There couldn’t be another old silver SUV on this highway, I thought as I pulled over to the side, then backed up, my eyes on the beat-up car in my rearview mirror. I parked quickly and grabbed my phone.

I’d barely gotten out of my car when Min called to me. “Dara Noona!” He was waving his arms at me, standing forty feet back in the roadside grass.

“Who is it?” came a voice from under the car.

I walked around to the back of the car. Jae’s long legs were hanging out, the rest of him under the car.

“Hi…It’s Dara…Need help?”

“No, thanks. I’m just taking a coffee break,” he murmured.

“Okay, I’m leaving.”

“Dara!” he called, then slid out from beneath the car. He looked up at me, his tongue and grinned. “Nice to see you again.” God! Does he know how good-looking he is? Nobody should look this good. Period!

For a moment I was lost for words. I glanced down at my hands. “Yeah, nice to uhh…see anyone with a car phone.”

He sat up.

“Who do you want to call?” I took several steps closer and held it out to him, not really sure if he has his own cellphone. If he touched my hand and looked in my eyes, would I tingle again or just get grease all over me?

“I think all I need is a coat hanger,” he said, wiping his hands on a towel. “All of ours are plastic. Do you have a wire one with you?”

Yes,” I said. “But I don’t think it’s to hold those wheels on.”

“It’s for the muffler, Dara,” he said, lying down again, showing his chiseled abs beneath his shirt. Oh God!

“Oh, you mean you have a muffler? It sure didn’t sound like it when you left the rest stop.”

He gave me a sarcastic smile, and then pulled himself back under his car.

“One coat hanger, coming up,” I said cheerfully. I fetched it for him and stood around, watching his feet and listening to him grunt and mutter beneath his car.

“Is there something I can do to help?” I asked after some more muttering from below.

“Nope. I can do this.”

I went and sat in the grass with Min who was busy with his gaming console. “I knew you’d come,” he told me.

“How could you know that? You didn’t know what road I was taking.”

He shrugged. “Things happen like that at Christmas,” he said with a simple faith that touched me.

“Well, it was a lucky thing.”

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“Seoul. My family lives on the other side of the Han River.”

“Will you be there all Christmas?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Maybe you could visit us, Noona.”

“I’d like that, Min,” I answered. “But Seoul is a big place and ….”

“You have a car,” he interrupted. “Or we could visit you if you want. Do you know how to get to Ichondong?”

For a moment the name stuck in my throat. “Did you say Inchondong?”

“Yes, that’s where our dad lives.”

Maybe there was more than one Inchondong.

“It used to be where all of us lived. It’s near YGU. Do you know where that is?”

I knew, all right. And I knew there was only 1 University in that area of Inchondong., the one in which my sisters had fast become the reigning queens. Jae and my sisters would probably know the same people, be part of the same cool crowd. What if he told a story about a silly girl named Dara who had tried flirting with him on the rest stop? *I cringe thinking about it*

“You’re blushing a lot, Noona,” Min observed.

“It’s cold out,” I said, though I was warm inside. Despite my embarrassment, a tiny flame started to burn at the thought that I might see Jae again.

“It wasn’t cold at the rest stop and restaurant,” Min reminded me, “and you blushed there too. Here comes Hyung. He’ll tell you how to get to Inchondong.”

“He doesn’t need to, Min. That’s where I’m going.”

“You are? Yow!” He jumped up. “Hey Jae hyung.” His brother was walking with long strides over the grass, looking satisfied with himself. “Guess where Dara Nonna is going?”

“In the other direction, hoping to lose us?” he joked and smiled.

“To Inchondong.”

Jae stopped, though still a short distance from us. “You are?” His easy smile disappeared immediately. “Well…great,” he said. Walking the last few steps to us.

“My parents moved there last year,” I told him. “I was only in town for 2 days, so I don’t really know the place.”

“There’s not much to know.” He sounded irritated – almost angry.

“All the friends  have live there,” Min told me sadly.

“It’s hard to be away from friends,” I replied, turning to Min. “All mine are back at my boarding school in Busan.”

“You’ll do all right,” Jae said curtly. “It’s a small town.”

I looked up at him, mystified by the sudden coldness in his voice. What was his problem? Did he think that knowing no one else, I was going to follow him around like a puppy dog? Did he have such an ego that he thought a little f