Your apartment in South Korea didn’t have any ceiling fans.

You pressed your lips contemplatively together as you stared up at the spot that should have held a ceiling fan. You stared at it blankly as if the more you looked the more likely it were to show up. It was… hot, much too hot for you to really be comfortable while sitting on the fluffy covers that lay rested over your bed. You could open a window but… That would require movement.

You rested your head against the wall behind you, watching as the YouTube video on your phone you had previously been trying to pay attention to zoomed in on one of the characters hands.

The hand wasn’t moving. You found that odd. The image lay fixed on that perfectly still hand for seconds as the time clicked by. At first, you waited patiently for something, anything to happen on screen. You were surprised when nothing did to the point that you even tapped the screen to make sure that the video hadn’t frozen.

It hadn’t.

You stared contemplatively at the hand, you waited expectantly for it to twitch, wondering if that much time really was passing or if maybe you were just so zoned out that it seemed that way only in your own mind.

You turned your eyes and rested your own hand similarly on the bed, suddenly feeling the urge to mirror what you were seeing. You tried to make your own fingers twitch. You flexed them contemplatively, once, twice. No… No that was no good. It looked much too unnatural. If you were the person in the video there would surely be comment after comment about how fake your finger movement had been. You raised your hand to inspect your own fingers more closely. Maybe your issue lied in your fingers themselves?

You set your hands back down after only a moment. Your hands were shaking too hard for you to really determine anything.

You sighed and retracted your eyes from your shaking hand to the hand on the screen. It was still so motionless. It hadn’t twitched, and it wasn’t shaking, and you couldn’t help but wonder how that could be. How could someone keep so still? Keep so calm?

Suddenly on the screen, another hand joined the first one. It intertwined with the original. You retracted your own hand from its previous state and turned the video off.

Ha, of course, that had been it.

You thought the silence would be better than what you had before. At least without the video playing in the background, you weren’t left craving a personal intimacy you could never expect any of your friends to return. But the silence… It was deafening.

You remained frozen for a moment, just staring across the room at the other wall. There was nothing on it. You had just moved into this room after all, and you still had to put up the extent of your wall decor.

You considered doing it right then, but when you shifted to hold a tentative hand in the air, you decided against it.

Shaking hands would make it difficult to put up posters.

“Are you really still in bed? Come on, the day is young! I won’t let you waste it all in bed!”

Your bedroom door burst open and one of your roommates, Julia, burst into the room. She was shorter than you were, Filipino, and one of the sweetest people that you knew. She just… could sometimes be a little assertive.

“We’re in Korea for a year, at least. Why do I need to rush around on our first day here?” You responded wearily. You had initially been really excited for your first day in Korea. There were so many places you wanted to go and so many things you wanted to see, and honestly, a year didn’t feel like long enough to do it all.

You couldn’t help that when you woke up that morning any wish to do anything had just… Vanished. You could barely give yourself a good reason to get dressed. Much less go outside.

“Every day you don’t go out is a day that you miss the chance to see him.”

You wrinkled your nose and turned your eyes down to your friend. She had a stupid grin on her face, surely knowing that her words had been just the right ones to say in order to get under your skin.

“You know the likelihood that we will see them this year? Just because we are in Korea-”

“And going past their entertainment company every single day this year-”

“Doesn’t mean that we will see them!” You protested. “Much less even get the opportunity to talk to them.”

“And fall in love.”

Your other roommate, Caitlin, walked in at that.

“Oh, are we talking about Lee Jihoon?”

You threw a pillow at her.

“You guys both better shut up or I really won’t go out today,” you stated stubbornly. Caitlin threw the pillow right back.

“Hey, we all have our idol goals to meet, so let’s get moving.”

Both girls began to exit your room, you watched them leave knowing now was the time for you to get up and get dressed and get out of this hot apartment..

“We came to Korea for an education, not to stalk hard working people, you know!” You called after them.

You still couldn’t find it. The urge to move, that drive to do something with your life. God, you didn’t know where it had gone. All you did know was that for the moment you didn’t have it. For the moment you would give anything to be able to stay on your own. Keep away from your friends for some time.

They weren’t having any of it.

“Shut up and get dressed!” Julia ordered back.

You glanced down at the packed suitcase on the floor of your room and reluctantly began to crawl out of your bed.

-

Korea was a beautiful country. Seoul was a beautiful city.

