A continuation of  A Beautiful Night. 

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"We're not doing it."

The tone which the younger girl used to voice out her disagreement was cold, almost angry and uncaring. Irene probably had heard it wrong, because never in her short three-year of knowing Son Seungwan had she heard the latter sound upset. Sure, she would whine occasionally whenever Irene , but to sound legit angry like now? That was a first.

So Irene put down her stack of cards and calmly ask Wendy why, to which Wendy replied with, "Just because," triggering a frown on Irene's forehead.

They were in the middle of a practice for Irene's MC-ing tomorrow. Or rather, Irene was practicing, going through her lines—damned scripted lines—with Wendy assisting her. They were just on page three, Irene reciting a line which remarked how the weather had become colder, when Wendy suddenly put down her cue cards instead of responding to Irene and carrying on with her part—Bogum's, Irene corrected herself, Bogum's parts which Wendy had agreed on practicing along with her weeks ago.

"Are you feeling unwell?" Irene reached out and placed a hand on Wendy's forehead. No, the younger girl did not have a fever.

"That's not it," said Wendy, taking Irene's hand and weighing it on her own palm. Something was bothering the girl again, Irene noticed, as a deep frown started forming on the younger's forehead.

The silence stretched longer than Irene liked, and it reminded her how sometimes Irene wished she could be a vampire, preferably one who had a gift like Edward Cullen, so she could read Wendy's mind whenever she wanted. Like now, for instance, because Wendy often had something troubling her mind but she chose to keep it to herself than to share it with someone else. With anyone. With Irene. And it drove Irene crazy every single time.

"I'm sorry, unnie—" there it was again, the wall Wendy suddenly put up to separate herself away from Irene's reach, that honorific, "you should ask Seulgi to help you for tonight."

With that, Wendy rose from her seat and left the kitchen.

Irene was dumbfounded. No, beyond that actually, and Irene was too surprised at Wendy's display of anger that she could not do anything but stalk Wendy's movement until the girl disappeared around the corner.

The abandoned cue cards on the table were picked up, and Irene looked through them once again. She had memorized them all, actually, and though scripted, it was not like she would not be allowed to look at them and read during the broadcast in case she forgot something. It's just that Irene felt the need to go through those scripted lines with Wendy, less because the younger girl had spared her precious time which she could better spend baking than because she needed Wendy to keep her mind focused. It was obvious that Irene would not be able to ask Seulgi to help her out with it because—well, because Seulgi was not Wendy. The trick would not work.

These lines... they're crazy—worse than any cheap drama scenarios she had ever watched on TV, and there were a lot of them, because Seulgi never missed a single episode of all dramas ever aired, so it was saying something. Yet it was not in Irene's possession the authority to tell the script writer that he better off quit his job than to keep producing weekly trashy romance. Nor could she quit herself. The agency would go wild and dismiss her as an irresponsible rookie as well as leader for failing to see the opportunity to promote her group through the show.

Really, if it wasn't for Wendy—

"What happened?" a demanding voice cut short Irene's train of thoughts. "And why is my Wendy-unnie offering to clean up my room this late at night?"

Irene looked up and found Kim Yerim standing by the door, hands crossed over her chest, lip jutting out in protest. Irene would have rolled her eyes hard at Yeri's emphasis on the word 'my', she would, had she not seen who followed right behind the maknae—both Park Sooyoung and Kang Seulgi, practically the entire gang minus Wendy, and all looked equally murderous.

"Geez..." Joy moved forward and strode in big steps while her hands reached out. Before Irene could defend it, the cards were snatched away from her. "Just as I expected," said Joy, eyes scanning one card fast, sounding impatient. When she was done, her eyes fell on Irene's figure.

"What?" Irene shot back, bewildered as well as offended. What had she done wrong for the tall maknae to judge her like that?

"Seriously, unnie?"

Behind the tallest girl, Irene could hear Seulgi whispering to Yeri, something about Yeri and Joy sleeping in the big room with her, and telling her to check up on Wendy. Then Yeri left the kitchen and Seulgi moved forward, joining Joy in the 'judging you so hard now' squad, though less threatening and less intimidating—if anything, Seulgi looked the most confused out of the three of them.

"This 'the weather has become colder nowadays, please be careful not to catch a cold' line is kind of overused now, don't you think?" Joy asked, quoting the exact same line which Irene recited before her practice with Wendy was halted. "Does it also come with you being given a jacket by him?"

"No," replied Irene fast—she remembered that one and just the thought of it still made her cringe, "that was from the other week. It's not—"

Irene's eyes widened as it suddenly downed on her that she was very, very stupid. An idiot. An insensitive imbecile. And to think that she was being her thoughtful and responsible self for practicing her MC-ing routine to make it perfect.

"I've told her it was a bad idea to begin with," said Joy, now less judging than before, "but she insisted that she would do whatever possible to help you out. Well," Joy shrugged her shoulders, a lopsided smile decorating her lips, "at least, now we know that our Wendy-unnie has a limited amount of patience as well. Just like all of us. She's actually human."

"Sooyoung..." Seulgi said quietly, eyes glancing worriedly at the younger girl, perhaps worried at the girl's well-being for being too careless with her choice of words, afraid that Irene would lose it and start hitting the tall girl in the head.

"I'm right though." Joy was adamant, and Irene could not agree more with her. Joy was right, and no one Irene found more suitable to be hit in the head than herself at the moment. Even as patient as Wendy could be, there must be a limit to it. And Irene,