t w e n t y t w o

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blm_sunshine: #throwback to a few weeks ago. miss you min. hope you're having a great time promoting in latin america! @lagosdmoreno  #soundsofmycountry #blminnie ^.^

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-

That afternoon after Minnie created her post about being in Mexico for her promotions and supporting EXO's Tao, the rumors spread once more like wild fire. Of course, no one linked the Mexican Baby Lips vocalist to Tao because she was at the moment in her country with her boyfriend. But there were rumors nonetheless. People began to speculate that perhaps the Sun only supported the fallen idol for Zhang Yixing who was his fellow group member. The rumors also speculated that Minnie only supported his recovery for Sun who was connected to Zhang Yixing.

Lina sighed in frustration as she gathered four girls in the lounge room, the other was with them live via a stream from one of their computers. Even though Minnie was far away in Mexico, that wouldn't save her from the scolding they were all going to get.

"You girls keep making my job so much harder." She said to them. Grabbing her phone out her pocket, she opened an internet page and typed in what she was looking for. It was an article written four hours earlier by allkpop about how the two vocalists of Baby Lips M were supporting Tao after his gruesome injury during a game show. She turned her phone screen around for Sun to be able to see it. But she already figured that was the reason why she was going to get scolded again.

Sarang raised her hand and said innocently, "I don't know why I'm here. I have done nothing wrong, Lina unnie."

But of course she had her own secrets to keep, though no one knew of them yet.

Lina eyed her with a stern look. "You're not in trouble, Sarang. You're only here so that I can give you specific instructions on taking care of the maknae." She looked at Sun, but since Yeojin and Chaewon were in the room as well, Chaewon thought Lina was talking to her since she was the maknae of her own group Roser-lo. Lina quickly clarified, "Not you, Chaewon. Yeojin has done a pretty decent job of taking care of you as of now, and either way you're not my responsibility."

"I don't need anyone to take care of me." Chaewon protested.

"Then why are we here?" Yeojin wondered aloud.

"Your manager asked me to talk to you two about being more careful when you're on air. We don't want an incident like that to repeat itself again, ever." Lina explained. Looking back to the two Baby Lips members, plus the girl on the computer screen, she continued to explain, "From now on, neither of you posts anything online without permission. Sarang has been appointed my official permission giver."

Sun's jaw dropped open. "What? That's not fair!"

"You can't do this!" Minnie agreed.

Lina gave an uncaring shrug of her shoulders. "You lost the privilege when you deliberately got yourself into more trouble by openly supporting that group."

Her tone taking on a note of anger, Minnie argued, "What was I supposed to do? Post about being happy that he's injured? Who cares if he's in a rival group? Who cares if we hate them? He's a person and he's injured. They said he might not be able to dance again, do you know what that will do to his career? SM will drop him." 

"You could have said nothing." Lina pointed out, adding, "And you should be thankful it was just posting permission as the new rule. Next time we're taking your phones."

Sun heaved a sigh. "This is slavery." She muttered under her breath.

Lina pretended not to hear her because she had no words to retaliate.

When she finally said something, she said to the girls, "I also hope you realize this isn't my decision. I only follow orders too."

The two members of Baby Lips were dismissed and Minnie signed out of the video chat after Lina gave them more instructions and warnings. Yeojin and Chaewon remained in the room, as they were next to get a talking to. 

As they left the room, Sun could hear Lina muttering to herself, "These girls are so problematic."

-

The first few days after Tao's return to the group were stressful for everyone, though they tried to be patient with their group member. Everything seemed to have changed about him except his appearance. 

He was more shy, more reserved, and more formal around them. When he talked to the other members--anyone who wasn't Lu Han--he seemed uncomfortable. He didn't ask the other members to shower with him like he used to, which struck everyone as strange considering that they knew the way Tao was when it came to having to shower in the middle of the night after practices.

He had to re-learn the choreography for Growl, which also stressed many of the other members. That had been because they all knew the choreography, but they had to stay over time for dance practices because Tao couldn't get them right.

Eventually, one of the managers noticed and allowed the other boys to return to the dorms. He had asked Baekhyun to help Tao, and Lu Han volunteered to help as well. 

The other members were slightly starting to dread going to group practices because of Tao. 

There was also tension between Tao and some of the other members in the group. Yixing and Tao still got along well, but there had been bad blood between Yifan and Tao now. That had started when Tao decided to switch rooms to be with Lu Han. There was also a small amount of hostility with Baekhyun who continuously picked on Tao and was resentful of the fact that they had to spend so many hours in the day practicing the dance routine for Growl. Then there was Sehun who was acutely jealous at the growing friendship between Tao and Lu Han. Of the late it seemed that Lu Han paid less attention to the group's maknae in order to spend time with Tao.

Yixing who was seemingly the most clueless in the group and always appeared to be spacing out, was the only one of them who most seemed to begin with suspicions about Tao. But he wouldn't dare ask anything. Whatever had happened to Tao to make him change so much was his own business, and Yixing didn't want to pry.

