Home Straight

The season didn’t slow down after Korea.

If anything, it got much faster.

Between races, Nick’s life turned into a blur that combined airports, simulators, hotel rooms, and headlines that updated faster than he could read them. The calendar sped fast without waiting—Miami, then Canada—two races that continued the momentum he had established in the first three races.

Miami was, expectedly, an exciting blend of heat and spectacle. The cameras combined with the circuit walls to surround him on the track, adding danger to the excitement. But Nick kept his head down, drove clean, and when the checkered flag fell, his name sat third on the timing screen.

His first podium hadn’t been a fluke.

Canada came after, much cooler in temperature but by-no-means any slower, A race with long straights sandwiching tight turns, it wasn’t a race that rewarded mistakes, yet Nick didn’t make many. He brought the car home comfortably inside the top five, another solid result added quietly to a rookie season, the likes of which hadn’t been seen for some time now.

There was no longer room for rookie mistakes.

His potential and skill were rapidly increasing, an observation shared by many, including his team, the other drivers, the whole world even.

Somewhere between all the debriefs and press briefings, Nick realized something else had changed too.

While his drive to succeed and excel in the sport had only increased, his thoughts were increasingly being drawn to something else—no someone else.

The message came while Nick was still half-buried in post-race routine.

Having just showered, Nick was currently changing into much comfier clothing. Sitting on the edge of the hotel bed, he gazed at the distant and blurry city lights beyond the window.

His phone buzzed once.

Then again.

He picked it up immediately.

He knew who it was.

When he finally looked, the message was short.

🡺 Are you free tonight?

Nick laid down on the edge of bed, his legs still hanging off the bed, thumb hovering before he typed.

🡸 I should be. Why?

The three dots lingered a bit longer than expected before flickering. He could picture her—thinking about what to say, probably staring at her schedule with that tiny crease between her brows.

When the dots appeared again, they lingered.

🡺 I have a gap. It’s small.

🡺 But I don’t want to waste it.

Nick sat up.

🡸 Neither do I.

Another pause.

Then—

🡺 We can’t go anywhere obvious.

🡺 No places with windows. No staff. No photos.

🡺 Somewhere we can leave separately.

He smiled despite the obvious risk.

The way she spoke implied she had thoroughly planned this.

🡺 I know a place,

🡺 Close. Quiet. Not trendy enough to matter.

🡸 Are you sure?

🡺 I wouldn’t suggest it if I wasn’t.

He waited before responding.

🡸 Okay.

🡺 But let’s not arrive together.

🡸 You first. I’ll be ten minutes behind.

🡺 Understood.

Nick nodded to himself before replying.

🡸 Deal.

A few seconds passed.

Then—

🡸 This is a date, right?

He waited for the reply for what felt like an eternity.

🡺 Yes Nick, it is a date.

Her response came almost immediately.

🡸 Good. Then I’ll see you there.

The screen went dark.

Nick stood and grabbed his jacket. He slipped the phone into his pocket, glanced once more at his reflection in the mirror, and stepped out into the hallway.

The door clicked shut behind him.

The restaurant wasn’t the kind that you would know about from a guide.

There was no huge, glowing sign nor a line wrapping around a whole city block. Just a quiet storefront tucked between a laundromat and a closed bookstore, its windows slightly tinted and foggy from the warmth inside. The lettering above the door had faded enough that you had to already know what it said to read it.

Areum stopped across the street and stared for a moment.

She checked her phone again; the message thread was quiet now. Nick had sent a single text earlier.

🡸 I’ll be late. Ten minutes.

That had been the plan.

She pulled her cap lower and crossed the street.

The bell above the door chimed softly when she stepped inside.

The woman behind the counter looked up, not recognizing Areum.

“Corner booth?” she asked.

Areum nodded.

The booth sat deep in the back, tucked into the far corner beneath a hanging light. A divider ran alongside it—the dark wood slats worn smooth. From here, the booth was isolated, feeling like a separate world inside of a bigger one.

Areum slid into the booth and set her phone face down on the table. She ordered tea and wrapped her hands around the cup when it arrived, letting the warmth seep in. Her shoulders eased as the minutes passed.

“Ten minutes,” she reminded herself.

When the door chimed again, it was much louder for Areum than anyone else in the store.

Nick came in quietly, baseball cap low, jacket zipped halfway. He paused just inside the door, eyes adjusting, scanning. When he found her in the corner, his posture shifted, loosening with relief.

He walked over calmly and took the seat.

“You’re right on time,” she said softly as he slid into the booth across from her.

“Barely,” he replied. “Traffic. Hard to drive the team-provided car without being noticed.”

Areum looked past the booth and out the window to look at the car Nick came with.

Nick’s car was low and compact, finished in deep black. Thin gold pinstripes traced the body, subtle, running cleanly along the sides and rear.

