Somewhere Only We Know(18)

Fern let out an odd sound and I froze. But the next thing to come out of her mouth was a snore.

I gritted my teeth. I was going to have a heart attack because of this person.

Suddenly, she threw her arm across her face, knocking her cap off.

I finally had an unobstructed view of her.

She had a lot of makeup on, almost like she had been made up for some occasion. Which was at odds with the fact that she had been barefoot in hotel slippers. But the rest of her—long-sleeved shirt and jeans—looked normal.

What was she doing here?

Whatever the case, I was staring, so I eventually drew the blanket over her and turned off the bedside lamp.

I looked at my phone in the dark to check the time, the screen washing everything in a cold blue light. Every part of this made me feel like a serial killer. It was late, past midnight. Charlie usually got off work around seven in the morning, so we were safe from him busting in here.

I hoped, anyway.

After washing up, I climbed into my makeshift bed on the sofa, hearing Fern snoring lightly in the next room. A billion thoughts raced through my mind, making it pretty much a guaranteed nope for sleeping.

What if she woke up before me and freaked out?

What if she freaked out and screamed, making my neighbors, or worse, my landlady, run in here?

What if she freaked out, screamed, and someone called the cops?

Every scenario ended with me in Hong Kong jail and being some weird Reddit urban legend.

Because I couldn’t sleep, I swiped through my phone—going through social media accounts on autopilot.

As I scrolled through Twitter, an image popped up that made me pause.

It was an account for a comedian I followed—and it was about his upcoming performance on The Later Tonight Show. The image attached to the tweet showed the comedian’s face alongside another.

A Korean pop star.

Her name was Lucky and she was going to perform in a couple nights. Fresh off her Asian tour.

Oh.

My.

God?

Long, pink hair floating around a radiant face smoldering into the camera. Full cheeks, wide eyes, a smirky smile.

Holy crap. It was Fern.

I actually recognized her vaguely from some stuff in Rumours mentioning her tour. But without the pink hair, she wasn’t as recognizable to someone who didn’t follow K-pop that closely.

Okay.

Okay. So I have a K-pop star sleeping in my bed right now.

No, not my bed. The bed I share with my roommate! Right. That made it better.

I scrambled over to the bedroom and crouched at the edge of the bed. Trying not to make a peep, I tilted my head to get a better look at her face, shining my phone’s screen on it.

I gasped. There was no denying it. It was her.

All right, Jack. Chill. Remain calm. No big deal that you might have inadvertently KIDNAPPED A K-POP STAR.

I quickly Googled “Lucky K-pop” and found endless links and images. Her music videos, live performances, fan pages. And paparazzi photos of her covering her face as she exited a plane at the Hong Kong airport. Then photos of her in concert just today, of her dancing and singing in an outrageous booty-short bodysuit thingy with super-high-heeled silver boots.

Stunned, I fell against the bed, my back making the mattress shake. I froze, but she didn’t move a muscle. I needed to reconcile these photos with the drunk girl in my bed, whose snot had rubbed against my shoulder as I carried her. Why was she out by herself? Was someone looking for her?

I went deeper into my Google search and found out she was supposed to perform on The Later Tonight Show on Monday. Scrolling through a K-pop news site, I saw an article that said this performance was going to be her American debut and that there were huge expectations for it, hoping it would launch her as a star there.

Knowing what little I did about K-pop, I knew it was hard to break out in Western countries. Would she become famous in the US? Was I alone in my apartment with a potential mega superstar right now?

Mega superstar.

LUCKY NIGHT OUT

The potential headline splashed through my head in flashing lights. Lucky … she wasn’t some cute drunk girl who needed help. She was a celebrity. One on the brink of becoming huge.

And extremely sought after.

If someone had snapped any photos of her tonight in that bar, they would have made the Asian tabloids for sure. It would have been a huge scandal. K-pop stars were tightly reined in, their images had to be squeaky clean. Drunk Lucky in a Hong Kong bar? With a guy?

Me. I was that guy.

This was the story. My brain glommed on to this immediately—cogs and gears turning. What if Lucky spent an entire day with some random guy in Hong Kong? What if it was all documented? That story would sell for a lot once she hit it big in the US. And if she didn’t, it would sell to the Korean media, regardless.

It was a decidedly uncool thing to do to someone. If they were my friend. But I didn’t know her, and beyond that, she was a huge celebrity. And if she was going to be famous in the US, being seen with a boy wouldn’t ruin her reputation—it wasn’t like that there.

I made the decision then—to manage an all-nighter, ensuring that I’d be awake before her. I crept back over to the sofa, my thoughts going a million miles per hour. If I pulled this off, I’d get that job, and so many of my worries would melt off—making rent, my parents’ college expectations.

They would peel off of me, layer by layer.