“Mama~!!! Papa~~~!!! Phantom?”

I cocked my head and giggled as my pet dog jumped up and down inside the car. He was the result of an inter-breed consummation—an American Spitz and a Lhasa Apso. The natural pair of ‘black-eye’ reminded me of his namesake, I told Woohyun, who for some reason found it funny that a small dog would be called ‘Phantom’.

“Woohyun, these are my parents.” The only thing I was worried about was the language barrier. It had been eons since my parents spoke in Korean. During phone conversations too, the three of us would speak English. It had taken a lot of persistence from my side for them to admit that they preferred their adopted language. Mom herself had studied in London all her life and Papa’s job as a diplomat had asked more of English from him.

“Mama, Papa…. Nam Woohyun,” I smiled. I could see my father’s eyes light up, even though his face tried hard not to show his happiness. “It’ll take me one look,” my father had warned me. “Just one look and I’ll know whether he is of good character.”

“Anyonghaseyo,” he bowed, a polite smile on his face. “Manna bangapsumnida.”

“Neh, neh… waah… jalsaengkaetda!” I stifled my laugh upon hearing Mom’s accented Korean. Woohyun grinned and said, “Well, I can see where Saya got her good looks from.”

My breath got stuck in my throat. My parents couldn’t contain the excitement and patted his head, Papa slapping him on the back. “Thank god, that’s one wall that’s broken down.” Papa nodded at Woohyun to seat himself and continued, “Now we can sit and have some man-to-man talk, without your simultaneous interpreter here!”

While Woohyun laughed, I quietly sat in the backseat, playing with Phantom. “You don’t have any heart-stopping surprises in store, do you?” I whispered to the dog. He barked and I sighed. “Thought so.” I watched as Papa and Woohyun hugged each other, like they were about to part. Strangely horrified, I buried my head in my arms.

“Eegeh mwohya….” I whined to myself and sat up when the three sat inside. Phantom barked at Woohyun, who couldn’t hide his amusement.

“I’m jealous,” he said and nodded at the dog who was lying down in my arms. Papa heard that and chuckled. “Don’t worry Woohyun-ah…”

DID HE JUST SPEAK TO MY BOYFRIEND INFORMALLY?

“…after marriage, men are nothing but lapdogs at home!!”

DID THEY JUST TALK ABOUT MARRIAGE?

“Aah…yes, I’ve heard that before.” Woohyun winked at me and all I could do was shake my head in awe. “When?” I mouthed. Throughout the ride home, Mama was the one who spoke to Woohyun while Papa and I conversed about my job. I had mentioned it before, me being an ESL teacher and how it was a simple decision to make. It was a simple decision because it was suggested by Papa. He was always telling me how following one’s dreams was good but one could not survive. “You need something called ‘salary’,” he had said and I knew that he was right. I loved writing but what could I write about? Apart from school essays and creative writing competitions, my hobby had not ventured further, not enough to become a passion.

“So how exactly did the two of you meet?” asked Mama. At that moment, I got a call from Kairi. “Because of this creature,” I said while waving my phone in the air and answered it.

“Yeah I’ve reached Delhi… yup Woohyun is here… yes I know you want to meet him… No, you don’t HAVE to know Korean…oh really, that’s nice of you…”

I cut the call and realized that the whole car was waiting for me to continue on the story. “Go on,” nodded my mother. “What did Kairi do?”

So I started off, though I edited a few things. Very many few things.

(Listen to I Know by Son Ho Young : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiIqKYDDvyg)

I skipped out the whole ‘I-almost-died’ part and said that Woohyun had made those boots for me and walked me to Everest Café on a cold rainy night. He himself had a meeting, I remembered and mentioned it. It turned out that his ‘date’ had been none other than SeokHyun’s late dad, whose funeral had been the set of our second meeting. But as I spoke more and more, suddenly a nagging feeling caught on.

“So how does SeokHyun know you, Woohyun?” Papa stretched his neck to see him from the rearview mirror. Woohyun shrugged and said, “I took care of his father in his last days.”

“I thought you were cousins…” I murmured. Woohyun turned to me and nodded, “Distant cousins. Yeah that’s what I said but… I didn’t know you too well then and I wasn’t sure if giving off every small detail was important.”

I pulled back, a little shocked. Was he being harsh or was I just being too sensitive?

“Then,” Papa asked eagerly. “What happened then?”

