Archive of Our Own

Byulyi had a fairly unique life growing up. When she was about seven years old, family had immigrated from Bucheon, South Korea to Waxahachie, Texas, of all places. They were the only Korean family in the entire town, and one of only three other Asian families in Waxahachie. Her parents never really explained the decisions to her; both the reason why they left Korea in the first place, and why they chose bum-fuck Waxahachie to build their new life. They started to build a living working in a chicken farm, the same one that hires about 15% of all the employees in town. Once they’d saved enough to buy an acre of arable land, their living would transition to farming Asian crops and vegetables to wholesale to various Korean grocery stores in the Koreatown of Dallas, about an hour’s drive from where they lived.

Byulyi started to work on the farm as soon as she turned fourteen when her parents had always promised her they wouldn’t pester her about it until she was sixteen. But her two sisters were still way too young at that point, and her dad’s leg was beginning to ache after wading through the soil all day. They had just gotten a horse then, to aid in the venture across the acre, unbroken because it was cheaper, and the patriarch of the neighboring family of rednecks they knew through church was very enthusiastic to teach her and her father how to break in the wild animal. Byulyi paid attention to every word coming out of his southern drawl, to every micro gestures of his body language as he approaches the horse. She hadn’t expected to be so immediately drawn to the prospect of taming this unruly brute, of drawing a connection to an animal so that it can trust her, and her family, enough to be obedient. She knocked on the neighbor’s door the next day, repeating back everything he had taught her just yesterday as his eyes bulged wide, before asking him to teach her more about horse taming. Within a year, her family’s farming business grew into another half an acre, and with that another horse. Her father stood from afar as Byulyi talked the the unbroken animal down from kicking and screaming to a gentle neigh.

If she was honest, she had more of a connection to the animals on the farm — which by the time she’d turn sixteen, consisted of the two horses, three corgis, two cows, and a chicken coop — than the people at her school. Once she really started to be good with horses, she began to think she was somehow invincible. The boys at school would dare her to jump on the unbroken horses and ride them around, almost like a form of bull riding, with even less of a safety measure. She did it to massive success on her first try, and then on her second try, and then she started doing it just for the fuck of it. She was small and agile, and that made it much easier to land and scramble away from the furious horses after she had been flung from their backs, something the huge, ungainly American boys would always envy her for.

It endeared her to the high school boys, and then to the girls. On her dozenth time she had grown too cocky, jumped on a particularly wild one with too much precarity, and had gotten flung across the pen, landing awkwardly on her hip. She spent the next two weeks sitting on the edge of her seat at school, wincing every time she made a slight movement, before finally telling her mom and going to the doctor with a broken tailbone. But the cheerleader that had knelt next to her, after the boys had dragged her out of the pen, who had gingerly brushed the dirt off her cheek with the gentleness of a leaf, and had checked on her every few days after she’d gone to the doctor — perhaps it was her that made the experience a whole of a lot more tolerable, even if by the end of it had made Byulyi promise to never ride untamed horses again. They promised to keep in touch at the high school graduation, and she had kissed Byulyi that in a spare bedroom at the graduation party, and then again right before she headed to college all the way in Austin. They went on their separate ways, and would never speak to each other again.

When Byulyi was twenty-one, she left her home and the farm behind, with only a high school diploma to her name as her second-youngest sister begins attending the local college in pursuit of a pre-med degree, with intentions of going to medical school after. She traveled around Texas in the old ‘91 Toyota pickup truck that her father had given her when she turned nineteen — a compensation for the last five years of hard work on the farm — getting odd jobs at rodeos and ranches while living out of a suitcase and rented rooms. The only form of permanence she had was a winter ranch job she got in Amarillo, feeding the cows and horses through the cold seasons, while the family that owned the ranch moved to their second house closer to Houston, where it’s warmer and their kids could go to a school with more than 100 students. The family had, of course, hesitated at first when the “Byulyi Moon” that applied to look over the entire six-acre ranch for the five winter months turned out to be a barely five-foot-four, scrawny woman. But they had endeared to Byulyi quite quickly, after she charmed the animals to her within minutes and helped the father haul bales of hay that were over a quarter of her weight across the farmhouse. After that it was just introducing her to the ranch’s layout and the feed schedules, then the job was hers. They were so thoroughly impressed with her work by the time March rolled around that they offered to make this a yearly gig, which Byulyi accepted with no hesitation.