It was hard for you to believe that had it not been for your introduction into the world of kpop you may not have ever been able to come here and see this place. You had always liked the idea of traveling but as a kid, you had never set any Asian country other than China in your sights.

Luckily, you had found your way into the vast world of kpop and idols, and that drive led to you to form a fascination for the language, the culture, the people, and of course the idols.

Your friends all joked a lot about stalking idols but in reality, none of them had any intention to do so. You were all fans of Kpop, and you were learning Korean partly because of that, but you weren’t as insanely obsessive as some fans and you weren’t going to waste your time in another country chasing after people who in reality didn’t actually care much for you at all.

You were here to make real friends, who weren’t just nice to you because you spent 200 dollars buying their albums just for a photocard of them, that you didn’t even end up getting.

Of course, making friends in Korea was going to be hard. Your Korean was pretty good, but it wasn’t perfect, and you weren’t as socially inclined as some people believed. Plus you were terrified of coming off to anyone as just another koreaboo. Back at home you just generally avoided talking about kpop around people that might know what it was and judge you for liking it. Here, there wasn’t really any avoiding that. You could see it in the eyes of pretty much all of the locals. They knew what had inevitably brought you here.

You sighed and shoved your hands in your pocket, murmuring an apology under your breath as you stepped out of the way of another person.

You wished that you could improve your mood.

Normally, you would be thrilled to be here in this situation. You should be giggling with Caitlin and Julia as you silently pulled a Seoho and Keonhee and danced to Heart Shaker while you shopped for food, but instead all you wanted to do was go home and lay in your bed, and do legitimately nothing for the rest of your life.

You couldn’t do that though. That was unfair to all that you had done to get here and unfair to your friends who had been excited to come here after all the planning you guys had done. So, instead of moping in your own, completely unreasonable state of depression, you forced a smile onto your lips.

“I think I’m going to run to the bathroom, okay?” You murmured to your friends. They nodded, both consumed in excitement at the food they had just found at the street vendor they were passing. As you walked away to find the bathroom you considered eating. You hadn’t eaten too much today, and you knew that you should eat but you weren’t hungry either way. You considered possibly stress eating, but there wasn’t really any reason to be stressed out at the moment.

You almost bumped into a tall guy, and your face burned red.

Okay, there wasn’t any reasonable reason for you to be stressed right now. All of these people that spoke a different language then you was a reason for you to stress out in your mind all on its own.

But you weren’t going to do that. You weren’t going to give in to your anxiety and ruin your first day in Korea.

Once you were out of the bathroom, you spotted your friends pretty quickly. They were talking to someone that you had never seen before. He was in all black, with colorful Nike shoes. You joined the group, making your friends jump excitedly.

“Hey! Meet Jongin! He was born in Seoul but- and this is insane he visits our city all the time!”

You forced a smile onto your lips and dipped your head towards him politely in greeting.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” you said to him.

You didn’t hear what he said next in favor of watching the passing crowd. You caught sight of a passing couple, their fingers tightly entwined as they made their way together through the crowd. She was smiling pretty brightly, using her free hand to brush her long dark hair out of her face. He was just watching her, this loving expression riddled over his facial expressions. You paused to look down at your own hand again. You spread your fingers and then clenched your hand into a fist.

You then sighed and dropped your hands back to your side. When you looked up, you noticed Jongin was looking at you. You smiled, partially as an apology, partially in shame at having been caught doing something so embarrassing.

“Are you okay?” Jeongin asked. You frowned and tilted your head to the side as if the idea of being unwell at all was ridiculous. Your friends noticed this and laughed.

“She’s probably just thinking of her boyfriend,” Caitlin said teasingly. You smacked her shoulder.

“Shut up,” you grumbled. That response made Jeongin scrunch his facial features together.

“Boyfriend?”

“Lee Jihoon,” Caitlin cooed. You hit her again.

“Shut up! I don’t even like him!” You protested in English. Caitlin took off, laughing as she rushed around the sidewalk. You chased her, you both probably looking like children as you playfully called after each other in English. A few of the people on the sidewalk gave you both side glances as you brushed past them.

“You like Lee Jihoon, you like Lee Jihoon, you like Lee Jihoon.”

