I lean against the metal and take a deep calming breath. My emotions are all over the place. One minute, I’m excited to dance the night away. The next, I can’t breathe. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I clear my throat, run a hand through my hair, and tug on the waistband of my jeans. I wish I had a glass of water instead of the soju.

I haven’t felt this disoriented since my freshman year during the Drake Relays when I drank for four days straight and woke up on the fifth thinking I was blind but really my eyes were just glued shut from all the alcohol I’d imbibed. It was the first and last real bender I’d ever gone on. As I rest my hand against the railing, I remind myself I’m no longer eighteen and away from my mother for the first time, but an actual adult so I don’t need to down liquor like I’m never getting another chance at the bottle. I close my eyes and count my breaths. Inhale one. Exhale two. Inhale one. Exhale two. The faint roar of the airplanes taking off fills the night air, but it’s still quieter. My chest no longer feels like it’s about to cave in.

Incheon looks like a scene out of a Marvel movie. The buildings are sleek and rounded. Tall, statement buildings. Dozens of cranes, heavy machinery, and scaffolding fill the skyline. It’s a manufactured place and none of it seems entirely real. Maybe if I stretched out a hand, it’d pierce the computer-generated image and I’d stumble forward to find myself in my apartment back home.

“There you are.” A voice slices through the silence like a whip.

Electricity arcs up my spine. I know that voice. It might be the only familiar one in all of Korea other than Boyoung’s, and so I shouldn’t be surprised when I spin around and find Choi Yujun standing on the first landing of the wide stairs that lead up to the entrance of the club. I am, though, and my return greeting sticks in my throat.

“We met at the airport,” he says, as if I could ever forget. His long legs cover the stairs two at a time and he’s in front of me, within dimple-poking distance, even before I can blink. He’s dressed in black slacks and a silky shirt whose top two buttons are undone. A hint of his clavicle peeks out. I scrape my teeth along my lower lip and wonder when collarbones became sexy.

“I remember,” I reply, a little too breathlessly. You’re not eighteen, remember, Hara? “Choi Yujun. You gave me a ride home.”

“You’re supposed to call me Yujun, remember?” He grins and the left dimple winks into existence. I’m glad I’m still holding on to the railing. “And take me out for a giant steak dinner.”

I’d forgotten that. The news of my father’s death followed by the funeral and then the discovery of the five photos had shoved everything else out of my brain. I’d forgotten my mother, Boyoung, and this man. Thinking back, though, I never would have called him because Yujun from Seoul was as much a mirage as the images that flash along the exterior of Club Dance—a dream. Perfect but not real.