I met him at the mall's department store. It was a Saturday afternoon, and it was hot. The whole purpose of being at the mall would probably be for the cold AC. The temperature was a whopping 94ºF. Regardless of the climate, I was there to browse for some new clothes. I hadn't gone shopping in three months or so.

I was browsing the sports wear section when someone spoke from behind me.  "Excuse me, miss." I turned and saw a man not much taller than me. He was about half a foot to three-fourths of a foot more lanky; not to mention how dapper he looked.
"May I help you?" I replied, stuck in such a situation.
"Ummmm.." He trailed. I was expecting him to say something like, "I've dropped my wallet". Something romantic and cliche; but no— I obviously expected to much from it. "You're stepping on my shoelaces.."
I looked down and I felt a bit embarrassed. 'Sorry." I briefly replied and walked off.
"I didn't mean to be blunt." He followed after me, maybe catching on to my blushing cheeks of embarrassment.
"No, no. Don't worry about it." I felt stupid knowing I expected more. As I continued to walk, I rubbed my forehead and closed my eyes for a bit— a bit too long. Having closed my eyes, a huge cart of empty boxes pulled up by a worker, had gone in my way. As expected, I trampled and fell. 

I opened my eyes. My head hurt and the fuss and bustling around me didn't help. My vision was blury but, I blinked a few times. The ground was hard and cold.  I looked to my left and saw a pile of smashed boxes. "I didn't know I was that heavy." I thought to myself. I looked around and saw that people were staring at me. By then I had no care, whatsoever. Though, only at that time did I notice that my head was no longer on the ground. Rather, someone seemed to be helping me get up. To no surprise, it was shoelace man. "Are you okay?" He looked a bit concerned but his voice sounded as if he was joking.

"Yeah, my head just hurts." I got up and dust myself off. 
"I'm sorry if I were to cause you any trou-"
"No need to mention it." I nodded, examining how cliche this was going. "Thanks, though. For helping me u-"
"No need to mention it." He mimicked my ways and smiled. "Jonghyun." He held a hand out for me to shake but, I just stared at it. "No?" He uttered, feeling a bit embarrassed that I'm basically declining his hand shake. "A taste of his own medicine." A half of my conscience spoke; while the other said "How rude of you."
"I guess not.." He said putting his hand down. "Well, my name is Jonghyun and I'm sorry if I've caused you any trouble." Instead of an attempted hand shake, Jonghyun went straight for a hug and encircled his arms around my shoulders briefly. I didn't know whether to punch him or oblige to it.
I took a deep breath, "Ok then, I'm guessing you're just the friendly type." I nodded and smiled, "I'm Sooyun. Don't worry about causing me any trouble; I probably caused more trouble to you."
"Nice to meet you, Sooyun and don't worry I've got no trouble with you." He laughed and replied to me.

Our conversation didn't go on for long until he got a phone call and had to go. As it turned out, he was going to be my new neighbor; he was going to live three floors higher than me in the apartment complex. The somewhat best part was that every morning, we went to work together. Our jobs were exactly the same train station stop. We saw each other around often; making small talk and exchanging smirks every now and then. Later on, we ended up exchanging numbers. We also had a few movie nights and even venting sessions at late night; we’ve been becoming pretty close buddies. Jonghyun was the friendly type after all. Or so, that's what I thought, right?

A few months have passed since I first crashed into the pyramid of boxes. Today, he approached me on the train. "Sooyun-ah." He tapped my shoulder. "Are you free tomorrow night?"

I nodded. "Why do you ask?"

"It's Friday night and I was just wondering if you'd possibly wanna spend it with me."

"Sure!" I completely misinterpreted him, "You want me to invite some of my friends too?"

He chuckled lightly at my ignorance. “Maybe just you and I.”

“Oh! Yeah! Another venting session would be cool.” I smiled and obliged.

He scratched his head and rubbed his nape. "Well, umm...What I'm trying to say is:” He looked at the ground, “ Would you wanna go on a date with me?"

"Oh!" I nodded slowly, getting the jest of what he was trying to say. I laughed, trying to break free of the leash of humiliation I've captured myself with, "Of course, I'd love to go on a date with you.” My outside was simply agreeing while my insides were thinking "Well, this is one hell of a way to say you wanna get jiggy with me."

He smiled back at me and slowly crept his hand over to mine, intertwining our fingers, keeping it there the whole train ride.

…what did I just get myself into..