Make Me STAY

Back Door

One of the best - and worst - parts of Rose's job was that she got to see behind the scenes. For a fan of the group that meant a lot of spoilers. The day she walked into Stray Kids' practice room and saw them rehearsing for their World Tour was one of those days. The bags of drinks and snacks she had brought slipped out of her hands at the sight before her. Luckily nothing was spilt, and she quickly bent down to pick everything up before the boys noticed.

"Noona!"

"Food!"

Felix and Changbin were the first the run over to Rose, closely followed by Jisung and Jeongin. Felix linked his arm with hers while Changbin took the bags and started taking out the food.

"Yah! Thank her first, you animals!"

Felix giggled next to her at the pout on Changbin's face from being told off by their leader.

"Thank you for the food, Rosie-Noona."

"You're welcome, Binnie."

She smiled fondly as the rapper smiled at her with his cheeks puffed out full of food.

By now everyone had joined them around the table at the back of the room where Changbin had spread out the containers of fruit and bottles of drink. Chan spotted on the other side of Rose to Felix and rubbed the back of his head while smiling sheepishly.

"Sorry about them."

"You don't think I've been ignored in favour of food before?"

"No one should ignore, Noona."

Rose ruffled Felix's hair in thanks, making the dancer crinkle his nose in delight.

"So... was that - are you doing an OT8 version of Red Lights?"

"You saw that? Yeah, what did you think?"

"I think STAY are going to die... happy."

Her heart warmed as Chan burst out into laughter.

"Wah! Seungmin, no!"

Changbin's shouts were mostly ignored by the group as if they were a common occurrence, but Rose looked over.

"He keeps stealing my fruit!"

Seungmin leaned over and ate the piece of fruit direct off the fork that the rapper was holding.

"See! Did you see that, Noona!"

"What? I didn't see anything. You should really stop being so mean to Seungmin, Changbinnie."

"But - But - Rosie-Noona!"

The younger boys laughed at Changbin's expression of dismay before teasing him that he should be nicer to them.

"Lixie, I have an idea for the choreography!"

Hyunjin jumped on Felix who was still holding onto Rose's arm and so almost knocked her over in the process. Chan caught her as she stumbled backwards, wrapping an arm around her protectively and pulled her into his side and out of the path of his overly exuberant teammates.

"Thank you."

"They should be more careful."

"They're fine. I'm not that fragile."

Chan frowned slightly but changed the subject.

"Where are you assigned this afternoon?"

"I'm accompanying Minho to Music Core."

"They asked you to go with him?"

"Actually, I volunteered. I - I was hoping we could spend some time together."