The tension isn’t about being discovered by paparazzi; it’s about Suho trying to assemble a flat-pack bookshelf with the quiet, simmering rage of a man personally betrayed by a wordless diagram.
At the grocery store, I stare in horror at a small tub of “artisanal, imported”kimchithat costs twelve dollars.
“This is a hostage situation,” I declare.
Suho just laughs. “Welcome to America. Freedom smells like overpriced fermented cabbage.”
I buy it anyway. It feels like reclaiming a small piece of Seoul in a city that smells of sunscreen and possibility.
He’s traded his scripts for a surfboard. And he’s terrible at it. The prodigy of physical grace spends most of his time looking like a newborn giraffe trying to stand on a unicycle. He gets knocked over by waves a toddler could handle. He falls. A lot.
But he always gets back up, paddling back out with that stubborn grin. He comes home exhausted, smelling of salt and sunscreen, sand in places I didn’t know sand could go—and he’s happier than I’ve ever seen him.
And me? I haven’t found a new purpose. Freedom, it turns out, is terrifying. Most days, I just walk—hours along the beach, no mask, no hoodie, letting the sun beat down until I feel real again.
Eventually, I come across a small photography exhibition. I volunteer to help—assisting with the displays, arranging frames, and guiding visitors. It’s not glamorous. It’s not measured in applause or likes. But it’s mine.
Every print, every visitor who lingers on an image feels like a quiet reclamation of the life I’ve built for myself.
One afternoon, I crouch to show a student how to adjust the light on a print. Sunlight spillsthrough dusty windows, catching in tiny, glittering clouds. I look up and see Suho leaning in the doorway, arms crossed, hair a mess, smiling in a way that’s all for me—unguarded, unperforming.
I grin. “Checking on the troublemaker?”
He shakes his head, amusement soft in his eyes. “Checking on what my heart wants—what it wants.”
I laugh. The sunlight warms the floorboards, and a quiet joy fills the room—the kind that doesn’t need validation.
We’re not perfect. We’re not fully healed. We’re a chaotic duo of flawed wrecks, washed up on a shore where we can finally breathe.
And somehow, that’s more than enough.
***
5c
SmokeSignals
The streets of Seoul are quiet, mostly empty, save for the occasional hum of a distant car. I swing my bag over my shoulder, that mix of“I really should go back”and“maybe I shouldn’t”buzzing in my chest.
I could go back to my apartment, back to Shin and his calm, quietly exasperated presence, and let him fix everything in his usual, infuriatingly efficient way.
Or…
My mind drifts back to Suho. To the pull he always seems to have—reckless, magnetic, a little dangerous.
Part of me still wants that.
Part of me knows better.
So I don’t go back. I turn and walk, my feet carrying me through the quiet, sleeping streets of Mapo-gu until I’m standing in front of a familiar, unassuming apartment building.
My aunt’s apartment smells like home-cooked food and a quiet, uncomplicated life I’ve only ever seen in dramas. It’s small, a little cluttered, every surface covered in either a doily or a framed photo of a cousin I barely recognize. For the moment, it’s feels like the safest place on Earth.
She opens the door in her housecoat, hair in soft rollers, and doesn’t even glance at me, despite it being nearly midnight. She notices the dark circles under my eyes, the frown on my lips, and ushers me in without a single question.
She presses a warm mug of barley tea into my hands and starts cutting up a pear. My aunt’s love language has always been unsolicited fruit—and, rare as it is, she never treats me like a celebrity. No photos, no requests, no expectations. Just her quiet, ordinary life, offered freely, and it’s enough.
“You look thin,” she says, pushing the plate of perfectly sliced pear toward me.
