Just a heads up, this is an edited chapter 1. It is still the same just that I added more of what needs to be added cause I found the previous one was too freaking plain(??) LOL.

Ever since the confirmation news of their comeback broke through the entire company, all 11 members of today’s hottest boy band, EXO had a small discussion during the absence of Kai and his daughter, and came to a mutual agreement when one of them voiced out a suggestion about enrolling Kim Cherry to a nearby day care centre since they were gonna be extra busy than they already are preparing for the comeback. However, none of them dared to inform the little girl’s father on the subject of their compliance, not even their ever strict manager hyung.

“Why me?” Baekhyun panicked.

“Because it was your idea, duh.” Tao answered, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Baekhyun grabbed a nearby cushion and flung it towards Tao earning a curse from the latter. He was about to retaliate, cushion high up in the air, but Kris, who happened to sit beside Tao, simply snatched the pillow away.

“Hyung.” Tao complained.

Kris gave him a look which instantly shut him up before turning to look at the only person in that room that Kai really listens to, “Kyungsoo-ya, can’t you try?”

“I don’t know. I mean, he’s pretty sensitive and he tends to get overly overprotective with matters concerning his daughter.” Kyungsoo said.

“Why not just all of us tell him? Instead of picking one person, let’s tell him as a team. We are one, remember? Maybe he’ll take it a bit…calmer?” Xiumin, the oldest among them, proposed.

“I doubt it’s gonna make any difference. Like I said, hyung. When it comes to Cherry, he’s extremely finicky.” Kyungsoo replied while massaging his temples.

“What about Cherry?” Luhan suddenly asked.

Ten pair of confused eyes, landed on him. “What about Cherry, hyung?” Chanyeol repeated.

Luhan rolled his eyes seeing how dense s were. “Kyungsoo said Kai is very fussy when it’s concerning Cherry, right?”

“Oh!” Sehun exclaimed in awe once he caught what Luhan meant. “Hyung, you’re genius seriously.”

The others, still in bewilderment exchanged looks before fixing their attention back towards the excited maknae and a frustrated Luhan.

“Your point is?” Suho questioned.

“Instead of asking the overprotective-fussy father, why not ask the little princess herself. Daddy wouldn’t say no to anything princess wants, right?”

The whole room went silent for a minute, letting the only possible solution to their dilemma sink in. Luhan and Sehun high-fived each other when they saw one by one of the rests’ expressions started to brighten up.

Not long after the quote unquote discussion ended, a shrill was heard all over from the opposite closed door, “Samcheon-deul!”

Chanyeol stood up hurriedly to open the door because he wanted to be the first one to greet their beloved little princess. “Cherry-ya!”

He went on his knees with arms wide opened which Cherry gladly ran into. He lifted her up in the air repeatedly. Per contra to Cherry’s pure with joy giggles, the parent of the happy girl frowned in disapproval at the sight of his prized possession being tossed in the air.

“Hyung, please don’t catapult my daughter in the air like that. She’ll get hurt.” Kai grumbled.

“Don’t be such a party pooper, Kai. Can’t you see how much your daughter’s enjoying it?” Chen placed a comforting hand on the young father’s tense shoulder.

“Yeah, she’ll be fine. Chanyeol wouldn’t let her get hurt, nor would any of us.” Lay comforted.

“But still…”

Xiumin interrupted Kai, “Relax, Kai. Nothing’s gonna happen to Cherry, okay.”

“Dude, we have one good and one not-particularly-that-in-favour news for ya.” Sehun blurted out.

“What do you mean by a not-particularly-that-in-favour?” Kai raised a brow.

“Er…” Sehun awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck before scanning around the room, SOS-ing to the rest of the members with his eyes.

Coming to the maknae’s rescue, Kris calmly asked, “Which do you wanna hear first?”

“I had a pretty rough start this morning, so I think I’d go with the good news first, hyung.” Kai sighed.

“Well, manager hyung just told us that our comeback has been confirmed.” Suho announced.

“Finally.” Kai muttered. “What about the other news?”

 “Err…you might want to take a sit before that.” Baekhyun gently pushed Kai down onto the couch.

Kai looked at his band mates in confusion but still made himself comfortable. Chanyeol who was happily playing with Cherry was called by the rest and he wasted no time in joining them. Kai opened his arms for Cherry and of course, Daddy’s little princess was more than overjoyed to be in her father’s warm embrace. Because they were too afraid to deal with Kai’s rage in case he suddenly explodes, all 10 members, including the wushu expert, settled themselves on the floor, a few feet away facing the father and daughter. Besides, it was easier that way for them to flee from the scene if required.

