Finis

 

 

 

 

Dami raised her hands and asked for quiet. Behind her on the stage sat the bride and groom, Dara and Jiyong. The two sat on single chairs with their backs to each other.

 

“This game,” Dami announced with a smirk, “is called His and Hers. As you can see we have our lovely bride and handsome groom up here. Each of them is holding one of their own shoes and one shoe belong to the other. We’re going to see how well our newlyweds know each other by asking them several questions that they have to answer by raising the shoe that belongs to the person that they think is the right answer. For example, if the question is, who is the better cook? Then Dara will either raise her shoe or Jiyong’s shoe. And Jiyong will do the same. Okay, is everyone ready?”

 

“Oh boy,” Jiyong muttered, shaking his head in fear of what type of questions his sister might ask. He could hear Dara laughing behind him.

 

“Question #1. Between the two of you, who takes longer to get dressed when you’re going out?” Dami asked.

 

Dara and Jiyong instantly raised their hand that held Jiyong’s shoe, much to the laughter of their family and friends gathered. Dara and Jiyong turned to see which shoe the other had held up, and when they saw they had chosen the same, the two cheered and Jiyong leaned over for a kiss from Dara.

 

“Excuse me, that’s not part of the game!” Sanghyun snickered.

 

“Ah but we’re making it part of the game,” Jiyong smirked. He and Dara sat again with their backs to each other and waited for the second question.

 

“Question #2 – Who fell in love with the other first? Did Jiyong fall for Dara first? Or did Dara fall for Jiyong first?”

 

Jiyong raised his shoe high in the air and waved it back and forth looking at the audience with a wide grin on his face. Behind him Dara hesitated, wondering which shoe Jiyong had raised. After a slight pause she answered by raising her shoe.

 

The audience roared with laughter. Dara and Jiyong turned to look at each other’s answer and their eyes grew large with surprise.

 

“Oooh! So each is claiming they fell in love first with the other!” Dami stated. She walked over to Dara and asked, “When did you fall in love with Jiyong?”

 

Dara blushed and said, “At your wedding.” The crowd hooted and laughed.

 

“You mean when you were my maid of honor, you were looking at my brother?” Dami asked, pretending to be shocked.

 

Dara covered her face with her hands while she nodded. Behind her Jiyong shook his head and sighed.

 

“How about you, Jiyong,” Dami asked. “When did you first fall in love with Dara?”

 

Jiyong looked sheepishly at the audience and said, “I fell for her first.”

 

“We’ll be the judge of that,” Dami declared. “Now tell us, when did you first fall in love with Dara?”

 

Jiyong laughed and shyly rubbed a hand over his face before he answered. “I think I was five years old.”

 

There was a collective gasp from everyone, including Dara, while Sanghyun roared with laughter because he knew Jiyong was telling the truth.

 

Jiyong grabbed the microphone and turned to face Dara. He went down on his knees in front of her while their families and friends cheered him on. “Jagiya…”

 

His use of the endearment had the crowd cheering even louder. “Way to go hyung!” Seungri called.

 

“Jagiya,” Jiyong began again, and he signaled for the audience to grow quiet. And then he said, “Do you remember when I was five and you kissed me?”

 

The audience erupted. Seungri, Daesung, and Seunghyun were on their feet giving cat whistles while the girls looked on in shock. Jiyong was laughing and Dara was attempting to cover his mouth with her hands so that he couldn’t speak. She grabbed the microphone away and spoke into it.

 

“Ani! I don’t recall any such thing!” Dara declared, her cheeks pink. She could barely be heard above the laughter of their family and friends. Dara shook her head and looked as if she was about to bolt from the stage. Jiyong stood and embraced Dara from behind, feeling bad for unintentionally embarrassing her. He took hold of the microphone and called for silence once more.

 

“I fell in love with Dara first,” he declared, looking into Dara’s eyes. “I’ve been in love with her from the time when I was very young. Our families were neighbors and she was best friends with my noona, and I was best friends with Sanghyun. My earliest memory of her was when she came to our house with my noona and they were playing dolls. I had this toy truck that was my favorite toy. She asked to play with it and I refused.”

 

There were smiles on the faces of their family and friends as Jiyong recounted his story. Dara too was listening, having long ago forgotten this incident. But it came back to her as Jiyong shared it.

 

“We got into a wrestling match,” Jiyong said, grinning at his wife. “She was older than me but I was bigger than her. She was losing but she was so stubborn and wouldn’t let go of the truck. Then she did something that surprised me.”

 

Dara laughed and buried her face in her hands, remembering fully now the incident Jiyong was describing.

 

“Do you want to tell them what you did?” Jiyong asked gently, his eyes full of love.

 

Dara sighed and spoke into the microphone. “I kissed him on the cheek,” she confessed.

 

They looked into each other’s eyes, recalling that incident, how long ago it was, and how much time had passed since then.

 

“Needless to say,” Jiyong continued. “She won the wrestling match… and my heart.”

 

*

 

Much later that night as they sat next to each other on the plane on their way to their honeymoon. Dara leaned her head on Jiyong’s shoulder, their fingers entwined. “Were you serious about falling in love with me from that long ago?” she whispered.

 

Jiyong nodded.

 

“But if I remember correctly you cried when I kissed you,” Dara teased.

 

“Well that’s true,” Jiyong agreed, laughing softly at the memory. “But do you remember what you did after that? You came over a few days later and you brought me a gift to apologize.”
 

“I did?” Dara frowned as she tried to remember.

 

“You brought me a transformer truck,” Jiyong recalled. He lifted her hand and kissed the back of it. “That was when I first fell in love with you.”

 

Dara smiled. “Oh, that’s right… I remember now.”

 

“From then on you were my special noona. I was always aware of you, always looked for you when you were nearby to make sure that you were okay.”

 

“You used to buy me ice cream whenever I was upset…”

 

Jiyong smiled. “It made me proud when I could do that.”

 

“Buy me ice cream?” she asked.

 

“Make you smile,” he corrected gently. “My world felt right if I could see you smiling. If you weren’t smiling then I wanted to do whatever I could to change that.”

 

Dara turned her head to look into his eyes, saw the truth of his words reflected there. “I’m sorry I never noticed.”

 

“It doesn’t matter,” he answered, taking her hand and placing it over his heart. “Because in the end you finally did notice. And now you know that I’ve loved you all through the years that we’ve known each other.”

 

She gazed at him tenderly. Her hand coming up to touch his face. “If we have a son someday, I hope he’s just like you.”

 

Jiyong smiled and leaned in to kiss her forehead. “Sleep jagiya, soon we’ll be at our destination.”

 

 

*