Months had passed and things were going….I guess you could say smoothly at work. It was an early morning. I had some time before work so I took my Satoori out to the local dog park. I sat on the bench and crossed my legs under my pastel pink flowered dress, taking a sip of coffee as I watched my puppy play with other dogs. Some were his size, some even bigger. I would’ve taken Kazaki but his big lazy wouldn’t budge. So I said it. The wind blew and I ran my fingers through my short burgundy curled hair. My real hair. I had been wearing wigs since I moved to Korea; my hair needed to breathe. I sighed as I began to put myself into deep thought. Being a makeup artist was hard. No one ever wants to be true to themselves. Or the color of their skin for that matter. There were several incidents and instances where people would criticize Kai for being too dark. One fan even gave him a card with the number and address of a skin lightening doctor. Thinking about that angered me and I scratched my scalp, blowing out hot air. It was frustrating. I suddenly began to think about why I was even here. Why was I put on earth? Why was my existence a thing? Why was air put into my lungs? The wind blew harshly and I looked up to the sky to watch the leaves on the tree blow and the clouds pass in front of the sun. Suddenly, I heard the gate open and I drew my attention to the entrance where a tall boy with his face hidden behind one of those surgical masks had entered with three dogs on leashes. They were all adorable, small, and purely fluffed with curls. Way too small to be pure bred but there was definitely some poodle in there somewhere. He set the puppies free and pet them before sending them off. He looked around the park for a while before noticing me and began to walk towards me. I gulped and took a deep breath as I straightened my posture. I made a mental note not to say much.

“Hey, you.” He said, sitting down with a grunt.  The voice sounded quite familiar and so I turned to get a better look at him. He removed his mask and pulled the hood of his grey sweater over his head before flashing me a sunshine like smile. My eyes grew.

“Holy shi- Kai!” I exclaimed. He placed a finger to his pouty lips and chuckled.

“Sorry,” I whispered, covering my mouth and glancing around to see if anyone had heard me. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“I’m taking my dogs out to play.” He said, hunching over, trying to keep his face hidden.

“Don’t you have people for that?”

“No…. I do it myself.” He chuckled.

“Are you even supposed to be out right now?”

“I can go out….. I just have to be super careful about it.” He said, bowing his head when a group full of girls with their dogs walked by. I sighed and took off my rounded sunglasses to give them to him. “Thanks.” He said, putting them on quickly. And he huffed.

“Mhmm,” I mumbled briefly, with a hint of sass, straightening out my dress and slumping into the bench. We sat in silence for a while, watching the puppies play. “So what are their names?” I asked casually. He looked at me and smiled.

“The white one is Jjangah. The bigger brown one is Jjangu and the smaller one is Monggu.” He said pointing to each of them proudly.

“Wauw. You’ve got yourself a little dream team goin’ on, huh?” I chuckled and he nodded furiously, giving me a closed lip smile.

“They’re my babies. What about you? Which one’s yours?” he asked looking around the park.

“The stubby legged pug over there playing with the ball.” I pouted, pointing to my dog as he lifted a short leg to move the ball around with his paw. I smirked at his cuteness.

“Aw. What’s his name?” he smiled.

“Satoori.” I replied.

“Oh I’d love an explanation for that name.” he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. I rolled my eyes and chuckled.

“For some odd forsaken reason, he only listens to me when I speak in dialect. So I use the satoori accent to talk to him.”

“Interesting. Maybe he’s from Busan.”

“I bought him in Busan.” I said and we shared a small laugh.

“That explains a lot then.” He grinned.

“I guess so…” I trailed off and we suddenly had nothing to talk about. Then again being from different cultures and of different genders, what could we talk about? So I picked something of random. “Hey guess what I just realized!” I said tapping his knee casually. He blushed a bit but he smiled anyway.

“What did you just realize?”

“This is the longest conversation I’ve ever had with you.” I grinned. Kai smiled and forced a laugh.

“It seems that way.” He said adjusting his sunglasses.

“So that means we can be friends, right? To be honest with you, other than my roommates, I don’t really have friends. Which of course I knew was going to happen, being that I’m not Korean and all….”

“Well……..I can be your friend. The kids can have play dates and stuff.” He said hesitantly.

