Four months had passed since I moved to live with my uncle in Seoul.

Four months since my training at SM Entertainment should have started.

Four months since they told me that a mistake had occurred.

But there was no going back anymore.

My parents helped me get signed up for a school here in Seoul when we found out that I’d been accepted to become a trainee at SM Entertainment and it was only when I showed up for their trainee sessions that I was informed that there had been a mistake.

My family still hadn’t overcome the financial crisis that had hit Asia five years earlier, so I had to work as a waiter in a small restaurant in the evenings, though it was clear that once the school was on another break, I’d have to work another job as well. While my uncle didn’t mind taking me in, he also claimed that it was nevertheless a financial burden and there was no way that I’d tell my parents about that when they had enough to take care of and to manage even without paying extra attention to me.

Finding friends also turned out to be very challenging. Not only were school and work incredibly time-consuming, but ever since the rejection from SM Entertainment, I had arrived on an emotional low. Dancing had always been something that I was confident in, something that I was good at, something that promised stress relief and happiness. But now even when I wanted to dance again to just try it, there was still no time to do it, making me feel out of place. I also realized that I had suddenly become more insecure than before, a fact that I absolutely hated about myself because it didn’t fit who I was. Somehow all of that had resulted in me not seeking out social contact like I normally would have, but instead I found myself using ever bit of free time bent over my notes and books for school.

It was late at night and I was tired. How long had it been since the last night that I had gotten more than five hours of sleep? With midterm exams coming up, I knew that I’d have to study once I got back to my uncle’s apartment and right then, it made me want to just quit. I couldn’t remember all the things that the school expected me to learn because my school in Gwangju had been a little behind this high school in Seoul in Math, English, and History, and I’ve never been in a literature class before that expected you to read one book, including a proper analysis about the plot and the characters and pretty much everything else that had been written down in that book, in such a short time as it was the case here, so I was almost constantly behind with readings as well. If I wanted to catch up properly with one subject, that would mean getting left behind with others.

To top it all off on this particular day, I had overslept earlier which meant that I hadn’t been able to hand in all of my homework which had in turn led to detention which had then led to me arriving late for work. And at work, nothing seemed to go right either. I mixed up two orders which made a customer yell at me, and then I broke three glasses, which hadn’t happened since my first week of work. That got me a lecture from my boss.

All in all, I could definitely say that this was the worst day. Maybe only so far, maybe worse days would follow, but for the time being, this was the worst day and I let myself dwell in that. I wished there was someone to talk to about all this, but who? I hadn’t made close friends at school yet in part because I used every bit of time during breaks or even on the bus to finish assignments, my uncle wouldn’t understand, my parents would only get worried and talk me into going back to Gwangju, plus they were probably asleep already. My sister would also be asleep by that point. And my friends from Gwangju probably also wouldn’t quite understand this, though I assumed that they had also already gone to sleep or were super busy studying for midterms just like me. Leaving… No one. Again. That was always the answer. Who could help? Who would listen? Who was willing to take things a bit slower and give me a chance in school or the chance to even just take a deep breath at work in order to calm down from the hectic environment? No one. The answer was always no one.

The bus I had to take finally arrived and I got on, taking a seat somewhere in the middle of the vehicle because there were older teenagers in the back who creeped me out. The thought that they could start teasing me (or even beat me up, who knew what they considered to be ‘fun’) making me feel uncomfortable with their presence.

I pulled the hood of my shirt a bit deeper, hoping to somehow become one with the uncomfortable, flat bus seat. Would that also help with my other problems? If I could just become one with the bus seat?

I closed my eyes for a moment, but when I immediately felt like I’d fall asleep, I quickly opened them again, trying to find something else to concentrate on. Maybe the guys behind me?

I tried to eavesdrop a little, but soon realized that they were only talking about a party and about some girl who also planned to attend, so I quickly decided that they were absolutely not worth being listened to.

But what else was there? There was hardly any traffic, it was too dark really to focus on much outside except for my reflection in the bus window and the neon signs advertising stores that were open 24/7 or drug stores or a company… No, that wasn’t interesting enough either.

How about trying to recall what I had learned in school earlier? What subject had we discussed again in biology? Genetics. So what had I learned earlier..?

Seconds went by before I caught myself just staring into the distance, repeating that same question occasionally, but I couldn’t come up with an answer. Alright, so that wouldn’t get me anywhere either.

My eyes went to the front again, trying to figure out if anything else inside the bus could catch my attention. But there were only the usual seats, the handles, the drawings on the backs of seats and…

My eyes stayed glued on the ‘drawing’ in front of me that wasn’t a drawing at all. Someone had written down their phone number, but nothing else with that. No smiley face, no comment, no name… Only a cell phone number, the last few digits probably written in a hurry because the writing got worse, the last one even barely readable as it seemed like the writer had either needed to get off the bus or someone might have tried to stop them from writing.

I could…

No. No, absolutely not. Under no circumstance whatsoever! I would not call a random number! For all I knew, the person was probably also here in Seoul, probably not far enough away for me to be comfortable with since we took the same bus. There was probably some needy old creep or some teenager waiting to prank others… No, I would absolutely not call that number. I wouldn’t do it if I were more awake, so I definitely wouldn’t do it in my current state and run the risk of reacting inappropriately or even spilling information that I shouldn’t spill. No, I had learned enough about stranger danger. I definitely wouldn’t call that number.

I looked around the bus once again and tried to busy myself with the ugly pattern of the seats, but the grayish background with black, yellow, and red forms on it quickly gave me a headache and I started to feel a bit nauseous—apparently it was too late, I was too tired, and… had it been too long since I had eaten anything? Yes, probably, since I couldn’t recall having eaten anything since lunch at school because I hadn’t had any time.

Another sigh escaped me at the thought of how expensive school lunch was. Sure, comparing it to restaurants or probably work cafeterias or whatever, it wasn’t all that expensive, but since I didn’t earn all that much money, the prices seemed horrendously expensive. Getting my school equipment earlier this month also hadn’t exactly been cheap, so… how much longer was this month? How much longer until I got my next paycheck?

My eyes went back to the phone number and another sigh escaped me. What kind of life did that person have? Why had they written their number on the backseat of a bus? Were they rich or poor? Male or female? Good at school or not? What was their family situation? What age were they? What was life like for that person?

No, even if I called them, I probably wouldn’t find out about anything like that. Who even wrote their phone number on the backseat in a bus unless they wanted to exploit someone else or were very willing to be exploited themselves? No, that was too stupid.

I looked up at the announcement board and wondered if we were really only approaching the second stop. Had I fallen asleep and I was actually already on the second round? I took my phone out to check the time, but no, we were really only just approaching the second stop since I had gotten on the bus.

I raised my gaze back to the phone number and, with the thought in the back of my mind that I wouldn’t arrive for another fifteen minutes or so, I decided to not care and just call. What was the worst that could happen? A creep, whatever gender, could answer and then I could quickly end the call again. It could even be one of the guys in the back, but then I could just hang up while leaving my phone up and pretending to call someone.

My fingers moved quickly as I dialed the number. I briefly double-checked if I had gotten all the digits right, then I pressed the call button, wondering if this call into randomness even had the potential to still make this day any worse or if it would actually leave me unaffected if it turned out to be a creep.

I could hear it ring once. Then twice. Then a third time.

“Yeoboseyo?” The voice sounded younger than I had dared to hope, maybe about my age even. It was a bit difficult to tell through the phone. Male, that was for sure. And incredibly tired. So there was no real danger, was there?

“Yeoboseyo?” the other person said again and I remembered that I still hadn’t responded.

“I’m sorry, hello,” I replied and got a pause in return.

“Your voice doesn’t sound familiar.”

“I’m sorry, I…” I started, but what was there to say? Hey, I had a rough day—a rough four months, to be precise—and now I’m sitting in a bus on my way home and called a random number because I wanted to talk to someone. How pathetic! “I’m sorry, I should hang up.”

“You literally just called.”

“I know, but I really shouldn’t—“

“You’re on that bus, aren’t you? I’ll just assume that you’re not at my school because it wouldn’t make sense for anyone there to call right now, so you’re on that bus, aren’t you? That bus that has my number on that seat.”

I hesitated, unsure how to answer. Wouldn’t that give away too much? Then again, what else could I say? Where else should I have gotten the number from? And if his guess was so precise, then it seemed like there wasn’t really another option anyway. I lost my chance to claim that I had dialed the wrong number when I told him that I had to hang up instead. “Yes,” I answered eventually.

“Just tell me one thing: is that bus still in Seoul?”

“Yes?”

“Then go on with whatever you called for. If it helps: I’m not in Seoul, not even near Seoul, and I won’t go there anytime soon, so the chances for us to meet even on accident are pretty much down to zero.”

Was that boy even for real? He received the call from an unknown number in the middle of the night, answered, and then even asked me to stay on the phone!?

