Presley was spending the last two weeks of summer with her mom in Seoul, South Korea. As usual, her mom took her along to do her daily routine as much as possible. She was surprised when they stopped in front of a dojo. "You do karate?" she looked at her mom.
"It's called Tang Soo Do. I joined because I figured we can have something in common when you get here." She took her daughter by surprise. She never did anything that showed she cared what Lee was interested in. Every summer was Lee doing her hobby and if she shared them great, but if not it was an experience.
"Yeah, well, that's something… do you like it?" She wonders.
"It's a good exercise and I'm learning to defend myself which is a useful skill." She shrugged.
Lee nods, she may not be enjoying herself but the attempt was there. "Well, let's get started." She was excited to show off to her mom.
Lee was sitting outside a cafe with milk tea and gilgeori toast. She got a video from Monica, a friend she met doing yoga with Moon. The video was Eli dancing with a girl. He had his arms wrapped around her while she rubs her ass on his crotch. There was a text saying that he went home with Chris and Dirk, but it didn't take away from the sting. She was gone for one night and he was out partying like he was single. With the 17-hour time difference, she had the choice of staying up until three in the morning to have an argument or wait to get back to have the conversation.
"Hey, you speak English, yes?" A boy approached her table.
"Yes, I do." She nods.
"I sit with you? I want to practice my English." He points to the chair. He sat down after she told him he could. It was a nice distraction as she helped him understand the weird rules of English. They were going over the worksheet he got at summer school.
A girl ran up to them, slamming her hands down on the table, screaming in Korean. "What? What's happening?" She glanced at Do-Yun.
"Misunderstanding." He stood up to try and calm her down.
Lee stood up when the girl pushed past him to get to the table. The girl grabs the milk tea and raises it towards Lee. Seeing where this was going, Lee slaps the cup in the other direction so the tea covers the angry teen. She screams and charges at her. Lee sidesteps and lifts her leg to kick her stomach. The momentum of her running took the breath from her. She fell to the floor in the fetal position, holding her stomach. Do-Yun grabs her and drags her away. "So fucking stupid." She rolled her eyes.
"What do you expect when you have a date with someone's boyfriend?" She turned her head, ready to tell whoever to fuck off but stopped when she saw him. He had brown eyes that danced with mischief, spiky hair that resembled Kuroo Tetsuro, high cheekbones, and a cocky smirk that rivals Draco Malfoys. She knew he had to be bad news with how he made her heart race.
"It wasn't a date. I was helping him practice English." She glares.
"You fell for a line like that. I guess the rumors are true. American women are easy." That smirk was looking smackable now.
"Fuck off." She hissed and was going to walk across the street where a park was for him to step in front of her.
"You know karate." He wasn't asking, he was stating a fact.
"You know that from one kick." She tilts her head.
"And the way you redirected the drink." He nods.
"So, you must do Tang Soo Do. Of course, I can't seem to get away from fighters." She walks around him to continue to the park. She didn't realize he was following her until he sat down on a bench beside her. She couldn't believe she didn't hear him.
"Kwon Jae-Sung." He stuck his hand out.
"Presley Cole." She shook his hand firmly. Her father made sure she had the perfect business handshake.
"So, have you done any tournaments?" He asks.
"One, it's called the All Valley. I got eliminated in the second round." She told him.
"So, you're not that good." He chuckles while taking out his phone.
"If that's how you measure it." She shrugged. She looks down at the phone when she hears the voice of a familiar announcer. It was her first match against the Novak girl. She watched herself deliver the kick that she later learned broke a few ribs.
"You don't have to watch that." She tried to take it from his hand when he pushed to watch her second-round fight.
He stood up quickly. "What's wrong? You don't want me to see you get your ass kicked." She could tell by his face when he saw her lose control. It went from amusement to shock. When her violent screams stopped, he looked down at her in awe.
"That was beautiful." His eyes shined.
"What?" She never saw this reaction after someone watched that video.
"Do you have a boyfriend?" He asked so boldly, making her blush.
"Yes?… Yes, I do." She corrected her tone when it came out like a question.
"Too bad, you should still come to a… you Americans would call it, fight club, we have here." He took her unlocked phone from her hands to put his number in.
"I don't know." She was unsure about doing something dangerous with a stranger in a foreign country.
"Come on, you were only in one tournament, don't you want to test your skills? You can't do that in a spar in practice. It needs to be a real fight." He smirked when he saw the gears turning in her head.
