Nikka hummed merrily as he waltzed into his flat and dumped his rucksack onto his sofa. He was in a good mood despite just coming back from a busy day at the office. As he undid his tie and stripped off his navy blue suit, he cheerfully sprang to his room where he kept his laptop on standby. Excitedly, he turned on his laptop and waited for it to start up.

He couldn't wait to Skype Mirei.

Just a few hours ago, Nikka had received the delightful news that Mirei was coming back home early. Richard had informed him himself that Mirei had been told the news almost a week ago and that she was scheduled to fly out tomorrow. At first, Nikka was annoyed that no one had notified him that Mirei was coming home but, his earlier irritation ebbed away when he realised that he didn't have to wait another six months before he saw her again. He was going to see her tomorrow.

His smile widened as he thought, Mirei was coming home to where she belonged.

When Nikka's laptop finally started up, he noticed that he had forgotten to close some of the tabs he had been working on previously. On his browser were many articles and YouTube videos on 'We Got Married', the South Korean reality show.

Over the past month, Nikka had been watching every episode of WGM to observe how Mirei was doing. At first, he had been so shocked to see Mirei taking part in an intimate reality show that, forced strangers to act as a married couple. He found the concept of the show bizarre and he wasn't at all thrilled that Mirei, of all people, was pretending to be married to some idol he couldn't even remember the name of.

Nikka scowled as he saw Mirei's onscreen husband's face appear next to hers. The last time he had seen Mirei or spoken properly with her, was when he left Seoul four months ago. She had explained to him that she was fake-dating that man-child, Chanyeol, because he had busted her cover. And just a month ago, he suddenly found out that Mirei was fake-married to someone else. What on earth could have happened to have led her to get involved in a fake marriage?

It had driven Nikka up the wall not knowing.

Straight after discovering Mirei's sudden debut into South Korean entertainment, Nikka had done a lot of intense digging to find out what could have happened. After toiling through article after article and watching video after video, Nikka was able to connect the dots on what possibly may have led to Mirei's involvement in WGM. He knew that Mirei wasn't stupid and he also knew that she wouldn't participate in a reality show if she had the choice not to. After all, she had her cover to maintain and by joining WGM, she was compromising it.

Nikka discovered that the person responsible for getting Mirei involved in the show was someone called Suji Lee or Lee Suji, as the South Koreans would call her. Suji was Lee Sooman's daughter, who also happened to be the CEO of SM Entertainment. Nikka had wanted to meddle at first but decided not to, in fear of implicating Mirei further. He had learned that Suji was an influential person because of her father and it didn't take him much to discern that Suji didn't like Mirei at all.

Nikka knew that Mirei had been fake-dating Chanyeol because of their complicated situation. And he also found out that there were many rumours circulating amongst the fans that Suji and Chanyeol were secretly dating. But this misunderstanding was cleared up when he watched an interview of Chanyeol with some of the other EXO members who explained that Suji was not his girlfriend. On another interview, however, Suji had expressed her interest in Chanyeol, which made Nikka nervous for Mirei, who was caught in between the two.

Providing that Suji found out that Mirei and Chanyeol were 'supposedly' dating, Nikka had a gut feeling that Suji had planned to split Chanyeol and Mirei up by forcing Mirei to go on WGM. But little did she know the futility of her efforts since their relationship wasn't real to begin with.

Nikka closed his tabs on Suji before he proceeded to open Skype. He had researched a lot on Suji and found that she was quite the diva with a squeaky clean record but he knew that she had a skeleton in her cupboard. Nikka had planned to send her a taste of her own medicine if anything bad had happened to Mirei, which was why he had kept her number just in case. After all, a little blackmail never did anyone any harm.

Nikka's excitement grew as Skype finally loaded. Since the EXO members had already left for the US, Mirei should be alone at the dorm. It was finally safe for him to call her through Skype. He waited in anticipation for the line to connect.

"Hello?" he heard Mirei's silky voice say.

"Mirei!" he shouted excitedly. He searched the screen and saw that hers was still dark. "Sorry! Were you sleeping?"

Mirei sleepily replied, "Nikka, do you have any idea what time it is right now?"

"Sorry!" Nikka apologised quickly, "but I just got the news from Richard. He says that you'll be coming home soon!" He searched her expression as she turned on her nightstand, illuminating his screen. He couldn't help his grin from growing wider at seeing Mirei's face after so long. "I've missed you, you know. Why didn't you tell me?"

Nikka watched as Mirei rubbed her eye. "I'm sorry, Nikka. There was just so much going on over here..."