Heaving a sigh, I said, “Well, Woohyun approached me at the funeral, asked me a question and I blew up on him. Started ranting about how he shouldn’t be obliged to help me, etc.”

“Why would you do that?” My eyes shifted to Mama when she asked that. There was something different in her tone. She sounded…worried.

Wondering why, I continued, my gaze fixed on her reflection from the side-mirror. “I didn’t want him to be so helpful if he wasn’t genuinely interested in knowing me well. I didn’t want to be just someone he spoke to. I had a small crush on him.”

“I did too,” murmured Woohyun. He looked at me and held my hand. “And honestly, I was more than interested. I was quite intruigued, Saya was not like any other I have met before.”

“You sound like a wise owl,” Papa commented. “You sure you’re not like that young looking oldie, Eduardo Cruz?”

“Edward Cullen, honey,” Mama chided him. My jaw dropped. “How on Earth do you know Edward Cullen??” I shouted. Mama widened her eyes innocently and I shook my head.

“If there are any more aftershocks, just throw them. NOW. I don’t think I can take it anymore.”

We reached home—I thanked the Almighty like never before—with Woohyun carrying both our bags. I kissed him on the cheek for the chivalry and he walked inside with Papa, discussing their respective jobs. Mama though pulled me back. She gave me the ‘We-need-to-talk’ look and I shrugged.

The two of us sat inside the trunk of the car, our two petite figures comfortable enough to chat for eternity in there. I looked down at my sneakers and waited for Mama to say something. She was always the one to start, especially if it was something important.

“You didn’t know he could speak English, did you?”

I shook my head, a smile forming on my lips. “Woohyun can be a little…unpredictable. Scratch that. He probably wanted to form a good first impression, without  me getting involved. He’s like that, doesn’t mind going an extra mile.”

Mama nodded and glowed a little at my smile. “How long has it been?” When I replied, she didn’t look surprised. In fact, it seemed like she already knew the answers before I spoke.

“I’m just going to say this,” Mama said, no apprehension in her voice. For some reason, I didn’t feel defensive. Nor did I prepare myself to say anything that could counter her statement, whatever it might be.

“Does Woohyun know about your trip to rehab?”

“Which one? For disassociative disorder or the suicide attempt?”

My mother maintained the calm look on her face and caressed my cheek. “Both,” she murmured and kissed my forehead.

Without holding back, I embraced Mama and became a little girl again, the one who had often been teased and bullied, the one who had to fight for herself without any friends by her side, the one who had accepted her status as a wallflower but still needed her mother’s hugs.

“I was…thinking…” I wasn’t going into hysterics, thank God. But tears were flowing down, that was for sure. “Mama, he’s been helping me out for the last two and a half years and honestly, I have never been so sure of myself the way I am with him. I just don’t want….I…”

“You want to do that by yourself,” Mama spoke, completing my sentence. “You want to walk with confidence by yourself, not with him prepared to catch you everytime you fall. Sweetheart, from the moment I saw him, I could see how you were to him. He’s a nice guy, there’s no doubt about that. But if you want to spend your life with him, you need to make sure that he lets you commit your own mistakes. He needs to know the Saya I know, the one who didn’t follow the stupid teenagers in her school and stood her ground, who refused to attend parties despite us giving you permission….You weren’t running away from your problems, you just didn’t think they were problems at all. You saw them the way you look at the trees outside a car window---just passing by.”

I noticed Woohyun walking towards us and notified Mama. Wiping my tears, I slowly pulled back and smiled at her.

“Having a mother-daughter moment?” Woohyun smiled, reaching out for my hand. I nodded and the three of us walked inside. I was pulled back a little and gave a questioning look to my boyfriend.

“What? And first of all, when did you take English lessons?”

The crease in Woohyun’s forehead disappeared momentarily. “Ever since we moved in together.” I was about to say something, but the crease returned and he interrupted me. “Are you sure you’re fine?”

“Why would you say that?” I asked. He stared at my face, almost as if he was expecting me to take off a mask and say ‘Surprise! It’s me, Hoya!’ He took in a deep breath and firmly held onto my hands.

“You’re just… ever since we started preparations for this trip, you’ve been a little distant.” Woohyun looked upset, seriously upset. “If you ever feel like something is going wrong or you can’t take care of something, tell me. I’ll help you. That’s why I’m here.”

Though I nodded and shared a deep kiss with him, all I could think of afterwards was the dream I had during the flight. Was it a forewarning of some sort?