Seoulmates (Seoul 2)

“Living here would be too foreign for her, wouldn’t it?” He squeezes my hand.

“I think so. The language barrier is a lot.” Plus, Ellen said she didn’t feel comfortable because she stood out, the only white woman in the midst of millions of Koreans.

“How come there are no barges on the river? It’s almost always empty.” The main waterway closest to me is the Mississippi River and it is full of tugboats and barges moving cargo up and down the north-south commerce artery.

“It’s zoned for residential traffic only because it’s connected to North Korea. The river starts in the Kumgang Mountains, joins another river to form the Han. About fifteen years ago, Seoul decided it would try to create a”—he pauses, searching for the right word—“greenbelt?”

“Yes, greenbelt. I know what that is.”

“The government decided to create many greenbelts to encourage Seoulites to enjoy the outdoors and to help with pollution, as it is very bad here.”

Air quality is of constant concern to Seoulites. Every home has an air purifier. There are several in the office. The government sends us text alerts to wear masks outside if the air quality is poor, but tonight, the sky is clear, the air is fine, and Yujun’s hand covers mine. Honestly, I’d be out here in a sandstorm if it meant I could be with him.

His stomach grumbles, reminding me of why we came here in the first place. “This way.” He pulls me down a walkway to a concrete boulevard that’s lit up by streetlamps and lights from various vendors.

My eyes land on a familiar vision. “A food truck. In fact, I think it’s the Yongsan pork lady.”

“There are restaurants here.”

“I can’t skip a food truck, Yujun. It’s part of my civic duty to help small-business owners.”

His dimple winks into view. “Okay. I, too, am a proud citizen of the Republic of Korea. Let us do our patriotic duty.”

We hurry over and get in line. To my delight, it is indeed Yang Ilhwa from Yongsan. I wave to her and she waves back in recognition.

“You know each other?”

“She parks in an alley not too far from IF Group. I’ve eaten there a few times.” A few dozen times. “The pork balls are very good.”

“I didn’t know there was a food truck over in that area.”

We order a whole tray of the fried food, including a new dish with crispy pork belly, which Yang Ilhwa slathers with parsley and some kind of creamy hot sauce. It basically tastes like a form of bacon-wrapped cheese curds in all of its melty, salty goodness. I devour five of them, while Yujun massacres the rest of the container.

“These are good,” he exclaims. “I haven’t had them before, but it’s like tonkatsu but stuffed with cheese.”

“Yes.” Tonkatsu is fried pork cutlet. It’s funny how we both have our different food frames of reference for the same types of flavors. When he’s done, we find a dessert stall serving powdered sugar doughnuts and banana milk in cartons no bigger than a fist. Walking away from the stall, we narrowly avoid a pack of teens careening down the cement on skateboards. They run into an older couple and the man curses at them. The kids shout something at him, one of them bows, and they all run off. But for the language difference, it could’ve taken place at the Riverwalk in Des Moines. Okay, but for the language, the fact that these are all Koreans, and the size of this park, this could be the same. We are not so different, Des Moines and Seoul.

“You have some sugar,” Yujun starts to say but decides he might as well take care of me. He leans down until his face is a whisper away from mine and brushes the back of his pinkie along my cheek. His knuckle catches against the corner of my lip, and while it shouldn’t, that brief touch makes my whole body clench. I sway toward him, my hand finding purchase at his waist. I’m so close I can feel the swift inhale of his breath and then a slow, painful hiss of release. “Hara—”

“Choi Yujun-nim?”

Both our heads pop up in response. I guess we are tent desperate despite what we proclaimed earlier. I take a step away from him, putting a safe distance between me and temptation before turning to see who addressed us. It’s a man and a woman, about our age. He’s wearing jeans rolled up slightly above his ankles, a pair of expensive tennis shoes designed to look dirty, and a T-shirt with a designer logo emblazoned across his chest, matching the one on his shoes. Over it, he has a loose-fitting black blazer. The woman has a similar blazer, but underneath is a white dress with little blue and pink bouquets embroidered all over. On her feet are a pair of snowy white tennis shoes with the same logo that’s on his shoes and shirt. Her handbag is also a designer brand.