Nikka frowned slightly. Mirei still hadn't told him about WGM and he didn't forget the fact that she had been ignoring his messages and calls up until now. He was slightly wounded that she had cut contact with him for a while but, seeing her in front of him now made him forget his earlier qualms.

"It's such good news that you're coming home!" he continued to say excitedly. "The footage you sent over was such good quality. I think I heard Richard say that you did well for a rookie. I think you might even be the prime candidate for that promotion--"

"Nikka--"

"And you know what? You've missed a lot of drama at work over the past couple of months! You know George, yeah? Apparently, he got caught having an affair with Katie from HR--"

"Nikka--"

"And Darren from Tech was so upset! He and George had a full-on fist fight in the staff room so now--"

"Nikka!" Mirei shouted.

"Yeah? What?" he asked innocently. "I was just getting to the good part."

Mirei looked at him steadily from across the screen. She was hugging the heart-shaped pillow that he had given her when he left Seoul. Her voice was low, "Nikka... I'm not coming home."

Nikka blinked. "What?" His voice had gone up a notch. "What-what do you mean you're not coming home?"

"I've decided," Mirei said firmly. "That I'm not going back to the UK."

Nikka couldn't process what he was hearing. He started to laugh, "Haha, Mirei," he said with forced humour. "Very funny. You got me. So, stop joking like that--"

"Nikka, I'm serious" she replied, her eyes fixed on his. "I'm not going back."

Nikka was speechless. He looked deeply into her eyes, trying to figure out why she was saying such things.

Mirei sighed. "I owe you an explanation."

"You owe me more than that!" Nikka heard himself shout as he finally found his voice. "What the hell's going on Mirei? What do you mean you're not coming back home?"

Mirei averted her gaze as she took a deep breath. "Before the EXO members left, Kyungsoo..." she locked eyes with Nikka, "proposed to me."

"What?!"

"I know" Mirei replied with a small smile, "I was like that too." She traced her finger around the letters stitched on the heart-shaped pillow. "And I've been thinking about it ever since."

"What did you say?" Nikka asked her hurriedly. "Surely, you said 'no'?"

Mirei responded calmly, "I told him that I'll think about it and he's given me a month to answer."

Nikka's mind was working overtime as it tried to process the shocking news. He felt dizzy as thoughts raced through his mind at high speed. "You can't get married!" he exclaimed. "What about your family? Your job? Your life, here? In the UK? You're just gonna abandon all that for some guy you met six months ago?" his voice trailed off as he finally asked, "What about... me?"

Nikka gaped at Mirei desperately as he urged her to make the right decision. He didn't want her to marry him; he never wanted her to leave the UK in the first place. Why did this happen? How did this happen? It just didn't make any sense.

"I know it sounds stupid but I've given it a lot of thought" Mirei began. "And I want to be with him, Nikka."

Nikka felt a stab in his heart.

"I'm going to quit my job and find one here, in Seoul."

"No, Mirei!" he begged her, "You can't!"

"I know it's a shock but I've made up my mind," she told him with a smile on her face. "I'm going to say 'yes'. I'm going to tell Kyungsoo when he gets back."

Nikka was exasperated. "Wait, Mirei! Think this through again. You're making a mistake!" he warned her. "You're making a mistake!"

Mirei frowned at him. "Nikka, as my best friend, I thought you'd be happy for me--"

"How can I be happy when the woman I love is getting married to another man?" Nikka suddenly proclaimed. He stopped as he realised what he had said and he covered his mouth in shock. After months of keeping his mouth shut, he had finally told her the truth. He had finally come out of the closet.

Mirei stared at him motionlessly. "...What?"

"I love you, Mirei. I've loved you all along" Nikka told her, his voice trembling. "And I don't love you as a friend or even as a best friend-- I love you as a woman." He stared into her eyes as he told her sincerely the words he should have told her long ago, "Mirei Na, I'm in love with you."

Mirei's eyes rounded at Nikka's speech. "You-you love me?"

Nikka nodded.

Mirei was speechless once more.

Nikka waited in agony as he watched her try to process all that she had heard.

"But..." she finally uttered, "you're gay..."

Nikka smiled humourlessly. His voice was bitter, "It was only ever you who believed that. I've been straight all this time."

"What?!" Mirei was even more bewildered.

"It was a misunderstanding. You know Karen, right? She was my ex-girlfriend at the time and we had just recently broken up. She was the one who spread rumours about me being gay. And I couldn't tell you because you were so excited about having a gay friend."

Nikka watched as Mirei slightly nodded her head as if she finally understood how the misunderstanding occurred. "I-I can't believe this." Her voice was barely audible as she shook her head. "All this time, I thought--"

"You thought wrong" Nikka sourly replied.

