Ra Jinah, 5 years old

Snow.

Snow coated the ground, pure white and fluffy; cold and chilly. It was soft, yet crunchy under my feet. I heard Mommy tell us to be careful and to not stay outside too long since it was cold. We sat on the porch steps, wondering what to do first. The possibilities were everywhere. The snow was so tempting...

I jumped from the porch step and stamped my feet on the snow, sending up cold puffs. I giggled. It was so pretty…

“Hey, Jinah, come back and sit on the porch. It’s slippery under the snow!”

“I’ll be okay, Kyungsoo.” I said. “I’m very careful.”

He looked at me curiously with his big shiny eyes. He looked silly bundled up with that poofy coat his Mommy made him wear and striped hat with a pom-pom on top. He kicked some of the snow off the porch steps and began to gather snow with his mittened hands. I stamped my way over to him again, liking the way the snow would puff up all over the place with every step.

“What are you doing?” I asked. He grinned.

“This!” He threw the snow at me. It hit my coat with a thump. The snow didn’t stay together very well so it pretty much fell apart as soon as it hit me. I laughed.

“You’re so silly!” I gathered up some snow in my hands and made a ball. I threw it at him with all of my might and it hit his hat, raining snow onto his face. He sputtered and wiped the snow from his face.

“That’s it! You better run!” he shouted, standing up. I squealed and took off running into the yard, making sure I didn’t run into the street. Kyungsoo came running after me, sending snow up all over the place. He chased me around all over the front yard, leaving the pretty snow blanket full of holes from our running around. He finally tackled me to the ground, sending snow everywhere. I squealed and wiggled out of his grasp. He was laughing too.

“I’m going to make a snow angel.” I said, plopping into the snow and spreading my arms and legs out. I swished them back and forth. Kyungsoo stood up and watched me.

“How is that a snow angel?” he asked. I sat up and stepped away from my snow angel.

“See? Those are the wings!” I exclaimed, pointing out how it’s a snow angel to him. He tilted his head to one side.

“That’s weird.” he said. It began to snow again. We looked up at the sky and felt the snow hit our cheeks. Kyungsoo stuck his tongue out to catch snowflakes. “Try it, Jinah! It’s cold and delicious!”

I stuck out my tongue and caught a snowflake. It melted on my tongue. “It’s just water!” I said, “It’s not delicious!”

“Of course it is!” Kyungsoo said back, scrunching his eyebrows together.

We heard a loud noise in the street and saw that it was a big brown truck coming this way. We ran out of the front yard and behind the porch was where we hid. The truck stopped in front of my house and we peeked up from behind the porch to see a man pull out a box from his truck. We watched him walk up to the house and onto the porch. He rang the doorbell and had a clipboard in his hand. We watched as my Mommy opened the door and said hello to him. The house smelled like sugar cookies. We looked at each other and smiled.

“The cookies are almost done.” Kyungsoo said happily. I nodded.

“Who were those cute little kids in the yard just now?” the strange man asked.

“Oh, that’s my daughter and her friend.” Mommy answered.

“They sure are cute. How old are they?”

“Oh, they’re both five. It’s their first snow day.”

“How nice. Have a great day!”

“You too!”

“They were talking about us.” Kyungsoo said.

“Weird…” I said. “Grown ups are weird. They tell us not to talk to strangers and then they talk to strangers.”

He nodded. “Are you cold? Should we go inside?”

I peeked over the porch and saw that the man was getting in his truck. “Not until he leaves.” I decided.

“Hey, you have snow in your hair.” he said, brushing it out.

“Oh, thank you.” I said shyly. Sometimes I don’t understand Kyungsoo. One minute he’s chasing me around all over the place and teasing me, and the next minute he’s making sure my face is clean and fixing my hair.

"There, it's all gone." he said, smiling at me. Just then the wind started blowing. I shivered.

"Are you cold now?" he asked, eyes getting big.

I nodded. "We should probably go insi-"

He gave me a hug. "I will keep you warm." he said shyly. My eyes got big. He was looking at me funny again.

"Jinah..." he said quietly.

"Yes?" I responded.

"I think I like you." he said. I saw his cheeks turn pink. I giggled.

"You're pink." I said.

He looked at the ground, but then looked back at me. Then he leaned very close to my face. "Stay still, okay?" he said. I was confused and so I nodded.

Then he leaned very close to me and I saw his eyes close. I think he kissed me...did he just kiss me?

He backed away, looking even more pink. I giggled. "Eww, gross." I laughed. "Why did you do that?"

He pouted. "Mommy says that she kisses Daddy because she likes him. So I kissed you because I like you."

I felt my cheeks go pink. "I like you, too."

"Kids! The sugar cookies are ready!" I heard my mommy say.

"Okay! We're coming!" Kyungsoo said. He turned to me. "Ready to go?"

I nodded. Together we walked inside and got all warmed up and ate cookies...

12 Years Later

"Amanda, there is no need to be nervous. You can always call us up, you know." my friend Savannah told me over the phone.

