“My era.” Jay sighed dramatically. “I was deep in the Hallyu wave until 2013, I think. EXO had just released ‘Growl’ when I quit the game.”
“Interesting,” she said, and it was killing Jay that he couldn’t see the expression on her face. It wasn’t cool to like K-pop when he was in college, but at the time he enjoyed it too much to care. When he was in his twenties, he changed music tastes, moved to Top 40 songs and a sentimental love of early 2000s R and B. But now in his thirties, he kept looking for those familiar K-pop sounds and found himself discovering the new, younger acts, too. Mamamoo was his favorite. The screen on his dashboard showed that his phone was playing “Gee,” by Girls’ Generation, because of course it did.
The familiar intro started, and Jay spoke along. “Uh-huh. Listen boy.”
“My first love story,” Mara said back, much to his surprise and delight.
“Oh my god.” He started singing the vocal harmonies. She knew them just as well as he did. Mara clapped along to the beat, and they continued in tandem just before the verses started. Jay tried his best to fake his Korean, as he had ever since he first heard this song in 2009. He knew…some of the words. He definitely knew, “Gee gee gee gee.”
He was sure Mara knew the words, too. Knew them better than he did, actually, because he stole a glance at her and she was mouthing them perfectly, not missing a single beat. And just when he thought she was lip syncing, he heard the softest little voice singing the chorus sweetly. The music wasn’t that loud, and there were only the two of them in the car, so he could catch words that weredefinitelyKorean.
“Mara, if you know the words, you should sing them out loud.”
“But—”
He didn’t wait for her to make any excuses. “It’s just me.” Wasn’t that enough inducement? He could feel in his bones that Mara wanted to sing out loud. Loving K-pop was 99 percent feeling and 1 percent knowing the words. It wouldn’t do for her not to do the 99 percent. “Sing your heart out.”
And she did. She hit the high notes perfectly, like the girl group’s unseen tenth member. Jay would never know or understand the feeling of a young girl’s first fluttering of love the way the song described, but the way Mara sang the song, smiling and shimmying in his peripheral view (she knew the dance, of course she did)…man, he wished he could dance along.
They cycled through a few more songs at her choice, which contained her favorites from 2NE1, SHINee, and KST, a newer boy group. It made the drive feel faster, and Jay liked that she was letting loose in front of him.
“You know more words than I do,” Jay teased her.
“Well, I took basic Korean as one of my electives.” Mara snickered, like the idea was hilarious to her now. “My course let me take two electives my entire college life. Because I was fully convinced that I was going to shed all of my interests after college because of work, I chose musical theater—”
“Oh my god, you’re an ex theater kid.” Jay shook his head. “No wonder you can sing.”
“And basic Korean,” Mara finished. Laughed like it was the silliest thing in the world. “For my final, my teacher let me act out a scene fromDream Highwhere IU is singing a phone ad? Peak of my acting career.”
“That’s daebak.” He stole a quick glance at Mara just in time to catch her rolling her eyes. She was smiling, though, which was likely a good thing. “And are you still into Korean things?”
“Oh yeah,” Mara said like it was a given. “The music, the food. My usual weekday post-work vibe is watching a drama while crocheting.”
“Crochet?” he echoed, immediately picturing her sitting in one of those wooden rocking chairs with the long arms, her brows furrowed as she glared intensely at her yarn and her TV screen. “Like…potholders?”
“Like blankets? Cardigans? I’ve made bags, bucket hats, holders for things. I made Mabel a top with these puff flowers.” She grumbled a little and held up her screen to quickly show him. What he saw was Mabel, posing in a foreign country (Japan, maybe?), wearing a sweater made of cute, puffy flowers.
“Whoa. You made that?”
“Yuh. It gets weirdly cold in the studio so I decided to pick it up. Crocheting helps me not think so much, after work. And I get to do something with my hands, which I really like.”
“You should make me something sometime.” He grinned, and yes, he was being flirty, and he was teasing her a little bit. But crocheting your days away was unexpected. “I would love to see your yarn stash.”
“Oh my god.” Mara laughed, shaking her head at his little innuendo. “That’s where you live, on the corner of maginoo and bastos.” She sighed like it was a damn shame. “What do I do with you, Jay.”
What indeed.
“So…” he started when Mara put on a different song, this time “Jeepney” from Sponge Cola, which was such a throwback that Jay actually felt his thirty-five-year-old back spasm. “You’re the only one heading home tonight?”
“Marina and David have a second reception tomorrow at Seda in BGC.” Mara sighed, sinking back into her seat like her little K-pop high was wearing off. “I want to get to the studio as early as possible tomorrow to help with setting up.”
“Ugh.” The sound came out of Jay’s mouth before he could stop himself, and even then it was too late because he’d already rolled his eyes to the back of his head. Beside him, Mara laughed.
“You want to say that to my face, Jay?”
“No, it’s just…” He tried to formulate nice words, he really did. But the annoyance was real, and this was really annoying. “Seriously? They’re having a fake wedding for the people they didn’t think were important enough to invite to theirrealwedding?”
“Well,” Mara said. He wished he could look at her, steal a glance, glean what she was thinking. But did he detect a bit of…amusement in her tone? “Some of our cousins couldn’t make it, and David has a few people he didn’t invite to Tagaytay, so—”
