+ ten

Days turned to a week and Narda thought she had driven Baekhyun and the other boys out of their dorms. It wasn't something completely out of the ordinary. Narda had once read about how another kpop group had been forced to move to a different dorm building because the fans had found out the exact location and had posted about it on the internet. Within hours, the outside of the building was swarming with fans and the idols were not able to have a single moment of peace and quiet.

Narda had worked too hard to find out the exact address to lose them in a matter of days like that. She didn't tell anyone where the building was, much less that she knew where it was located. To any one else, it appeared like any other apartment complex building, which blended in with the other buildings in the city.

She watched the building from afar. Other idols came and went a few times, but none of them were EXO. She spent her newfound free time trying to learn how to cook Korean meals by watching youtube videos, but it was difficult for her. There was even a video where she tried to make Kyungsoo's famous kimchi spaghetti, but she had failed miserably. She eventually gave up and found out there was a Costco market in Seoul, where she went to buy things to prepare the foods she knew from back home.

On the day that Nari was scheduled to return, Narda was hard at work in the kitchen, cooking a nice meal to welcome her friend back home. She was a bit surprised and worried that Nari hadn't texted or called her while she was in China, but she assumed it was because she was very busy.

It was Thursday afternoon when the front door opened and Narda heard Nari's tired footsteps from the kitchen. With her long hair tied back into a bun, and a pink apron with bunny patterns around her waist, Narda stepped out from the kitchen to greet her flat mate. With a bright smile, she said, "Welcome back, Nari!" There was even a banner in the living room which Narda had made with her primary school students for Nari's return. "I tried to cook you a traditional Korean meal, but I'm not very good at it. So I thought you might like to try the flavors of my country."

The moment she saw the look on Nari's face, Narda knew that whatever was coming would not be good. "I want you to get out of my apartment, Guti." Was the first thing that Nari said to Narda in a cold manner. "Pack your things and get out of my apartment right now." She demanded in a harsh tone.

Narda stood there frozen. Nari had been so good to her from the moment she arrived in Korea and it had all changed in a matter of a few days apart from each other. A great flat mate, and even a good friend. She didn't understand why everything changed between them. Her smile was gone, now replaced by a look full of hurt and confusion. "Why Nari? I've paid my rent on time. I've stayed out of your way when you're busy. I haven't been noisy or messy. You don't have any reasons to kick me out. I don't understand."

"I don't want crazy sasaeng fans in my apartment." Nari gave her response. "That's why I was so hesitant to let people into my apartment even thought I needed someone to share expenses with. Are you even a teacher? Is the primary school really where you go all day, or do you use that time to stalk our neighbors too?"

The foreign girl felt her heart drop. Nari had found out that Narda had been stalking Baekhyun.

"I do teach at the primary school." Narda assured with a quick nod of her head, her words almost coming out jumbled in her nervousness. "You can go ahead and ask if you don't believe me. Liking EXO doesn't stop me from having a proper job."

"You have been a great flat mate." Nari admitted with a sigh. "But I just don't want to have this kind of drama in my life--you stalking our neighbors..."

Narda brought her hands together to beg her friend, her voice full of desperation. "Please Nari. Don't do this to me. I really have nowhere else to go. You know I don't have any loved ones or friends in Korea. Its only been you who opened up to me."

"I can't have you here, not when my-" Nari began, but immediately stopped herself.

"Your what?" Narda asked, confused.

"Nothing." Nari shook her head. Thinking up a quick excuse as to how she knew about her flat mate's activities, she explained, "Our neighbors are very important people and they just complained to me and asked me to talk to you."

Narda pondered for a moment. Who else could have gone to Nari but Baekhyun? He had probably asked her to kick Narda out of the apartment because she was pestering him. It could have been him or Chanyeol, Narda thought. Perhaps he had only been pretending to be nice to her when she was out there in the cold. Pretending to be nice only to show his true intentions after talking to Nari and asking her to kick Narda out.

"Please pack your things and get out of here." Nari repeated her request once more.

Narda sighed, but nodded in understanding. It was Nari's apartment after all and she would get to decide who could live there as her flat mate--there was nothing Narda could do about it. Narda removed her apron from around her waist and folded it neatly, placing it on the sofa. "I cooked dinner." She informed Nari with a dejected tone as she gestured to the kitchen, yet it was oozing with pride because she felt like she had done nothing wrong. "You can enjoy it with your friend, the one whose face you always cover with a couch cushion when I walk by."

With that she went to her room and began packing her things, leaving Nari going red in the face.