She quite liked the pay, and the family had grown to like her so much that they would sometimes randomly mail her a couple $20 bills extra along with the contracted money for food and pay, with a note telling her to drive into town and get something she liked with the money. There were plenty of food, a surprisingly comfy twin-sized bed, a box TV that worked alright, although the cell reception was so shit that the only phone reception that really works is the landline in the house. Sometimes, she can earn a little bit extra if one of the neighboring houses had called her over to tame some new horses. The family began allowing Byulyi to keep the majority of her belongings in the spare room when she’s gone for the warmer months two winters ago, the only form of permanence she had in her life at that moment.

_____

Her day began at six in the morning, the ranch owner had told her that the animals had only known a single feed schedule for the vast majority of their lives, and stressed how imperative it was that she stuck to it everyday. She started with pouring Kibbles into the bowl for the white barn dog as she brushes her teeth, and then wet food for the black cat that had gotten used to sleeping on her chest every night and a mixture of wet and dry for the orange tabby as she waits for the coffee in the percolator pot to boil on the stove.

She puts on a winter jacket that she’d gotten with her first paycheck and the brown felt wide-brimmed hat that she’d gotten custom-made with her second paycheck when she’s finished with her coffee, heading for the cow shed on the old UTV with bales of hay on the bed as the dog trails behind her in a sprint, barking wildly at his own footprints in the dust of snow. She fed the cows hay, checked for sick ones, and hopped back onto the UTV to do the same for the horse stable and chicken coop.

Afterwards, she made lunch for the cats and dog and then for herself, which was usually just Krafts’ boxed Mac-and-cheese, spent the rest of the afternoon bucking bales of hay, and then went for a second feed for the rest of the animals. Her day usually ends at seven or eight, depending on how long she wants to spend that day. And then, for the rest of her time until she falls asleep, Byulyi would spend it rolling her own cigarettes from a bag of loose tobacco she had bought from a Native reservation in Oklahoma, the box TV playing replays of sitcoms in the background.

The ranch itself was six acres, but the land beyond that stretched much, much further. Having traveled all throughout Texas, she was no stranger to how big the state truly was, but it was times like these where she really, really felt the vast emptiness that went on for miles. She quite liked the gig, but sometimes she began to grow a bit afraid of the hollow silence that screams back at her, of the nothingness for miles and miles. She was much of a loner in her teenage years, but nothing could’ve prepared her for loneliness like this, like only having the barn animals to talk to, like falling asleep to the sounds of the horses moving in their stable, to the purrs of the unnamed black cat on her chest. She had just turned twenty-six years old, and yet the monotony of this work has left her feeling like hundreds and hundreds. It all made her feel like wanting to be invincible and reckless again.

Her mother had called a couple of nights ago, the calls used to be almost daily when she first left home, then it become weekly, and now, monthly. She told Byulyi that her second-youngest sister had gotten accepted into medical school, and also that her youngest sister is moving to Dallas to go to beauty school, to become a hairdresser. Byulyi pretended to be happy for them, and noted how rusty her Korean has become throughout the years. Her mother— as if she had read her mind— commented on her Korean, and compared it to her second-youngest’s, who was still living with them as she maneuvers college, whose tongue was still perfect from speaking it with her parents daily. Byulyi merely hummed a response, before thanking her for calling and then hanging up without a goodbye.