“Um… but… it’s late…?” I tried instead, but only got a sigh in response.

“I’ve been trying to study for midterms ever since I got back from school and I can’t tell letters apart from numbers anymore, so I need a break anyway.”

“I wish I could have done that…” my tired mind replied and I realized too late that I also said that out loud. I got a hum in response, so, figuring that it was too late now anyway, I just continued to speak, “Studying, I mean. I also have midterms coming up and I’ve never been this unprepared.”

“Why?” When I remained silent, the boy on the other line added, “If that’s not why you call a stranger in the middle of the night, then what is?”

“Do you really think you’d like to hear it?”

“I answered my phone to an unknown number even though I don’t usually do that. But we both seem to be in similar situations right now, kind of at least, so whatever. I just assumed that if someone called an unknown number, they’d have something on their mind that they’d like to talk about.”

I hesitated again and glanced at the bus’s announcement sign, then outside. We should still have a little more than ten minutes left, so I decided that it would be worth to give it a shot. “But if you don’t want to listen anymore, feel free to just end the call, alright?”

The stranger actually laughed quietly at that. “I will, don’t worry,” he replied, sounding a bit more awake.

So I told him. I told him everything, from the auditions and how I had failed them to how I had moved to Seoul because I had gotten a notification that I had been accepted to SM Entertainment and about everything that happened since then. I nearly missed my stop in the meantime, but somehow still managed to get off, walking towards the apartment building where my uncle lived, though I simply began to walk around the block, wanting to keep on talking because someone offered to actually listen to me for the first time in forever—though of course I couldn’t tell for sure.

When I stopped talking eventually, the stranger was quiet and I was certain that he had left to do something else in the meantime. On this particular day, it wouldn’t surprise me. In this situation in general, it wouldn’t surprise me!

“I think I might be able to help you a bit, actually,” he suddenly replied, catching me completely off guard. I came to a stand, wondering if I had heard correctly.

“You… help me?”

“Yes. I mean, not a lot probably since I’ve learned that you have to figure out most things on your own and check if they work for you at all, but maybe I can at least give you options to think about,” he repeated thoughtfully and I slowly started to walk again, feeling uncomfortable just standing there even though I knew that nothing could really happen to me other than maybe some officers getting a bit suspicious about a sixteen year old kid walking around a block in the middle of the night.

“What would you recommend then?”

“Well, one thing is: don’t eat in the cafeteria.”

“What? But—”

“For real. Don’t do that. Take lunch from home. You said you do homework in the mornings, right?”

“Yes?”

“Take a bit of time from that to make yourself a lunch box. You could start with really easy stuff. Maybe you have leftovers. Or you could make enough one morning so you’ll also have something to eat the next day. Start with easy recipes if you haven’t cooked much so far, but try to always include rice and vegetables.”

“I don’t really know much… I’ve never really had to cook before, even now, my… guardian does that,” I revealed, not really comfortable yet to disclose that I lived with my uncle despite all the other details I had shared with this stranger.

“Then offer to help them. You don’t have to work every day, do you? Offer them help on the days that you’re off. Also, try to concentrate on eating while you eat and don’t study during that time, if possible: if you concentrate on eating, then your body will actually remember that it has eaten and that it’s sated.”

“Are you for real?”

“Yes, absolutely!” The other sounded almost enthusiastic before he continued to speak more quietly again. “Also, I know it seems like a difficult thing to do right now, but try to spend lunch break with people around you. I get it that you could use that time to do homework or study, but believe me when I tell you that it’s better to use it to make friends. I’ve been there and done all of that. But when I started relaxing at least during lunch break instead of working my brain all day every day, I noticed that it was easier to remember things. It generally helps to relax your mind so you can take in new information again and studying will be easier. Believe me, it works.”

“How do you know all that?”

“Like I said: been there, done that. And right now, I’m following the same advice I gave you and taking time off from studying.”

“Ah right, I should have let you study instead!” I exclaimed and flinched at how loud my own voice sounded, remembering that I was actually on the deserted streets of Seoul. It was past midnight, which meant that I should be in bed and not on the streets.

“No, I’m pretty sure that if you had done that, the syllables would have started waltzing around my biology book. Oh look, since we’re talking about the nervous system right now, there’s even one of those cells here on the page. Maybe while the syllables would have started dancing, it would have moved ninety degrees and started becoming a tree instead?”

I couldn’t help but laugh at that. “You have a vivid imagination!”

“I assure you that that does not help me during class and—” He suddenly interrupted himself. “Hey, I gotta go, I think I woke up my sister.”

“Wait,” I said quickly before I could stop myself. “Can I call you again?”

Silence greeted me once again and I wished it wouldn’t make me seem even more stupid, even more desperate. Was it too late to rewind time? Was it too late to try again? Maybe…go back to when I signed up for auditions?

“Sure,” the stranger replied, startling me once again, and I stopped in my tracks.

“For real?”

“Yes. I really have to go now,” he whispered, obviously trying not to let anyone notice that he was on the phone. “Bye.”

“Bye,” I replied and listened as the line went dead. After a couple seconds, I took the phone away and looked at it, shaking my head lightly. Trying not to overthink the situation, I put the phone back into the pocket of my jacket, feeling a little better.

Since there wasn’t anything else stopping me, I hurried back to the apartment building that my uncle and at that point also I lived in. Once in the apartment, I quickly undressed before sitting down in my bed and trying to read a little more for my literature class.

 

Over the course of the next two months, I didn’t call and neither did he. He only texted me the day after my call and sent me pictures of food and recipes that he said were easy to make and I texted him back to thank him, but then our contact stopped. I thought about telling him that I had tried the recipes, but then I figured that there was no real use in doing so. I also tried to follow his suggestion to start making friends and not only sit over my homework, but since it wasn’t the beginning of the semester anymore, that turned out to be rather difficult. Everyone had already formed cliques and I had already gotten the reputation of being the quiet kid who didn’t want to be interrupted. If they only knew…

The only one whom I kind of befriended was a boy two years younger than me. It was more like us tolerating each other while we sat across from each other during lunch, doing our homework or studying. The only other information I really got from him was that his name was Shim Changmin, and then we went back to studying.

We were not even a week away from finals when my finger hovered over the unknown number again, the number without a name but for which I knew that a boy who was about my age would answer. So far during the past few days, I had been able to reason myself out of calling him again, and I tried to do the same thing this time. What would happen if I called? Chances were that he didn’t even remember me, especially not as more than ‘some desperate teenager who had called him in the middle of the night’. We didn’t even know each other, so wouldn’t calling him again seem extremely strange? He might not even answer. He was probably already asleep anyway, it was past midnight after all. There was no valid reason for me to call him. Absolutely none.

I glanced back at my math book and had no idea what I was looking at with all the numbers and letters and the explanations that grew hazy until they formed thick lines that didn’t make sense, stressing me out even more. I really had to get this information down! I had already read through my notes for this once, the book information should only add to my knowledge, but while I read through the text, all of it sounded new and at the same time didn’t seem to register in my mind.

I thought back to the teacher starting a new topic that morning and how my classmates had afterwards talked about it while I hadn’t really picked up any information. Apparently, being stressed and thinking about being stressed had distracted me too much from focusing during class, which didn’t really decrease my stress level!

One thing I had realized during class, though, was that it was close to Christmas and that the more the others talked about their Christmas plans, I really started to miss my family. The other students could sit with their parents, they could talk to people they loved and empty their hearts and minds before they went back to studying. My uncle? He’d probably listen, but I wouldn’t burden him with all of this, not when he’d probably tell me again that he had also managed to get through university while working, so I should also be fine. And my parents were too far away. Maybe telling my mom all of that would help, maybe hugging her, smelling her familiar perfume…

No, I couldn’t call her. My parents were still struggling financially, they had my sister to take care of, and it was once again in the middle of the night! They had enough worries even without me adding to that!

I knew that this thought should calm me, should give me a closure to this topic and enable me to just move on and focus on studying—it didn’t. I couldn’t help but miss them, I couldn’t help but want to call them, just pretend that there was no school and no work, no stress…

I blinked and my eyes landed back on my school book. Okay, well, I wouldn’t get any studying done like this, that much was for sure. I looked back at my phone, at the number that I had already typed, and the thought crossed my mind that this stranger had already helped me once. He was probably awake, wasn’t he? Was he also stressed? Would it work for now to call him in order to get my mind off this workload? Would he be able to help me again?

Without trying to come up with any answers, I finally pressed the call button, still I trying to think of a way to start the conversation while the dial tone resonated.

“Yeoboseyo?” he answered after about five rings, making me jump and blurt out the first thing that crossed my mind.

“How do you do this?”

“This is the strangest way that anyone has ever started a phone call with me.”

I sighed, ignoring the amusement in his voice. “We haven’t exchanged names, so I figured I’d start off directly,” I reasoned even though it was only part of the truth.

