tense body relax against his, her rapid heartbeat had learned how to slow down as she shifted in his arms and he had loosened his grip to let her lean back until the two could meet eyes.

“You just have to trust me, like the way I trust you, got it?”

Seeing his determination flaring up in his eyes after so long had sparked up something within her. She swallowed hard and used the back of her hand to wipe away what she called her ‘tears’ before she gave a nod. Maybe it was because she was still in a haze, swimming in her emotions but she really did mean it when she said, “Got it.”

“How was it?” One out of the two people had asked for the second time today as she remained seated on the floor, exhausted from the past hour of training that she had decided to just use the wall behind her as a support. She exhaled calmly before replying, smoothly at least, “It… it was g-great,”

“It was a disaster,” Kai chipped in distaste, beside Hee Young and he was close enough to hear her sister’s voice on the other end laughing, “Is that Kai?”

The boy nodded, as if she could see, “Yes, noona, hey!”

“Dude,” Hee Young breathed, nudging Kai by the arm until he fell to the side because of how rough she was all of a sudden. Just thirty minutes ago she was crying and clutching to him like he’s the only one who could understand her but now she’s shoving him to the side as he if’s nobody to her but a peasant. He huffed and rubbed his hip, “Rude, much,”

She placed a hand on the speaker and whispered softly, “I don’t want her to worry for me—she has so much more on her shoulders than me already,”

Kai saw the intentions of her lying in the first place before he pressed his lips together after mumbling a soft apology.

She went back to talking to her sister on the phone, hearing about her days have been and about the projects she’s been landed with. She’s also mentioned a thing or two about her mother and father but all Hee Young could do was shrug, “I’ve never seen them since I got back from the MT,”

Kai was resting as well, partially leaning against Hee Young and listening to the conversation but he was playing some game on his phone, Magic Touch, as it is. The one where you’d have to draw out the shapes with your finger before the balloon hits the ground—childish. Everyone’s been playing that game around here and she got irritated just by hearing the sound effects but as long as Kai minds his own business, she let it slide.

“The principal has been MIA a lot,” Kai breathed mindlessly, not giving a thought to what he was saying but he was indeed, speaking the truth. Kai was the type of person to gallivant all around the campus and lately, he hasn’t been seeing the principal as frequent as he usually would.

“Really?” Hee Min asked, somewhat confused but at the same time, Hee Young grumbled a soft mind your own business, Kai before she did something to the screen on Kai’s phone and the boy was jerking away from her with a huff, “I was going to beat my high score!”

“You can do it without interrupting my conversation,”

Kai grumbled under his breath about something relating her to a vixen before he rolled off onto the floor, back flat, arms stretched, phone above his face as he restarted the level once more and actually giving her the space she needed.

“M-Mom told me that she wants to meet us both,” Hee Min sounded unsure because part of her didn’t know what to expect from this, either.

Hee Young could only sigh, “I thought things were settled the last time…”

Hee Min’s voice got shallower just saying, “I have a feeling she wants to patch things up between us, Young-ah… like, there’s a chance she might want us to attend the wedding,”

“I told her we wouldn’t already, doesn’t she ever listen to me?” Hee Young rolled her eyes and lightly kicked the air, but as it seems, she didn’t.

“What was that for?” Kai hissed, making her have this look of apology on her face, “Oops,”

Kai rolled further away until she can’t even kick him if she intentionally wanted to or not and she didn’t know if she should laugh or feel annoyed by it. Her attention went back to her sister when the other end had said, “How about we get dinner together tonight? You, me, maybe even Kai?”

The mentioned latter looked away from his phone, “I heard my name!”

Hee Young kept her foot up, “Come any closer and you’ll have a few prints on your face,”

Kai clicked his tongue and went back to his phone, turning his back on her, “Jeez…”

With a soft sigh, Hee Young asked, “And… James?”

Kai’s ears perked up at the foreign name but remained calm as he continued to flick here and there with his finger, drawing out the shapes and going up higher, higher and higher until he screwed up but he remained allowing his phone to let out the noises but he pretended to be busy when he heard his name being called out, “Hm?”

“Free for dinner tonight?”

He thought he wasn’t hearing clearly, so he cleared his throat and widened his eyes as he looked away from his phone screen almost too quickly but apparently, that was still too slow for her liking. “Wait, what?”

“Nope, he’s busy—I think it’ll just be—“

“I’m free! We’ll meet you there!” Kai snatched the phone from her, already agreeing to her sister’s suggestion and he could hear the happiness in Hee Min’s voice, “That’s great!”

“I know—what the f-!” Kai was left muffling his own curses when Hee Young gave a jab at this abdomen, pushing him down to the floor and pinning him square on the surface before retrieving her phone once more. “Not the hands, not the hands!” Kai nearly shrieked when Hee Young was pressing one of her knees down on Kai’s palm, making the boy poorly bite down on his lower lip to halt any screams from escaping as Hee Young remained her weight on the boy’s hip, holding him on the spot before she told her sister to text the details and then she was left to glaring at the boy underneath her with her phone shoved aside, next to his before she flicked his forehead, “What did I say about taking my phone?”

He still tried to fight her off, “It’s your fault for not keeping a better grip on your phone.”

All she did was add more pressure, feeling his whole body tense when her knee was literally to the edge of breaking the bones of his hand, “O-Okay, okay! I won’t do it again!”

With a sinister-like grin, she got off him and he sat up, rubbing his pained hand hurriedly, “Are you Satan’s daughter or something?”

“If I am, what are you?”

“Please,” He scoffed, deciding to give up on soothing the redness of his hand, “I’m friends with God, we hang out like every weekend,”

That’s when she snorted, “Bull.”

“Says you,” He countered, watching her get up and he stiffened when she looked over her shoulder, “Do you want to keep your other hand uninjured?”

With a meek nod, she rolled her eyes, “Then get up and let’s practice again before wrapping things up,”

Along the lines of sure and coming, your highness, Kai got up with that smile plastered on his face that he can’t hide even if his life depended on it since her back was turned to him, all he could do was try to bite it down with his teeth but the back of his mind had already expressed how he truly felt about the situation.

This was all worth it.