The shape was smooth, with a short, pointed nose sitting close to the ground, and headlights sharp and aggressive. From the side, the car looked tightly wound, its curves hugging the wheels intimately. The rear tapered cleanly into a visible diffuser and twin exhausts, with a small fixed wing that looked more functional than flashy.

She smiled, then looked at Nick teasingly. “Good instincts.”

He set his phone face down beside him and leaned back slightly, making eye contact with Areum. For a moment, the small table between them became much smaller.

“You look tired,” she said.

“So do you,” he answered.

They shared a quiet laugh, the kind that didn’t need to go anywhere.

They ordered quickly. Areum spoke easily with the server, asking for recommendations, choosing what the server had suggested. Nick followed her lead, nodding along. When the food arrived, it came in simple bowls, steam curling upward, inviting them to eat.

The warmth settled between them.

Nick began talking about the last couple races: Miami’s heat created an intense environment that Nick overcame with a second hard-fought podium finish; Canada’s cooler climate brought the satisfaction of a clean top-five finish. He spoke with his hands sometimes, stopping himself halfway through and stuttering when he noticed.

“You’re very fun to listen to,” Areum said with a laugh, stirring her soup.

“I think I’m learning how to be,” he replied. “I hope I’m not boring you too much.”

She hummed, thoughtful. “You’re okay, I’m having fun listening.”

“Well, how about you?” he asked. “How is the world of a k-pop idol?”

She shrugged, a small motion. “Rehearsals followed by performances concluded with fan meetings. Oh, and monitoring what the internet is saying about me.”

He smiled. “You’re good at that.”

“At about the second year mark after debuting, you start to get the hang of it,” she said, rolling her eyes lightly.

Their conversation slipped easily into quieter things. Old memories that they both held dearly. Small complaints that definitely couldn’t leave the booth. They laughed softly, leaning in without realizing it, with voices lowered in the already-quiet restaurant.

At some point, Areum glanced at the clock on the wall behind him and then quickly away. Nick noticed but chose not to say anything.

Halfway through the meal, she reached for her phone.

“Wait,” she said.

He stilled instinctively. “What’s up?”

“I want to take a picture,” she said quickly. “Just me.”

His shoulders eased. He leaned back a little more, turning his body away from the table. “Okay.”

She lifted her phone, framing herself with the ease that came from years of media training. Considering thins that seemed foreign to Nick, such as angle, the light, the careful avoidance of anything identifying. Her face. The warm glow overhead. A sliver of the divider behind her.

Nick stayed still, deliberately out of frame.

“Don’t move,” she murmured.

“I’m frozen,” he replied.

The shutter clicked once.

She glanced at the photo, lips curving into a small, pleased smile, and locked her phone without showing him.

“For me,” she said.

“Of course,” he answered.

They ate the rest of the meal slowly, but seemingly rushing due to the late hour. The warmth lingered, but there was an almost—ephemeral edge to it.

Nick pushed his bowl aside first. “I should probably go soon.”

She nodded, understanding that she couldn’t ask for more. “I know.”

They sat in the quiet for a few seconds longer than necessary, neither moving.

“I’m glad we did this,” she said.

“Me too,” he replied. “It feels…like picking up where we left off, all those years ago.”

She smiled at that, soft and a little sad. “I’m sorry…for that.”

“No,” he agreed. “It’s ok…we’re here now and I wouldn’t change it for the world.”

He stood first, slipping out of the booth and heading to the counter. He paid quickly, left a tip that made the woman smile, and came back to the table.

Areum stood a minute later, mask already back on, coat pulled close around her.

“I’ll head out first,” he said.

Nick stepped out through the side door and waited in the parking lot, hands in his pockets.

The parking lot of the restaurant, half-lit and mostly empty, was the kind of place people only passed through on their way somewhere else. A single streetlamp cast a soft pool of light near the far corner, leaving shadows all over the asphalt.

A few minutes later, Areum spotted him immediately. When their eyes met, something felt heavy, yet warm in her chest. She walked over to him, her sneakers trotting softly against the pavement.

“You okay?” he asked as she reached him.

She nodded. “Yeah. You?”

“Yeah.”

Nick opened the passenger door for her, waiting until she was seated before moving around to the driver’s side. The two sat in the car after putting on their seatbelts. For a moment, neither of them said anything.

The car smelled faintly like coffee and clean car scent. A strangely unremarkable, yet intimate moment

Nick started the engine, keeping his voice low even though there was no one to overhear. “Is there a more secluded spot I could drop you off in?”

She glanced at him, eyes soft. “Yes, there is an underground parking garage that I use with my people to enter and exit the building”

He smiled at that, just a little, and eased the car out of the lot.

They drove without rushing. The city slipped past the windows in quiet streaks of light, reflections stretching and dissolving across the glass. Areum leaned back in her seat, coat folded neatly over her lap, hands resting together like she didn’t quite know what to do with them.

Nick waited, one hand still resting on the steering wheel, the other relaxed against his thigh.