“Caitlin Elizabeth Bordallo, don’t make me hurt-”

Just as you were saying that someone stepped in front of you. You slid to a stop, barely keeping from bumping into the stranger. You didn’t even look at the person, you just dropped your head into a deep bow and blurted an apology in Korean. You were going to just wait for a response and then move on as quickly as possible, but the response that you received, wasn’t what you expected.

“You’re a lot more aware then I assumed, I thought you would run into him.”

The first thing that made this sentence odd was that it was in English. Not to say that Koreans can’t speak in English, it was just really well spoken and not expected. The second thing that surprised you about it was that you recognized that voice.

“Stop speaking in English, you know I don’t know it well,” a voice added in Korean. It was whiny and loud. You recognized it as well and if you were right…. Not that you could be right, this had to be some sort of dream or-

You looked up and the color drained from your face.

The owner of the first voice was none other then Vernon- Hansol, from Seventeen. The second voice, well there was no doubt that it was Boo Seungkwan. You swallowed hard and your eyes turned to the person in front of you.

He looked… Amused. Something inside you was relieved that he looked amused. He was everything that you had always imagined too. Ruffled dark hair stuffed beneath a black ball cap, that cocky smile, his hands on his hips and his body posed in a way that despite his height made him seem like he was a lot bigger than you.

Ironically, the first thing that you thought was that he was taller than you thought he would be. All the joking your friends had done, and all of the times that you had stubbornly stood up and held your hand in front of your face saying that the height difference really wasn’t that big meant nothing when actually stood in front of him.

Your eyes lowered to his shoes, but you decided he wasn’t wearing anything to make him taller. You broke out into a nervous smile, and distractedly rubbed the back of your neck.

“You make it sound like you meant to push someone in front of me,” You said in Korean, directing your eyes to Vernon. He, on the other hand, was much taller than you thought he would be. You had to actually lift your chin a bit in order to properly eye him.

“But you wouldn’t do that,” you added in English. The switch of languages made Seungkwan grow exasperated again. He snapped his fingers sharply dragging your attention to him. Now he was more your height. Still taller then you had imagined, but your eyeline was much more even with him.

“Hey!” He protested. “You’re in Korea now, so how about you use a language I can understand!”

You chuckled, not confidently at all, and lowered your head again.

“Sorry, I-I hope I didn’t bother you, strangers, too much,” you stated. Your voice quivered a bit. You couldn’t believe what was happening.

It was your first day in Korea.

It was your first day in Korea, and you had almost literally run into three members of one of your favorite kpop groups ever.

You turned away from the boys, perfectly content with escaping from them, without intention of even getting a picture because you were so utterly mortified when-

“Don’t pretend like you don’t know us.”

You froze. That voice. That voice was one you had never even dreamed you would get to hear in real life. It was almost too much to hear him speaking to you so casually. Like you were old friends. You your heel.

“I’d hate to bother you,” you replied. “I’m sure there are lots of moments when fans try to talk to you in your free time.”

“We’ll make an exception this once,” Jihoon responded. That smile was still on his face. You didn’t understand it. He acted like he knew you in a way, but that wasn’t possible. That wasn’t possible at all. You had only had a few “interactions” with him- if you could even call them that. You commented on his Instagram pretty frequently, and you had written many letters to him… None of which you actually sent…

But there was no way he recognized you from that.

“Come on, call your friends over. We can all take a picture together.”

They didn’t wait for you to do it yourself. Vernon smiled, mischievously and called over your friends. They weren’t reacting quite the way you were and you felt like you must be imagining it but the boys were acting much more like their stage selves in front of them. They were smiling and kind and not speaking every word like they were playing some sort of game.

It made you unnecessarily suspicious.

Click, click.

“Alright! Got them! You all look great!” Jeongin said pleasantly. You dropped your pose and thanked Jeongin for taking the picture. You then turned and thanked the boys for taking a picture with you in the first place. It was kind of them to do something like this for you guys.

Your friends were busy excitedly looking at the photo that had been airdropped to you, but all three of the boys were looking at you with an odd expression. You wrinkled your nose and your gratitude became only half expressed.

“We’re more than happy to meet fans,” Vernon said. Seungkwan started to say something. It wasn’t directed towards you, and you knew that it wasn’t really meant for you to hear either. It was about plans for the day so you turned your ear away from the group.

It wasn’t until later when you were back in your new temporary home that you realized Jihoon had even said goodbye to you, that Jihoon had said your name during the conversation something he shouldn’t have known and despite it all that when you looked at your hands they were no longer shaking.