-

Minnie returned to Korea within two weeks of promoting in Latin America. In that time, she had gone to different places in Mexico, as well as other spanish speaking countries to promote her solo album. And in that time, all of her social media posts had to be approved by Pledis before being posted. She had wanted to spend more time in Mexico with her boyfriend, as she had only gotten three days with him, but she had been scheduled to return to join the rest of the group in dance practices for the upcoming music video Sweet.

Pledis had filmed a short one hour special of all the places she visited, but there was mostly footage of her and her boyfriend spending time together, since the two of them were Pledis' power couple. They had been together for so long and all the fans loved them.

The special was aired the same day that she returned and the members of Baby Lips gathered together in the lounge room of their dorm for a movie night. 

Minnie covered her face in embarrassment with a pillow as she was shown on screen, getting off the plane. She walked into the crowded terminal to see her boyfriend waiting for her with a giant teddy bear and a sign that read Lee Mina. 

She ran to his embrace and jumped on him, knocking them both down to the ground, but the bear served to cushion their fall. Immediately she peppered his face with kisses and started crying, sobbing tears of joy because she hadn't seen him in that long. He chuckled as he helped her up, but it was evident he was trying to hold back the tears.

How difficult it must be to live like that, Sun thought to herself.

"That was so embarrassing. I can't believe Isaac didn't stop me from doing that. I'm such a pabo." Minnie sniffled, laughing at her own image on the television.

Sun placed a hand on her shoulder reassuringly. "Missing your boyfriend who you haven't seen in months doesn't make you a pabo."

The other girls nodded in agreement.

They watched the film about her travel to Latin America, which ended up lasting about an hour and a half once commercials were added. When it ended, they still had a few hours of free time before the time in which they normally went to sleep.

Each of them went to do individual practices on their own, which were not scheduled for that day. Minnie only returned to her bedroom to rest, since she had been stuck in an airplane for several hours in order to get to Korea. Sun remained in the lounge and practiced some of the choreography for Sweet with the help of Yoona who was one of the main dancers in Baby Lips.

-

It had been about an hour of practicing when she decided to return to her room. 

The door opened just as she was about to reach for the door knob, and from the room came her room mate Sarang, the leader of Baby Lips, and the subgroup Baby Lips K. 

She was dressed in a bright red pencil skirt, a white button up blouse, and black high heels. Her hair was nicely combed out and fell past her shoulders in soft waves. It was nearing the time to get into bed for the night, but there she was dressed like she was going out on a date. 

"Unnie," Sun eyed her with curious eyes. "Where are you going dressed so pretty?"

"Going to the Pledis building to practice my vocals." She said so fluidly that Sun might have believed her if she hadn't been dressed like that. But whenever the girls went to practice at the agency building, they hardly ever dressed that nice. They mostly went there in sweats, or track suits and sneakers. It was rare that one of them would dress up to go there since all they did was stay cooped up in a room practicing all day.

"Are you going out with the mystery guy from the party?" Sun guessed, a hint of excitement rising in her tone. 

It also wasn't very often that the Baby Lips members went on dates given that Minnie was the only one with a boyfriend--as far as anyone knew--and he lived halfway across the world. Now with Aron and Sun being supposedly together, they got to see one of their own actually going on dates. For Sun it was just nice seeing one of her group members having some time to do something fun for a change.

Sarang heaved a sigh, deciding that it would be best not to keep anything from her group members. "Okay, yes. I'm going out with the guy from the party. But please don't tell anyone. We want to see if things would even work out before we mention anything to the agency. You know, like you and Aron did." But she still wasn't ready to reveal the identity of the mystery man.

Sun brought a hand up to her mouth and pretended to zip it closed. "Baby Lips sealed."

The older group member rolled her eyes playfully at the maknae. "Please do not do that ever again."

"You don't like it?" Sun puffed up her cheeks in a pout. "Minnie thought of it and I think its really clever."

"I guess it can be our thing." Sarang smiled. Looking down at her cellphone screen, she said to Sun, "I have to go, he's waiting for me. Take care, maknae, and if you go out with Aron just remember to be good." She eyed the youngest member of the group with a warning look that said I'm watching you.

Sun lifted up her hand in promise. "I always behave."

Of course Sun always behaved when she was with Aron because there was nothing going on between them. But even with Yixing she thought of herself as rather well behaved since they never had time to be anything but that.

They were always rushing around in the shadows, hoping no one would see them.

As the leader made her way down the hallway, Sun gave a final call to her, "Take care unnie. Have fun, but not too much fun." She winked.

Sarang only stuck her tongue out at her, "No promises."

-

this one is kinda filler because nothing much happens during the time in which yena joins the group. yixing and sun are rather happy, even though she's publicly dating aron. and then sarang is embarking on this secret relationship with a mysterious person that we all already know is junmyeon oppa.

but things will get dramatic again.

thank you all loads for reading and supporting. now i will go drown in all the homework i have to do for my classes. i didn't realize until just friday that i am enrolled in NINE courses. no wonder i felt like i was dying on friday.

it all piled up and became too much. but no more of my personal rants. i hope you enjoy the chapter.

-clary xx