Authors: Katie M. Stout
He shrugs. “Just told them to stop staring. They got embarrassed.”
“Uh-huh.” Because politely asking someone to stop staring always inspires them to run away from you at the first opportunity.
We fall into silence, but then he breaks it with, “They were making fun of your dress.”
“My dress?” I glance down at the gauzy fabric I thought complimented my skin tone. “What’s wrong with it?”
He shrugs. “They said it was too long.”
I roll my eyes. “Just because I’m not willing to wear a hemline that’s practically showing off all my goodies, doesn’t make me a prude.”
A half smile appears on his face, and he catches my eye. “They also didn’t like that I was sitting beside an American girl.”
Surprise steals my thoughts for a few seconds before I can ask, “Would they have preferred it if I was Korean?”
“Probably.”
“Interesting.” Not really, but it’s the only adjective I can articulate, at least out loud. “You’d think they didn’t know you lived there for more than half your life,” I muse.
The semipleasant expression on his face fades, and I realize that we’ve just had a complete exchange that didn’t involve a single insult.
Jason shuffles his foot across the dirty footrest. “It’s been a few years since I was in America.”
Confidence streaming through my veins at our newfound civility, I venture to ask, “Why did you guys move back to Korea?”
Coldness swallows his eyes and freezes any emotion in his face, so he looks again like the boy I met in the cafeteria. Like he’s completely cut off all feelings. “You can talk to Sophie about that,” he says.
A few minutes later, the bus crosses the bridge and we’re back on Ganghwa Island. But instead of continuing on through town and up the mountain toward school, we pull into a bus station, and the driver turns off the engine.
Passengers stand, collecting their things, and file off the bus. I look to Jason in confusion, but his blank expression reveals nothing.
We stand and shuffle toward the exit, and when we pass Sophie and Tae Hwa, she says something to Jason in Korean.
“What’s going on?” I ask, but the twins continue their conversation.
Right in front of me, Yoon Jae hangs up with a huff and stuffs the phone back into his pocket. He cranes his neck around.
“The bus doesn’t run all the way to the school this late,” he says to me.
“So how are we going to get back?”
He runs a hand through his hair, making it fluff up like a cockatoo. “We walk.”
A million protestations build in my throat, but I don’t let them out, afraid of being
that girl,
the whiny American who can’t cope with a new place and new culture. But as we trek through town and my shoes rub blisters on the backs of my heels, I seriously consider firing off complaints anyway.
To distract myself from the sweat rolling down my back— and how we’re not even at the base of the mountain yet—I turn to Yoon Jae, who walks beside me, and ask, “Who was that on the phone earlier?”
He scratches the back of his neck and smiles, but it doesn’t have the same brightness as it usually does. “My father.”
The hike up the mountain seems endless. We walk along the side of the road, but it might as well be a cliff face. I have to stare at my feet to keep from slipping over the loose gravel.
I think I’m safe when we turn off the road and pass beneath the arch at the entrance to the school campus, but the tip of my shoe catches on a rock, and I tip forward. But before my face can meet pavement, a hand shoots out and grabs my elbow.
Stumbling, I peer up at Yoon Jae.
“Are you all right?” he asks.
“Well, aren’t you just my knight in shining armor,” I say, exaggerating a Southern accent for dramatic effect.
Yoon Jae beams, but the sound of a snort travels from Jason’s general direction.
We’re almost back to the dorms when I spot a group of students congregating outside the dining hall, a dance song with a heavy bass riff sounding from the middle of the circle of bodies. As we get closer, I stand on my tiptoes and see two guys break dancing inside the circle, acrobatics and all. It’s like watching a dance show on TV.
“Hold on,” I toss over my shoulder, then push closer to see.
The boys inside the circle physically taunt each other, performing a dance move, then holding out their arms or getting in the other’s face. One of them has better footwork, the other better ground work, spinning on his head like a top, then walking on his hands. The song ends, and the crowd bursts into applause.
A second song begins, and another figure emerges into the circle, his movements jerky and in time with the beat. I figure out he’s dancing at the same time I realize his identity—Yoon Jae! He pops and locks like a pro, his body twisting and jerking into bizarre movements that he makes look effortless. The other two boys resume dancing, and the battle is on.