She didn't so much want to test her skill, but her restraint. She wanted to see if she could take someone down without breaking something. "Yeah, I'll text you so you have my number too."
"That's done already." He hands her phone back to her. "I'll see you tomorrow night."
Lee was on a dojo mat in the basement of a seedy bar with a cheering crowd surrounding her. She was standing over a sobbing woman who was holding her ribs with a bloody nose. There was no rage or hard feeling for the stranger on the ground. Only a sense of pride and accomplishment burning in her chest. "The American Psycho, right here." Kwon pulls her off the mat.
"Hey, Kwon." She looks to see a guy with big ears walking towards them.
"Yoon." He mutters. They talk in Korean. When they were done, he threw an arm around her shoulders to pull her out of the bar.
"Who was that guy? A friend?" She stood in front of his ninja motorcycle.
"He isn't a friend. He is an annoyance. He thinks he can boss me around. Telling me I can't bring outsiders here." He huffs.
"I don't want to get you in trouble." She put her hands in her pockets.
"He has no authority. He's a fucking idiot who thinks he's hot shit because sensei named him the top student." He rolls his eyes.
"If he's top, doesn't that make him hot shit?" She laughs at him being a sour loser.
"He only got it, because sensei thinks I'm too much of a loose cannon." He crossed his arms, leaning against the bike.
"I get that." She nods. "Can you…. Can you control it? You know the instinct to go for the kill."
"Control it? If I wanted to I could. Why would I?" He squints.
"I don't know. I want to." She whispers but he hears her.
He let out a bitter laugh. "Don't let anyone fool you. Martial arts weren't made for self-defense. It was made for war. People tell themselves that inner peace bullshit so they can feel better about hitting someone in the face. Me and you, we are the ones truly honoring the sport, not them."
"Last time, I felt rage when I was fighting Piper but tonight I felt proud. Now that the adrenaline wears off I don't feel anything." She was worried about the feeling of nothing like she didn't leave someone injured on a basement floor.
"Piper?" He asks.
"The girl from the second video." She explains.
He nods his head before taking a helmet off the seat. "Embrace yourself." He puts the helmet on her head and clips it on. "We have the true fighter spirit."
"Of course, you want to go to a place like this." Kwon looked around in disgust at the dog cafe.
"Stop, you can not be grumpy while looking at this face." She pets Chow Chow's head, which is on her lap.
"It's just a mutt." He sips strawberry milk.
"I bet I can get his hair like yours." She tried to spike up the dog's hair.
He let out a sarcastic laugh that he did when he was mocking her joke. "Are all American women as funny as you?"
"No, you got lucky." She teases.
"I got something alright." He rolled his eyes. "So, how did you get into karate?"
"I had a lot of friends who did it, but my ex-girlfriend who I was able to remain friends with. She broke up with a girl and that girl blames me for the breakup. She was harassing me and making up wild rumors. So, I learned to kick her ass." She explained with no shame for the first time, because she knew if anyone would understand it would be him.
"Wait… Ex-girlfriend?" He thought of the most shocking thing to him from the story.
"Oh, yeah I guess I didn't mention it. I'm bisexual." She watches his face. It was nerve-wracking to tell someone after you got attached to them.
"Oh, so this girl was Piper. The girl from the second video." He pieces it together. She was relieved that he moved on like nothing. It was as if she told him she preferred bananas over oranges.
"Yeah." She drinks her Yuja Tea.
"So, why do you still do it?" He figured she could be done with it.
"As a way to bond with my friends." She stirs the tea. "I enjoy it, but it's not a passion."
"Shame, because I like watching you fight." He smiles sincerely, making her feel uneasy in the best possible way.
She took a deep breath to let out a scoff. "Please, you would get off on any kind of violence."
"You want to know what gets me off?" His smiles turn smug making her comfortable again.
"Like it's hard to do that. I probably just have to slap you across the face." She snorts.
"More like let me slap you. Not in the face but in another place." He winks. She giggled trying not to imagine him spanking her.
She looked at the check-in text that Eli sent to her before putting the phone back in her pocket. She thought about answering it knowing it was three am in California, but it wasn't like he stayed up to talk to her. He was at another party. This time she got a video from Yasmine of him doing body shots off a girl. "You good?" Kwon broke her out of her dilemma.
"Don't worry about her. She gets in her head sometimes. She is so smart, thoughts can become long." Her mom reassures him.
He stares at her until she gives him a small smile. "I can't believe I didn't realize these were Korean. I order them all the time." She grabbed a gimbap from the roll.