“That makes sense,” he replied and I sighed again, turned away from my textbook, and rubbed over my eyes tiredly. “Anyway, you wanted to vent?”

“Is that okay?”

“Of course it is, go ahead,” he replied and this time I was certain that there was laughter in his voice.

“It’s just… How? Seriously, how do you do that? Work is killing me. And then there’s homework and studying and trying not to lose track of what the teachers say…”

When he laughed for real, I stopped talking, frowning at the messy bed in front of me. “You sound pitiful,” he commented after a while before he continued to laugh and I realized after a while that it sounded less like genuine delight and a lot more like serious sleep deprivation.

“Are you okay?” I asked when he eventually seemed to calm down.

“I should probably stop drinking coffee… But it’s exam time…”

“I don’t think I’m supposed to, but I can relate.” My eyes were still glued to the bed. It was so tempting to just walk across this room, slip between the covers, sleep for just a few hours…

“Did you at least follow my advice?”

“What?” I blinked when his voice suddenly interrupted my train of thoughts.

“To take the time to make friends,” he specified.

“Ah, yes, I did. Kind of, at least—at lunch I sit together with this one kid while we do homework,” I explained.

“That is not quite what I meant when I told you to make friends…” he noted and this time he sounded incredibly tired.

“I know,” I replied but then didn’t know what else to add because asking if that still counted seemed even more pitiful to me.

“I don’t know how to answer your question, to be honest,” he spoke up again eventually. “I mean, is anyone ever okay during exam time? Especially when they’re like us and have to work? I don’t know how I manage to pull through it every time, I always tell myself that I’m used to it and then I have to notice that I’m absolutely not and ask myself the same things: How? Why? And will it ever stop or at least get easier?”

“That sounds very depressing.”

He was quiet for a moment, just long enough to make me wonder if maybe I shouldn’t have said that, until he responded. “True. I usually try to focus on my family and friends whenever I take breaks, or I’ll try to study together with my friends, if that helps.”

“Well, my family and my friends don’t live here with me,” I reminded him and only realized in the following silence that he might not remember that and that, if that were the case, this probably sounded strange when hearing it out of context.

“I was about to tell you that I have a lot of questions, but then I remembered that you told me about that last time,” he said eventually. “Maybe you should consider calling them one of these days. You don’t have to talk to them about your situation, in fact, I prefer to just talk to my friends about other stuff when I talk to them,” he suggested and, when he said his next words, he suddenly sounded excited, “So here’s tonight’s mission: call your friends or just one of them or your family tomorrow. Take thirty minutes or an hour completely off what’s going on and then continue studying. Which reminds me—I should probably go back to my literature notes and check if the words are still waltzing across the page.”

I couldn’t help but laugh at that. “Alright, then I’ll see if my letters and numbers have mastered their foxtrot by now.”

He laughed, too, at my response and I was happy to know that I had also managed to brighten up his night a bit—that’s what it seemed like, at least. “Alright, good luck with that,” he agreed.

“You too,” I replied and listened as he ended the call before I took my phone away from my ear. Then I stared at the small device.

There was only a number, nothing else, and suddenly it made me frown. I needed a nickname for this stranger whom I could call in the middle of the night and who would answer my calls anyway, the one who hadn’t only listened to my worries and fears once but twice. Had he saved my number in his phone? Had he created a name for me? What could that be? And what should I call him?

‘Hero’ was the first thing that came to my mind, but I immediately discarded that idea again. No way that I would save him as that! But how else should I call him?

I stared at my phone for another while (Seconds? Maybe minutes?) before I gave up and typed Yeongoong into my phone, deciding that I would take the time after exams to think of a better nickname while I saved the contact.

With yet another sigh, I turned back to my math book and tried to remember the equations that shouldn’t be as difficult to remember as they seemed right then.

 

I was completely surprised when my phone rang the next week and the caller ID revealed the (nick)name Yeongoong.

“Hello?” I answered the phone after I had overcome my initial confusion.

“You’re my last resort right now,” he answered, and I was about to take the phone away from my ear to stare at it in total confusion. Now it made sense why he also got confused at my rather… innovative ways of greeting him.

“You sound desperate,” I observed carefully, and he groaned.

“I am: please tell me that you’re good at math!”

“What’s your problem?” I asked, and he immediately started to explain it to me.

I quickly came to the conclusion that it would have been much easier to explain mathematics to him if I had been sitting next to him, but it also seemed to work out like this over the phone.

We only hung up at 3AM when both of us had a mere three hours left to sleep and neither of us had still been able to focus on the task at hand. I could have bet that he even nearly fell asleep on the phone at some point, but he always responded and kept on asking questions. His quiet cheers were the most amusing part to me, because he always got really happy when he managed to solve a problem.

The night afterwards, he returned the favor with Japanese, explaining some of the characters and some phrases to me and telling me in the middle of our call that I had most likely saved him with math the night before. After midnight, we tried to make conversation in Japanese because he claimed that it would help me for the next day, only ending the call after both his mother and my uncle interrupted us, complaining that we were laughing too loud over the nonsense we were saying.

I thanked him again for helping me after my last final the next day and he told me that I was welcome, then my phone remained quiet again for a while.

 

With our history, I was completely taken by surprise when my phone rang again two months later at a point that was definitely not exam time, showing the caller ID Yeongoong. It was one of my nights off from work and I had busied myself with trying to catch up with my literature class, not having expected to be interrupted anytime soon.

“Hello?” I asked skeptically.

“Hey,” he answered, sounding more shy than usual. “Umm… I know it might be strange for me to call right now… It’s not even like I need your help with anything.” Yup, he definitely sounded nervous, making me both a little more relaxed but also incredibly curious why he was calling. “You see, all my friends made plans for tonight, and I could have come along with one of them, but I have to be at work starting at 5AM tomorrow…”

“So you’re basically asking me to help you pass time?” I asked in amusement and thought that it felt kind of good to have the upper hand in this for the first—well, second if math was also counted—time.

“Is that okay for you?”

“Sure. My other option is the Tale of Hong Gildon, I think you can understand why I’d prefer you over that,” I explained, grinning at his groan over the obviously familiar classic.

“Yes, I absolutely understand! Why didn’t you tell me beforehand, then I could have already called sometime before now to save you from that,” he argued, making me smile.

“I wish my teacher would just let me skip it. Do you think it’ll work if I ask her to have mercy on me because of how much other stuff I have to do?” I asked him, knowing very well that my teacher would never in a million years allow me to do that. He laughed once again.

“You can try? I mean, if you tell her in detail all the reasons why you couldn’t make it… Maybe you should even make a proper essay out of it and then, if you can, talk about others who reached their breaking point with this load of work and then you can have your class analyze the essay,” he suggested, making me laugh in return.

“This actually sounds really tempting, I think I should totally do that! But then my teacher might question why I had time for a profound essay but not for the Tales of Hong Gildon…”

“Easy,” he replied to my surprise without missing a beat, “You were able to stay awake during the essay while it was impossible to say the same about those tales.”

I laughed again and finally put a bookmark between the pages before I put the book on the nightstand beside my bed, getting more comfortable afterwards. “So tell me.”

“Tell you what?”

“You called, so I don’t know. Tell me about your friends or school or what you like to do or just funny stories that you read on the internet…”

“That’s a lot to choose from,” he admitted and stayed quiet for a moment.

“Then why don’t we start with your work? You know that I work at a restaurant, what about you? Where do you work?” I asked since all the information I had about his work place up to that point was that it was also time consuming and apparently he had to start work at 5AM on some days.

“I work in a bakery,” he revealed a moment later, and I could once again hear the shyness in his voice. “You see…this might sound weird to you, but I’ve always enjoyed cooking and baking, so I thought I might actually go in that direction later on as well. For now, it’s mainly something I knew I’m good at and can do before I have to head to school, you know?”

“Do you work every day?”

“God no! We wouldn’t be talking right now if I did because then I would have died long before now! I work about fifteen hours per week—five hours on Saturday and Sunday morning each and then another two and a half hours Wednesdays and Thursdays before school,” he revealed and I wondered how I would feel with a schedule like that. It sounded like he was basically completely unable to sleep as well as to meet up with friends often outside of school. “What about you? Oh, and did you ever follow my advice about learning to cook?”

“I also always work on the weekends, though I usually work the late shifts. Other than that, my work schedule changes a lot, though I never work on Wednesdays because that’s my really long day at school,” I told him as well. “And yes, I have tried to follow your advice, but I turn out to be really bad at it.” Getting a sudden idea, I added with a grin, “Maybe you should come to Seoul sometime and bake for me?”

“I’m afraid that would be a bit difficult to arrange,” he replied, sounding amused.

“Then how about you send me something?”

“I’m sure a cake will do very well when being sent,” he argued sarcastically.

“Wrap it in love and nothing should happen,” I suggested without missing a beat, only realizing a moment later what I had said and blushing furiously.

