After they curl my hair and put me in an ice-blue wrap dress (“Perfect for a casual brunch!”), we head to what is supposed to be my favorite childhood restaurant—but what is actually a French restaurant that’s so fancy I can’t even pronounce its name.

“Remember, you’ll take a long time staring at the menu and settle on the onion soup,” the director says, looking at me. “Jason, get whatever you want. And action!”

I would have much preferred the duck confit waffles—or even better, Alice’s Tea Cup, this amazing old Alice in Wonderland–themed tea shop where Leah and I used to celebrate our birthdays, eating scones and drinking tea with our pinkies up and feeling like princesses. I’m usually too busy to feel anything but tired these days, but suddenly a pang of homesickness hits me so hard that I almost fall off my chair. I grip my legs to the seat and pretend to peruse the French brunch items for an unnecessary amount of time as Jason goes ahead and orders the duck confit waffles. Of course. I’m almost tempted to ask him for a bite, but after dinner in Brantwood, things between us are weirder than they’ve ever been.

The director gestures for me to hurry up and say my line. I lift my glass and smile. “Cheers!” I can only bring myself to look him in the eye for a split second as we clink our glasses. As I do, my stomach growls in hunger and I hear Jason snort with laughter. I look away quickly, taking a sip of my drink (I’m not even sure what’s in mine. Pink lemonade? Grapefruit juice?) to cover up the fact that I am about two seconds away from dumping my bowl of soup all over my costar.

“Jalmukesumneda,” Jason says, even though he’s already inhaled half of his waffles.

“You have to say it like the French do,” I say primly, smiling at the camera. “Bon appétit!”

I’ve barely lifted the spoon to my lips when the director yells, “Cut! Perfect. Let’s head to the next spot.”

“But I haven’t even eaten,” I say, blinking.

“We’ll get it packed up to go,” the director says, distracted. “We need to get a move on if we want to finish filming today.” He turns to his assistant. “Can we get another outfit change for the girl?”

I look sadly down at my onion soup. Suddenly, Jason looks at me in concern.

“Here,” he says, nudging his plate toward me. “Eat the rest.”

I’m too hungry to argue, and I grab the plate from him, gulping down a few bites of waffle so quickly I can barely taste it, and before I know it, I’m being shoved into a pair of skintight leather pants and stilettos and deposited into the middle of Times Square. The sun is beating so hard that I can’t even touch the top of my head without my fingers burning. Whoever decided that leather pants and stilettos were a good combo for the most crowded place in New York City should seriously question their fashion choices.

A group of girls stops a few feet away from us, gasping and reaching for their phones to snap a photo. “Oh my god, it’s Jason Lee from NEXT BOYZ!”

“Ugh, but he’s with that Rachel Kim girl.” One of the girls sneers in my direction. “Isn’t South Korea known for their plastic surgery? If I were her, I would get a whole new face.” His fans have been following us around all day. Once one person saw us and posted our location on social media, we’ve had crowds of people popping up out of nowhere to gush over Jason.

I’m having Lotte World flashbacks and sweat is pouring down my legs, but the cameras are rolling and I have no choice but to keep a smile plastered on my face. The director leads us around the middle of Times Square, positioning us on the bottom row of the red TKTS bleachers, gesturing at me to recite my line about how this is my favorite spot in the whole city and it was where I would come and imagine my future as a famous K-pop star. (For the record: it is not and no native New Yorker who values their mental health would ever willingly come to Times Square.)

We walk past a halal cart, and the smell of grilling meats practically makes me swoon. I remember Umma and Appa used to buy shawarma and falafel every Friday night for dinner from the halal guy two blocks over from our old apartment. They would say he came to America to find a better life, just like they had. It was always so good too, the soft chewy pita, the grilled chicken, and the cool, tart tzatziki sauce.…

Suddenly, Jason’s arms are around me and my cheek is pressed into his chest.

I blink. What just happened?

“Are you okay?” he asks, worry etched into his face. “You were swaying, and it looked like you were about to collapse.”

“I was?” I say, my eyes squinting in the sunlight. I press my hand to my head, feeling woozy.

Jason turns angrily to the camera crew. “Stop filming! Can’t you see she needs a break?”

“But, Jason, we’re on a tight schedule,” the director says, looking over his notes for the next scene.

“I don’t care if we’re on a tight schedule,” Jason snaps back. “You would stop in a second if I said I needed a break.”

The director’s head whips up. “Jason, are you okay? Do you need a break? Cut! People, cut for Jason. And let’s get him some water, please?”

Jason shakes his head furiously. “No, what?! This is exactly what I’m talking about. The star of your video just almost collapsed from lack of food and water and you’re more concerned about me.”

“Because you’re Jason Lee. You’re DB’s biggest star—”

“You know what,” Jason says, cutting him off. “You’re right. I am Jason Lee. And I’ve decided that we’re taking the rest of the day off.”

He grabs a pair of sweatpants, a T-shirt, and some sneakers off the rack holding all my preapproved outfits for the day and leads me away from the crew. His fans are going wild with their phones, no doubt capturing the whole exchange on Snapchat, but I don’t care. I realize with a sudden jolt that I’ve spent so much time in front of the cameras this past week that I barely even noticed them today.

“Come on.” He grins, holding out his hand, then says the three most beautiful words in the English language. “Let’s get lunch.”

* * *

I breathe a sigh of relief as I dig into my second Shake Shack burger, my feet tucked under my seat as we sit in our Uber by Madison Square Park. Next to me, Jason’s window is open and he’s taking pictures of tourists feeding french fries to a group of particularly fat squirrels.

“So… what’s it really like being back in New York?” Jason asks slowly. Now that I’ve eaten, the fact that Jason and I are alone together for the first time since that night in the pojangmacha seems to be setting in for both of us.

“It’s weird,” I admit after a pause. Not sure what else to say, I swallow a bite of burger, my homesickness still looming large inside me.

Jason nods, his eyes darting around the park, refusing to look in my direction. “In what way?”

I sigh. It makes me think about how different things are for me and my family since we moved to Korea. “I don’t know. In every way.” Almost without thinking, I pull out my phone and show him Appa’s graduation selfie. “My dad just graduated from law school. I’m the only one in our family who knows because he wanted to keep it a secret until he was sure he could succeed.” I look at Appa’s smiling face on the screen. “And I get that. I feel a lot of pressure too. If this whole K-pop thing doesn’t work out, all those years of training will have been for nothing, and I’m terrified of that happening.”