Oftentimes, Byulyi would drive into town just to see the sight of people in their daily lives, and to hear the sounds of anything other than farm animals. Tonight, she does just the same, gearing up in her winter coat and brown felt hat, and laced up the mahogany-colored boots she had bought just last month, struggling with the strings through her bandaged right hand. The orange ‘91 pickup coughed and sputtered before shaking to a start when she turned it on, as if it, too, had been shivering from the cold. She drove into town, watching as swarms of people walk in and out of storefronts. Byulyi wondered where she would hang out for the night. Much of the businesses were closed, even though it was barely eight o’clock. There was the diner, the only one in town that opened from 6am to 11 pm, which might as well make it a 24 hour diner here, but she wasn’t hungry. She drove past a school, the one high school in town, with a grand total of ten classrooms and a gymnasium. Curiously, one of the classrooms still had its lights on, and a group of six or seven were beginning to leave their cars to amble inside the metal double doors.

She picked at the threads that were coming apart on the worn steering wheel. It couldn’t hurt to go check it out. But she wasn’t ready to admit that she was lonely enough to go inside a random classroom at night just to see what they’re teaching in the adult gen. ed. classes, and to hear the sounds of people. But she was genuinely curious, so she parked a few spaces further away from the rest of the cars, took a long deep breath, and headed inside.

She hadn’t been inside a school since she graduated, a whole eight years ago, and walking down the hall of this one, she’s beginning to think that they really were all the same. Only one classroom had its lights on, and inside, were seven older individuals, all with the same salt-and-pepper colored hair, sitting in tiny chairs that connected to tiny desks, having to crouch in on themselves just to fit. They all sat in one clutter near the chalkboard, chattering amongst themselves as if they all knew each other. They probably do. It would be harder to not know the vast majority of people in that town. Byulyi didn’t know any of them.

She shuffled to the very last row as they all stared, not bothering to take her brimmed-hat off, the chatters died down as she pushed some of the desks out of her way. Looking around the classroom awkwardly as the conversations started up again, she quietly judged the posters littered all over the walls of the room. She thought they were a little infantile to belong inside a high school classroom.

The wooden door opened again. This time, a woman in a cream wool sweater much closer to Byulyi in age stepped in. She had straight, black hair that grew a little beyond her shoulders. The woman looked a mixture of tired, cold, and miserable.

“Hi, um,” The woman spoke as she plopped the tote bag that was slung over her shoulder into the chair. Her cheeks were rosy, either from the cold or from nervousness. She took a piece of chalk on the desk, and began to write on the board in writing that was way too small. It took Byulyi a moment to realize she was writing her name.

“You can call me Solar. Or Kim. Whichever one you prefer. Um, I guess we can get started.”

Ms. Solar Kim took out a stack of papers from her tote bag and began to pass it out. She smiled slightly when she got to Byulyi’s desk, who gave her a nod and a smile just as subtle. Then, she reached inside the bag for some postcards, and began to flip through them in a stumble, as if they had gotten out of order in the mess of her bag. She began to talk about the most fundamental basics of computer literacy as the group of older folks listened tentatively and began to take notes.

Byulyi reached for the neighboring table with a loose pencil and started to take notes as well, if only to fit in with the rest. It was hard to make out any eligible words with her clumsy bandaged hand. She was never a strong student, just did alright in school, turned up to all the classes that mattered, and did just enough to not flunk every exam. Her two sisters were obviously the more educationally-adept ones, although it wasn’t what her parents had asked of her. They needed her to help with the farm, until it was successful enough to hire more helping hands, so that her sisters could do well enough to go to medical school and beauty school. Byulyi remembered spending the majority of one English class drumming up a note to give to the cute cheerleader, who sat two rows up and would sometimes look back at her.

By nine o’clock, Ms. Kim thanked everybody for attending the class and started packing up. The rest of the class stood up all at once and began to chatter again about heading to the bar near by, walking out of the class together as if they always needed to travel in a pack, leaving just the two of them behind. Byulyi was still sat at her desk.

