After he bought us popsicles, we walked and talked and ate.  It was fun.  I didn’t even realize we’d walked in the wrong direction again and were now even farther from my apartment building.  I didn’t care because, well I rarely did about much, but he didn’t seem to care either.  So we just kept walking.  Until we came across a playground behind a preschool.

            “Ooh!  Swings!” I cried out, rushing to the fence.  “Let’s go in!”

            Tae Il laughed.  Stepping up to the gate in the fence, he pushed on it.  “It’s locked,” he said with a shrug.  “We can’t get in.”

            I slithered up behind him.  “Says you,” I whispered.  He jumped a little when I brushed up against him as I leapt onto the fence and scaled it.  “Hurry, come on!” I hissed as I landed, catlike, on the other side.  The street was pretty dead.  I think it was just the situation that made me feel like I needed to whisper.  His eyes bugged out and he put his fingers through the links, shaking his head.  I giggled.  “Come on, come on.  Let’s play.”  My fingers wiggled through the links to the backs of his hands.  He averted his eyes and laughed a little.  “Come on.  Don’t be scared.  I’ll catch you,” I teased.

            He pouted a little and pushed his black newsboy cap an inch higher on his head to look up the length of the fence.  “Alright, alright,” he sighed. 

            I stepped back as he jumped to grab links higher up on the fence.  He clumsily crawled his way to the top and fumbled over.  His hands slipped a little and he ended up catching himself a couple of feet from the top.  He hung over the side by his fingertips.

            Gasping, I cried, “No! Don’t let go, you’re too high up still!”

            “What?!” he wheezed, his legs bending at odd angles in an attempt to scramble back up the fence.  I covered my mouth, but I was laughing so hard, he could tell.

            “I’m just kidding.  You’re really close to the ground, just let go.”

            I snorted back the laughter when I caught his glare down at me.  He peeked over his shoulder and saw how close to the ground he was before he let go.

            “You’re really funny, you know that, Kelly?” he said, words oozing with sarcasm as he pulled the bill of his hat back down low.  He had such attractive features, I was curious why he wore his hat so low.  He’d said he and the other Block b guys had to disguise themselves when they went out now, but it was the middle of the night.  And we were in a deserted playground.

            “I crack myself up sometimes,” I told him as I eyed the swing set behind him.  “Race you there,” I taunted before poking him in the chest and taking off toward the playground.  I heard him sprinting behind me, but I made it there first.  “Too slow,” I said, sticking my tongue out at him as I plopped into one of the four swings hanging from the metal set.

            He laughed and fell into the swing next to me.  I began swinging a little, dragging my feet in the dirt so that I wouldn’t go to high.  He followed suit, but I could feel him watching me.  He was smiling.  I was uncomfortable.  Silence made me nervous.

            “So, Lee Tae Il,” I began still looking at the ground.  “Before you became some hot shot singer for a group I never heard of, what were you?”

            He shook his head at me and laughed softly.  “I wasn’t anything.  I graduated high school, but I hadn’t gone to college yet,” he answered casually.  “Oh!  I was on a Korean music variety type show.  Kind of like American Idol, I heard.”

            “Really?  That’s so cool.”

            “Yeah,” he sighed with a nod.  “But then I got cut.”

            “Oh,” I laughed.  “Well, doesn’t matter.  You got the last laugh.  They said you , but now you’re a super star.”

            “Yeah, in a band you’ve never heard of,” he joked.

            I giggled.  “Sorry, but here, I promised I would check out Block b performances and videos when I get home.  I meant it, I swear I will!”

            He shifted in his seat a little and pulled out his phone.  “Why wait?” he wondered as he slid his finger across the screen and then tapped on the keyboard for a second.  Handing it to me, he added, “This was the video Kyung was doing the dance from for you earlier.  He’s really good when he’s prepared.”

            I laughed, taking his phone and hitting ‘play.’  I tried to keep my expression straight, but I had to admit, it was really good.  I wasn’t really into kpop or fangirling or ogling idols the way Korean girls were – or some foreigners I’d met in my time here including Leah from work, but I was feeling giddy watching their Freeze video.  These guys were a triple threat.  Dancing, singing, rapping.  I could just imagine the girls at their concerts.  The screaming, the crying, the works.

            “You have a great voice,” I said honestly as I handed him back his phone once the video ended.

            He smiled, but didn’t meet my eyes.  “Thanks,” he mumbled.

            “There’s just one thing…”

            “What’s that?”

            “My alien?”  I bit my lip to keep a straight face.

            He sighed.  “Talk to Zico.  He writes most of our songs.”

            I laughed.  “Ah, speaking of your leader, does he know it sounds like he’s saying fuc-”  Tae Il sighed louder.

            “His English is actually pretty good.  He just needs to work on his accent.”  I could tell he felt bad that he wanted to laugh, too.

            “I really liked the song though.  You guys are pretty awesome,” I complimented with a firm nod.  I swung a leg over the chain of my swing and sat facing him like I was riding a horse.  “Show me some more?” I asked sweetly, batting my eyes.

            His head popped up and he looked over at me.  Nervously excited was the best way I could think to describe the look on his face.

            He showed me a few more videos and some live performances.  I searched through for some fancam performances, too.  He told me funny stories from filming and crazy things that happened at some of their fanmeetings while I watched them.

            I hadn’t laughed so hard in, well ever, I was pretty sure.

            Handing his phone back for the second time, I was still grinning.  “You guys are so good.  I love it.”  He smiled more to himself and mumbled another ‘thanks’ as he pocketed his phone.  “There’s one thing I’m curious about though,” I mentioned.  He looked at me, eyes wide with curiosity.  “Why are you always wearing a hat or sunglasses?”

            His cheeks flamed up.  “Not every time…”

            “Pretty much every time,” I pointed out.  I stood up from my swing and snatched his hat off his head.  Avoiding his grabbing hands, I ran over to the middle of the playground and threw myself onto my back in the grass.  A rare sight in a metropolis like Seoul.  He yanked the hat off my head and slipped it back onto his own with a pout as he sat cross legged near me.  “No one is here now and I promise I won’t ambush you and scream in your face like an untamed wild woman.”

            He stuck out his lower lip, but laughed under his breath.  “It’s not that now.  I just…I don’t know.  I like sunglasses and hats.  I have a lot of them.”  He inspected his fingers and shrugged. 

            “Now tell me the real reason,” I stated, folding my arms under my head and looking up at him.

            “I’m not the most attractive member,” he admitted just above a whisper.  A sad smile on his face as he continued to be thoroughly fascinated by his hands.  “I don’t like my eyes.”  I sat up, arching an eyebrow at him, but didn’t say a word.  He finally met my eyes, his face a crimson color.  “I’m sorry.  I don’t know why I told you that.”

            “Give me your phone,” I said, voice void of emotion.  He laughed, confused.  I held out my hand.  “Give it to me.”

            Pulling it out of his pocket, I grabbed it and searched through the history to bring up some of the videos I’d watched.  I played on fancam of a performance.