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“I will,” Yujun promises while I hide my face in embarrassment. This is only slightly less humiliating than walking out of the bathroom with your skirt tucked into your tights, but not by much. A public breakdown so loud and obvious that strangers are coming up to Yujun to see if I need help? Dig a hole in the concrete and cover me with the leftovers.
“I’m not much of a crier,” I say when the tears subside to a small trickle. “I didn’t even cry at my dad’s funeral. Either of them. Pat, my adoptive dad, didn’t like it when I cried. It made him uncomfortable.” I draw the damp silk across my swollen eyes. “What about you?”
“I’ve been known to shed a tear or two.” He bends down to gauge the tear status.
I wave him off. “I’m so confused right now.”
“I wish I could say I understand what you’re going through but I can’t. But I do know one thing. You’re Korean, Hara. Even though you grew up in America. Even though you speak English and not Korean. Even though you feel like you’re different when you open your mouth. You are Korean where it counts. Here.” He draws a finger across the blue veins in my wrist. “The same blood that flows in me flows in you. My ancestors are your ancestors. Where you were raised and who you were raised by doesn’t change that. If anything, your experience makes you all the more Korean because what is a Korean but someone who has experienced loss and still survived?”
I have only four nights left with Yujun. When the taxi transports me from the river to the bottom of the mountain of stairs, I tug him out with me. I pull him through the gate, up the stairs, and into my bedroom. He leans against the door and takes me into his arms. His kisses are slow and lazy, as if to say without any words that time has no meaning. Blood pumps through my veins, hot and heavy.
My limbs feel curiously weighted as I lift my arms to unbutton his wrinkled soggy shirt that is still damp from my tears. His hand comes up to cradle my head as if he doesn’t want us to break contact for even a second.
I push his shirt off his broad shoulders, warm my palms against his heated skin, breathe in the scent of the river, soap, and mint from a candy he popped into his mouth on the ride here.
My hands find his waistband and then his zipper. I pause, not sure if I should go on, but his fingers fold around mine and together we tug the fastener down. His slacks fall to the floor as he dances me backward to the bed. Goose bumps pebble my flesh as the cool air hits my lower back where his free hand has pushed up my shirt.
“Cold?” he murmurs against my lips.
“No.” And that statement is made true when his body covers what he bared.
He’s all long limbs, capable hands, confident mouth. I give myself over to him, let him console me with his strength. Of all the memories I want to take back home from Seoul, Yujun features in all of them. The river is more seductive, the sun is brighter, the food is tastier, when I’m with him. There are no parents here in this bed. No responsibilities between the sheets. There is only his body worshipping my body. His lips on my breast, his hot breath on my stomach, his mouth lower still. I twine my fingers through his hair, part my legs, and allow myself to crest one wave of pleasure after another.
And when he takes me, when his mouth returns to mine and he whispers broken things to me in a language that sounds like music, he is not anyone but my Yujun from Seoul.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
I wake up with a pounding headache and an empty bed. Beside my pillow is a phone box with a note that reads, “As promised, here is your new phone. You can’t return it because it’s already activated. I put my phone number as your first contact.”
As promised? I can’t remember when— Oh. Last night he had that conversation with the stranger.
She threw her phone in the river.
You should buy her a new one.
I will.
Yujun from Seoul.
I curl my fingers around the edge and smile ruefully. I do need a phone.
I push myself out of bed and get ready. First order is to text Ellen.
ME: Am coming home soon. Give me a call. I don’t care what time it is here
That sounds inviting rather than threatening. Actually, if I really want a response, I should send some vague panicky text like omg pls call right now, but I don’t know what to say to her yet. I’m hurt and mad and maybe this conversation would be better in person, but I can’t swallow this down like I’ve done everything in the past. It’s too big to put in its own box and be forgotten.