“You staying for the next class?”

Byulyi figured she should leave now, too. “No, I didn’t even know there was another class after.”

“Are you registered for this class?”

“No, ma’am, I’m not.” She didn’t even have a computer, haven’t touched one in about two years, she wanted to say to Ms. Kim. “I just saw people coming in and got curious.”

They walked to the big double doors together. And then, Ms. Kim asked, “Do you know where I could get some food near here? I’m on a bit of a time crunch. Need to head back to San Antonio.”

“There’s a diner five minutes away. I can show you where it is, if you just follow me.”

Solar looked at her, skeptical, as if she was still deciding whether she should trust Byulyi. But there isn’t a lot to be distrustful of a barely five-foot-four, scrawny Korean woman, with a feeble bandaged hand, so she just nodded as they both headed for their own vehicles.

On the drive to the diner, Byulyi occasionally glanced at the rearview, making sure she could still see the lights from Solar’s tiny yellow Ford Focus. She thought about how she could’ve just given Solar the name of the diner, and the woman could’ve easily looked it up on her phone. She forgot that the cell service isn’t as nonexistent here. She wondered if she had come off strange or off putting, but she really would just liked to spend some more time with Solar.

Inside the diner, after Solar had ordered a black coffee and a turkey sandwich that she specifically requested to be cut in half, which the cook most definitely won’t remember, Byulyi asked, “You said you were driving back to San Antonio? That’s—“

“Six hours away, I know.” Solar said, rubbing circles into her eyes in defeat at the fact. She had looked a little embarrassed when she continued. “I was… a little desperate when I graduated. Thought I needed the first job I could find, no matter how shitty, even with my masters done. I had just moved to Texas from California, had no fucking clue where or what Amarillo was. Thought I had set the filter to only find jobs within 50 miles. Guess I didn’t. Well, I had just gotten a real job programming at a software design firm, but they’re letting me do this because they think it’s funny. Can’t believe how stupid I am.”

She put her head down on the table, and let in a deep inhale to sigh it out before looking up at Byulyi. “Be honest. I made a fool of myself in that classroom, didn’t I.”

“No, ma’am. I don’t think you did.”

“Well, that’s very kind of you. But stop calling me ‘ma’am’. I’m only twenty-eight, and you’re aging me more than this drive already is.”

“Sorry.” Byulyi cut herself off before another ma’am comes out. But it was how she was raised, just typical southern politeness. She didn’t mean any harm.

“I just realized, I never got your name.”

“It’s, uh, Byulyi Moon. But most people here don’t bother saying ‘Byulyi’, so they just call me Moon.”

Something about her answer seemed to make Solar chuckle. “I’m sorry.” She said, “It’s just, you have the slightest bit of a southern accent when you talk. I noticed it when you first spoke to me. Well, you were the first thing I noticed when I walked inside that classroom anyway, sitting in the back with your cowboy hat on. I couldn’t even see half of your face. I remember thinking, who’s that cowboy sitting there in the back?” The food was starting to come out, and they both took their elbows off the table to make some space, even though Byulyi didn’t get anything. “So the shy, overtly polite cowboy who attends computer literacy class is named Byulyi. Texas really does have it all.”

Byulyi squirmed a bit and blushed despite herself. “I’m no cowboy.” She was just a ranch hand. Cowboy was a title to be earned. And she had done nothing to earn that.

“Right. Sorry.” Solar apologized before cutting her sandwich in half with a butter knife. The cook had clearly forgotten again. “So, what do you do?”

“I work on a ranch right outside of town. Taking care of the animals. It’s just for the winter. Then I’ll have to find something else when the weather gets warmer.”

“That’s really cool. Do you have anything in mind?”