“I can bake it with love, but I’m afraid wrapping something in love is not my specialty,” he explained in an amused tone, though there also seemed to be an insecure edge to his voice.

“What a shame… I’d really like to taste your cooking or baking someday…”

We were quiet for a while, both of us probably trying to come up with a new topic, while I at least wondered if this kind of talk was normal for people like us before discarding that worry. After a few seconds of thinking, I realized that I had still not asked him about the most obvious thing: “Why is your phone number on that backseat on the bus?”

He groaned in response to that. “I knew you’d ask someday!”

“You don’t have to answer, you know?”

“I know,” he replied but since it sounded like he’d nevertheless explain the situation, I remained quiet. “It happened last year, actually. I was able to go on a trip to Seoul organized by my school and some of my friends also came along. And well… we were basically high on sugar and had slept too little and generally had a lot of fun… and then we were joking around, getting to the topic of dating and I mentioned how I wasn’t even really looking for anyone because I don’t have time anyway and I usually don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything. Then my friend started writing on that bus seat and I didn’t even notice it at first or noticed what he was writing and once I did notice, it was basically too late. And I’m sorry if that was too much information…”

I smiled to myself, trying to imagine those scenes: a bunch of boys, fooling around, then their conversation, one of them writing the number on the bus seat, getting interrupted towards the end because the last digits of the phone number had indeed looked a bit messy and I remembered the last one being barely readable.

“Actually, I would love to be in a relationship. Maybe not now, but someday for sure.”

“Me too,” he was quick to fill in, “But you know how I barely have any free time anyway and the bit of time I do have, I prefer to spend with my friends. But someday things will certainly get easier, it feels impossible for things not to get easier at some point. I just hope that I won’t meet anyone of interest before then…”

I laughed at that and shifted a little to get more comfortable. “Good luck with that!”

“Thanks, you too.” Another short silence followed, but this time it was him who interrupted it. “By the way, what are you interested in? I mean, aside from the things you already told me… do you know what you’d like to do later?”

“In all honesty? No, not anymore. Everything seemed so clear when the people from SME said that they accepted me… Maybe I’ll go into the direction of a dance instructor? I don’t know yet…”

“I’m certain you’ll figure it out eventually!”

“Thank you.”

“It’s your turn with a funny story now! I’ve only heard you complain or explain math to me so far,” he suddenly requested.

“You expect me to come up with something just like this?”

“Oh come on, what do you have friends for? Does your family have a pet? There are always funny stories when you have pets! And I’m sure that your time with your friends back at your hometown wasn’t boring either, was it?”

I huffed and thought about his words for a moment before I came up with something I could talk about. “At my parents’ house we have a Siberian husky called ‘Typhoon’,” I started and proceeded to tell the stranger on the other end of the line about our family dog, sharing stories from training sessions and from sleeping in the same room together and about the disaster of trying to bathe this dog and how I was certain that the majority of things we owned had needed to get replaced in the process, making him laugh.

It was shortly before nine when he told me that he’d have to end the call, but that he wouldn’t mind repeating things like this. He emphasized how much he preferred these kinds of talks over school stuff or work-related stuff, and I immediately agreed that we should definitely talk more often in the future.

The moment we had ended the call, I stared at my phone, questioning what we had just said. Wasn’t it strange for two people who didn’t even know each other to talk on the phone like this? We didn’t know who the other person was, had never met in real life, had started talking over the deepest complaints and worries that I at least would never share with my friends or family—and yet here we were, talking about getting to know each other.

I shook my head and tried to postpone those thoughts to whenever I had time for them. With a sigh, I grabbed my book again, figuring that I should try to read for at least one more hour.

 

We stuck to the promise. We started texting, first only every now and then until it gradually became more. We also called from time to time and I realized over and over again how easy it was for me to talk to him. The only possible reason that I could think of why I could talk to him so freely was because we basically didn’t know each other even though that began to change.

We found out that our birthdays were almost at the same time and that we liked similar books even though our music tastes couldn’t have been more different. When I revealed that my eating habit still hadn’t improved too much, he sounded like he was indeed about to come to Seoul just to cook for me and I thought to myself that I wouldn’t even have minded him doing that.

Another thing that I noticed were the many comments that I would have normally labeled ‘flirting’, but I couldn’t tell for sure with Yeongoong. Maybe this was normal for him? Maybe he talked this way with all of his friends? He had also mentioned growing up with sisters and I had overheard my own sister call her friends ‘sweetie’ or ‘honey’ and joking with them in kind of similar manners as well, so maybe Yeongoong had simply taken on that habit from his sisters? Whatever the reason was, I quickly got used to our flirtatious comments that sneaked into the conversation every so often, giving me one more reason to look forward to our phone calls.

I also got closer to Changmin. Our conversations were by far not as deep as those that I had with my call partner, but early into the new school year, I realized that it was nice to chat with him when neither one of us had had to do a lot of work to do.

At some point, I wondered if it would be weird to also mention my call partner in our conversations and that’s when it really hit me for the first time: I didn’t know his name. I couldn’t possibly introduce him to anyone as Yeongoong! But what was I supposed to call him?

We had been talking for more than half a year now, so I could certainly ask him sometime soon, couldn’t I?

Like many others, this question also got postponed with the arrival of finals before our summer break and then a party to celebrate having made it through the semester. It was my first time actually seeking out contact among those people and they seemed to be just as surprised about that fact as I was. Within just a few hours, I found people who seemed to be nice to get along with and we exchanged numbers and for the first time in a year, I felt like I belonged to Seoul, like I wasn’t just a stranger visiting and disappearing again without a trace, but I was as much a part of this town as everyone else.

One week later, I called Yeongoong again and we talked for a while before I remembered my initial question and decided that it was definitely time to bring it up! “By the way, what did you save me as?” I asked into another short silence during which I had been tracing the outline of my book, one that was not related to school for a change.

“I saved you as ‘U Know’,” he answered in a casual tone, but I almost choked on thin air. I had misheard him, right? I could not possibly just have heard him correctly!

“You’re kidding me, right?”

“No, it’s a reminder to myself saying ‘you know who it is’, does that make sense?” He sounded a little embarrassed again and shy, like always when he showed a side of himself that he didn’t seem to be sure I should know about, but this time I couldn’t have cared less.

“My name is Yunho,” I revealed instead of giving a proper answer. I could almost feel his surprise through the stunned silence that followed until he finally reacted.

“No way!”

“That’s also exactly what I thought ten seconds ago.”

We were quiet again, but this time it was a different kind of silence, one still filled by surprise and wonder if this was actually real. Was it possible to create such coincidences? Was it possible for him to find a name for me out of the blue that just so happened to almost be my real name?

“What about you? What did you save me as? I mean, you did save me in your phone, didn’t you?” he eventually asked, sounding nervous but also excited.

“Yes, I did. I saved you as Yeongoong, to be honest,” I answered in embarrassment, not even surprised when I heard him laugh again.

“Nice to know that you honor me this highly!” he replied, the amusement that had momentarily replaced the astonishment only fading from his voice when he added, “But you’re actually not all that far off either—my name is Jaejoong.”

U-Know and Yeongoong. Yunho and Jaejoong. That only left one question: How on earth had this happened???

“Come on, you’re fooling around with me right now, aren’t you?” I asked in disbelief.

“No, not at all.”

I stared at the white wall across from me blankly, trying to catch up with what had just happened. How was this possible? Couldn’t coincidences like this normally only happen when your subconsciousness remembered something, like a déjà-vû? But no, I absolutely couldn’t recall having ever met him before, his voice sounded completely unfamiliar and the things he had told me about himself had also never rung a bell, not to mention that he also hadn’t heard my name before.

Suddenly, he started to laugh. “You know what? Maybe I should tell my close friend about you!”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s good at matching people and telling whether they really fit together or not. I don’t know how he does it, but he somehow has a thing for doing that. So when we meet in real life, I’m sure he’ll be able to tell us more about this! Who knows, maybe he’ll tell us that we’re connected by destiny, reincarnations of ancient lovers,” he joked, but my mind was still stuck on something else.

“When?” I repeated in surprise, a smile slowly spreading on my lips. “I like your way of thinking.”

“You know, I thought about going to Seoul after my graduation. Of course I could also follow my dreams here, but some of my closest friends have gone to Seoul in the beginning of the year, so I figured I might also try it. And, you know… If there’s a chance that we could meet…? I thought that would be pretty cool,” he explained.

I couldn’t help the grin or the fact that I suddenly felt super excited about those vague plans. “Yes, that sounds great! It’ll be awesome to finally get to see you.”

He laughed at that. “I know right?” he agreed. “What will we do, though? Can you show me Seoul? Would it be okay if maybe friends of mine will come along to our meeting?”

“Of course! I’ll probably also bring along friends, if that’s alright for you?”

