Page 87 of The Way Back Home

I stand, roll my neck until it cracks, and pad to the bathroom. Run cold water over my face, scrub at my eyes, look at myself in the mirror. There’s a crease on my cheek from his shirt seam.

When I come out Ryowoon’s awake, sitting up, bleary-eyed, scratching the back of his head with the controller still in his other hand. He blinks at the TV screen, then down at the controller, then up at me.

I nod at the kitchen. “There any coffee in this place?”

He yawns. “Cabinet above the stove. The mugs are clean, I think.”

I go make coffee. I bring him a cup. We sit on the couch drinking it, the game menu still looping its jingle on the screen, the morning pouring in through the window, and neither of us says a word about where we woke up.

A few weeks in I’m at the store one afternoon, helping Mrs. Nam restock the back shelves. She’s gotten a delivery of canned goods and dried noodle packets that need to go up, and I balance on a step stool reaching for the top shelf while she supervises from below, directing me like a military general.

“No, not there. To the left. Your other left, Seyeon.”

“Halme, I only have one left.”

“Then use it properly.”

I snort and shift the cans where she wants them, wiping sweat off my forehead with my arm. The store’s warm today, the afternoon sun beating through the windows and the old ceiling fan doing its useless best overhead. I’ve been at it for a couple hours and my shirt is sticking to my back.

Mrs. Nam shuffles off to the front counter to attend to a customer and I finish the last row, stepping down off the stool and stretching, my shoulders popping. As I’m reaching for the next box I hear a low, throaty rumble from outside. It gets louder, closer, then cuts to an idle right outside the store.

I wipe my hands on my jeans and walk through the store toward the open roll-down doors, squinting against the sunlight.

Ryowoon is sitting on a motorcycle.

Not just any motorcycle. A black Yamaha SR400, the model from the magazine ad he had taped above his bed for years, the one he used to stare at while I studied, the one he’d circle with a pen and leave lying around as if someone might take the hint and buy it for him. It’s sleek and dark and beautiful under the afternoon sun, chrome reflecting the light.

Ryowoon sits astride it with both feet planted on the pavement, his jacket on, a dark tee underneath, his helmet hanging off the handlebars by its strap. He looks at me with a crooked grin already forming.

I stop in the doorway. Look at the bike. Look at him. Look at the bike again.

“What’s this?”

“What’s it look like?”

I come closer, walking around it, taking it in. My eyes trace the body, the engine, the clean lines of the tank.

“Is this yours?”

“No, I stole it.” He rolls his eyes. “Yeah, it’s mine. Bought it with my savings a couple months ago.”

I shake my head, laughing. I press the heel of my hand against my mouth but I’m grinning behind it, grinning so wide it hurts, because this idiot actually did it. All those years of staring at that ad, all those years of talking about it while we sat on the rocks at the harbor, all those late nights when he’d flip through car and motorcycle magazines by flashlight and tell me one day, Seyeon, I’m going to ride the coast on one of these and never come back. And here it is, real and solid and rumbling beneath him.

“You absolute lunatic.”

Ryowoon’s grin widens. He reaches behind him and holds up a second helmet, matte black, dangling it by the strap.

“Want to go for a ride?”

I shouldn’t. I still have boxes to unpack and Mrs. Nam’s going to give me grief about leaving early. But my hand reaches for the helmet anwyay, and when I glance back through the doorway Mrs. Nam is watching us from behind the counter with her arms folded and a knowing look on her face that says go, you fool, before I change my mind.

I pull the helmet on, fumble with the chin strap, and swing my leg over the back of the bike. The seat’s narrow. My knees bracket Ryowoon’s hips and when I settle my weight the whole frame dips slightly between us. I put my hands on his sides, uncertain for a second about where to hold on.

Ryowoon glances back over his shoulder, visor up. “You’re going to want to hold on tighter than that.”

I wrap my arms around his waist, locking my hands together against his stomach over the jacket. I can feel the expansion of his ribs when he breathes.

He kicks the stand up, revs the throttle once, and we shoot forward.