“Yes? No?”
He unlocked the door in the name of self-preservation. “I wanted you to know it, though,” he said. “Really, it's okay.”
Her expression softened for a moment. “Hopefully no one else heard. Please tell me it's a fake name, at least.”
“It isn’t. I'm sorry. But I have more than one name, just like you.”
“I’m not sure I can handle this responsibility. What if I'm captured and interrogated?”
Eunjae smiled. “You could refer them to Ryan Kim in San Bernardino.”
“That won’t work. They might go after his mom next.”
“Good call. She seems like a nice lady.”
“See? Exactly. I’m in a bind, here.” She reached around him, turned the knob, and tugged the door open. From the living room came snatches of cooking show narration and Denny’s noisy commentary. For the second time that evening, Eunjae almost crumpled to the floor out of sheer relief. He went to go sit at the desk before his knees could buckle.
Jiyeon tossed her tote bag onto the bed and plopped down beside it. Sighing, she began removing the tiny red flowers from her hair, setting them in a pile on the nightstand. “I don't know who you're hiding from or why,” she said, “but the less I know, the better. Keep your secrets, Ryan Kim.”
12
Generallyspeaking,Eunjaehadlittle experience with keeping his own secrets. He’d kept plenty for his brothers over the years. Small secrets like shoes borrowed and never returned, and the big secrets bound up with Jungwoo’s latest fated — or star-crossed — romance. But Eunjae didn’t have many secrets, personally. This was one of the few.
“That wouldn't bother you? Not knowing much about me?” His hesitation came from a genuine place. In addition to rarely having secrets worth keeping, Eunjae was accustomed to people wanting to know every tiny detail about him.
A flower fell apart in Jiyeon’s fingers, disintegrating into individual petals. She frowned. “Me, specifically? No. The world could stand to be a little more mysterious. And I guess I’ll know who you are, sooner or later. Amnesia can be reversed. I learned that from Korean dramas and Joey Han.”
A little more mysterious. Entire websites were dedicated to the minutiae of Eunjae’s life. Search engines had long since indexed his birthday, his favorite food, even the name of the Montessori school he’d attended at the age of five. Receiving permission to maintain an air of mystery was nothing short of refreshing.
“But it does bother me that someone is probably worrying about you, wondering where you've gone. You have at least one person who would worry about you, right?”
“More than one,” admitted Eunjae. And now remorse crested over him like a wave, blotting out the light. But he still didn't regret what he'd done, so did that make him the most selfish person on the planet?
Jiyeon stopped tugging at a flower that had gotten tangled in the strands framing her face. She reached into the tote bag for her phone, executing what seemed to Eunjae like an unusually long chain of swipes and passcode entries. When she finally got up to press the phone into his hand, he saw that it had been reverted to factory settings. Perplexed, Eunjae held it flat on his palm, looking down at the setup screen as it politely waited for him to select his preferred language.
“All yours.” Jiyeon closed his fingers over the phone before he could drop the thing entirely. “If you don't know phone numbers, maybe you can email. Either way, try and let someone know you're safe.”
“But I can't just take your phone.”
“I can spare it. See? I have another one.”
Eunjae’s consternation only intensified as Jiyeon showed him her second phone, a relic that flipped open to a no-frills, pixelated display. He wanted to ask if she’d raided an early 2000s time capsule. Instead, he tried not to laugh. This attempt ended in failure.
“Oh, sure. Laugh all you want. But I do have a functional phone, so you can have this one without feeling bad about it.”
“Won’t it still be linked to your number?”
Jiyeon shook her head. “No one has that number except family. It’s almost brand new, especially since I barely use it. Denny got it for me after my old phone, um, fell. Into the Pacific Ocean.”
“The Pacific Ocean.”
“Uh-huh. I prefer the other one. It can’t run any apps and it’s better for me, that way. It makes everything… quieter.”
Quieter. Well, he could see the appeal there. Eunjae squinted at the screen. “So… you can call and text? That’s it, right?”
Soberly, Jiyeon replied, “No, there’s more. I can also play unlimited games of Snake.”
“You’ve got it all then,” Eunjae choked out.
