1
Jiyeonfoundthesixthphoto tucked inside the glove box of her car.
Six of these, so far. Pictures had also appeared inside a kitchen cabinet, plus the tiny closet in the entryway and the drawer where she kept her hairbrush. Then, Eunjae had hidden one in the pocket of a cardigan left hanging in her closet all summer, on hold until a chilly day when the season turned at last. Another was tied to the handle of an umbrella, a selfie they’d taken on her tiny excuse for a balcony after dark. It came out grainy and underexposed, and yet somehow sweeter for it.
Leaving the glove box open, she examined the latest photo. Printed on flimsy copy paper, it featured Jiyeon’s right hand and Eunjae’s left, both holding milkshakes. A single line had been scrawled underneath. “Sorry about our weird dates,” she read aloud to herself.
It made her laugh, and suddenly Jiyeon was there again: hidden in a booth toward the back of a twenty-four-hourdiner at 1:00am, trying to decide between blueberry cobbler or something called a peach melba. No one else had been around except a disinterested waitress and some teenagers sharing a stack of pancakes.
Over the summer, they’d grown accustomed to a pattern of late nights and early, early mornings. Times when they might slip through the world unnoticed, pantomiming a normal life. They couldn’t be seen together in the broad light of day. They couldn’t be caught, or else. Things were already unstable for Apollo. The need for secrecy intensified with every passing week.
Generally, Jiyeon was delighted to find these surprises he’d left behind. But she’d opened the glove box to dig out a business card, one that Eunjae had watched her toss in there, and she hadn’t touched it since July. Even though Jiyeon promised to call the leasing agent for that retail space he’d found back in June. Even though she’d promised to make that call as soon as the calendar flipped to August.
If she told him about finding this picture in her glove box, Eunjae would wonder why she’d only discovered it now. He’d ask about it, of course. She didn’t want to lie, but she couldn’t bring herself to explain, either. Jiyeon retrieved the photo from the diner, dropped it gently into her bag, and snapped the glove box shut. The business card stayed where it was.
A pizza arrived fifteen minutes later. Jiyeon brought it in, realizing she was hungrier than she thought. Had she remembered to take a lunch break? She put her phone on a tripod and went to brush out her hair. It was beginning to unravel after so many hours at the shop, strands sliding free from the tidy braid she’d pulled together that morning. What a long day it had been. But she’d managed to get the rest of the afternoon off, and now Jiyeon had a full evening to catch up on laundry. Talk about a wild Friday night.
Fridays never really felt like Fridays in the traditional sense; Jiyeon worked every weekend, full shifts on both Saturday and Sunday until Denny returned from Seoul. She’d be up before dawn the next day, braiding her hair in front of the bathroom mirror, decidedly unglamorous in her Wanna Waffle t-shirt and battered sneakers. But on Fridays, she met up with Eunjae. They ate together, ordering the same food or similar. She’d arrange for his meal and he’d arrange for hers. It was a small thing, but it helped diminish the many thousands of miles between them.
Eunjae called not long after she came to sit at her tiny kitchen table, right on the dot at 4:30pm. It was 8:30 in the morning for him, and already tomorrow. He’d still be asleep right now if Emerald hadn’t scheduled a meeting on extremely short notice. The whole day had been reshuffled to accommodate this change. At least they’d managed to make date night happen anyway. Date afternoon? Date morning? Whichever.
Jiyeon chose a slice of pizza. She held it up for him to see. “Here’s mine. Did yours make it?”
“Ah, mostly.”
“What do you mean, mostly?”
“Max went to pick it up last night,” Eunjae replied, yawning, “and ate half of it on the way back. Said he was starving.” He took a bite. “Breakfast pizza, though. It really is a thing.”
His brothers always claimed to be starving. Also, of course Eunjae was content to eat the pizza straight out of the fridge. Maybe he was worried someone would beat him to the microwave and claim it for themselves. Shaking her head at this very plausible scenario, Jiyeon said, “It’s definitely a thing. I’ve tried to get Denny to add it to the menu tons of times. Waffle breakfast pizza, you know? So fun.”
“And he won’t do it?”
“Just starts ranting that breakfast pizza is an abomination.” Which was why Jiyeon had asked Max to handle the date night food delivery; she’d wanted to avoid another lecture on why waffles are not pizza and why pizza is not breakfast. A girl could only hear the same monologue so many times before going nuts. “Oh, but did they tell you what the meeting’s about? Is it the public relations stuff?”
“Don’t think so,” Eunjae replied. “We picked a PR firm and Zenith sent approval, but now we’re waiting for both agencies to agree on when the management should start and who’s paying for it. Should be the only thing left, though. Hopefully we can sign in a week or two.”
A thought occurred to him. He set the pizza down, trading for his phone. “I need to forward this email, hang on. It’s from the shipping company. I think some of my stuff might get there before I do. Was it really okay to send it all to your parents?”
“Like they’d ever let you send your stuff to some storage unit. We’d never hear the end of it. Dad will just pile it up in my old room until you get settled. Besides, Denny told me you’ve got nothing but ‘photography doodads’ and ‘overpriced denim.’ It’d be different if you had furniture, too.”
“Never needed to buy any,” he admitted. “I’ve lived in the dorms since I started at Emerald and the rooms always came furnished, so yeah. I guess all I’ve got are cameras and clothes.”
“You can just find everything else later on.”
“Yeah. Denny says I need to prioritize a haircut, though. Direct order.”
“Oh, sure,” said Jiyeon. “He’s the boss of everyone, our Woosung.”
“It does get in the way at dance practice.”
Eunjae often joked about keeping the same haircut until he turned eighty, and Jiyeon was late to realize that this meant never wanting anyone else to trim it until he was eighty. He keptletting it grow out so long that the strands had to be tied back from his face. “Go get a haircut,” she told him. “It won’t hurt my feelings, I promise.”
“Can’t. I signed away the exclusive rights.”
He pronounced this with such mock solemnity that Jiyeon had to smile. “You’re allowed to do that? Don’t you belong to your fans? I figured you’d have to ask them before signing your life away.”
“Yeon-ah. You’re not a fan?”