“Please don’t take whatever we’re about to say in the wrong way, okay.” Suho carefully started.

“Depends.” Kai shortly replied.

“As we’re informed, we’re finally having the comeback after two years, right?”

Suho paused to examine Kai’s expression nevertheless the latter remained stoic as he patiently waited for the leader to continue. Heaving out a deep sigh, Suho proceed to say.

“What do you think of enrolling Cherry to a day care centre?” Seeing the frown that started to appear on Kai’s handsome face, he quickly added, “I mean, we’re gonna be really busy, you see. They say this time it’s a full album. You know what that means, right?”

In contrary to everyone’s prediction, Kai took the news way calmer than they thought he’d be. They were already closing their eyes tightly, anticipating a raging Kai flipping the couch but what they saw definitely left their jaws agape for a good couple of minutes.

“I know. Honestly, I was actually thinking about the same thing. Even so, I don’t want to have Cherry under stranger’s care. For all we know, they’ll secretly take advantage of her for their own good or something.” Kai confessed while snuggling into his daughter’s hair.

Baekhyun and Chanyeol both got up to ruffle the younger male’s hair. Kai was annoyed but he still let them do as they please. Cherry giggled loudly seeing how messy her father looked. All of a sudden, all of them attacked Kai on the couch except the leaders. Kris went to take Cherry away before she got squished by the 9 wolves she calls uncles.

“Our Kai has grown a lot. I feel like a mother seeing her rebel son finally talking about taking responsibility.” Suho wiped the invisible tears away.

“You lift them by grasping both their ankles with one hand like this, okay. With your other hand, you take the dirty diaper and place it aside. Don’t bother throwing it just yet because you need to quickly put on the clean diaper first before they suddenly pee on you. So far so good, Mina-ya?” Jini asked the practical training student.

Mina nodded her head in reply, “Yes.”

“Great, next is the milk preparation.”

Jini continued to demonstrate the works needed to done and once she was finished, she instructed Mina to mingle with the kids so that they were familiar with her. While the practical student was playing with the children, Jini approached her colleague who was busy preparing breakfast in the kitchen.

“How’d it go, Eonni?” Sora asked.

Shrugging Jini simply said, “She seems reliable.”

“She better be. If she somehow turns out to be like the previous student, I’ll fry her head myself and this time, nothing’s gonna stop me. Not even Mrs. Go.”

“I doubt you’re gonna fry her head any sooner, Sora-ya. Trust me when I said she seems reliable. She’s different. I can feel it.” She answered while tying the apron around her waist.

Sora scoffed, “That’s what you said the last time. You know, Eonni, you trust people too easy and it’s not healthy.”

“Hey, I do not.” Jini saw the look Sora was giving her and sighed in defeat. “They look nice, okay.”

“This is where that proverb ‘Don’t judge a book by its cover’ should be implied.”

The younger female muttered under her breath. Apparently, the other woman's hearing is as sharp as a newly sharpened blade.

“Are we seriously gonna continue talking about my gullibility instead of feeding the kids?” Jini questioned with annoyance, crystal in her voice.

Sora chortled and almost instantly yelped in pain while rubbing her sore back. The older woman had smacked her hard on the bottom with the wooden ladle in her hand. Jini grinned in victory when she heard a miffed grunt from her dongsaeng.

“You’re one violent hyphen childish woman.” Sora retorted.

 “Mehrong.”

Sora rolled her eyes and resumed working on her fried rice.

“Eonni! Jini eonni!”

At the sound of her name being called in such an urgent way, Jini who was helping Sora scooping side dishes into the kids’ bowls, sprinted towards her other colleague.

“What’s wrong?” Jini asked as she eyed the flustered Sooyeon.

“Um…Woojinnie.” She whispered.

As if on cue, the toddler started to cry at the top of his lungs. Of course, the kid who just registered the previous week threw yet another tantrum whenever his parents dropped him off at the day care centre. They spent the whole afternoon trying to coax the infant to stop crying but he was persistent. He kept on stubbornly thrashing and squirmed. He even went to the extent of slapping all the teachers in the face. None of the teachers, even though there are 5 including Jini herself, succeed at consoling him at first.

However, Jini was just as hard-headed and she was nowhere near giving up because she was worried that he could get sick from crying so much. Besides, she wouldn’t want to risk having the other kids crying too because of him. Thus, she calmly took the toddler into her arms again and soothingly rubbed his back in a manner of saying she meant no harm towards him.

After what felt like eternity, the toddler finally surrendered to Jini’s mother-like gestures before falling into a deep slumber and from that day onwards, they decided to have only Jini to take care of him.