Byulyi thought for a moment. “I could always find a country club to teach horseback riding lessons at. I’ve been all over Texas, there’s always a job for me somewhere.” She could crash on the couch of this girl she met at a gay bar in Fort Worth for a couple of weeks, then make the trip down to Houston for the rodeo, or head straight to Abilene for the country clubs, or go to El Paso to herd some cattle for the rich rancher there.

They sat in silence for the next couple of minutes as Solar ate her sandwich. “I really like that your name is so Korean. Even back home, in K-Town, the majority of the kids I went to school with had English names. I started adopting ‘Solar’ because the teachers couldn’t pronounce ‘Yongsun’. Kinda wish now that I had stuck with Yongsun.”

Byulyi debates whether she should, and blurted out before she could fully stop herself as Solar goes for a bite. “I’ll call you Yongsun. If that’s what you’d like.”

Solar chewed ever so slowly. Byulyi couldn’t tell if she was deep in thought or just trying to slither her way out of the situation that she’s made tenfolds more awkward.

But Yongsun spoke again, and it’s soft and appreciative. “Yeah, I would like that.”

Byulyi smiled, all coy like the sun during daybreak. She’s gotten shy all over again.

“Will you come back? To the class, I mean.”

“I’m not registered.”

Yongsun shook her head as she picked up the check that had been requested right as the food came out. “They’re not gonna check.”

“Okay. When is the next class?”

“Thursday. Every Tuesday and Thursday for the next eight fucking weeks.” She smiled at her sarcastically, painfully. And then she shivered, “It’s cold here. It was warm in San Antonio so I didn’t even think to pack a jacket. Never thought Texas could get this cold.”

The waitress came by to pick up the check, turned to Byulyi to ask her again: “You sure you don’t want anything, Moon?” and she just shook her head.

“That’s the misconception everyone has about the northernmost parts of Texas. The weather’s nothing like the rest of the state. It might as well be Oklahoma.”

“Well, that’s nice to know.” Yongsun glanced at her wristwatch. “Jesus, it’s almost ten. I have to go.”

Byulyi watched as the yellow Focus pulled out of the diner’s parking lot and then onto the patch of paved road. A cigarette hangs low from her mouth as the light and smoke from the vehicle became smaller and smaller in the distance, until it was nothing but a piece of her imagination in the night. She was already starting to miss her. Thursday felt like it’ll take a lifetime to come.

_____

Byulyi was the first car in the school’s parking lot come Thursday night. She sat with the window of her truck rolled down, smoking and ashing a cigarette onto the pavement. When the light of the now familiar classroom was turned on, she was the first to be inside, and found her seat in the back again. Less people showed up this time, and they all ignored her presence in the back again as they barreled in, making conversations with one another the entire time. Byulyi glanced at the clock as it struck eight on the dot, and then again after thirty seconds. After three more intervals of checking the time, Yongsun came rushing in. She was wearing a black turtleneck with light wash jeans, her hair tied back into a low ponytail, holding a beige coat in her arms. The woman looked very flustered as she sets down her bag, before pulling out a stack of handouts.

“My apologies. There was, um, a bit of traffic.” She apologized, and began passing out the papers containing the layout of a basic computer homescreen. The teacher gave Byulyi a slight nod when she got to her desk.

Yongsun made her way to the front of the class when she’s finished, and put on her best practiced smile. She began to go on about the functions of the basic applications, just the utmost fundamental stuff, but it all went over Byulyi’s head anyway. A bunch of hands shot up as soon as she finished a sentence. Byulyi observed as she took in the questions, and generated a reply with the patience of a priest. It was strange to her to see all the oldest people in the room be the student, and one of the youngest be the teacher. At exactly nine o’clock, the rest of the class stood up at once, and left together talking about getting a beer at the local bar. In the span of about a minute, it was just the two of them once again.

“They canceled the class right after, so I have to lock up.” Yongsun said to Byulyi, collecting the loose papers and shoving them mindlessly into her bag at once. She put on a long beige coat instead of the sweater from last time, and it made her look all the more luxurious.