“Oh true! Sounds like a plan then, friend.” I said poking his side, causing him to giggle. I took a moment to analyze his profile took the opportunity to say a bit of what I’ve always wanted to tell him. I know he hadn’t been the same since being given that card. “Seriously, you have some gorgeous skin. Like the complexion, the color, everything.” I smiled genuinely and yet he looked down and mumbled a thanks. After that, things got a little awkward. Maybe it was too soon for some skin talk. There was a long silence that washed over. I went to open my mouth to say something but he beat me too it.

“So you didn’t have a schedule today?” he asked.

“Uh, no. I mean, I’m supposed to be on hair and makeup for EXO and SNSD for the awards show tonight…”

“Ahh…. So then, can I make a request? Since we’re friends?”

“Sure. What is it?” I chuckled.

“Please don’t up my hair,” he grinned which made me laugh harder than I should have. “The last few hairstylist have been doing this thing….and it’s just not working out.”

“Ok, I won’t mess you up too much.” I said through retreating laughter.

“Good. Well I gotta go now. Practice time.” He said checking his phone as he stood.

“Okie dokie.” I said standing up as well and hugging him. Mid hug, I realized…... I’m not in America. I couldn’t just hug people outta the blue like I used to. There was a thing called skinship which some people were comfortable with and some weren’t. That was something I wasn’t used to at all yet. Quickly, I released him and bowed. “I am so sorry…” I said continuously. He bit his lip and smiled as he looked away.

“NO, you’re fine,” He blushed. “And for the record, I give better hugs when I know it’s gonna happen, by the way.”

I sighed in relief. “Well I’m not gonna hug you again cuz…… it already happened and that would just be weird and I’m pretty sure you should get your dogs and leave before I start spewing nonsense just like I’m doing right now.” I said with a big awkward smile. He did that thing where he covered his mouth with a fist when he laughed and nodded before whistling loudly towards the park.

“Jjangah, Monggu, Jjangu! Let’s go!” The three puppies ran straight to him. He clipped their respective leashes to their collars and gave me one last smile before walking away.

That night, I began to get ready for the awards show with my roommates. Because I was a staff member, I was able to get two free tickets. I put on my light gold bandage bodycon dress and some red open toed ankle boots. I did a classic matte red lip with a smoky eye with a touch of gold then I sat on my bed to think. Sitting before me was an array of wigs on a shelf in my closet. I was tied between a long straight black wig with blunt bangs, a vibrant red little mermaid wig, and a classy wavy dark brown highlighted wig. I sighed. The most difficult part of creating my outfits were never the clothes but the wigs. I bit my tongue lightly as Satoori ran into my room and sat at my feet, tail wagging. I picked him up and pet him as he my jaw.

“Hey, you.” I said mimicking Kai for a moment. “You’re getting fat, yeah? Am I feeding you too much? You know you can tell me if I am.” He looked at me with his big eyes and I chuckled when he didn’t answer. “Not that you would tell me anyway, right?” He barked and gave his puppy smile, his own nose. I laughed. “Yeah, naw. You wouldn’t. Satoori-ah!!” I pouted, lifting him up for him to face me eye to eye, nose to nose. “Pick a wig for me!” I sat him on the ground and without hesitation, he ran straight under the red, jumping and barking. I stood up and lifted the red wig from the mannequin. Leave it to me to trust my damn dog with the way I looked. I looked in the mirror and smiled. “Not bad, babe!” I bent down and held up my hand. “High paws!” Satoori looked down and around before walking away. I snarled. “Ah jinjanah? Fine! No treats for you, little bastard.” With that he barked and disappeared. I stood up and grabbed my suitcase and clutch before entering the living room to grab my black leather blazer. Yoko wolf whistled.

“Girl…”

“What?” I chuckled. She replied with a head shake.

“Nothin’ girl. You look good.” She flipped her golden micros over her shoulder and chuckled. “See you at the show.”

“I’ll text you the address, babes!” I smiled before leaving.

The venue was huge. I entered through the front, marveling at insides as I went towards the sign in sheet for staff. There was a line but it didn’t take that long for it to move. After signing my name, I rushed to the backstage area. The hallways were very busy. Full of costume racks being pushed back and forth between rooms and idols rushing to their respective rooms. I greeted and apologized to the ones I bumped into and knew. The rooms were labelled with idol groups in pairs. I was looking for EXO/ Girls’ Generation. Both groups were big and I knew I was going to have my hands full. There were only 4 makeup artist on the team with myself included. When I arrived, I received a card with my respective idols and I scanned the list.

