Taken in

Shannon Arrives

* * *

Wednesday morning

* * *

When I woke up, I didn’t want to. Not because of my laziness, but because yet again I was cuddled with kitty. This time we were front-to-front, and we were both awake.

“Good sleep, chicken?” he asked me in his sexy morning voice.

“Excellent, kitty. You?”

“As good as always. We should maybe get up. You have your friends arriving today. What time are they getting here?”

I reached over to my watch on the floor and looked at it, seeing that it was eleven thirty.

“We’re picking them up in forty five minutes from the airport. Do we have to move just yet?”

“The airport is about a half hour drive away, so yes,” he giggled. “We’ll regroup in the kitchen in fifteen?”

“Okay. See you then,” I said in reply. Kitty planted a kiss on my forehead, then he sat up and jumped down from the bed. I walked out of his bedroom and through to the living room, where I retrieved some clothes and took them to the bathroom.

I took a shower quickly, got dressed, made sure my hair looked okay, then did my makeup. If she remembered, Shannon would be bringing me a shit load of stuff from home today. I asked her to bring me any clothes I left, my hair curlers I thought I didn’t need, any makeup I left, and as many shoes as she could get on the sale at the local shop. What are friends for, right?

Exactly fifteen minutes later, I was ready in the kitchen. And kitty was late. An extra five minutes later, he came rushing through, grabbing his keys on the way and darting out the door.

“You’re late,” I sang to him mockingly.

“Oh, lay off chicken. I had to do my hair,” he replied with a smirk, and I had to give him a break.

We drove to the airport in relative silence, and I realised how much I would miss the silence when Shannon arrived.

I followed kitty into the airport, up escalators, and through turnstiles. When we were amongst a group of other people, he stopped. And about a minute later, Shannon, Megan and Tracy came waltzing off the plane with their suitcases. They looked around and tried to spot us, then Tracy saw us first. She stopped in her tracks, grabbed Shannon’s arm, then directed her towards where I was stood with her idol. Well, one of seven. They all stood wide eyed at me, then came running over like giggling little kids.

I hugged them all in turn, giggling that I had missed them.

“Nice to meet you, girls,” kitty said like a gentleman, then started wheeling off with two of the three suitcases. I took Shannon’s.

“Okay, no time to wait. What is going on between you two?” Shannon ‘whispered’ in my ear, but it was far louder than an average whisper.

“Nothing. He’s great. He’s really nice to me, and he’s putting you up for the next three nights. So no funny business!”

* * *

I helped the girls get settled into the living room, as the rest of the boys had loaned it out to us for a few nights. I swear they were the nicest people I had ever met.

There was one moment when Shannon wanted some alcohol, so I asked Jaehyo to go with her. He took Pyo too, but the look on her face was priceless. All girls went, so that they could buy stuff and spend time with the boys.

I took advantage of the free time to go and chill in kitty’s room. Only two hours with Shannon had me missing kitty.

When I got in there, he was sat on his bed with his laptop. He patted the space next to him when he saw me.

“Your friends gone out?”

Yeah, I sent them out with Jaehyo.”

“Ooh, I bet she loved that,” he laughed.

“You should have seen her face!”

“Are you having fun with seeing your friends again?”

“I guess, but I’m missing my downtime with my best mate.”

“She just went out, didn't she?”

“Not her, stupid,” I joked, nudging his shoulder with mine.

“Me?”

“Something wrong with that?”

“No, of course not!” he said quickly, laying his arm across my shoulders.

It felt sort of right calling him my best friend, but also really wrong. I knew that deep down he was the closest I had been to anyone ever, even Shannon, but even further down than that I knew that I wanted him to be more than just my best friend.

* * *

I spent the rest of the day just gossiping with the girls. I told them I had weird feelings for Yukwon, Tracy told me she had a boyfriend, Megan had all of the gossip on everyone at school, and Shannon was just being her usual self. The most used phrases were “just kiss him”, “you so love him”, and “oh my god Jaehyo is so hawt!!”

When night time came around, Shannon whipped out the alcohol.

“Okay, first party game. And we need as many people involved as possible.”

“What is it?”

“Just get the boys!”

I went around the house and found all of the boys in the second living room, watching television, but they all looked utterly bored.

“Hey, would any of you boys be interested in playing some party games?”

“What kind of games?”

“I don’t know, Shannon won’t tell me.”

“Go for it,” Pyo said excitedly, taking Jaehyo’s wrist and dragging him through too. Zico also came, and then I gave the puppy dog eyes to kitty.

“Save me?” I mouthed to him, and he rolled his eyes and came through to the living room with me.

“Okay, first game then, boys. Seven minutes in heaven.”

I groaned at her, but knew she would have been planning this for days.

“Right girls, put something in the bag. Boys, turn around.”

Shannon took a handbag round and got us all to dump something in, and I chose my bracelet. It was a weird little charm bracelet that had no charms on, because I thought it looked better without. I left it in England, but missed it. That went in the bag.

I grabbed my coke from the table and sipped at it, while Shannon jiggled everything around in the bag.

“Right, Yukwon you can go first!” she said excitedly, thrusting the bag towards him. I watched him out the corner of my eye, not sure what I wanted him to pick out. I looked away, not baring the thought of him kissing someone else for seven minutes.

“Oh my god,” Shannon whispered. Oh god I thought, he’s got her item. “Jessika, you’re up.”

I spat out my coke back into the can. When I turned around, kitty was holding a bracelet, my bracelet. He looked plain startled.

“Okay guys, into the closet.” Shannon marched us into a cramped little cupboard, and I wondered when she had the time to find this place.

As soon as the door was slammed on us, silence fell.

And it was awkward as hell.