"Kaikai, over here!" Dani called, waving a hand.
"Oh, coming!" Kaija replied, weaving her way through the sea of people, with Esko right behind her.
Dani and Antony had arrived with the KE backstage crew. They had co straight from campus, while Esko had been with Kaija since morning for the press eting.
While the backstage crew went inside to prepare, Dani and Antony stood waiting just outside the staff gate of the Muzik Open Hall.
"Kaikai?" Antony raised a brow, curious. "Where did that na co from?"
"Didn’t she insist you save her nickna in your contacts?" Dani replied, lifting a brow back. "I can’t just call her by her real na out loud in public now, or people around here might notice and go crazy. Besides, Kaikai sounds cute, doesn’t it?"
Antony’s eyes narrowed as his gaze shifted to the approaching Kaija, her face now fully covered.
"It does sound cute," he muttered.
The only problem was, she had never ntioned that nickna to him. Ever.
"Let’s go inside," Kaija said, pointing toward the staff door. "I’ve got, like, an hour before my turn."
Antony followed right behind, but the stiff, flat expression he wore whenever he sulked had already returned to his face.
The corridor led straight to the backstage area, where Kaija would first have her makeup and hair done, along with her outfit, in an assigned dressing room.
Since the Muzik Open Hall was specially built to host dozens of artists performing for the S Top Hundred program every weekend, each artist was assigned a private room rather than being cramd together in one space.
When their turn ca, the artist would step onto the stage and perform live in front of fans and countless caras broadcasting the performance to millions of viewers across the country.
The program itself was mainly for artists to promote their new songs, and to stay relevant to the music scene in S Country.
All votings from the fans and comrcial performance of each song had already been calculated prior to the show.
At the end of the show, the top three songs out of the top one hundred chart would be announced onstage, with the artist in the first place taking ho a trophy, significant publicity, and a cash prize of S$5,000 from the sponsor.
As for Kaija, who only had her song released that morning, the debut performance today was purely for promotion, not for the result that day.
The song she was performing today would only start joining the race on the weekly chart in the following week.
"Not going for blue this ti?" Dani asked, eyeing the scarlet red dress hanging on the rack, freshly ironed and stead by the outfit staff.
Instead of satin, the dress was made of light, flowing chiffon, designed to move flawlessly with the sensual chair dance and the stage fans blowing from both sides.
Just seeing the brand tag made Dani want to refrain from touching it, admiring its beauty and craftsmanship in quiet awe.
After Kaija wore the light blue Birds of Paradise dress at the festival, the fad designer house had gained significant public exposure and decided to sponsor a different outfit for her debut performance today.
"The designer said a deep, bright scarlet red fits the song much better than light blue," Esko said, also careful not to touch the crystals adorning the princess seams. "He didn’t even ask for her asurents! The dress is gorgeous, but I’ve been worried sick about whether it would even fit."
Dani raised a brow at the dress, examining it carefully, then turned to Kaija. "Speaking of that light blue dress, where did you even get sothing that pricey? Did you order it from them?"
"Not at all," Kaija replied from the makeup chair in front of the mirror. "Rember when I kept asking whether any of you sent flowers and a black bag? That blue dress was inside the bag, and sohow, it fit perfectly. I’m still baffled every ti I think about it."
From his chair in the corner, Antony, quiet this entire ti, raised a brow.
He knew Birds of Paradise had opened their first store at the Kosonen Tower fifty years ago, and Charles’s mother, the Lady of the House, had always been a fan of the brand.
That woman must have spent millions on dresses made by this brand, and Charles gave her more every birthday or special occasion, if he was not mistaken.
If anyone on the campus could pull it off, it could only be his damned older half-brother, but he kept the suspicion to himself.
"Instructor Antony," Esko’s voice ca, "I’m afraid we have to leave the room for a bit now, Kaija is going to get changed."
Snapped out of his thoughts, Antony rose to his feet and turned toward the door almost imdiately. "Co out when you’re done then," he said, with Esko and the other male staff quickly following behind him.
When the door to Kaija’s dressing room opened again, everyone’s gaze inevitably turned toward the doorway.
The artist they had co here for stepped out, the scarlet dress dazzling on her body, hugging firmly around her tiny waist and flowing elegantly down her thighs all the way to the floor. When she moved, the chiffon flowed with her, like wild flas dancing in the wind, bold yet elegant.
Antony thought his breath had left him for good in that mont.
When he had seen her in the blue dress, he had found it hard to breathe enough, but now the scarlet on her body burned his eyes the way moths must have felt when they were drawn to fla.
"Kaikai," the na slipped from his lips, now trembling faintly.
Her blue eyes widened slightly before she broke into a small laugh. "Instructor," she called, "did you learn that from Dani just earlier?"
A flush rushed to his cheeks unbidden, nodding shyly despite himself.
Around the two of them, almost every staff mber, including Esko and Dani, could already sense sothing going on between the ever-steely Antony slash AK, now blushing without restraint, and the artist he had co for today.
"Antony," Dani’s voice ca, her hand frantically signaling the staff to retreat into the dressing room, "why don’t you take Kaija to the main stage? The rest of us will stay and watch Kaikai’s performance from here. You still rember the way around, right?"
Though Antony didn’t quite catch Dani’s thoughtful consideration, he wasted no ti agreeing. "Then wait for us here," he said. "I’ll get her back the second she’s done."
With final wishes and hugs for Kaija, the staff thoughtfully retreated into the dressing room.
"I’ve troubled you again, Instructor," Kaija said, turning to Antony, who was still burning all over. "What a sha I can’t keep the dress after the performance. It would’ve been nice to wear this to that dance with you, don’t you think?"
"Um, yes..." Antony replied timidly, clearing his throat. "Um, we should, uh, go this way..." He pointed to his left awkwardly.
A chuckle slipped from Kaija the mont she recognized his struggle at last.
"Lead the way then, Instructor," she said, reaching for his hand.
Just as they were about to take a step, a feminine voice ca from behind them, sweet and sultry, faintly trembling with surprise.
"My goodness, AK, is that you?"
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