“Yes, of course!” Jaejoong agreed immediately, and I smiled and leaned back while he began to babble about his friends who sounded absolutely fantastic. It turned out that two of them wouldn’t be able to come along because they had decided to complete their military duty right after high school, but therefore his friend who had written down his phone number would join us, making me laugh inwardly: the one who had brought us together would also be present during the meeting. I liked that thought! I should remember to thank him for having completed his joke. Then again—had he? He had been trying to set Jaejoong up, after all, and that wasn’t really what was going on, was it? No, certainly not, I still hadn’t actually met my wonderful call partner in person, after all.

When we ended the call, I felt a little giddy. The thought that we’d probably get the chance to meet in just a few months was exciting and I caught myself wondering what he would be like. Would he be as nice as he was on the phone? Making jokes? Would he laugh a lot? Would we get along as well in reality as we did on the phone? And what about looks? Would he be my size? Smaller? Bigger maybe?

Or would things be awkward between us? Would we have to realize that we couldn’t get along? What about his friends? Would they accept me? Would my friends accept him? Would things actually work out? What if they wouldn’t?

I decided to postpone all of those serious thoughts until later when there was actually a reason to worry about those things!

 

Two months later, Jaejoong managed to surprise me again in the middle of one of our calls.

“I’ve been talking about you with my sisters,” he started slowly, and I simply hummed. This wasn’t the first time that he told me about his sisters, though it still amazed me that he had eight sisters when even my one sister could sometimes drive me crazy (which of course didn’t change the fact that I loved her more than anything). “When I mentioned that we want to meet up when I come to Seoul next year, she asked me if I actually knew what you looked like.”

It was only when he said it out loud that I realized that despite worrying and thinking about our future meet-up so much, there was one thing that had never actually crossed my mind—the fact that I didn’t know what he looked like would make it nearly impossible for me to know who he was. And the fact that he also didn’t know what I looked like didn’t make things easier. “So… what do you suggest?” I asked after a few seconds of silence.

“Minye-noona suggested that we could do a video chat or maybe several video chats before we actually meet in person,” Jaejoong revealed, and I hummed again, absolutely liking the idea.

“Should I end the call then and we do a video chat instead?” I joked.

“Sure, why not?” he replied without missing a beat, and I briefly glanced around my room—yes, it looked as messy as always, but as long as I stayed on my bed where I sat at the very moment, he probably wouldn’t notice much of it.

“Alright, then let me get my laptop, that will be easier. Do you have Skype?”

“Wait, we’re really going to do this now?” Jaejoong asked in surprise, making me halt in my tracks from where I just started to get up.

“Yes? I mean, you did agree…” I replied slowly, wondering if he had just been teasing me, but when he spoke up again, his voice sounded a bit more confident again.

“True again. Yes, I do have Skype, give me a second,” he finally answered and I let out a deep breath before I pushed myself off the bed, went over to the desk, grabbed my laptop, and got comfortable on the bed again while I let the device start. While I still waited, I could hear Jaejoong talking to someone on the other end of the line, but the voices were too quiet and muffled for me to understand them. “Yunho?” he suddenly asked, catching me off guard.

“Yes?”

“I have to put you aside for a moment,” he informed me.

“Alright,” I replied in lack of anything better to say and then it got quiet again. I could still hear Jaejoong talk as well as a female voice, probably one of his sisters while I watched my laptop come to life. Eventually, I opened Skype and waited for the first window to pop open where I entered my password and then waited for the program to load my account data.

“Yunho?”

I jumped when I suddenly heard Jaejoong’s voice again. “Yes?”

“Good, you’re still on! I just wanted to apologize in advance if the room should appear a bit messy, but I’ll try to adjust the camera so you won’t see it. It’s also not my room, by the way, so…. Yeah…”

“It’s fine,” I replied, smiling softly to myself because of how nervous he suddenly sounded.

Skype finally opened and showed me a moment later that two of my friends from Gwangju were online at that moment as well. Knowing they’d text me sooner or later, I went to their profiles, and typed a quick ‘hello’.

“You’re already typing?” Jaejoong asked suddenly, making me jump lightly.

“Yes, sorry. I just noticed that two of my friends are also online right now, if I didn’t message them now, they’d message me later and might even attempt video chats while you and I are talking.”

“I see, that makes sense,” he replied. “The computer here is almost ready for me to start Skype…” he added after a moment just as a message from one of said friends popped up, asking how I was doing and if I was available.

“That’s fine, I also enjoy your company without an image,” I replied and hurried to type back that I was doing fine but didn’t have time at that moment. “Though I’m also very much looking forward to seeing you,” I added, not wanting him to back out of this Skype call.

“True again. I’m really curious about this, actually,” he revealed, and I hummed, though that wasn’t all I was feeling—the closer we got to the actual video chat, the more nervous I became again. What would he look like? Would it be awkward? What if our expectations of what the other person looked like didn’t fit? We could at least be certain that we were indeed about the same age after all the school work we had done together.

My nervousness only grew when I heard the familiar tune on Jaejoong’s end of the line that revealed that Skype had loaded, followed by the sound of him typing, probably entering his password.

“I’m almost ready,” he informed me and I put on a smile.

“That’s good. It’ll be nice to know what you look like.”

“What do you imagine me to look like?” he asked in a kind-of-secretive-but-also-his-typical-teasing-tone.

That was a tough one! I leaned back against the headboard to think about how I could best answer it. What would sound too weird? What might sound insulting? Then again, I couldn’t think of anything particularly insulting, not with the sound of his voice! “Handsome, I guess. Probably black hair and thin… But I don’t know… those are just guesses. What about you?”

“How can you assume that I’m handsome just because of my voice?”

“I like your voice! Then again, there’s your character…” I mused and didn’t even get to explain it further before Jaejoong protested.

“Yah! What about my character? I’ve helped you so much in the past, how can you talk bad about my character!?”

“Who says that I wasn’t about to call you ‘super handsome’ because of your character?”

He only huffed in response, though. “Yeah, sure,” he commented in a sulky voice before brightening up a little. “Skype is finally ready,” he announced and I straightened a bit again, telling myself that there was nothing to be nervous about—we had already talked on the phone so many times, seeing each other would only be a tiny step now. We still didn’t meet in person, after all, so there was nothing wrong with what we were doing. What was the worst that could happen? That one of us didn’t look the way the other had imagined and things could become awkward because of that. That was it. So we were fine.

“What’s your Skype ID?” Jaejoong interrupted my thoughts, and I passed it on to him, grateful that my dad had made sure that I wouldn’t choose an embarrassing ID when I had moved out.

A moment later, a new Skype account popped up on my laptop, asking to be friends with me. I couldn’t help but grin at the words he had chosen:

U-Know who it is ;) Your Hero

“Haha,” I commented dryly. But I added him as a friend, quickly typing back.

U-Know I’d always recognize my Hero ;P

“Good to know,” he replied via phone while I took a moment to inspect his profile picture. There was a big family on it, as it seemed, and he was the only boy—maybe. The image was too small to make out any details, but he nevertheless indeed seemed to look handsome, though also quite thin.

“Is that you on your profile picture?” he asked as if he had read my mind and I thought about it for a moment before I remembered which picture I had chosen—it was from my friend’s birthday party that summer and the image showed me and two of my friends.

“Which guy do you mean?” I asked back.

“I’d been hoping you’d tell me,” he replied while I clicked on my own profile picture so I could view it a little bigger than before.

“You have a thirty percent chance, go ahead,” I challenged him, and he grumbled softly before silence returned while he probably inspected the picture.

“I don’t know… Are you maybe the one in the middle?”

“Nope, try again,” I replied and looked at the mentioned teenager. The me on the picture had one arm draped over that friend’s shoulders while raising the glass I had been holding in my other hand in a quiet toast. It almost surprised me that Jaejoong hadn’t picked me out right away!

“Then… The guy on the left maybe?” he made his second guess after a few moments.

“Yup, that’s me.” I waited in silence for his reaction, wondering what it would be. The silence dragged on, and I felt my nervousness grow at the utter lack of reaction. Was I not what he had imagined? He didn’t think I was bad-looking, did he? Or that I had some kind of alcohol in that glass? The photo did kind of suggest that, but I was certain that the glass had held either coke or some kind of juice, I had had both that night.

“Yunho?” he suddenly asked, sounding like he had talked to his sister again in the meantime, though this time I hadn’t picked up any sounds from his end.

“Yes?”

“Good, you’re still there. Should we start the video chat?”

“No comment on the picture?” I , unable to not question it—that long silence had to mean something, didn’t it?

Another short silence followed and this time it made me wonder if I should have asked him about it. Or should I maybe have shut up about this? Had I asked for too much? Was he just trying to be polite and not offend me?

“I’m sure you have a lot of girls who are crazy about you,” he answered in the end, still sounding like he was trying to avoid his real answer.

“Not really, I think,” I admitted.

