I barely register the sound of the audience screaming with applause as Electric Flower ends their set. The starlight cover lifts and daylight streams back into the stadium. I pull away from Jason just as the light floods the space between us. He looks as dazzled as I feel.

“We’re up next,” I whisper.

“Right,” he says, his voice raspy.

“There you two are!” We both turn to see Mina marching toward us, her stilettos clicking rapidly against the stage floor. “Come on, come on, let’s get ready.”

My lips still tingling as I hurry to join Mina, I turn my focus to the performance, but my mind is lingering on that kiss.

The kiss. Holy shit. I just kissed Jason.

The MC’s voice booms out across the stadium. “Introducing the first-ever performance of their new single, ‘Summer Heat,’ please welcome Jason Lee with Rachel Kim and Choo Mina!” I can hear Leah from her front-row seat, cheering and applauding along with the rest of the audience. Mina saunters out, basking in their adoration, and I’m about to follow when I feel a hand on mine. I turn to the side, and Jason smiles at me, giving my fingers a squeeze. I squeeze back and quickly drop his grip as the two of us walk out onto the sunlit stage.

In this moment, I feel like I could face a thousand cameras.

Fifteen

For most families, summer in Korea means swan boating in the Han River, fireworks at Haeundae Beach in Busan, and watching the parade of lanterns on Buddha’s birthday. But for my family it means one thing: naengmyeon.

Four bowls of the ice-cold noodles are spread across our table, each one topped with thin slices of pear, cucumber, beef, and half a hard-boiled egg, except for mine, which is cucumber-free. Umma rings the buzzer on our table to ask the waiter for extra pear slices for Leah like she always does. Appa fishes out the excess ice shavings floating in his broth and plops them in my bowl like he always does. All that ice makes his teeth chatter, while I like mine extra-chilled.

“Rachel, you’ve been glowing lately,” Appa says, beaming at me from across the table.

“I’m not surprised. Her performance last week was amazing,” Leah says. She squeezes an extra shot of vinegar into her bowl before slurping up a huge helping of noodles. “It was the highlight of the whole concert! And I’m not just saying that because we’re sisters. Unni was born to be onstage.”

I grin. “Thanks, Leah.”

Umma says nothing as she jabs at her naengmyeon with a pair of scissors. Truthfully, she’s barely said a word to me since that day Mina sent her the video of me drunk at the trainee house. A small lump forms in my throat when I think of Leah bursting into our apartment after the concert, screaming about how amazing it all was—how we hit every note, every step, and had the entire stadium on their feet clapping along. But Umma didn’t even smile or say congratulations. She just looked at me and said, “I imagine DB will be announcing the Family Tour any day now.”

I swallow hard, forcing down a bite of egg.

Just then, my phone buzzes, and I peek at the screen under the table.

Hey, are you tired? ’Cause you’ve been running through my mind all day. A gif of an exploding heart pops up next to the message.

I snort. It turns out, unsurprisingly really, that Jason is the prince of cheesy pickup lines. He sends me ridiculous texts like this at least three times a day, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love it.

Appa raises his eyebrows. “Everything okay, Rachel? You’re smiling like you won the lottery.”

“It’s nothing,” I say. But he’s right. My smile is so big my cheeks hurt. I tuck my phone away and try to focus on my family. It’s been a while since Appa’s come home early enough to eat dinner with us. Between late nights at the gym followed by even later nights studying, the dark bags under his eyes have reached ultimate panda level. I can tell Umma is worried about him by the way her eyebrows pinch together every time she glances over between bites of naengmyeon. Like she wants to make sure he hasn’t floated away in the middle of the meal.

As tired and stressed as they are, they’re both smiling and nodding along at Leah, who has somehow mastered the skill of carrying on a conversation without missing a beat while simultaneously scrolling through her phone, liking Instagram photos and reading her favorite K-pop gossip blogs. It’s disturbingly impressive.

While Leah jabbers on about Kim Chanwoo’s recent bout of amnesia on Oh My Dreams, my mind wanders to a couple days ago, when Jason and I snuck away to a movie theater he’d rented out for us for a few hours after practice. (One great thing about Korean culture is that it makes secret relationships pretty easy to maintain—there are private movie rooms, private karaoke rooms, and private dining rooms at most restaurants). We could select whatever we wanted to watch. Jason suggested Train to Busan, but I’ve never been a huge fan of the zombie apocalypse and convinced him to watch Say Anything instead. It came out before I was even born, but it was Umma’s favorite movie and we used to watch it together in New York. I’ve seen it thirty times, at least. Thirty-one now, with Jason—and I’m still a sucker for John Cusack holding a boom box outside Ione Skye’s window.

“Do you want me to serenade you like that?” Jason asked, his arms wrapped around me on the couch as he bent down to kiss the tip of my nose.

“Of course,” I said, deadpan, giving him my most serious look. “But do you think you’d be able to pull it off? I mean, holding a boom box and standing still. That’s not easy. It’s a whole league above K-pop dancing.”

He deadpanned back at me. “You doubt my serenading abilities? You sure know how to cut a guy to the core, Rachel Kim. Come on, let’s go right now—I’ll serenade you in the street.”

I burst out laughing, sure he was joking, but he was already up and dragging me toward the door. “Jason, stop!” I almost shouted. “We can’t go outside together! Why do you think I insisted on meeting here in private? You know how strict DB is about the no-dating rule!”

Jason laughed, brushing it off. “Those rules aren’t really enforced. They just say that to scare us and keep us on track. Trust me.” He squeezed my shoulders. “We’ll be fine.”

I raised an eyebrow skeptically. Part of me wanted to believe him and cast aside Kang Jina’s warning, but I have six years of DB media training and dance practice and the endless hours of wall sits we’ve all endured on my side. Just being there with Jason was risky enough. I couldn’t afford to take any more.

“Jason,” I said, “I’m not sure what world you’re living in, but I really don’t think DB would—”

“Rachel,” Jason cut in, giving me a smile that made my stomach feel like it was floating away. “I don’t want to go anywhere else. Why would I? When I could be here. Alone. With you.” He took a step toward me, and we tumbled back onto the leather couch, Jason’s hands tangled in my hair as he leaned in to kiss me.…

“Unni, hello? Did you hear me?”

“Huh?” I snap back to the naengmyeon restaurant, where Leah is looking at me with wide eyes. Her face has gone completely pale, like she’s just seen a ghost.

“I said, did you know about this?” She holds up her phone. “Kang Jina is leaving Electric Flower!”