Wiping her wet hands on the apron, she greeted the crying toddler who had an iron grip on his mother’s blouse with a warm smile on her face.

“Oh. Our Woojinnie’s crying again today? But, he’s a good boy, isn’t he? He shouldn’t be crying.” Jini cooed.

The kid turned when he heard her voice and almost instantly, his sobbing ceased. Jini held out her arms and Woojin went into her embrace without hesitation, totally ignoring the fact that his parents were still there.

“What would we do if you’re not here, Seonsaeng-nim?” Woojin’s mother said in a thankful manner.

Jini let out a shy chuckle. “Rest assured, I’m not going anywhere, mam.”

She politely bid them goodbye and entered the centre with a calm Woojin in her arms. Sora who witnessed the whole scene could only stare at her with mouth agape.

“I see this everyday but why does it still leave me speechless?” Sooyeon uttered.

“That’s cause I’m just good like that.” Jini joked.

“Heol. You know what, forget that I ever said that.” Sooyeon playfully rolled her eyes before dashing away to avoid Jini’s smacks.

“Hey, that’s not how a day care teacher should act!” Jini hollered.

“Kai!”

Kai stopped in his tracks and turned to look at the person who called him. He immediately bowed when he saw it was none other than the sunbae he is most comfortable with since they always practice dancing together.

“Hyoyeon noona, annyeonghaseyo.”

“Hey, I heard Baekhyun talking to Taeng about you wanting to enrol Cherry to a day care. Is it true?”

“Yeah, but I’m starting to doubt my decision. I mean, I seriously don’t want to leave my daughter under a stranger’s care. You know how I don’t trust people easily, Noona.”

“Hm…well, a dear friend of mine whom I have known since forever somehow happens to work at a centre not too far from SME. If you want, I can give her a call.” Hyoyeon kindly offered.

Kai was hesitant. He didn’t want to be rude and rejects his sunbae’s help just like that. But he also didn’t trust this friend of hers even though Hyoyeon noona is very cordial. Hyoyeon smiled seeing the reluctance on her hoobae’s face.

“Don’t worry, Kai-ya. She’s very good with kids and plus, she’s my best friend. We grew up together. I assure you, you can totally trust her.”

“You sure she won’t take advantage of Cherry just to get to us idols?” Kai warily asked.

Hyoyeon chuckled at the thought of her uninterested-in-the-idol-world best friend chasing after them. Kai scrunched his forehead in confusion but the female merely shook her head, still with that foolish grin lingering around .

“I promise. She’s no harm at all, Kai. She may be the same age as I am, but she’s old.” Hyoyeon purposely emphasized the last word.

Kai bit his inner cheek before letting out a deep heavy sigh. “I guess it won’t hurt to at least give it a try.”

“I’m calling her now to let her know, okay.”

Kai meekly nodded and unknowingly broke into a grin watching how excited Hyoyeon was.

Just when Jini was about to chase after Sooyeon, her phone vibrated. She shifted the confused Woojin into her other arm and reached behind her back pocket jeans to retrieve her phone. She looked at the caller ID, Dancing Queen Hyoraengi, before answering.

“Oh, Hyo-ya.”

The person on the other end of the line shrilled in excitement. “Beupeu-ah. I need you to do me a favour, please.”

Silence.

“Why do I have a feeling that this favour isn’t just any favour?” Jini squinted her eyes.

“That’s because it’s not!” Hyoyeon then continued to laugh happily.

Jini had to hold her phone away from her ear a few times because Hyoyeon just couldn’t content her happiness. Jini mentally face-palmed and heaved out a heavy sigh.

“Will you help me or not?” Hyoyeon asked anxiously.

“As long as it’s within my capability, of course I’ll help you.”

“Yokshi, the ever warm-hearted best friend of mine, thank you, Jini-ya! I’ll treat you to dinner sometime. Talk to you later, ciao babe!”

Jini stared at her phone in total bafflement. What the heck just happened? Shrugging, she simply put the matter aside and happily strode with Woojinnie to the rest of the centre’s family.

Heyyyy you lovely slash beautiful people! First of all, I sincerely apologise for the late update. Believe it or not, I acually have like 5-6 other drafts just for the first chapter. Yeah, that's how perfect I wanted this story to be heh. Apparently, I'm still stuck with my writer's block :/ 

However, I am trying my best to make this story stays as reasonable as I can, so bear with me && do shower me with your endless supports by subscribing/commenting/voting whichever you want pretty please? :)) 

/get bricked for being clingy