“Then maybe you just don’t notice it. I’m sure there are a lot of girls who have a lot of interest in you and would like to get to know you better and even date you,” Jaejoong added and then cleared his throat, sounding a little embarrassed when he switched the topic. “What about the video chat now?”

“Right. I’ll end the call and then call you again via Skype, alright?”

“Alright,” he agreed and I smiled, doing just what I had said. I took a bit of time to adjust the camera and just when I thought that I had found the right angle, the free signal stopped and the screen slowly came to life. A moment later, I saw a boy who was about my age in front of me on the screen. His hair was kind of long-ish, reaching almost down to his shoulders, and the sleeves of his shirt had been pulled forward so much that they even covered his hands. Despite the bad video quality, I could tell that he was really thin and his features appeared to be sharp. He reached up briefly to adjust the camera as well, then he lowered his hand again far enough to wave at me. “Hey,” he said softly, his voice almost getting swallowed.

“Hey,” I replied and waved back lightly, making him laugh awkwardly and hide his face behind his covered hands before he peeked at the screen again.

“I can’t believe we’re doing this,” Jaejoong said as he lowered his hands slowly. “I mean, you’re just a stranger all the way in Seoul…”

“Well, we’re working on making each other less of a stranger, aren’t we?”

“Yes,” he agreed softly and laughed again. For a moment, he got distracted by something else in the room, then he nodded and it sounded like he bid someone goodbye. A moment later, his attention returned to me. “My sister just left the room so I can have some privacy while Skyping with you.”

“She was with you all this time?” I asked in surprise, and Jaejoong nodded softly.

“Yes. She helped me get everything set up and quickly clean the room… and, well…she might have been a bit worried about you?”

“That’s understandable,” I admitted even though I kind of didn’t want to—like he had said, we were nevertheless just strangers who lived across the entire country and had never met in person. The fact that we had met at all was pure coincidence and too much stress! “I hope she didn’t get a bad picture of me then?”

“No, not at all,” Jaejoong replied quickly and waved his hand in denial. “She just wanted to make sure that you’re really who you claim to be and not… Who knows… You might have still been someone trying to…”

I shook my head lightly at his explanations, at the clear hint that I could have still been some ert because—yes, he was right, of course he was, but at the same time… “I would have needed to be very desperate then.”

“Mind you, you were very desperate when you first called.”

“Touché,” I replied and laughed at that, leaning back a bit and adjusting my laptop. “But I’m not some creepy old man, and I’m also not here on the mission of a desperate, creepy old man, so I guess you’re fine.”

“That sounds good.”

“How did your family react when you told them about me, by the way? You only mentioned so far that they know about me now…”

Jaejoong sat a bit straighter at that and fidgeted, probably feeling uncomfortable. “My dad and my mom gave me a lecture—again, mind you—about how I shouldn’t have let my friend write my number on that bus and then about how I shouldn’t have answered the call. Once they were done with that, my mom asked for more details about you and it seems like by now she’s pretty much fine with you. It did help that I could tell them that you’re still in Seoul and that I never mentioned where I live. My sisters were more relaxed, though they were also worried about all of this. What about your uncle?”

“So far, I just told him that you’re one of my friends from Gwangju, to be honest… But—”

“Wait, wait, wait, what did you say? You’re actually from Gwangju?” Jaejoong interrupted me and stared at me with wide eyes.

“Yes…? Did I never tell you about this?”

“No, you didn’t. Oh my god… At least I only find out now… If I had told my parents this right when I first told them about you….”

I shook my head lightly. “Jaejoong, there’s nothing to worry about. I usually spend a few weeks during my breaks in Gwangju and during that time I’m generally quite busy catching up with my friends and meeting all of them, I don’t think I’d even have time to search for you.”

“Still,” he argued, throwing me an accusing glare. “You should have told me that you grew up in Gwangju.”

“I didn’t think it would matter. I mean, I do live in Seoul by now and I don’t plan on moving back,” I argued.

“But now it at least makes sense why you didn’t really speak the Seoul dialect when we first talked…” he mused and then shook his head after a few more seconds. “Anyway, let’s talk about something nicer! Where are you right now? Is that your room?”

“Yes, I’m sitting on my bed at the moment,” I replied and sat up a little straighter. “Do you want me to give you a small tour?”

“You actually have a laptop?” he asked, and his eyes once again became a little bigger.

“Yes. My parents gave it to me when I moved out so we could stay in contact. It was pretty much a birthday present from my entire family combined at that point,” I explained, and he nodded in understanding, though he still seemed to be amazed at this new information about me.

“So your family has been really well off if they could still afford to buy you a laptop after the financial crisis hit South Korea,” he concluded and I nodded, not sure if he even wanted any further information. After a couple of seconds, he shook his head once again. “You used to live a life very different from mine, you know?”

“Tell me about it. All I know so far is that you have a lot of sisters and that you have to work aside from just going to school.”

He nodded in response and sighed softly. “I’ve never led a prosperous life, I guess, though I honestly can’t complain. I have the most loving family I could ask for, though it’s true that a little more money wouldn’t always be bad. But we always manage to get by somehow. With three of my sisters currently enrolled in university and four working because they’ve graduated from university, I think my parents are glad that I decided to go straight to work instead of going to university as well, though they always assure me that I can also go to university if I want to. We mean the world to them, you know?”

“So you’re the youngest one?”

“Yes, exactly. Now what about you? What’s your background? So far I’ve only learned that you grew up in Gwangju and have a younger sister and apparently an uncle that you currently live with.”

I nodded and thought a bit about what else I could tell him. “Back in Gwangju, I always enjoyed the privilege I had, though I don’t think I ever really understood it until I moved to Seoul and was just anyone and then even just someone who had to work and never had time or energy for anything else. I have a lot of friends in Gwangju with whom I’m still in contact, though I’m also beginning to really make friends here now. Because of my busy schedule, I don’t manage to really see my friends and family in Gwangju a lot, but I always try to visit them during summer and winter breaks.”

“Do you miss them?”

“Yes, definitely.”

Jaejoong smiled warmly at me. “I know that I’ll also miss everyone here when I’ll move to Seoul. But at least I’ll have my friends close to me, that’ll certainly help me.”

“I also think that’ll be good.”

“You’ll help me find my way around Seoul, won’t you?”

I laughed at that. “Of course I will! I hope I’ll be any help at all.”

“Well, you still have a few months to get prepared now,” he replied with a grin.

“Alright, then I hope you won’t mind if I leave first now, it seems like I have a city to explore,” I said and acted like I was about to get up when Jaejoong laughed, quickly shaking his hands in denial.

“No, no, no, that’s not how I meant it!”

I leaned back again and pulled the laptop into place. “But in all honesty, I haven’t done a lot of exploring so far. I just either never had the time to do that or I was in Gwangju.”

“Then we can also explore the city together, if you’d like.”

“That’s not how ‘showing you the city’ works,” I pointed out, but he simply shrugged.

“I don’t mind, to be honest. We can do whatever works best. Exploring together also sounds fun to me.”

“Alright, then let’s—”

I interrupted myself when I suddenly heard something else through the speakers from my laptop and Jaejoong also turned around.

“—project due tomorrow and I still have to do research for that…”

“Of course,” Jaejoong replied right away and turned to the screen again. “Hey Yunho, it seems like I actually have to leave first today. One of my sisters has to use the computer now.”

I nodded and sat a bit straighter as well. “Got it. I’ll talk to you soon then.”

“Definitely. It was nice to see you today,” he added, sounding a bit shyer than before.

“It was nice seeing you, too. Let’s do this again soon!”

“Absolutely,” he agreed and nodded excitedly, then he leaned forward a bit. “Bye Yunho~” he said with a small wave.

“Bye,” I replied and watched as the screen went back to our chatroom a moment later.

Jaejoong was an absolute cutie, I decided while I watched the green dot next to Jaejoong’s profile picture turn to a white one, signaling that he had logged off right away. When I looked at the sidebar, I realized that I had gotten new messages from both Hojong and Yubin, and I was surprised that I hadn’t heard before that they had texted me via Skype. Then again, I had been focused on Jaejoong, so I definitely had an excuse, didn’t I? He had been so adorable during this Skype chat and it had been fantastic to finally see his reactions, see his cute embarrassment as well as his confidence! It was funny to see him turn shy whenever he talked about something personal, while he seemed to be a lot sassier and bolder when we were talking about me or about things like work or school.

I smiled to myself while I replied to Yubin and Hojong before I logged off, deciding to do a bit of studying before the workload would become too much again, but this time I found my thoughts drifting off to a certain boy across the country over and over again. Was he also thinking about me?

 

From that point onwards, we Skyped multiple times. It also turned out to be much easier to explain certain school-related problems like this! I quickly got used to having him just a call away and as the semester was nearing its end, I found myself looking forward to the next year. We would finally meet in person! What would it be like to actually stand in front of each other? To actually see each other? At least we wouldn’t have to worry about not recognizing each other, but what about his friends? And whom should I take to our meeting?