"You ignorant America thought they were sushi." He smirks, happy to have her back with them. She laughed while rolling her eyes. It was better that he found it amusing than him being offended. She had seen what happened when he got offended. She was pretty sure he gave that guy a concussion with the kick to the temple.
"He's such a kidder." Her mom was charmed by him when he came to pick her up earlier that day. She invited him along to dinner at the Gwangjang Market. He haggled for them and got all the classics like tteokbokki, hotteok, sundae/blood sausage. Lee shared a knowing look with her friend because she knew Kwon was never joking. He might be amused but he was telling his truth.
"Yeah, he should work on a stand-up routine." She gave a sarcastic laugh. He stuck his tongue out at her.
"Lee, are you still going out with that boy?" Her mom's question caught her off guard.
"Yeah, I'm going out with Eli. You know Eli, mom." She reminds her mom of her childhood friend, whom she has met several times.
"I don't know, I haven't heard about him much this trip so I was wondering if he was still around." She winks at Kwon. He looks so smug about her mom trying to set them up. Lee wanted the ground to swallow her whole.
Two weeks had flown by too quickly for Lee. Normally, by the end, she was ready to go back home. But, she wasn't ready this time. She was supposed to be on an airplane right now but unknown forces kept her here another night. "Hey, my plane is delayed and won't come until tomorrow. My mom already has plans so I was wondering if you wanted to do something?" She was sitting in her mom's apartment thinking she didn't want her extra night in Korea to go to waste.
"Sure, I have to cancel my date but I'll pick you up in an hour." Kwon was in the middle of getting ready to go.
"What? No, don't cancel your date. I can figure something out." She shook her head.
"Don't worry about it. The girl will be there tomorrow, you won't." He had sent the text.
"You don't know if she will be." She didn't want to ruin things for him.
"Trust me, she will. Now, go get ready, you like to take forever." He hangs up on her.
She went to the guest room. She didn't want to unpack her suitcase so she picked up the clothes on top. She put on a black sweater, leather skirt, pantyhose, and ballet flats. She brushed her hair and parted it to the right. She left it in its natural waves. She did a nude lip, smokey eyes, and light peach blush. A text letting her know he was outside made her put on a black crossbody purse that had a gold chain for a strap. She opened the door to see him in a black shirt, bomber jacket, jeans, and sneakers. "Look at us matching." She grabbed his arm. She let him lead her out of the building to the motorcycle.
"Come on," He hands her the helmet. She took it to put it on and grabbed his hand to keep balance as she swung her leg over to straddle the bike. She held on tight as he sped through the streets.
"A boat?" She looks up at the cruise boat.
"I had the tickets for the date." He had got the sunset cruise on the Han River. He grabs her hand to push their way through the crowd. He got them a prime space on the second floor by the railing.
"This could have been a romantic date. I'm sorry." She watches the sun slowly go down.
"There is a sunset every day." He shrugs.
She looks at him. He was breathtaking with the orange light reflecting on his face. She looks down at his hand, ignoring her eager to lace her fingers with his. Guilt pooled in her stomach when she wished it was a real date. She told herself that this was innocent. She hadn't done anything with him that she wouldn't do with Miguel. She didn't have a horrible ache in her chest at the thought of not seeing Miguel tomorrow.
"Hey! We have a beautiful view and you're looking at the ground. Stop wasting my money." He bumps her shoulder.
"I'm going to miss you." Her voice croaked.
"Oh, come on, you thought yesterday was your last night and didn't cry." He tsks at her tears.
"Yeah, but we went to the fight, so I had adrenaline running through my veins." She throws her arms around his middle and rests her head on his shoulder as tears continue.
"Jeez." He rubs her back. "I'm going to miss watching you smash people's faces."
She sighs. They had gone back to the bar's basement a lot during her trip. After the third time, the crowd cheered as soon as she entered the room. She earned herself the nickname, American Psycho. She fails every time to restrain herself. After a certain amount of adrenaline, she couldn't control the amount of force she used. Her instincts told her to go all out at any opening she saw. She had broken noses, fingers, and ribs, and fractured someone's jaw. "I'm going to miss that stupid laugh you do when you win." She teases.
"Fuck off, woman." He pushes the giggling girl off of him.
She wipes away her tears and uses her phone's camera to fix her makeup and hair. "Come on, take a selfie with me." She leans against him. He grabbed the phone since he was taller to get the perfect angle of her, him, and the sunset.