The Kim’s house wasn’t far from us, on a tree-lined avenue just off YGU. When I arrived that night, Min answered the door smiling at me. He’s only 15 but he sure is tall. He’s easy-going smile can also sure melt a lot of girls’ heart. Just like his older brother, I thought.

Uncle Hyun Bin was also about to leave that night to make a deadline for the Christmas edition of their paper. I talked to him for a short while and offered to hang-out with Min until he comes back. Not that Min needed a babysitter, but looking at this sad teenage boy makes me want to see him smile.

After his father left, Min and I decided to walk to the nearest park where a Christmas show was being held. “I love Christmas shows,” I told him, making sure he heard it.

Actually, the show was a fabulous entertainment which we both didn’t expect. Min loved the performance as well, but afterward, he’ll just go back to his quiet self and looked at a group of teenagers spending time together not far away from us. It seemed like he knows them.

“Do you want to go over and say hello?” I asked him.

“No, noona.”

“Why not? They seem nice.” I asked him again.

“Yes, they are but it’s useless. I’ll be going back home in a couple of weeks as well,” he replied.

“That shouldn’t stop you from meeting them or calling them,” I said to him.

“Yeah, maybe. Noona, can we leave now?” Min asked.

We left and Min didn’t say a word on the way home. I wondered if I should try to get him to talk about his feelings. I didn’t know much about him or his family history. To me, he seemed like a teenage boy, who’d be popular with his classmates, but under the shadow of last year’s marriage problems he might have withdrawn.

Min’s mood changed for the better once we got inside the house. The house was smaller and cozier than ours, with just a living room, dining room and kitchen in the first floor. Each room had a long narrow Victorian windows and plain country furnishings, which I liked. Min took me upstairs and showed me the bedroom he’s sharing with Jae, then led me up to a back staircase to a single room on the third floor. It looked as if it was converted into an office.

“This used to be Jae Hyung’s room,” he said.

I walked over to a set of bookshelves lined with sports trophies. “Are all of these Jae’s?”

“Yup,” Min told me proudly, worked his way down the line. Soccer, basketball, lacrosse, most valuable player, scholar-athlete. Jae had done it all.

I picked up a photographed that showed Jae and another guy grinning at the camera, their arms around each other’s shoulders, both of them holding a lacrosse stick.

“That’s Yunho Hyung,” Min told me. “He was Jae Hyung’s best friend, but he moved to another place this year. That book has more pictures,” he said pointing.

I lifted down the scrapbook and paged through, recognizing some of the guys I had seen in the parking lot, especially Top with his hair – he always stood out.

“Why did Jae leave his trophies and pictures here?” I wondered aloud.

Min shrugged. “He said there isn’t enough room in our new house with mom, but there is.”

I put down the book and ran my hand over the cool metal of a basketball award. “We’ll I guess he’s displaying trophies from his new school now.”

Min shook his head. “He doesn’t play sports anymore.”

“He doesn’t?”

“He does homework with me in the afternoon, then, when Mom comes home from work, he goes to work at a nearby store to help my mom.”

What a change from his previous school years, I thought.

“He still goes out like he used to,” Min added. “Girls call him all the time.”

Great! Just what I wanted to hear. Thanks Min for being so insensitive. “Well, it’s nice that some things don’t change. You want to watch a movie?” I said immediately before jealousy creeps in. I’m really so weird. I don’t even know why I’m acting this way.

We went down to the living room and looked through their movie collections. We decided to watch

He’d selected Hunger Games. “I might need some tissues,” I said, moving a box to the coffee table in front of us.

“You cry at movies, noona?”

“I do at this one.”

“I do too but only if it’s really sad,” Min confessed, then clicked on the video to start.

Twenty minutes later, after scrunching himself closer to me, he fell asleep soundly in my shoulder. He looked younger than his age, his lashes curling up against his cheeks. I lifted my arm and placed it in his other cheek so he’d be more comfortable sleeping against me.

About halfway through the movie I heard a key being inserted in the front door lock. I glanced at my watch, surprised; it was about 10:15 pm, and Uncle said he’ll be home by 11.

The front door opened, and Jae walked in. He glanced at me and Min in the