The last question was the easiest to answer because I quickly settled on bringing Changmin—he knew the most about Jaejoong, and Jaejoong knew the most about Changmin, plus I was closer to Changmin than to anyone else from my class. But that decision alone didn’t help me with all the rest.

Time passed both agonizingly slow and way too fast for my liking. I got acceptance letters from two of the universities I had applied to and spent almost three days trying to figure out which one to go to. I ranted about this towards Changmin and Jaejoong, getting both of them to help me with my decision. Jaejoong called me excitedly one day to tell me that he had also gotten the job he had wanted. It would only be a small bakery, but one that had promised to teach him everything he’d have to know to either get a top position within the bakery or even open his own bakery just like Jaejoong said he wanted to.

We congratulated each other on graduation day, and I went back to Gwangju for Christmas to spend some time with my family and celebrate with them and my friends—my achievements as well as theirs. Three others would follow me to Seoul, and I immediately got excited about having them around again in the near future. But during my entire stay I couldn’t help but wonder how close I was to Jaejoong. He had mentioned that he lived somewhere in the South, but where? How close was I to him?

I returned to Seoul shortly before the international New Year’s because I had to work. In the first week of January, I barely heard from Jaejoong for three days because he was moving to Seoul as well and through a friend he had managed to get an apartment right away, but that meant that he had to take care of new furniture and everything else that belonged to it, but on the evening of the third day, he finally texted me the words that I had been dying to read—the question if we could meet up the next day. We agreed to meet at a subway station downtown from where I would show them everything and when I texted Changmin the details, he first complained about the short notice before agreeing anyway, his curiosity probably getting the better of him.

And finally, that day arrived. I spent twenty minutes in front of my wardrobe, a very comical amount of time considering that we had already seen each other via Skype and we could merely be considered friends, if at all! After all, we had never met in real life! But because of that, it was okay for me to take a long time getting ready, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it understandable that I wanted to leave a good impression in front of him and his friends when I’d finally meet him (or rather: them) in real life?

In the end, I simply went for black jeans and a black and red striped shirt, figuring that since it was winter and we would spend a lot of time outside, it was better to dress warm. I pondered on styling my hair but then decided against it at the thought that I would either wear my jacket’s hood or the self-crocheted beanie that my grandmother gave me for Christmas.

Trying not to end up too late, I hurried to get done for real and left my uncle’s apartment ten minutes later.

I arrived five minutes early at the subway station where we’d agreed to get together, but when I went upstairs to the small bakery stand in front of which we wanted to meet, I saw that Changmin had somehow still arrived before me.

“Hey,” I greeted him as I approached and then stood next to him.

“Hey,” he greeted me back and then looked up. “Nice beanie,” he commented with a grin, but his tone was sincere.

“Thanks,” I replied and briefly scanned the area, but all I could see were figures who were huddled up in their winter coats, trying to protect themselves against the cold. “Can’t believe that I’m about to start university.”

“Me neither. I mean, who’s gonna sit with me during lunch without saying anything?” Changmin teased me right away.

“Yah! We did start talking eventually.”

 “M-hm. Took you long enough to get there,” he remarked, but I rolled my eyes.

“You know I was stressed.”

“Even a blind fool would have noticed that.”

“Thanks,” I commented dryly and checked the area again before checking my phone as well, but I hadn’t gotten any new text messages, so I put my phone back into the pocket of my jacket.

“Nervous?”

“Definitely! This is very different from having talked to him over the phone and everything…”

“I understand. You know how surprised I was when I found out you could speak?”

“Idiot,” I commented with a smile, grateful that he tried to distract me a bit from meeting Jaejoong and whoever would come along with him.

“But for real now, I understand why you’d be nervous,” Changmin replied and glanced around as well as if that could help him figure out whether the others were arriving or not. “Do you think they’re running late?”

“They might. From what Jaejoong told me, he’s never lived in the city before, so he might not be used to how long it can take to get from one place to another. Even I was still surprised when I realized that some ways take longer than expected,” I revealed and Changmin nodded.

“That’s probably it then. Plus, you said that there’s a small group arriving, didn’t you?”

“The last I heard is that they’re four people—two of the others turned out to be busy and the other two entered the military service in the beginning of the year.”

Changmin nodded again and I looked around for the third time, still without success. I glanced at the big clock on the wall where the escalators to the platforms were and noticed that Jaejoong still had another minute anyway, so I tried to relax as I turned back to Changmin. “What did you do during Christmas?”

“Not much, mainly a lot of reading and listening to music. What about you?”

“I visited my family and spent some time with my friends.”

“How is Typhoon doing?”

“Good! He was probably the happiest that I had returned home for the holidays!”

Changmin laughed at that. “Oh come on, I’m certain that your family was also glad to see you again!”

“Of course they were,” I replied and looked around once more, still without any results. “But Typhoon is Typhoon, you know?”

“And dogs always get more excited to see you than humans can, I know,” Changmin finished my usual argument with a grin. “I should definitely also get a dog someday. But only when I have time to take care of a dog…”

“So you’ll do it when you retire?”

“Oh I do hope that I’ll find time for that sooner! By the way, I think your friends are arriving,” he mentioned casually, nevertheless making me spin around to indeed find four people who seemed to be about our age approach us. A moment later, I recognized the features of the one in the middle and my lips curved up into a smile.

Jaejoong came to a stand with the other three shortly afterwards and bowed lightly. “Hello, it’s nice to meet you,” he said shyly, and Changmin and I bowed back.

“Hello, it’s nice to finally see you in person,” I replied and sported a bright smile towards him. “This is Changmin,” I introduced my friend from high school, and Jaejoong glanced over at him, smiling lightly.

“Hi, I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“Only good things, I hope?” Changmin asked, immediately sounding worried, but Jaejoong nodded right away.

“Yes, of course! These here are Heechul-hyung and Jungsu-hyung, two of my friends from school even though they’re three years older, and this one here is Yoochun, the one who wrote my phone number on the bus seat,” he introduced his companions and when I greeted them again separately, I noticed the guy who had been called Heechul raise his gaze to meet mine, his expression showing surprise at first and then happiness. “Just for your information, Heechul-hyung is the one who’s so good at figuring out whether two people belong together or not.”

“Yup, that’s me~” Heechul replied with a bright grin.

“That’s good to know,” I replied with a polite smile and then motioned towards the exit. “Should we get going?”

The others nodded immediately. “Yes, let’s get going!” they agreed and we exited the station together.

Changmin and I took the lead through the city, pointing out beautiful spots we had discovered and even going to some sights that Changmin and I had talked about before, a conversation where Changmin had ended up staring at me blankly (probably deciding whether to be kind to me or just lose it) because I hadn’t seen the majority of sights in Seoul. Jaejoong and Yoochun had already seen some of them because of the school trip they had taken to Seoul, but other than that Changmin and I also gave the other four a more personal view on this city. Somehow, I found myself by Jaejoon'g sside throughout almost our entire small tour.

When it got late and all of us were freezing despite the thick clothing, we found a small café. Once we managed to get a table for the six of us, we sat down together and took a look at the menu.

“Too bad this is not Ryeowook’s Café,” Heechul mused, pity tinting his voice.

I looked up in time to find Jaejoong roll his eyes. “Hyung lives in a small village not too far from here and went out to that one café on his first day of moving there and immediately fell in love. I don’t think he’s already visited a different café than that one,” he explained.

“Why would I? Their apple cakes are literally the best ones on earth!” Heechul immediately defended himself, making the rest of us laugh.

“He’s right, though,” Jungsu helped him out. “Their cakes are pretty good. Though, unlike a certain someone, I’m still trying to taste their entire menu before I pick a favorite.”

Heechul shrugged the playful criticism off and looked at me instead. “Do you have any favorites here?”

I shook my head and turned to Changmin who had suggested coming here. “Their chocolate cake is superb. I’ve never tasted anything that tops it. But all of their cakes are really good.”

We nodded and looked back into the menu until a waitress approached our table to take the order. “I’d like to have your caramel fudge cake, please,” Heechul started off shamelessly.

“For me the apple cake, please,” Jungsu continued with an amused smile towards his friend.

“I’d like the vanilla dream, please,” Yoochun ordered.

“For me, it’s the chocolate cake~” Changmin added happily when the waitress turned to him.

“The same for me, please,” I replied, trusting Changmin’s judgement. Plus, chocolate cake on a cold day like this one sounded like the best idea.

“Can I please get your strawberry cake?” Jaejoong asked and when the waitress nodded, he smiled at her, a cute and kind of shy smile. The young woman collected the menus and left, so I turned to Jaejoong instead.

“How do you like Seoul so far?”

“It seems really nice! But I also have good company,” he replied, sounding sincere and still shy.

“That’s great! It’s good to finally get a tour through this city,” I answered and turned to Changmin with a grin, but he simply rolled his eyes.

