“The way you’d better fix your face if noona walks in while we’re working.”
“Fix my face…?”
“He means,” said Kei, berating him over the dryer’s deafening roar, “that you’re a terrible actor. You’ll be a total weirdo whenever you see her, and that’s how you’ll get caught. You get caught, Sunshines find out we’ve got two of you idiots dating, and we lose our deal with Zenith.”
“Get off him,” barked Max. “Go finish your stupid hair. Hyung, just be normal. You’re so obvious. Try harder, that’s all I’m saying.”
“Try harder to fix my face. Okay.”
“Ha! Fix his face! Is that what you just told him?” Namgyu strolled in, shirtless, chugging black coffee out of a travel mug. He tried the English phrase a few times before switching back to Korean. “Fix your face, fix your face. Aww, there’s nothing to fix there, Ari.”
Nicky popped his head into the cottage. He’d wrangled the dog into a track jacket that matched his own. “Hey, Ari Junior’s here.”
“Don’t call me that,” snapped Ezra.
“Ari the Sequel.”
“Stop.”
“Okay, so Budget Ari—”
Ezra whirled around to confront him, but Nicky had taken off again, hooting with laughter, running another lap around the property with Uyu on her leash. But the name changed yesterday, didn’t it? Wasn’t she back to being Marshmallow now?
Eunjae held the door open in case his brother wanted to come inside. The kid didn’t move an inch. “That’s what you’re wearing?”
“Ah, yeah. Why?”
“You look like a walking laundry basket,” sniffed Ezra, “but whatever.”
“They’ll have us change when we get there.”
A shrug. “Okay.”
Since this topic wasn’t going anywhere, Eunjae decided to change tack. “I saw the schedule. Did they give you the interview questions in advance?”
“They did. Why?”
“Just wanted to make sure. I asked them if they could. I know you’ve never done anything like this before.”
“It wasn’t a big deal. All the questions were pretty boring.” Ezra shoved his hands into his pockets. “Mostly they just want to know about you. Story of my life.”
He said this with such bitterness that Eunjae took a small step backward, bumping into an incensed Max. He’d heard everything from ‘walking laundry basket’ onward. It might have ignited the umpteenth brawl of the morning if not for Denny’sarrival. He surveyed the scene, colossal and unimpressed, a portent of inescapable doom.
“So,” said their manager. “Three fully dressed, three half-dressed, one in a stolen bathrobe, one in a towel. Par for the course.”
“Zu counts as half-dressed, right?” mumbled Kei. “Grandpa’s not even wearing a shirt under that jacket.”
“It’s zipped up all the way,” Kazu exclaimed in his own defense.
“Should you get a trophy or something?”
“I should get a trophy,” whined Jesse. “Why am I awake right now? This can’t be legal.”
“Just get in the car, Ahn.”
“But Captain, can we bring the puppy?”
“Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh can wepleasebring her—”