“You heading to the diner again?”

Yongsun looked at her as if she hadn’t at all considered the question. Byulyi had no idea what to make of her expressions. But she said, eventually, “Sure.”

At the diner, Yongsun asked for the quickest thing on the menu and ended up with a bowl of chilli con carne and two pieces of toast, cut diagonally, with another black coffee. And, because the waitress had looked at her so expectantly, Byulyi ordered a bowl of plain grits and a water.

“Do you know anyone here who can teach this class?” Yongsun asked, stirring some sugar into the steaming coffee.

“I don’t know anyone at all.”

The food came out, almost immediately. Yongsun shook a layer of pepper into her bowl. “I wanted to ask you, but didn’t know if it was appropriate last time. But can I ask what happened to your hand?”

“Just a sprain. I was in Waxahachie visiting my parents on Monday.” Byulyi said, staring a hole into the tab of butter that was melting to a puddle on top of the grits. “When I was a teenager, I used to jump on unbroken horses just for fun. And I guess I wanted to see if I still got it. Turns out I don’t.” She wanted to tell Yongsun about wanting to feel invincible again, and maybe that she wanted to feel younger, too.

“Is breaking in horses part of your job?”

“A little bit of everything is part of my job.” Byulyi joked, stirring the butter into the grits before taking a bite. It needed a lot more salt and pepper.

“I was so afraid that when I finished grad school there still wouldn’t be a job for me. I thought I’d be selling perfume at the local mall with a masters degree. I never took a risk once.” Yongsun shoved a couple spoonfuls of chilli into her mouth, and swallowed without barely chewing. She sighed. “Sorry I keep bringing this up. It’s the only thing I can think of right now. I don’t know how I’m going to keep up the drive for much longer.”

_____

The next morning Byulyi woke up humming the tune of an old country song. It was one of the tunes of her childhood, in between the Korean trot songs that her mother loved and the 60’s rock ‘n roll her father enjoyed, a tune about a man’s journey to Amarillo from San Antonio. She chuckled to herself, wondering how she didn’t make that connection until now. She prepared breakfast for the house animals, and drank her coffee with milk and sugar. She had grits and scrambled eggs for breakfast, dropping bits of eggs for the cats to fight over, and hopped on the UTV tractor with bales of hay. One of the calves in the shed had breathed a little heavy, so she dragged it back to the barn with a rope and dosed it with medicine. The dressing on her right hand had been taken off last night, so everything was a little easier on her.

She made herself chilli from a can and warmed the tortillas over an open flame for lunch. Then, for dinner, she made a very non-traditional kimchi jjigae using the last of the kimchi from a gallon container her mother had back sent with her the last time she came to Waxahachie to visit. Byulyi mourned the loss of the kimchi for lag of time, and thought about the meals of budae jjigae and grilled gopchang that her family would get every time they drove to Koreatown to deliver the vegetables. It was the only time they could get a proper Korean feast, given that Waxahachie barely had any Asian grocery stores that sold enough Korean ingredients to make anything remotely traditional. Now there isn’t a Asian grocery store here at all.

And then she thought about Yongsun again, and whether there were any places to get real Korean food in San Antonio, too. She wanted to show her to Dallas, and the Koreatown that won’t be as adequate as the one in Los Angeles, but was now the only real memory that comes to mind whenever she thinks of Korea, a placeholder for the old country.

There’s a weird sensation weighing down on her chest whenever she thinks about Yongsun, that’s been there since Tuesday night. It all felt a bit silly, in a way. She felt like she was brought back to her high school years, of trying to shake the nervousness out of her body as she handed the cheerleader a crumpled note in the school hallway. She’s been with a few women since, from different parts of the state, but never dated any of them. She wasn’t even sure if she’s actually ever had a real relationship.

