“Are you okay?” Jason pulls up, parking his go-kart next to mine. “I looked behind me and you guys were gone!” He glances from me to my dress to Leah, assessing the situation. For a second, I wonder if he’s going to bring up my own puke disaster, but he simply pulls off his hat and puts an arm around Leah, rubbing her back.

“I’m okay,” Leah wheezes. She presses her hands against her flushed face and leans in so only I can hear.

“Did I really just throw up in front of Jason?” she whispers to me through her fingers, mortified.

“Don’t worry,” I say, winking at her. “It’s nothing I haven’t done before.”

“Come on, Leah,” Jason says as his hands move to Leah’s back, cradling her as he helps her gently to her feet. For the thousandth time that day, my heart catches in my throat. Jason turns to me and smiles before looking down at Leah, his eyes filled with such caring and protectiveness I would have previously thought only capable of existing in some K-drama universe. “I had them put the newest movie from The Rock on the plane for the return flight.”

I’m going to need a self-care day to recover from my self-care day, apparently.

* * *

An hour later, we’re back on the plane, the two of us wearing cheap cotton Mickey Mouse pajamas we grabbed from a street vendor. Leah’s wrapped in a fuzzy blanket, sipping ginger tea and watching The Rock tear his way through downtown Manhattan on one of the plane’s portable Blu-ray players.

Leah takes off her headphones for a moment and turns to us. She pauses, twirling the cord in her hands, looking embarrassed. “Sorry about go-karting, Jason. And extra sorry you had to see me throw up.”

He gives her a warm smile and ruffles her hair. “Don’t even worry about it. What else are oppas for?” Leah’s face bursts into a wide smile and she snuggles down into her blanket. I pick up my Blu-ray player and start scrolling through the movie choices.

“Oh, Kiki’s Delivery Service!” I say. “I used to love all the Ghibli movies. In New York, my best friend and I had a tradition of watching them with a bowl of chocolate pretzels.” I smile, a wave of nostalgia hitting me.

Jason grins. “My friends and I loved the Ghibli movies too. We used to fight over which was the best one—Spirited Away or Howl’s Moving Castle.”

“Definitely Howl!” I say, laughing.

“For sure,” he agrees. “Calcifer is the best.”

I try to imagine a Jason before K-pop, one who filmed YouTube covers in his bedroom and watched movies with his friends on Friday nights.

“Do you wish you could go back?” I ask.

He cocks his head to the side and arches his eyebrows. “In some ways, yeah. I mean, I was born in Toronto. No matter how long I live in Korea, there’s always this part of me that feels like I don’t fully belong, you know? I’m not Korean-Korean. I’m Korean Canadian.” He pauses and looks at me, like he’s wondering if he should keep talking. I give him a small smile. “And also, you know, half-white, which is this whole other thing.” I nod in understanding and he continues, speaking faster, like these thoughts have been building in him for a long time and he needs to get them out. “I feel like I’m constantly straddling two worlds. Too white to be Asian, too Asian to be white. It’s like I’m tricking everyone on both sides, trying to convince them that I belong, when truthfully, I’m not even sure exactly where I fit.” He laughs, running his hand down the back of his head. “Sorry. Am I making any sense?”

“Total sense,” I say. “I’m not half-white, but I feel the same way being Korean American. Sometimes it’s like Korea doesn’t fully accept me as Korean because I’m from America, but on the flip side, America doesn’t fully accept me as American because of my Korean heritage. It’s weird. It’s like I exist in the in-between.”

I don’t think I’ve ever voiced these feelings out loud. At first I feel self-conscious, but Jason is looking at me and slowly nodding his head, like he understands exactly what I’m saying. Like he feels it too.

“I don’t regret it, though,” he says. “Coming to Korea and starting this whole K-pop thing.” He pauses and flashes me a small grin. “Though I do wish I could have gone to summer camp at least once.”

“For me, it’s road trips,” I say.

“Drive-in movie theaters on summer nights.”

“Pep rallies.”

“Part-time jobs at the mall with all your friends.”

“Prom.”

He laughs. “Yes! Prom! Why is that not a thing in Korea?”

“I know, right? People go all out in the States. Here, give me your phone.”

He obliges, and I scroll through the promposal hashtag on Instagram. Leah’s obsessed with these and we’ve spent more than a couple late nights watching videos of people asking each other to prom through flash mobs, balloon-filled lockers, and elaborate scavenger hunts.

“This one’s my favorite.” I show him a photo of a box of letter-shaped doughnuts that spell out “PROM?” Just looking at it makes me feel happy. “Total classic. Who expects anything other than regular doughnuts to be inside a doughnut box? It gets me every time.”

“Seriously?” Jason cracks up, his nose crinkling with laughter. “Of all the romantic, over-the-top promposals, you like the one with the doughnut box?”

“What? It’s genius in its simplicity! Plus, if they say no, you have an entire box of doughnuts to console yourself with.”

He grins, shaking his head. “My mom would have been all over this kind of stuff. She’d probably hire a wedding planner to help me plan my promposal and then show up to videotape it herself. She was super extra like that.”

My heart squeezes at his words. Everyone knows that Jason lost his mother when he was twelve. I look over at Leah, who’s sleeping in her seat next to me. She’s snoring softly, and I brush her hair off her face. Twelve. That’s practically the same age she is now. I can’t imagine Leah losing our mom at this age—much less having that fact broadcast to the entire world. I have the sudden urge to wrap my hand around Jason’s, but I resist.

“She would be so proud to see you today. I know it,” I say.

He pauses, turning toward me with a sad smile on his face. “You know, I think my mom would have really liked you,” he says. His words surprise me, and I blink, trying to find the right way to respond.

“Why do you say that?” The moment feels fragile, tender, different from the ones we’ve had before. I search my head for something—anything—to tell me to change the subject, to not get too serious with Jason, too vulnerable. But I can’t find it. Instead, I hold my breath, not wanting to break this moment between us.

He considers this. “Remember in the practice room, when I said I’m excited to sing with you? And I asked if you wanted to know why?”

I nod, at a loss for words. My heart is moving faster than my reason can keep up, and I don’t want to say anything that I might regret tomorrow.

“I feel like I can be myself when I’m with you.” He looks at me, and before I know it, he’s wrapped my hand in his. “Whether we’re singing or just talking like this.” I can feel the warmth from his palm radiating throughout my entire body. He takes his thumb and rubs it softly over my knuckles. “I don’t have to put on a show for you.… It just feels good to be around you.”