-

Narda left the apartment over an hour later without saying another word to Nari. Her heavy luggage trailed behind her as she took slow steps toward the elevator and then through the lobby to the front doors. She walked down the street in the direction of the kimbap restaurant where she had first been interviewed by Nari a month prior, knowing nowhere else to turn to. She had planned that she would stay there until closing hours and then decide what she would do afterwards. Perhaps she could find a park with a comfortable bench to sleep on for the night.

From the other side of the street, Chanyeol and the rest of the boys had gone to the kimbap restaurant to get dinner for everyone--except Minseok who didn't like kimbap. They had gotten something else off the menu for him to eat. Chanyeol spotted the young woman walking down the street with her belongings and separated from the group, assuring them that he would catch up with them in a moment.

The boys didn't question it and walked ahead towards the dorm building, disappearing inside. Only Kris, Suho, and Baekhyun had gone along. The rest were back in the dorms, exhausted from a week and a half of arduous schedules in China.

Chanyeol jogged across the street to catch up with her after making sure there were no cars coming. "Hey--little liar!" He called out to her and waved a hand above his head frantically.

She stopped in her tracks when she heard the familiar voice, or rather the nickname that only one person called her since she had arrived in Korea. Narda looked over her shoulder to see him jogging in her direction, stopping directly behind her. She then turned around fully to face him, her hand letting go of the handle on her heavy luggage.

Narda raised an eyebrow at him, her voice accusing. "Did you come to laugh at me now?"

He shot her a confused look. "What are you talking about?"

"You talked to my flat mate and asked her to kick me out. Now I have no where to live--I'm a hobo because of you." She told him, as though it could have only been him who did that to her.

"Chill, I didn't talk to anyone about you." He swore. "This is the first I'm hearing about you not having a home."

"Then it was probably Baekhyun." She sighed, knowing somewhere in the back of her mind that it had most likely been him. It had to have been one of the two. She hadn't come into contact with any of the other boys, and she didn't plan to. She only wanted to get close to Baekhyun, and Chanyeol was the one seeking her out for reasons unknown to her. On any other occasion she would have been estatic. But she couldn't because she had nowhere to live. "It doesn't matter who did it, honestly. I'm going to stay in a hotel--or a park bench--and then give it a few days to find another place to live."

"So dramatic." He chuckled. "How do you go from having hotel as option A and park bench as option B."

Narda shrugged her shoulders, not finding the situation even slightly amusing.

"Hm." Chanyeol hummed as a thought came to mind. He remembered something that Baekhyun had said to him, She's staying in apartment 512 across the street. He knew that apartment number. He assumed that Narda didn't even know where to go, and he thought to give her a suggestion. "There's a hotel really close by, just about five streets from here if you go straight down the line of buildings to your left." He gestured down the street with his arm pointing out in a straight line as though they could see the hotel from where they stood on the sidewalk.

"It was nice seeing you, and thank you for the suggestion, Chanyeol oppa." She nodded thankfully and bowed slightly. 

He shook his head and raised a hand politely to stop her. "You don't have to call me oppa or bow in front of me, since I know its not your custom. I understand if you just call me by my name, I won't feel disrespected or anything." Chanyeol flashed her a small smile as he spoke. 

Narda bit down on her lip. "Its not a custom in America, but my parents are from Mexico and that is a very traditional society. One has to show respect for the older generations of people." She replied to him, matter-of-factly. More than living by the American culture, she lived by the traditions of her parents' county, especially at home. She had learned the traditions of Mexico from a young age, and it wasn't until she started school that she learned American customs. "I just wanted to find a way to show that I respect you as a person. English has no respectful words, really. Its so informal and rude sounding." Pausing for a second as an idea came to her, she told him, "If me calling you oppa makes you uncomfortable, I'll just call you usted, in Spanish."

"What is an usted?" He crinkled up his nose in confusion. The foreign word rolled off his tongue with some difficulty and it came out butchered when he had tried to make it sound like she had spoken it.

"The formal way to say you, in Spanish. There's tu, which is the informal, the way one would speak to a close friend or family member who is about the same age as one. And then there's the usted to show respect, to speak to someone you just met recently, or to speak to someone who is older than you. Its basically the Spanish equivalent to oppa or unnie." She explained like an expert on the topic of her other language. "Its our custom, but we don't bow."

Chanyeol nodded with a grin, "You can call me usted, then. I wouldn't mind that. As long as you're not insulting me in Spanish or something."

"I would never." She assured him with a shy nod of her head. She then turned to continue her path down the street after waving a small goodbye to the kpop idol standing on the sidewalk.

But Chanyeol already had a plan in mind. He would go to the apartment building where she lived and talk to her flat mate and convince her to take Narda back.

-

update for this story because it's been a while. so now we have narda being kicked out of the apartment all bc of byun bacon. lol

i hope you all like the chapter. thank you for reading!

-clary xx