Tae
“Kari, what are you doing here?”
“I’m in town for work. I thought while I was here, you and I could talk face-to-face, get some closure. What I didn’t expect was to find you here with someone else.” Her tone was sharp, the accusation clear. Kari leaned to look behind Tae. But he blocked her way. He didn’t want a scene.
He held Kari by the elbow and walked her across the street away from the park to his house. He wanted to look back. He wanted to give Julia anI’m sorryglance. But that would be a dick move along the lines of, oh, almost kissing your childhood crush while the girl you recently broke up with is standing nearby. He hated leaving Julia behind, though. Heat prickled at his back. He just knew she was watching them walk away.
Julia.
What was he thinking leaning in to her that way? He just couldn’t stop himself. He was so swept up into her and her nutty family and their obvious love for each other. And he wanted her to see him, not as the little brother, not as some dating coach. But him. As someone... possible. He wasn’tcrazy, was he? Could the two of them work, despite being at two totally different places in their lives?
“You should have called,” Tae said.
“I did. You should have checked your messages.” Kari’s eyes drifted back to the park. “Seems you’ve been... busy.”
“Julia is an old friend. I’m here because of my family and nothing else.” A couple weeks ago, those words would have been the truth. But Tae was starting to wonder if maybe there were other reasons for him to stay.
Kari dropped her head and let out a long sigh, the sound of defeat. “I’m sorry. I guess I need a reason, someone to blame, for us falling apart.”
She lifted her eyes up to meet Tae’s, tears welling. Tae didn’t want to be an asshole, but he couldn’t quite understand why she was taking this so hard. Or maybe he was the one that was emotionally broken.
“I don’t think we fell apart so much as we just didn’t work, if that makes sense.”
Kari furrowed her brow as if trying to make the math work. “I shouldn’t have come,” she said.
“Whydidyou come?” Tae wanted to make sure he helped her get the closure she needed. So he had to know what doors she might still feel were left open.
She shrugged. “I wasn’t ready to give up on us, Tae. I thought maybe if I came by and talked to your parents, they would see everything you left behind and let you come home. Is it crazy that I wanted to fight for us? To try and make it work?”
The problem was that Kari thought Tae was choosing his family over her. She wasn’t able or willing to make space for them all. And that was what Tae wanted, to be with someone who had space in their heart for him, his family, her family, her friends, her business...
Tae’s eyes wandered back over to the swings where he had just been. Julia was gone.
His heart sank.
“Kari, trust me when I say that I’m not worth fighting for.”
“Don’t sell yourself short, Tae. I think you’re pretty great.”
He wanted to tell her that the man she dated wasn’t the real him at all. It never had been. He’d been a shell of a person the last couple years, a robot going through the motions, doing the things he thought people expected of him. Could she even understand that the person she thought Tae was becoming while here in Irvine had been the real him all along?
“I’m sorry. I wish things could be different, that I could be different,” he said.
The pained look on her face pierced his heart. She deserved someone who wanted something serious with her, who loved her, someone who saw her as their entire world. That someone wasn’t Tae.
“Do you have feelings for—” she swallowed “—that woman? The family friend, the one you were with just now?”
Yes, he thought to himself. The answer felt so clear. But standing here with Kari, his recent past, along with all its failures, staring him in the face, he was reminded of exactly why he wasn’t in a position to date anyone, and most especially not Julia.
“I can’t be with anyone right now.” Tae meant it. This same issue was going to come up with anyone that needed him in their life. He didn’t have any extra to give. He had to remember that, or else the next person could get hurt too.
Tae thought about Julia. He would never let himself hurt her. Nothing had changed. Just because he had feelings for her, it didn’t magically make his own issues he needed to work through go away. He still wasn’t good enough for her, didn’t have enough to offer her. And he knew it.
Kari and Tae stood there in silence.
She looked broken. Shoulders slumped, head lowered, lips tightened together. Tae gave in and reached his arm out andwrapped it around Kari. She rested her head on his shoulder and started to cry. Fuck. He never wanted to hurt her. He thought they were both done with this.
“C’mon, let’s go inside,” he said. They’d given the neighborhood enough of a show. He looked over his shoulder one last time at Julia’s. The drapes of their front window shifted and swayed. But as he looked closer, he realized it wasn’t Julia looking out at them. It was Grandma Song. Great. He’d be the talk of the town by the end of the day.
