My Baker's Dozen

52

Mingyu's POV

"Is everyone ready?" Appa yelled from the kitchen, and I tried to decide between belt or no belt. It's not like my pants were going to fall down, but was it worth the risk?

Gyu, come on.

I'm coming, I'm coming.

No belt I guess. I ran out of our room and joined the rest of my brothers in the kitchen. I quickly threw on some shoes I knew I could dance in, and we all walked out to the car.

"You all dressed up very nicely for Hoshi's talent show." Appa noted, and I wondered if he noticed the color scheme. Some of us actually wore a completely different color overtop just to throw him off. A lot of planning has gone into just tonight.

"I guess we all just felt like it." Hansol hyung answered, and we waited in silence for us to arrive at the school. If it was too long of a ride I think one of the BooSeokSoon hyungs spill.

The van pulled into the school parking lot, and we all piled out. We probably look like a clown car to anyone who doesn't know us. Then again even people who vaguely know us don't realize we're all brothers.

"Noona!" Samuel screamed, and he ran across the parking lot to go hug her. The rest of us followed behind a bit more calmly and hoped the eight year old wasn't going to get run over.

"Hello!" She waved with her left hand because her right was around Sam as he clung to her. And then because favoritism could only go so far, we greeted Mark hyung too.

"Appa, I kind of have to go back with my team." Hoshi hyung said. Which was true, he did have to warm up with them since they were doing a team dance performance. That they had to practice for during the day.

"Okay. Good luck!" Hoshi hyung jogged to the front of the school, and the rest of us followed in suit. Just as planned. There are a lot of pieces to the plan though. All of which involve Samuel and his ability to communicate with every single member in the family. Everything relies on Sam remembering the plan.

The main part of the plan was for Appa, Noona and Mark hyung to sit next to each other in the middle of the row, while the rest of us sat on the outside. It looked less suspicious if we didn't sit in order of the plan, so we mixed ourselves up.

"Is this row okay?" Appa asked, pointing to an empty row in the middle of the auditorium. Mark hyung nodded and the three adults filed into the row, exactly as planned.

Chan then sat down right next to Appa, this way he would know everytime one of us left. The only part of the plan that was sketchy, was if Appa would notice we were all leaving and not coming back. It's probably a good thing we got Minseo Noona slightly into this so she can keep Appa in the audience. It would suck if he missed the song looking for us.

After the first two performances, Jihoon hyung and the triplets left to go support Hoshi hyung backstage. Three after them Hansol hyung and Minghao hyung left for the bathroom. Another two after that Wonwoo and Jeonghan hyung took Chan out of the auditorium because it was too loud. Probably one of our best excuses.

The last part of the plan was the sketchiest, and required a bit more waiting. Five songs after the last group left, Joshua hyung and Jun hyung left to go check on their twins that went to the bathroom. Now it was just Sam and I left.

Hoshi hyung's dance team came up onto the stage, completely taking away Appa's attention.

"We have five more numbers until we're up." Samuel whispered into my ear, and I nodded. For not spending much time on their number, Hoshi hyung's team did amazing. So while Appa was busy clapping, Sam and I snuck away. At this point in the planning we had run out of excuses, so now we rely on Minseo Noona.

The two of us sprinted backstage and spotted our brothers stretching themselves out. Those who had worn something overtop had already taken it off, and our color scheme was a lot more obvious now.

I rolled up the cuffs of my sleeves and started stretching out a bit with Sam.

"Did Appa seem suspicious?" Hansol hyung questioned, and I shook my head. Luckily his attention was all on the show and not his children slipping away.

"Chois, you're up." One of the teachers helping to run the event announced, and the thirteen of us made our way onto the stage with our hand held microphones. They would certainly make the dancing more difficult, but we had already practiced in this factor.

After what seemed like ages of waiting, the curtain rose and the staff introduced our song. The file Jihoon hyung had sent them of just the instrumentals started playing, and I went immediately into muscle memory from so many hours of practice.

Our performance didn't even seem long enough by the time we were bowing at the end and running off stage, but nothing went wrong. The thirteen of us handed our microphones back to the teacher and instantly piled into a group hug.

"I think Appa's suspicious by now." Jun hyung joked, and we all collectively jogged back to where we were sitting.

I didn't expect him to be crying with Minseo Noona. As soon as he looked up at us with such a proud smile, I broke down too.

There in the middle of a talent show, in the middle of the auditorium, was seventeen people crying and hugging each other. One of them was an angel.