Deer Luhan, With Love

13

Chapter 13 – In Which the Illness of Convenience Strikes

***ADVANCE WARNING***

Parts of this chapter are actually quite serious.  But don't worry: nobody dies.  I wouldn't do that to you, especially not with the current EXO situation.  But enjoy Chen's trolling, for the meantime.  The story will remain funny.  And in advance, for the songs mentioned, click on the external link for the Two Steps From Hell youtube channel and search for Back to the Earth and Dragon Rider, and listen to the media link that I've connected for Jump :)

All those songs are on the official Two Steps from Hell youtube channel, so if you enjoy them, just go browsing through the rest.  The Skyworld album is awesome.

Now I'll leave you to enjoy the chapter :)

Deer Luhan,

Kudos to you for being eternally patient with all the HunHan jokes.  I don’t know how you manage it, because I can’t, and I’d like some tips on how to keep my patience for scenarios where my mum wants me to go shopping with her, Abbie starts fangirling about K-pop, and when I have to sit through really, really dull lectures at university.  Thanks.

Leigh

There was absolutely no need to fake anything happening to my ‘singing’ voice this time: the combination of a throat infection and crying myself to sleep was well beyond pretence.  It was actually bad enough for the manager to pull Suho aside before we started our pre-showcase interview to tell him to make sure I didn’t have to answer any questions.

Chen and I were the first ones made up, so we sat in the corner with his iPod, one earphone each, listening to the music I’d convinced him he absolutely had to have in his life.  He’d been the only one willing to sacrifice his iPod as a guinea pig and he was a bit confused at first that most of it was what he dubbed “instrumental” – apparently film and trailer music wasn’t normally to Luhan’s tastes.  Or, at least, Luhan wasn’t obsessed with them to the point I was.

“And this helps you calm down how again?” he demanded fifty seconds into the guitar and drums at the beginning of Thomas Bergersen’s Jump!  “I’d use this to go on a run.”

I managed to refrain from snapping at him that Jump! soothed my nerves because I’d always practised gymnastics routines and tumble runs to it back when I was at school and had often listened to it on repeat to psyche myself up for competitions, remembering just in time that, as far as Chen was concerned, I was an easy-going twenty-three-year-old Chinese male, not a first-year female undergraduate from the UK.

“Shut up and listen,” I told him as the theme came on.  He raised an eyebrow, but a couple of seconds later he was grinning and tapping along to the beat.

“Actually, this song is pretty cool.”

“Thanks,” I said.  “It’s one of my favourites.”

“I’ve never heard of this guy before,” he went on, tapping the iPod screen.  “Where did you find the CDs?”

“A fan gave them to me when we were in the UK,” I mumbled.  Chen took out his ear bud and turned to stare at me.

“What, seriously?  A random fan bumped into you on the streets and just happened to have four CDs on her and she gave them to you?”

“Er… yes?” I hazarded.  According to Sehun’s account of the UK leg of the tour, which he’d told me in the plane, they’d had time to wander around London a little but had had very little official contact with fans except for the concert.  “And actually, it was five CDs.  Thomas Bergersen’s solo album absolutely rocks.”