“I’ve been thinking about something,” Areum said finally.

Nick turned slightly toward her. “Yeah?”

She nodded once, as if confirming to herself what she was going to ask. “About when I left.”

His chest tightened, enough to make him sit straighter.

“For Korea?” he asked.

She glanced at him. “When else would I mean?”

He huffed a quiet breath.

Another pause.

“I don’t think we ever talked about it,” she said, “like in detail.”

“No,” he agreed. “We have not.”

She shifted in her seat, turning to face him. Her expression wasn’t sad, exactly, but more like vulnerable.

“I want to know something,” she said. “And you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”

Nick shook his head immediately. “Ask away, if it’s something I can answer I will.”

She held his gaze. “Did you have feelings for me back then?”

Nick kept his eyes on the road, but put both hands on the wheel.

“Yes,” he admitted. “I did.”

Her shoulders dropped slightly, her cheeks became flushed in a soft red.

“How long?” she asked.

He thought about it. “Hmm…about as long as you’ve wanted to be an idol.”

She gave a quiet, humorless laugh. “That…was a very long time.”

“I didn’t want to become a reason you’d waver on your dream,” he continued. “You’d been working toward that for so long, I didn’t want to be the thing that made you hesitate.”

“I might have,” she said.

He looked at her. “Guess I made the right choice then.”

“I know,” she said quickly. “I’m not saying you should’ve stopped me. I just… I want you to know that if you’d said something, it would’ve at least been reciprocated.”

Nick let out a small laugh this time, “Well that’s good to know now, in hindsight.”

She leaned back against the seat, staring at the windshield. “I thought it was one-sided. Or that I’d imagined it.”

“Really,” he responded immediately, “I feel like you would’ve had to have noticed.”

She turned back to him. “Did it ever go away?”

The question landed heavier than the others, but Nick didn’t have to think about the answer.

“No,” he said. “It didn’t.”

Her breath caught, just slightly.

“I didn’t forget you,” he went on. “I just stopped letting myself think about it. But every time something important happened you were still there, in my head. In my heart, and that never changed.”

Areum swallowed.

“I felt the same, you know,” she said. “I never really regretted leaving to become an idol, but at the same time I regretted not getting to say what I should’ve. When things got hard over in Korea, I’d tell myself that it was my fault that I didn’t reach out and that it was too late or unfair to have told you about it after the fact”

They sat with that for a moment, the truth settling between them.

“But the feeling didn’t fade,” she said plainly.

“So,” Nick said quietly, “it never stopped.”

She shook her head. “No. It didn’t.”

He nodded once. “I still love you, I still want to be with you.”

The simplicity of that statement made it feel much heavier.

“Then I’ll say it properly,” she said. “I loved you back then. I didn’t stop either. I just didn’t think I was allowed to.”

Nick’s breath caught.

“So… we’re not imagining this,” he said.

“No,” she replied. “We never were.”

Another beat.

She reached for his hand, fingers warm and certain.

“I want to be with you too,” she said. “Not someday. Now.”

Nick smiled.

“Okay,” he said.

“Okay,” she echoed.

The hotel came into view sooner than either of them wanted.

Nick slowed as they approached the main entrance, headlights painting the dim tunnel with light. He turned in, rounding the corner toward the underground entrance of the parking garage. The air inside was cool and still, concrete pillars rising in neat rows. Only a few cars were scattered throughout the space.

Nick parked near the far end, away from the elevators, and turned off the engine.

The silence settled around them again, thicker now.

Areum unbuckled her seatbelt but didn’t move right away. She turned toward him instead, studying his face like she was checking something against memory.

“You look tired,” she said.

“So do you,” he replied.

She smiled, fondly. “We both followed our dreams, and live busy lives because of it.”

“Maybe,” he said. “But it gave us a chance to be together again too.”

“It did,” she agreed.

She glanced toward the elevator bank, then back at him.

“I should go,” she said quietly.

“Yeah,” he replied, just as quietly.

Neither of them moved.

Nick reached out first, resting his hand lightly over hers where it lay on her lap. She turned her hand, fingers threading through his.

“Be careful,” she said.

He squeezed her hand once. “You too.”

She leaned closer, not all the way, just enough that he could feel the warmth of her. Their foreheads nearly touched, breaths mingling in the space between them.

“This is hard,” she murmured.

“I know.”

“But I don’t regret it.”

“Neither do I.”

She pulled back first, the moment breaking gently. She opened the door and stepped out, the garage light catching in her hair. Before closing it, she looked back at him.

“Text me when you’re back,” she said.

“I will.”

She nodded, satisfied, and shut the door softly.

Nick stayed where he was as she walked toward the elevators, her footsteps echoing faintly against the concrete.

When the elevator doors closed, Nick leaned back in his seat and let out a slow breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.

He restarted the engine and pulled out of the space, driving up the ramp and back into the night.