I sense Jason beside me, and I turn to him. “I didn’t know Yoon Jae could dance. Can all three of you move like that?”
“Just Yoon Jae,” he mumbles, his brow wrinkled in an uncharacteristic display of concern. “He wanted to be an idol.”
“A what?”
He clenches his fist and releases it, like he’s grasping for the right words. “A pop idol, uhh … a superstar.”
“How is that different from what you guys are now?”
“He didn’t want to be in a band. He wanted to be in a pop group that just sings and dances, doesn’t write music or play instruments.”
“Oh.” It finally clicks in my head. “A boy band.”
Jason shrugs one shoulder. “They make a lot of money here.”
We break free of the crowd, stepping a few yards away, and I can’t help marveling at the fact that he hasn’t shut down our conversation yet.
“So how did he end up in your band?” I ask. “It started with just you and Tae Hwa, right?”
“The record company chose him for us.” Jason’s gaze follows Yoon Jae, a sort of wistfulness in his eyes, like he’s … jealous? “Tae Hwa and I auditioned together, and the record label wanted another band member, so they assigned Yoon Jae to be our drummer.”
That explains Yoon Jae’s lack of passion in his performance the other night. Boy wants to be dancing up a storm, not keeping beats for a pop-rock band.
“He was mad we’re not dancing for the new video,” Jason mutters, and I almost don’t catch his voice over the cheering of the crowd.
I glance back at the dancers and see Yoon Jae mid–Michael Jackson moonwalk. Always a crowd-pleaser.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
Jason doesn’t answer for a long time, and I think our momentary truce has been severed. But then he surprises me by saying, “We have a music video shooting next month. He wanted to dance, but I said no.”
“You’re shooting a music video?”
My mind spirals back to watching from behind the camera crew as Nathan and his band shot their videos. I doubt Eden’s video will have any big trucks, girls in cowboy hats, or beer kegs, however.
He jerks his chin down in a nod.
“Well, that will be fun!”
His lips twist into a smirk. “Says the girl who thinks we’re just a group of pretty faces instead of musicians.”
My cheeks burn, but I hold his gaze. I swallow the sarcastic retort that bubbles on my lips. Sophie would want me to be nice to him. Hold in the snark, Grace.
“I’m sorry about that,” I say, the humility burning my throat like acid. “It was rude, and I shouldn’t have said it.”
He tilts his head back and peers up at the sky, the stars dimmed by the lights of the buildings below us. “No, you were right.”
“What?”
I gape at him.
“Our music,” he clarifies, emotionless. “It’s terrible.”
Yoon Jae breaks through the crowd, bumping into me in his hurry. His cheeks pink and sweat trickling down his temples, he grins at us.
“Sorry,” he says. “It looked like fun.”
“No!” I try to shake off the stupor Jason’s words threw me into and focus my attention on the cute boy who actually might enjoy my company. “You were great out there, and I’m sure all the fans loved it.”
His face gets redder. “Thanks.”
Jason takes off down the sidewalk without another word, over to where Sophie and Tae Hwa linger near their dorm. Yoon Jae and I hurry to catch up with him.
“We decided to watch a movie in Tae Hwa’s room,” Sophie says when we reach them. “Do you want to join us?”
I’m exhausted after that walk, but I don’t have many friends here. Playing nice with the ones I do have is probably a good idea.
“Sure,” I say.
Tae Hwa lets us into their building with his student ID, and we climb five flights of stairs—
five!
—to his room.
His room is just as small as mine and Sophie’s, but he has a TV, DVD player, and gaming system sitting on his desk. A guitar and a bass have taken residence in the only empty corner of the room, sitting up in their stands.
Sophie climbs onto the top bunk, but I hesitate. Tae Hwa isn’t a childhood friend like he is for Sophie. Am I allowed to sit on his bed? Or would that be weird? I wouldn’t even think twice about it at home, but I’m not sure of the customs here.
Yoon Jae checks his watch, then says, “I need to work on a paper that’s due on Monday. I haven’t started yet.” His eyes search out mine, like he’s apologizing to me personally for having to ditch out on the movie.
“See you tomorrow!” Sophie calls from above us.
