She’s also introduced me to Korean dramas. I mainlined the shows Kingdom and Signal like they were Grade A drugs. I guess they were in their own way. With each minute I spent with Boyoung, I regretted how I acted when I was younger, immature, and, well, stupid.

When I was little, Mom took me to Korean cultural programs in Minneapolis—“dragged” is a more accurate word. I hated attending them and for the entire five hours or so that it took to get there, I pretended that counting the cows was more interesting than any of my mom’s attempts at conversation. I was a real brat. The music they played sounded odd and foreign. The smell of the food seemed to cling to my clothes for days after. If a schoolmate asked me where I spent the weekend, I’d lie and say I was home sick.

The sad thing was that those visits were the only time I was surrounded by people who looked like me. I should’ve been more comfortable, but it served to remind me how different I was from my friends. Eventually, Mom stopped forcing me to go.

I’d intentionally closed my eyes and ears and now I was paying for it. If I’d continued to attend those programs, perhaps I’d have learned a little Korean and I wouldn’t be forced to ask Boyoung for help today.

But that wasn’t my story, so I reach inside my pocket and pull out the printout that I made today. It’s a new one. The copy I’ve been carrying around has been creased so much that some of the Hangul is indecipherable. It doesn’t matter to me because I have it memorized, but Boyoung needs to see all the characters correctly. It’s important that the translation be perfect. “I have a favor to ask.”

“Of course.” She smiles and gestures for me to continue.

I take a big breath and lay the sheet in front of her. I don’t know why I’m nervous but I’m glad I haven’t had any of the pizza yet. It’d be in my throat right now. “It’s a translation request. I looked it up online but you’ve said I can’t trust machine translations, so . . . would you mind?”

“Yes, yes.” She takes the paper and scans the contents.

The email is short—a few sentences. I recite the machine translation to myself as Boyoung reads it to herself. I can tell she’s finished because her jaw drops and her dark brown eyes grow wide.

Strangely, I find this shock reassuring. It means my own translation wasn’t that far off. “It’s from my father—my biological one, isn’t it?”

My friend nods slowly and her words stumble out. “How did you— Where did you— When?”

She sounds as confused and as surprised as I felt the first time I read the email.

“A while back,” I begin vaguely, not wanting to admit that my father’s announcement that he was having a biological child sent me into a panic at my big age, “I signed up for a DNA matching service on the internet. You send your blood in along with whatever details you have about your adoption, and then, if both parties consent, you are contacted if there’s a match. I didn’t get a response, so I figured either there was no match or my birth parents didn’t consent.” I tug the paper out from under Boyoung’s hand and trace a finger over the Hangul at the end. Lee Jonghyung. That was my father’s name—my biological father. My mind keeps inserting that adjective, as if I’m going to forget. “The sperm donor” would be Mom’s term for him. “I figured there was no match because, you know, I was left on the street.”