Once A Park : Love Again

Confidence

Baekhyun slowly stand up from his seat after Jongdae has introduced him, he walks gracefully, aware of all the stares that he is receiving from the crowd inside the hall. Baekhyun can hear the murmurs of shocks from the audience . He went straight to Jongdae and took the microphone from him to introduced his self, first to their co-participants and then to the people in the long table that Baekhyun wished he never see again in this lifetime. He bowed gracefully, a perfect ninety degrees bow and when he lifted his head, he focused his eyes to Zhang Yixing who literally looks comical upon hearing his name earlier. Baekhyun couldn't help but to give Yixing a wink that caused the poor Chinese guy to fell totally from his sit, down to the floor. Baekhyun is well aware of the effects of his winks to other people but this is the first time it seems he almost gives someone a heart attack. Baekhyun couldn't help but smile at Yixing's reaction, leaving all the people in front of him breathless from his charm, but that beautiful smile was easily wiped when he noticed Yeri's slender fingers reached Chanyeol's hand whose holding a broken pencil. Baekhyun didn't failed to noticed the wedding rings that his ex-husband and his half-sister are wearing. The sight of their hands together left a bitter taste in his mouth. But he composed himself and averted his eyes to Junmyeon who's looking at him in disbelief. He gave Junmyeon a small smile, acknowledging him.

" Sorry about that. " Baekhyun directed his eyes when Yixing speaks in the microphone. " It is a pleasure to have you here with us today, Mr. Lee. " Yixing said with a crimson face. Still embarrassed from his fall , though no one in the crowd dared to laugh at him. No one wanted to offend the big boss of Zhang's Empire.

" The pleasure is all mine. " Baekhyun said with a nonchalant smile. It's not intentionally, but the word " pleasure " sounded sensual when it leaves his pink lips. Baekhyun can literally heard the gasps from the crowd whose eyes are watching his every moves. " Please allow me to start our presentation now. " He gracefully bow again before turning to Jongdae, Baekhyun almost rolled his eyes when he sees the glint of amusement in his friend's eyes. Jongdae nodded at him with a knowing smile before he focused to the laptop in front of him that is now connected to the projector. As the first slide appears, Baekhyun started his presentation.

Baekhyun might be broken in the past and had a little self esteem and big insecurities, though he can say he improves a lot and far from being the old pathetic Baekhyun that he once was, sometimes he still feels insecure about his self. But if there's one thing that Baekhyun will never doubt, it is his works. He is more than confident when it comes to his designs and ideas. IQ tests proves that Baekhyun have the mind of a genius and gifted, that's why all his designs are unique and mind blowing. He can go from modern to classic, from maximalist to minimalist. He plays with the designs with ease as ideas keeps flooding his mind. Standing in front of the crowd never bothers him when it comes to his works, not even in the presence of his ex-husband and his half-sister, their friends and Dara.

They gave them twenty minutes each to do their presentation, and Baekhyun stood in front of the people who sees him a pathetic Baekhyun from the past with grace and confidence. He did his presentation short but interesting, not giving too much information since ideas in this field can be easily stolen , but he make sure it will left a good impressions to the people in front of him. Throughout his fifteen minutes presentation, Baekhyun did not dare to meet Chanyeol's eye, he made sure of that. But he can feel Chanyeol's gaze never leaves his face. And at the corner of his eyes, he can still see the hand of Yeri holding Chanyeol's big one. Besides her is Dara who have this worried and confused looks on her beautiful face. Baekhyun didn't failed to noticed the tension and worries in Chanyeol's friends eyes. It seems the only people that is pleased to see him is Zhang Yixing. The others sits there like a stone cold statues, the only evidence of life is the worried glances that they throws to Chanyeol and Yeri's direction. As the tension starts eating him up, Baekhyun finishes his presentation and gave them another bow before approaching Jongdae, he leaned over to him and whispered - " I need air. " Jongdae nodded in understanding. Baekhyun walks to the back heading to the exit. He catches Minseok's gazed and with unspoken word, Minseok nodded and let Baekhyun leaves the hall. Minseok knows Baekhyun needs alone time. He is proud how Baekhyun stood there with confidence but he knows sooner or later Baekhyun will cracked, giving how intensed Park Chanyeol stares at him the whole fifteen minutes.

Jongdae retrieved his laptop and went back to sit besides his fiancé. Shindong takes the microphone again and announces a thirty minutes break before they will announce who will advance for the second bidding. But before Shindong finishes his words, Chanyeol is already out of the door leaving his speechless friends behind with worries in their eyes.

A/N:

Hello everyone! First of all, I am sorry for not updating soon. You must understand that I work 14 hours a day. 7 days a week. You can imagine how tired I am by the end of the day. And to add to that, time of work is changing making it hard for me to get a chance to write even a short update. But today, I made some time to write this one. After reading all your comments asking for updates, I am torn between feeling proud and feeling bad. It is not that I intentionally not updating to leave you guys hanging. No. It's not like that. I'm not updating because of lack of time and energy to do so.

I am really grateful for your support and appreciation for my stories and I want to thank you all from the bottom of my heart that beats for EXO, but please do understand that being a fan girl is never easy. I need to work hard to sustained my love for EXO and besides that, there's other things that required my attention. So, I'm sorry if I can't update sooner or updates are shorts, your poor author-nin have no energy at all. And maybe instead of asking for updates, maybe write your thoughts about the flow of the story, so it will give me more motivation to continue writing no matter how tired I am. Yeah?

I really love to hear from you. And due to your overwhelming liking for this story, I will try to update tonight again. It maybe short or long but an update is an update, right? 😉

Thank you and stay well and healthy. 💕 And keep loving our EXO. 🫶🏻

P.S. Like what I've said in the first part. This story will be chaotic. And the chaos might start in the next chapter. So, please bear with your crazy and lazy author. 😂

🍒JD🍓