EXO: Lay, Suho, Kai, D.O

I smiled upon seeing Kai’s name and then I continued to read on to Girls’ Generation.

GG: Tiffany, Sunny, Seohyun, Taeyeon

Taeyeon…… I disliked her. I admit she’s ing gorgeous and I’ll even admit the girl can sing her off. But I dislike her. ‘Why’ you ask? I remember a time when she did an interview where SNSD was asked of any American idols they enjoyed or liked. The first words that left were “Alicia Keys is very pretty for a black girl.” Like black girls can’t be pretty… Does it amaze people of another race when black people look good? Is it just so rare to find attractive black people? Has the media depicted us in such a way that makes us seem so rude, so ugly, so hot tempered, so….undesirable? Since reading that interview, I was unable to tolerate her close minded thoughts or her y attitude. I continued to rant silently in my mind as I set up my station. I could feel a small push of anger arising and I took a deep breath; closing my eyes trying my hardest to think of something other than that. Some positive things like rainbows, magic, kitties, bunnies…

“Allysha!” I heard a happy, gentle voice call. I turned around to see Lay waving and beaming at me.

‘Unicorns.’ I thought with a sigh and a small smile. All the bad thoughts seemed to just dissolve at the sight of Lay’s warm and ironically quite healing presence.

“Lay oppa.” I smiled. Following in behind him was the rest of EXO. They bowed and waved to the rest of the team and the last to enter was Kai. He bowed and greeted everyone and that’s when he noticed me. He continued to display his sweet smile and he nodded in my direction, making my insides all mushy and such. I leaned on the chair by my station and smiled back as the chair moved back unexpectedly. I caught it before it fell over and pulled a tress behind my ear, hanging my head in embarrassment.

‘Real smooth, Allysha. That was smooth as .’ I thought as I watched him chuckle in my peripheral. The boys were directed to costuming and I sat on the chair and huffed. This was going to be a long night.

It had been a few hours. I decided to work on the girls when they arrived first so I could get them outta the way since it would be the most work. After that, I began to work on the boys. They were easy but when it came to Kai, there always seemed to be a ing problem. Within minutes of completing his hair and makeup, an argument erupted. And guess what about? You’ll never ing guess…..

“Allysha….How many times do I have to tell you? The foundation is too dark! Again! We’re not doing a photoshoot, okay? This is live action! We cannot whitewash him like we do at the studio unless it’s with makeup!” the visual director snapped. I tried to speak as calmly as possible.

“Sir….if I lighten the foundation any more than I already have, he’s going to look like death warmed over-”

“Look, I understand you’re all about natural beauty and what not but our goal here is to display all our idols with the most desirable appearance: pale skin! Pretty, gorgeous, flawless pale skin. That is the look I want, the look that they want-”

“Are you saying that dark skin is undesirable? That his skin isn’t beautiful or flawless—” I inched closer and closer to the director, my voice raising louder and louder above volume. I had the entire room’s attention. Kai suddenly grabbed my wrist and shook his head.

“Allysha, please. Stop. It’s okay-”

“No, Kai, it’s not! It’s practically local racism and I’m sick of it. You keep telling me no don’t it’s fine but I really can’t take this anymore! I’m so over it! For months I have watched people belittle you and push you around and just take control of your image! And I have told you time and time again subtly that you…..” I had to stop myself before I went into tears.

“You know what, if it’s gonna be a problem, you can pack up and go.” He said coldly and firmly.

“Really?” I said in a low voice. “Seriously…. Fine. I’m well trained and I have enough cred to get a job anywhere! I don’t need this nor do I need this ing job.” I huffed grabbing my materials, not even bothering to clean them.

“Allysha, stop,” I could hear his voice breaking a bit and he sounded desperate for something. “You don’t have to do this, okay? Just do the makeup like they want and we can work something out, like some kinda agreement.” He whispered to me as I packed.

“Look, maybe this whole pale skin/tan skin thing doesn’t bother you, but it damn sure bothers the absolute outta me.” I mumbled out of pure rage.

“Listen to me, can’t we at least talk about this—”

“WHY DO YOU EVEN CARE?!” I snapped causing the room to go dead silent.

“…..Because we’re friends….” He said softly. I sighed, suddenly feeling bad for yelling at him. I closed my eyes and let a tear fall as I closed up my suitcase and walked out.