You remembered how your mother will always tell you, “Look your best before you leave the house, because you’ll never know who you’ll meet or where you’ll end up to.”

It’s 7 a.m. on a Saturday and you stood in your sweats and hoodie clutching your freshly bought half gallon of milk in one hand as you tried your best to comb your hair in order with the other.  And as you stood there looking at the panel of the elevator slide close laterally, the mirror coming into view, you smiled and shook your head thinking your mother would be greatly disappointed.  But you never believed her anyway.  You never believed you might end up somewhere you were not supposed to go or that you would meet someone you were not supposed to meet and that your life will change drastically one day because of it.  The farthest you went this morning is the convenience store across your building and the only people you interacted with were the usual doorman and cashier.  “So much for a life changing experience.”  You whispered.

“Hold the elevator please.”  A loud yell emerged from the hall in front of the elevator just before it closed.  You stepped forward to stick your hand between the closing doors to get them to bounce back open, letting in a man in a black leather and wool varsity jacket over a grey shirt and dark jeans.  “Thanks.”  He huffed and pressed the button to his floor and then adjusted the strap of his backpack on his shoulder before he leaned back against the wall of the elevator to catch his breath and take off his sunglasses.

At that particular moment your eyes met his on the mirror.  It was Junho.  And you began to ponder if he was real.  It has been weeks since you saw him last and you were just about to forget that he ever existed in your life and now he’s here with you in a small confined space with nowhere to run or hide.  And then you noticed he was smiling.  His lips were curved into a warm, dazzling smile.  A smile you wondered if he reserved only for you.  The smile he used to give you every time you met.  The smile that once captured your heart and made you believe all his lies.

You were trembling from where you stood and you prayed it wasn’t visible to him or at least not too much.  At that moment you couldn’t hear a thing.  That vital muscular organ in the middle of your thorax was pumping too hard to make the blood circulate that all you could hear was the wooshing and thumping sound in your ears.  You were sure you were about to hyperventilate and pass out and then eventually die from where you stood.  All that because of Junho.

It took a while before you got your senses back and you hurriedly turned your gaze towards the floor and clutched the milk closer to your body like he was about to snatch it from you.  It just felt like he was going to take something from you.

Junho then pushed himself off the wall with a joyous smile.  “Good morning.”  He said nonchalantly.  “Out of milk?”

Your shoulders sank and you sighed deeply as you turned around to look at him.  “Didn’t we agree not to do this anymore?”

“Do what?”  Junho’s eyes widened still with that smile that was slowly getting on your nerves.  “I’m just being a friendly neighbor.”

Your eyes widened in disbelief.  “Is he mocking me now?”  You thought to yourself as your mouth pressed into a firm line.  “What?”  You swallowed back the irritation knotting the muscles in your shoulders.

“You just said to regard each other as strangers.  So, I’m being a stranger.”  He pressed the emergency stop button.  “Hi.  I’m Lee Junho.  You are?”  He extends a hand out towards you with a cheeky smile that fueled that irritation in you, turning it into instant anger.

“Not interested.”  Your jaw jutted forward as you reached the button that was creating that equally irritating alarm that was piercing your ears and poking at your brain.

Junho held your hand to stop you from reaching the controls.  “Why are you so determined to hate me?”

Your eyes fell to his mouth as Junho his lips.  He watched your eyes track the movement of his tongue on his lips before you looked back up to his eyes.  It was a bad habit of his you thought, his lips and confusing you.  “Did you just ask me why?”  Your breath caught as you spoke.  “Did you totally forget what you and your friends did to me?  Just a quick note, common people don’t usually like being insulted.”

“I apologized for that and I still regret ing up and taking that bet, but you just won’t let me apologize to you properly.”  Junho tore at his hair in exasperation.  He wondered why you were being so infuriating, when all he wanted to do was apologize.  “And just so you know, it wasn’t like ‘I dare you to kiss that repulsive woman’, it was ‘I bet you don’t have enough game to get a girl like that to like you’.  They were insulting me, not you.”  He pointed his finger.

“And you think that makes it inoffensive?”  Your voice was edging dangerously to a squeal.  You finally reached the emergency stop button making the elevator continue to go up.  “You won your ing bet, what else do you want from me?”

Just then the elevator door opens to his floor.  “Let me make it up to you.  I don’t want to be that one evidence in your life why you can’t trust people.”  He hits the close button on the panel and moved a little closer to you.  “I want to fix this.  I want you to trust me again, be my friend again.”

The door opens to your floor.  “Everything you said to me, everything that you were to me…all of that was a lie.  So how in the world am I supposed to trust you and be your friend?”  You pushed your way out to leave without looking back.

“It wasn’t a lie.”  Junho followed you to your door.  “I spent time with you because I began to like the girl I got to know in the library.  And for your information, I kissed you not to win a bet, I kissed you because I like you.”

He watched as you fought for words.  “Am I supposed to believe that?”

“Please.”

“Yes please.”  You wouldn’t look at him again.  “Please leave.  I really don’t know what to do with you right now.”

Junho let out a deep breath.  “I can’t – “

You gave him a huge bright plastic smile.  “Are you going to say you can’t live without me?”  You said mockingly.

“No.”  Junho shook his head as you stared at him in confusion.  He watched your face, seeing the slight tremble in your bottom lip.  “I haven’t known you for that long and I’ve lived without you most of my life and I think I did pretty well.  I think I’ll still continue to do well without you.”

“Ah…Is that so?”  Something in his words hit you the wrong way that made you arch an eyebrow at him.  You weren’t sure what he had to prove with those words, but it wasn’t doing him any good with his plea.  “Then why are you still badgering me with this?”

He moved closer to touch your arm.  “It’s not that I can’t live without you…I just don’t want to.”

You were fighting not to smile, but he could spot the slight rounding of your cheeks that meant you weren’t as furious as you were at him anymore.  He was slowly melting your heart and he knows it.  “That might be the tackiest line I have ever heard in my life.”  You snorted.

Junho rubbed the back of his neck.  “You kind of get to me, you know?”  Junho smiled.  “So how about we get breakfast?”

“You Mr. Lee are not that close of a friend to me yet to have breakfast with.”  You pointed a finger at him.

“So does this mean I’m getting a clean slate?”  He moved a little closer to you and dipped his head.  “Like a start over?”  A smile began to creep across his face.

“Yes, BUT you will have to try a little harder.  I’m not going to be that same foolish girl.”  You asserted.

“Alright.  I can take that.”

“Now go home!  This isn’t even your floor!”  You started to open your door with a smile, hiding it as best as you can.

“Oh by the way, you look lovely.”  He said as he rubbed his fingers against his mouth.

And those words made you suddenly remember how you look.  “!”  You whispered as you closed your eyes.  You had fantasies about running into him and those were so far away from the reality you are faced with.  In those, you looked a whole better and a ton load cooler and was in the arms of your prince and dressed in a fabulous gown and wearing a tiara.  Your mom was right after all.