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My hair stood on end Rae stared straight ahead, his hands not even on the steering wheel “Are you okay?”

I sighed and looked out the“We should get going”

“Grace”

“Rae” I turned and stared at him “I know you’re the leader, and you feel this heavy responsibility, but I’uys You don’t need to worry about h skin”

He opened his ain and instead started the van and pulled out of our parking spot

I assu

“We’re not used to girls—women,” Rae said it so quietly I alht say et juain hate fro to be over But other than that…” I’d never seen Rae look so uncoirl back in LA We held hands at skate night”

I laughed at that “How very forward and scandalous of you”

He pulled into traffic, s “Yeah, at the time, I think I nearly passed out with each circle we did around the rink A week later, I was in Seoul; two days after that, I was a trainee”

I tried to read between the lines “Are you saying girls scare you?”

“No!” he said way too fast “No, I’, well, we’re careful We have no choice, and on top of that, none of us have had time to even see our families, let alone date”

“Wait!” I held up my hand “You haven’t seen your families?”

“No” His face fell “Last Christmas was the first ti Christ or too exhausted since our schedule started up the very next day”

My jaw dropped “That’s horrible!”

“How is that ?”

“Because it’s so much worse!” I exclaimed “At least you still have tiet back memories with your family”

He did a double take, his suarded the way it had been e first got into the van “You’re not what I expected”

“I’o probably can’t take another blow this week” I winked

“I mean it,” he said softly “About before…”

“Let’s not,” I interrupted “I’ll just want to punch you again”