"I know, I know. It's just, we moved away from here twelve years ago. I'm pretty sure no one would recognize me, or I would recognize anyone..." I faded off, looking outside the car window. I saw my Mom look at me through the mirror and she asked who I was talking to.

"It's Savannah." I answered her in Korean. Savannah chucked.

"I bet you're happy you're able to speak two languages, eh?"

"It's pretty handy." I replied. "I'm dreading this moving in day. It's going to be so hectic. I wish you were here with me."

"Well, if you just send me a plane ticket to Korea I'd be happy to join you." Savannah joked.

"Maybe one day..." I responded. Mom stopped the car. She told me that we arrived.

"I got to go, Miss Banana. I'll send you pictures as soon as I can!"

"Good luck on your moving day, Amanda-Panda!" Savannah chirped, and we disconnected.

"So, you are nervous about this move." Mom said, parking the car just outside the driveway. "You have been very quiet about it until now."

Movers were all over the place, rushing to get the small items we were able to pack up from America inside the house. Other movers were unloading the furniture that was scheduled to come today as well. This house looked oddly familiar to me.

Of course I was nervous. Last time I was here I was five. Then suddenly Dad got a job in America and so we moved there. Culture shock was inevitable and so we learned English the best we could (I was second most proficient, Dad was the best at it) and I even picked an English name for myself. I didn't have many friends at first because of my bad language skills, but Savannah was the first one to really pay attention to me. Since then she became my best friend. Of course later I gained more friends, but saying goodbye to her as we were moving back was really hard. I wondered still if I would recognize anyone...everyone would look much different now that so many years have gone by.

"I just didn't want to worry you about how I was feeling." I responded to my Mom. "I'll adjust again."

"That's my strong Jinah." Mom smiled. I smiled back and headed inside the house to explore.

It really was a nice house. It was very open and had an upstairs. I saw that my room was upstairs and had a window looking out into the street. I noticed something odd from the house across the street from us. Someone was watching the commotion with curiosity. I wondered who the neighbor was. Then the person disappeared from view. That was odd.

I heard movers coming up the steps. They could have some of my things. Sure enough they did and they asked me where I wanted my things. I told them to just leave them by the closet and I'd take care of it. I like assembling things. I'm pretty good at it. I'll just assemble everything once it all arrives. I looked out the window again and saw a family walk out from the house across the street. Two boys that looked around my age, a man, and a woman were walking to our house. That was nice of them to visit, but wasn't that a bad timing? Maybe they want to help us unpack. That would be very pleasant. I don't really remember the customs in Korea anymore.

I saw them approach my Mom, who was outside the house fretting about something. Apparently Mom and the woman used to know each other, for they seemed really happy to see each other. I decided to go down the stairs to investigate. When I reached the ground floor, the family was stepping inside.

"Your daughter has grown up wonderfully!" the woman said. I felt very embarrassed by that complement and simply bowed my head. I felt eyes on me and saw that one of the boys was looking at me in surprise. His eyes were very big and shiny, and his lips were sort of pouty. He wasn't very tall, but then again I'm only 157 cm tall. He sort of looked familiar to me, but I'm not sure how.

I felt rude so I introduced myself, "Hello, I'm Ra Jinah. It's nice to meet you." I remembered to speak formally and bow.

The boy who was looking at me earlier with surprise now looked amazed. Okay, he definitely recognized me now...but I honestly don't remember this person. Suddenly I was distracted by the movers carrying the box I had carefully packed that I was terrified something bad might happen to it and followed them up the stairs with it. I heard my Mom say something about following me but I wasn't paying attention.

Once the box was placed in my room I breathed a sigh of relief. I also saw that Dad had brought up the tools so I could assemble my furniture. Excellent! I found my first item I wanted to assemble, the dresser, and began my tinkering. I set it beside the window and got to work on installing the drawers and making sure all the screws were in place. When that was done I moved my box of precious things over to it and began organizing the top of it. I set the photo of me and Savannah as the last piece, thankful the frame didn't break.

"Who is that blonde girl?"

I jumped, startled by the new voice. I turned around to see that it was that boy that had been staring at me from downstairs.

"It's my friend, Savannah." I replied hesitantly. I still didn't know this guy's name.

"I guess you don't remember me..." he said. He looked a little hurt by that.

"I'm sorry." I replied, genuinely feeling that way. I didn't like how disappointed he looked.

"My name's Do Kyungsoo. You were my best friend a long time ago." he said. Suddenly it hit me.

"Oh! I remember you now!" I exclaimed. He smiled brightly.

"Really?" he asked.

"Yes!" I said. "I sort of recognized you, but I just couldn't remember your name." Yes, I remember that special heart-shaped lip smile he did. Gosh he was a cute kid. Now, he actually looks kinda handsome but cute at the same time.

"I'm glad you recognize me now. I was about to become very sad if you didn't." he said. "How do you feel about moving back?"

"I'm not sure yet." I said, and went back to rummaging around in my boxes to find my clothes and possibly something else to assemble. My bed wasn't up here yet, but I saw that my bookcase was. I dragged the box over to where I wanted it to sit and opened it up.

"You build stuff now?" Kyungsoo asked, proceeding to enter my still fairly empty room