“If you weren’t so busy and had asked, I could have given you a tour around Seoul a long time ago,” he argued and leaned back, so I turned to Jaejoong again.

“When will you start working?”

“Next week, actually. I managed to get this week off to get situated first, but I also planned to stop by the bakery this week to check it out before my first workday.”

“That sounds cool! University also starts next week. I really hope we’ll still find time to meet up afterwards…”

Jaejoong nodded. “Yes, me too. But I think both of us will be incredibly busy.”

“Where there’s a will there’s a way,” Heechul threw in from across the table, making both of us look up. He was smiling in a kind of secretive way that made me raise an eyebrow, but especially Jungsu and Jaejoong seemed to be a lot more used to this.

“That sounds a lot like you found new people whose luck you’re trying to push,” Jungsu commented, and Heechul looked at him with a surprised expression that seemed a bit fake to me.

“It does?” he asked and his tone made very obvious that his surprise was indeed merely artificial.

Jungsu rolled his eyes, but it was Jaejoong who spoke up. “No, don’t tell me that I am your new target,” he said slowly, catching an amused glance from Heechul. “No way! Hyung, please do me a favor and don’t say anything.”

“You should know me better than that!” Heechul protested immediately and the offended tone of his voice sounded sincere unlike his former ‘surprise’. “I’ll only push your luck a little, I’d be a fool to just tell people that they’re a match! You guys do have to work a little for your happiness.”

“Why only us? What about you?” Yoochun argued, but Heechul shook his head with a small smile.

“Isn’t that obvious?” the latter replied and widened his eyes as if the answer should indeed be obvious.

“You’re the Kim Heechul and thus love will come to you naturally, we get it, we get it,” Jaejoong replied in a tone that clearly stated that this wasn’t the first time that they had this conversation. “Remind me again why I thought bringing you was a good idea?” he added with a pout that just added to the adorable image I had gotten of him.

“I helped you move in, meeting your mystery caller should be the least I get as a reward,” Heechul replied immediately.

“He’s not entirely wrong, you know?” Changmin chimed in, leaning forward again.

“See? Even someone who’s only just met me can’t resist my glory,” Heechul argued, but when I glanced over at Changmin, he grimaced.

“That’s not the part I was agreeing to.”

Across from me, Jungsu and Yoochun started to laugh while Jaejoong next to me merely grinned. “Seems like you still have some work to do here until you earn his respect.”

Heechul huffed. “We’ll get there,” he promised and turned away just as the waitress arrived back at our table. “Cake!” he cheered, his grumpy mood seeming gone with the wind as the small plates were set down one by one.

I shook my head lightly at the sudden mood change but smiled as well while I watched what the waitress was doing. Each piece of cake looked really delicious and I silently thanked Changmin for taking us to this place. The strawberry cake that found its way to Jaejoong looked incredibly artistic just like the caramel cake that was put down in front of Heechul while the pieces of chocolate cake that were handed to Changmin and me looked perfectly fluffy with some cream filling. When I looked up, I found out that Yoochun’s cake looked nearly identical to mine and only Jungsu’s cake really differed from the others.

“Jae, do you want to try all of them?” Heechul asked before popping his first forkful of cake into his mouth.

Jaejoong looked up and blushed, looking around for a moment. “I’m not sure… Maybe at least the caramel cake?” he asked but glanced towards my plate.

“Do you also want to try the chocolate cake?” I offered and he looked away again, seeming embarrassed that I had caught him staring.

“If you don’t mind?” he asked while Heechul pushed his plate closer to him.

“He does that all the time,” Jungsu explained. “He wants to taste the cakes in hopes to be able to improve his own baking. Sometimes, there’s a certain edge to a taste that surprises him and if he likes it, he’ll write it down in his recipe books.”

Jaejoong used the time to get a piece of the caramel cake and eat it, looking down while he merely nodded lightly, his gaze fixed to his cake as if he was trying to analyze it just like that.

“Sure, you can definitely try some of this,” I said and pushed my plate a bit closer to him as well, earning a surprised look followed by a thankful smile. In that moment, the artificial but warm light from the lamp above us had just the perfect angle to highlight his evenly dark brown eyes.

He quickly looked away again and I caught myself before the situation could get weird, looking down as well to watch as he took a piece of the chocolate cake and I realized that it had almost the same color as Jaejoong’s eyes.

“If you like it, keep on pestering Yunho-hyung about it, okay? I like my cake too much to share,” Changmin spoke up and when I glanced back up, I found him scooting further away from me as if he tried to bring his cake into safety.

Jaejoong laughed softly. “Don’t worry, I won’t take more than this, I still have my own piece, after all! But you’re right, the cake is very good,” he agreed and Changmin visibly relaxed.

“I know, right? I always order this one when I come here,” he replied, and an excited Heechul gave him a thumbs-up.

“Thank you! Finally, someone understands that it’s absolutely not boring to just order the same thing each and every time!”

“Why should I switch from something that I know is extremely good?”

“Exactly!” Heechul agreed. A moment later, he and Changmin were involved in a conversation about their favorites, ranging from cake to ice cream flavors to movies…

I glanced back at Jaejoong to find him watching his friend in amusement while slowly eating a piece of his own cake and I couldn’t help but smile as well. The thought suddenly hit me that we had really just met, that I was indeed sitting next to the one whom I had called nearly one and a half years earlier when I had been at an extremely low point and happiness started to fill me at how far a simple phone call to an unknown number had brought me.

Jaejoong glanced over at me, but he was still smiling, not even seeming to mind that he had just caught me staring at him. I flashed him a smile in return and finally decided to focus on my chocolate cake. I carefully tried the first piece and found myself on cloud nine a moment later, realizing that Changmin had indeed not lied when he had called the taste “superb.”

In blissful silence, I listened to Heechul’s and Changmin’s conversation, enjoying the moment and the feeling that I had just made new friends that day.

 

 

Nearly thirteen years have passed since that day.

I look to my side where Jaejoong sits on our sofa, the popcorn that he specifically requested for earlier when we picked a movie long forgotten, the majority still left in the bowl.

Time proved us right—we’re both incredibly busy. Jaejoong managed to open his own bakery a little more than eight years ago while I went over to teaching dance classes until I was able to open my own gym after I had studied business administration, helping Jaejoong with all the paperwork he had to take care of. It was towards the end of my studies that we moved together and to this day, I believe that it was one of the best decisions of my life because I am able to see Jaejoong even on our busiest days. He is the love of my life. My soulmate, to say it in Heechul’s words from earlier when he told us about the golden threads that he says connect soulmates.

Jaejoong must have noticed my watching him because he blinks and suddenly turns to face me, smiling when our eyes meet. “What are you thinking about?”

“The fact that you wanted to have popcorn and now you’re not even eating it,” I reply with a grin. He rolls his eyes, taking a few pieces just to throw them at me. It makes me laugh. “And about how we met. Now it makes sense why I called you in the middle of the night and you picked up. I mean, I’m your soulmate, you had to pick up!”

“I feel like we would have also met if you hadn’t called in the middle of the night.”

“Yes, but then it would have taken so much longer!” I whine, successfully making him laugh as well.

“True again. Relying on Junsu and Hyukjae to introduce us would have taken forever,” he replies. Junsu is one of my friends whom I got to know in university, where we pulled each other through until we both graduated. Hyukjae is one of Jaejoong’s friends who happened to meet Junsu at a dance class they both participated in, but it took nearly a year when we all met at Ryeowook’s Café (Heechul’s suggestion, of course) until we found out that Junsu and Hyukjae had long since become friends.

“Plus, you wouldn’t have become my hero,” I counter, but he only smirks at me.

“Remember who kept you sane and cooked for you while you were enrolled in university and tell me again that I wouldn’t have become your hero,” he deadpans. I laugh, leaning in to kiss him because of course he’s right!

“I wouldn’t want it any other way,” I mumble against his lips before I deepened the kiss, feeling him smile before he fully gives in to the kiss, pulling me closer to him.

Maybe he answered the call back then because we are soulmates, maybe because he was indeed just too tired from studying. Truth be told, I couldn’t care less about the exact reasons for our first encounter. All that really matters now is that he’s here with me and we’re both living our dreams.

“I love you,” he whispers into the kiss and the words still make warmth flow through me from all the feelings I have for him and knowing that he feels the same way.

 “I love you too,” I whisper back and connect our lips again.

 

 

 

__________________________________________________________________________

Hey guys~

This is the YunJae sequel that I promised to my dear "The Golden Thread" readers~ I hope you all enjoyed it? Of course it's not mandatory to know what happens in TGT, if anything it would only give you a deeper understanding of the very last part.

Thank you for reading this oneshot~ Please let me know what you think about it ^-^

Also, big shoutout to my wonderful beta-reader Mira! In case you don't know her stories, please check her out, she's an amazing author and I am so honored that she agreed to beta this story!

I love you all <3

Happy New Year~