She looked at him, confusion in her eyes. "Nikka... I don't know what to say."

"Say you'll come back" he pleaded. "Say you'll give me a chance. Say you'll give us a chance."

"Nikka..." Mirei whispered. "I-I can't."

Nikka shifted in his seat as he stared at his webcam directly. "Mirei, please. I beg you. I'll give you everything. Whatever he can give you, I can give you double--no-- triple the amount. Please, Mirei, I will love you fully." Nikka saw Mirei hug the heart-shaped pillow tighter. It was like she was both physically and metaphorically squeezing his chest. "I gave you my heart," he told her as he gestured at the pillow in her arms. He croaked, "So why can't you give me yours?"

Mirei's face scrunched up into a pained expression as she answered, "Because mine already belongs to someone else. I'm sorry, Nikka."

All of a sudden, Mirei's face disappeared and the Skype call ended.

"Hello? Mirei? Mirei, are you still there?" he asked, urgently tapping his mouse. But when he tried to call her back, it said that she was no longer online. Mirei must have switched off her phone.

"God damn it!" he shouted in frustration as he slammed his closed fist hard on the desk. He didn't care that his hand was now throbbing with pain. All he could think about was the rawness he was feeling in his chest and the thought of Mirei getting married to another man.

How could this have happened? Mirei wasn't coming back? She was going to stay in South Korea? Forever?

No.

He won't let that happen.

He forbids it!

Mirei was never meant to go to Seoul. She was never meant to go undercover; never meant to meet EXO and most certainly was never meant to fall in love with one of them.

Nikka stood up abruptly as he started pacing around his room. He needed to find a way to stop her from making the biggest mistake of her life. He stopped suddenly as he pondered, Should I fly to Seoul and stop her? But then, he shook his head as he knew that Mirei would refuse to meet him even if he had flown over. He knew what Mirei was like. She was good at hiding and being invisible if she didn't want to be found.

Nikka clenched his jaw as he spotted Mirei's onscreen husband's picture on his cork board. While he was researching WGM, he had created a mood board of all the people connected to Mirei. It was meant to help him as a visual representation. He ripped his picture off his corkboard angrily, the push pin flying away as he did so. Furiously, he tore the picture until it was only shreds of paper. The thought of Mirei getting married to that guy was unbearable. She shouldn't be with anyone else but him.

Just as he was about to tear another EXO member's picture, his eyes suddenly spotted Suji's picture. He had scribbled her phone number, which took him ages to find, under her picture just in case she did anything to harm Mirei. Suddenly, a light bulb flashed in Nikka's mind as the eureka moment came to him.

That's right, he told himself. I still have some dirt on her. He smiled as he finally found a way to get Mirei to come home.

And Suji Lee was his solution.

~*~

Suji sighed as boredom invaded her being. She was currently at her private salon getting her manicure done but, even though it was her favourite pass time, she didn't feel any thrill at all.

Suji knew why she had been feeling discontent: it was because Chanyeol wasn't there.

Ever since Chanyeol had left for China over a month ago, she had found nothing to occupy herself with. She missed Chanyeol a lot and it was a big miscalculation on her part when she thought that by separating Nami and Chanyeol, she would, in turn, get closer to him and more distant to Nami. Everything had been going to plan until she realised that Chanyeol never answered her messages or her calls. And by being away in a foreign country, it had made it easier for him to avoid her.

Suji scowled as she thought of Nami. It was all her fault. If it wasn't for her, she and Chanyeol would already be an item. She huffed sorely as her personal beautician filed her cuticles and snapped at her when she had accidentally filed one of her nails too short. "Just file the other two!" Suji barked, as her personal beautician hurried to do the remaining nails.

Suji was too hot-tempered today. She was in a bad mood because nothing seemed to go according to plan. Initially, she had thought that by putting Nami on 'We Got Married' with another EXO member, it would upset her and, cause a rift between her and Chanyeol. But then, after watching the variety show, Suji had come to realise that her plan to sabotage Nami had failed.

Instead of embarrassing her or inflicting stress on her, Nami and D.O had been a big hit. Because of the onscreen couple, the ratings for WGM had gone up and Suji couldn't help noticing that the chemistry between Nami and D.O was very authentic. It was so authentic in fact, that it felt like they were really a couple and that annoyed Suji more.

Had she played an indirect role in getting two lovers together? She hoped not. She sighed miserably-- Suji couldn't believe how rotten her luck was.

Just then, she heard a knock on her door and her butler came in. "You have a call, agassi."

Suji frowned. She hated getting calls when she was in the middle of her manicure. "Who is it?"

