Seoulmates (Seoul 2)

Phone in hand, I drive my thumbs into my temples. I am not a melodramatic person. I don’t cry—often. I don’t lose my temper. I don’t have tantrums, but at this moment I want to throw my phone on the floor, jump on top of it until the screen is crushed, run outside, and scream until all the tension is released. I send Whatever your plans are tonight I need you to cancel them and then immediately wish I could retract it, but it’s too late. The bubbles in the group chat are already moving.

JULES: ???

BOMI: Are you okay? Are you here at work? I’ll come down

SANGKI: plans canceled

Seeing everyone’s sympathy and worry over this stupid moment of insecurity makes me feel even worse.

ME: nvm ignore this

JULES: Shut up. Let’s meet up at Casa Corona. They have private booths. You or Ahn Sangki are paying. I can’t afford that place on my flight attendant salary

BOMI: I can’t afford it either

I’m not getting out of this.

ME: I’ll pay

Technically, Wansu is paying.

BOMI: Is this about the dating

JULES: What dating? why didn’t u tell me? Choi Yujun’s mother is dating someone?

BOMI: Of course she isn’t!!! Choi Yujun’s father is still alive

JULES: Sorry! I was confused by your mention of dating. Who’s dating

BOMI: Hara.

SANGKI: you’re dating? Does Choi Yujun know this?

I bang my head against the bathroom wall. Look at the mess I’ve created.

ME: No one is dating anyone.

ME: I hope

A flurry of question marks follow but I don’t want to lay out my embarrassing laundry for anyone to reread later. Text messages should expire after a certain number of days. I flip to my chat log with Yujun, still listed in my contacts as simply “Yujun from Seoul.”

YUJUN: I miss u

YUJUN: Look at this cute dog

YUJUN: I walked by this waterway and there were two ducks under the bridge. I tried to take a photo but the male, the colorful one, must have thought he was in danger or didn’t like another male staring at his girl. He flapped his wings and they disappeared under the bridge. I thought of you. I thought of us.

He attached a photo of the red silk cord and the jade duck that hung around his neck. I press my matching silk cord into my collarbone. Messages should be immortalized, I decide, never expiring, always enduring.

ME: Come home to me, please.

CHAPTER SIX

Casa Corona is a rooftop bar and grill in Itaewon, a neighborhood adjacent to Yongsan. Back when the US had a major presence in Seoul city, the Itaewon streets would be filled with American GIs. Bomi said that Itaewon used to be a place where no good Koreans would go. It had a seedy nightlife and an even seedier underbelly of illegal sex, drugs, and contraband goods. The neighborhood has been gentrified in the last twenty years. Gone are the American soldiers and the cheap shops that lined the streets. In their place are fancy restaurants, nightclubs, and boutique stores. A little west is the very exclusive UN Village in Hannam-dong, a neighborhood where only the rich and powerful live. Sangki has an apartment in the UN Village as do many celebrities.

There is no private room on the deck of Casa Corona, but Jules has staked out prime real estate in one of the canopied booths away from the glass railing that wraps around three sides of the rooftop. Bomi and I wend our way past the rattan tables and chairs to Jules’s side.

“Is Ahn Sangki-nim coming?” she asks as we slide onto the cushions next to her. The table already has a small ice bucket with beer bottles, a bottle of tequila, and four shot glasses. “I came early and got this because we can close the drapes.” She points to the long cream linen curtains that are tied to wooden posts.

“He’s coming,” I confirm. “Let me text him.”

But it’s unnecessary, as he is stepping off the elevator. Dressed in all black with a cap over his dyed-blond hair and sunglasses over his eyes, Sangki has an aura. Eyes swivel in his direction and whispers start to ripple across the crowded bar as patrons try to guess who he is. He spots us right away and quickly crosses the room. Mr. Lee closes the curtains before Jules can get out of her seat.

“He’s so efficient,” she says, offering a beer to Sangki.

“It’s not his first time at the rodeo.” I move over so that Sangki can take a seat.

“I don’t know what that means. Explain. Please.” He takes the beer.

“It means you—or rather Mr. Lee—isn’t inexperienced. Have you seen a rodeo?”

He frowns. “I don’t think so?”

Bomi shakes her head. “Was there one in Iowa?” She looks disappointed that she missed something vitally American.

“Not really. At the state fair, there are elements of the rodeo, like roping calves and barrel racing, but those are horse show events. At a real rodeo—and I’m saying this like I’ve attended when I haven’t—it’s a whole festival. The clowns and steer wrestling and the bull riding are at rodeos.”