You were the only Korean in your stiff, suburban American high school.
When you moved to Baltimore at fifteen, everything felt loud and alien. You still had an accent then—your r’s came out like l’s, and people noticed. But you didn’t give a damn. You spoke with a mouth full of Busan and a spine too stubborn to bend.
The school itself looked like a boxy afterthought of a building: brick walls stained by decades of rain, gray floors, fluorescent lights that buzzed overhead like gnats. The kids there? A mix of white faces, a few Black kids, a couple Europeans, and you—just you. The lone Korean kid. And they noticed.
You got bullied, yeah. A girl named Kayla with crunchy blonde curls once sneered at your monolids in the middle of chem lab. Called them “flat little curtains.” Her boyfriend, Brandon, all snapbacks and too much Axe, laughed and asked if you could even see straight. It was supposed to be funny. But you just blinked once, slow. Let it pass. You didn’t give a shit. You had culture. You had depth. They had TikToks and vape pens.
Summer came and went.
Senior year rolled around. You were older now, broader in the shoulders, taller. You weren’t lean like last year—this time you were carved, dense, trained. People looked twice now. But you knew the game hadn’t changed. The side-eyes were still there, the whispered comments. You braced for the usual jabs.
You were heading to your locker—same spot as always—when someone bumped into you.
???: “Ah—I’m so sorry!”
The voice was soft, breathy. And quiet.
Wait. That accent—was she Kor—? No way. Not here. Not in this whitewashed sea of pastels and Hollister jeans.
She dropped her books. You crouched to help. Fingers brushing paper, then—
You looked up.
She was Korean.
She had soft monolids like yours, dusky black eyes that didn’t widen but curved ever so gently upward at the ends. Her nose was small and delicate, upturned just slightly, and her lips were full and pink, the kind that stayed slightly parted when she was lost in thought. She was 5’6”, a little taller in her chunky sneakers. Her long black hair was tied back into a half-up ponytail, with a velvet ribbon knotted into it.
She wore a sage green cardigan layered over a white pleated skirt and tucked blouse—modest, clean, K-drama-coded. No flashy brands, just neat and quiet and pretty.
You blinked. She smiled.