The butler replied, "He doesn't wish to say. He says that he wishes to speak to you but..."

Suji looked at her butler as his voice suddenly trailed off. "But, what?"

The butler resumed, "The caller doesn't speak very good Korean."

Suji was intrigued. A foreigner? Who could it be? She stretched out her arm to accept the phone in her butler's hand and waved her beautician to leave her. When both her butler and beautician had left, she proceeded to answer the call. Suji knew fluent Japanese, Mandarin, Korean and English-- courtesy of Lee Sooman's education philosophy.

She decided to try English first. "Hello?"

"Am I speaking to Suji Lee?" the caller asked. His voice sounded muffled on the other end and there was no caller ID.

"Yes, you're speaking to her right now" Suji answered warily. "Who is this? And how did you get my number?"

The person on the other end cleared his throat. "Never mind the details," he told her. "Just listen to what I have to say."

Suji pursed her lips. "Yah, if this is a prank call, I swear to God I will--"

"This isn't a prank" the stranger interrupted. "I have a proposition I think you might be interested in."

Suji shut up immediately. "What is it?"

"I have information on a certain person called... Minami."

Suji arched her brow. "I'm listening."

The stranger's voice sounded pleased. "Are you using an iPhone or an android?" he asked.

Suji was taken aback by the odd question. "iPhone."

"Okay, I'm face timing you right now."

Suji pulled her phone away from her ear as a FaceTime request was made to her by the anonymous informant. Suji watched in anticipation as the camera turned on and she saw another screen at the end. It looked like the stranger was videoing a computer screen.

"What are you trying to show me?" She asked him.

The stranger played the video and Suji watched intently. "Just watch this video and you will find out" he responded vaguely.

Suji watched as the video played and she saw the EXO members appear. She recognised where the place was being filmed: it was their dorm. The person filming it was doing so inconspicuously as the frames were shot at odd angles. Suji continued watching until she realised that it was some sort of documentary. After the stranger fast forwarded it to the end, Suji gasped when she saw Nami's face appear.

"This is Mirei Na, reporting for the BBC news. Thank you."

The video stopped. Suji's eyes were like the size of saucers. She couldn't believe it... Nami was an undercover reporter?

"If you are willing to cooperate with me, I will send you this video and you can use it to drive Minami away" the stranger informed her. "Use it however you wish to but, you must ensure that she gets on her flight home."

"Her flight home?" Suji repeated. "You mean to say that she's a foreign undercover reporter?"

The stranger replied. "Yes."

"I-I can't believe this..."

"I will only send you this video if you are willing to abide by my rules" the stranger added. "You must not, under any circumstances, release this video to the public or to anyone who might harm Minami. All I want you to do is to make sure she returns to where she came from."

"And what if I do release it?" Suji challenged.

The stranger let out a light laugh. "You wouldn't want to do that."

"Why?" she scoffed. "What would you do to me if I did?"

The stranger sent her something on iMessenger and Suji looked down on her phone. There, on her screen, were photos of her in unflattering poses getting cosy with other K-pop idols that she had met in nightclubs over the last few weeks. During that time she had been so upset at Chanyeol for ignoring her that she decided to find other distractions. Suji coloured at the images in front of her. How did this mysterious stranger manage to get a hold of these photos?

"If you know what's good for you" the stranger began, "you will abide by my rules and do as I say. If not, I guess Lee Sooman would love to learn what his darling daughter has been up to."

"You- you wouldn't!" Suji replied, flustered.

The stranger sounded like he was smirking as he answered, "Oh, but yes I would."

After a while, Suji asked, "Who are you? And why are you doing this?"

"I'm just a lowly shepherd" he replied mockingly. "And I just want my lost lamb to come home." He laughed softly at his own pathetic joke before saying, "So what's it going to be? Are you willing to work with me?"

Suji considered his proposition. He sounded like a dangerous person to be working with but, then again...

"You have five minutes to decide" he warned her.

"No need," Suji told him almost immediately. "I'm in."

"Excellent" the stranger responded.

Suji smirked as she finally found something that would get rid of Nami. And this time, it won't be a failure.

~*~

Author's Note:

Hi reader, thanks for reading chapter 61 of Our Little Dorm Mother!

Did you get the reference with the heart-shaped pillow? I hope you remembered it! It's been a while since Nikka appeared in the story but at last, he has finally told Nami his true feelings. What does he and Suji have planned?

Find out next time...

P.S The next update will be early/ late tomorrow because I will be travelling again. Like before, as long as I have wi-fi and a full battery, I will update. See you all soon! And as always, please vote, comment and share.