He flashes her a smile, then catches my gaze again. Not sure what he’s waiting for, I wave. He lingers a moment longer, then turns and leaves.
Tae Hwa pops a movie into the player, then launches himself onto the top bunk with Sophie. Okay, seriously,
what
is going on between them? Jason crawls onto the bottom bunk, but I’m not about to cozy up with him, so I take a seat on the desk chair of Tae Hwa’s roommate.
The movie pops up on the screen, and I realize within thirty seconds that I’m not going to understand a word of it. The actors speak in some Asian language, and subtitles appear at the bottom of the screen in another Asian language.
“Is this a Chinese movie or something?” I ask.
“Japanese,” Sophie calls down, then cries, “Oh! You don’t understand anything! Do you want us to switch the subtitles to English?”
“No, it’s fine. I’ll just watch what’s going on.”
But after ten minutes of only guessing the plot, my attention wanders. Tae Hwa’s roommate has books stacked on his desk—Algebra II, Biology, a dual-translation Bible. On the top shelf of his desk sits a long row of albums, some Korean and some English, most of the spines too dilapidated to read. But I recognize a few—the Beatles’
Rubber Soul, The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan,
the Grass Roots. Someone’s got good music taste.
It’s not until I spot the ashtray filled not with old cigarettes but guitar picks and the syllabus for my Korean class that it hits me—Tae Hwa’s roommate is Jason. I’m sitting in Jason’s room. Granted, with two other people. But still.
I sneak a glance at him, but he’s texting. Yoon Jae? A girl? I haven’t seen him talk to anyone besides the band boys and Sophie. Not that I follow him around all day or anything. And I’m sure he would have girls lining up to get texts sent from his phone.
You know, because he’s famous. Not because he’s cute or anything.
Jason glances up from his phone and catches me watching him. For a terrifying moment, we just stare at each other. I divert my gaze, my heart hammering. He thinks I was checking him out. He thinks I’m some sort of obsessed fan. He thinks I actually
like
him.
Panic. Flooding my entire body.
“Grace?”
I peer up at Sophie, glad for the shifting attention. “Yeah?”
“You’re bored, right?” She hops back down off the bed. “I’m sorry. Do you want to watch something else, or do you want to go back to our dorm?”
“Whatever you want,” I say with as much lightness as I can muster, my pulse pounding in my ears.
“I’m tired, anyway.” She picks up her purse and slings it over her shoulder. “Come on, let’s head back.”
I numbly follow her to the doorway, but she pauses there, shouting something back to Tae Hwa. He responds, and I peer back through the space between Sophie and the half-closed door. Jason still sits on the bed, the phone no longer in his hands. He stares at me.
When Sophie finally shuts the door, I’m freed from his gaze and from him, only to realize that knowing Sophie’s social life, I’ll probably see him again tomorrow. And the next day. And all the others after that.
And I’m not really sure how I feel about that.
Big Brother,
It may seem hard to believe, but I’m actually sort of transitioning into life here in Korea, although I do miss sweet tea and Southern boys who hold doors open for you.
I haven’t gotten up the courage to email or call Momma yet. Every time I think about her, I remember seeing the judgment in her eyes, and I know. I know she blames me for everything. And maybe that shouldn’t bother me because I know you don’t think that. But it hurts, anyway.
I go to bed remembering all three of us—me, you, and Jane—camping out in the backyard and listening to Brad Paisley and Garth Brooks, and you saying you wanted to be like them one day. Well, you did it. You made your dreams real. I guess that’s how we justify it all in our heads, that your success was worth the price.
I miss you. More than anyone else in the family, I miss you the most. (Don’t tell anybody I said that, especially Jane!)
You’d be proud of your little sis, making her way in the big, bad Real World. I don’t have anything left to say except this: I think about you every day, for better or worse. And I don’t think I’ll ever forget what happened.
But for now, I’ll sign off with
From Korea, with love,
Grace
I inch my way down the food line, searching the vats before me for something that resembles macaroni and cheese, mashed potatoes, or pizza. It surprises me what foods I crave when all I get is unfamiliar dishes. The Korean food I’ve tried has been good, but it’s not what I’m used to, and sometimes, I just want something familiar.