The weekend that followed was the longest weekend of her entire life. Byulyi drank percolator coffee with milk and sugar and drove into town for groceries and replenished the house animals’ food. She ate eggs and grits and a lot of rice and spam while flipping through outdated rock ‘n roll magazines that the ranch owner had in his stacks. On Saturday, she visited the horse shed and found one of the younger horses to be unusually lethargic, so a vet was called in from town. After all is done, she mailed the owner an itemized receipt of the bill for the vet and the groceries so he can send over the total on her next paycheck. She spoke to the animals for a good part of her day, and smoked outside as the sunset dwindled into a gorgeous splatter of colors. She decided it was finally time to learn how to make kimchi, and called her mother on her own accord for the first time in half a year. She thought about Yongsun, then thought about Yongsun some more. And then she grew terribly afraid again, of the things she usually thinks about when she’s lonely.

_____

Byulyi rode into town on Tuesday on Flynn, her favorite horse of the bunch, the truck left behind to sit idle with ice on its windshield. Thank god it wasn’t as cold as it was yesterday, and it actually felt quite good to ride tonight for a November night. The sky was clear and there was a distant breeze every once in a while. She rode slowly into where the roads lit up again and her surroundings became brighter due to the lights from downtown. She guided it to the side of the school building instead of the parking lot this time, and fastened it to a bike rack. It was uncommon but not a strange sight to see, here in rural Texas, where horses still remained as one of the modes of transportation. She’d taken Flynn into town a couple of times prior, when the truck had failed to start and she urgently needed some groceries.

She opened up a ziplock bag of oats that she had carried with her and brought it to Flynn’s nose. He sniffed at the contents inside the bag for a second, comforted by the familiar treat she’d always rewarded him with.

“Thanks for doing this with me, bud.” She said, and patted gently down his grotesquely giant head. “Don’t let yourself get stolen, now. I’ll be right back.”

Byulyi walked inside the classroom just seconds before class started this time, and just thinking about the stares the other classmates were giving her as she found her desk in the back was really starting to annoy Byulyi. Yongsun was already here, and the role was reversed as she was the one watching Byulyi enter the classroom this time. The teacher still looked tired and unhappy to be here, as always, but Byulti felt unreasonably happy to see her, regardless. Today, they went over the File Explorer application, and Byulyi spent the entire class drawing patterns into her handout.

When the class eventually ended, finally, and it was just the two of them left once again, Byulyi approached her. “Can I give you a ride to the diner this time?”

“Um—“ Yongsun looked confused.

“Not in the truck.” Byulyi quickly cut in, and the teacher looked to visibly relax at the clarification, as if she was intimidated by the idea of a pickup truck.“Just… come out.” She beckoned Yongsun.

Byulyi was almost relieved to see that Flynn was still where she left him, unreasonably, it was quite unheard of to steal a horse in this small of a place. She untied him and easily mounted onto the animal in one fell swoop, as if she was stepping over a yard fence. She rode to where Yongsun was standing out in the cold, clutching her bag into her coat.

“Oh. My god.” She watched as Yongsun’s mouth went agape, and then a hearty laugh escaped from her mouth. It was a sight so unlike what Byulyi had always seen of her.

“Don’t think about it.” Byulyi said, and she was now laughing, too. “Give me your bag. Now give me your hand. Left foot in the stirrup. Now swing the other leg over.”

Yongsun looked awkward and clumsy as she climbed, although she did follow Byulyi’s directions perfect to a T. Her grip on Byulyi’s arm weight more than cast iron itself as she pulled her up. The rancher held onto her bag and the saddle, while Yongsun held tightly onto her jacket. Byulyi lost a bit of herself and all of her breath as she slowly kicked Flynn into a slow jog. They rode in complete silence to the diner, but somewhere along the road Yongsun leaned closer into Byulyi’s back, and all she could feel was the warmth of her breath on the Byulyi’s neck. They ended up at the side of the diner, some of the customers looked outside the window for a second, and then went back to their meals as if it was nothing out of the ordinary. Byulyi swung down from the saddle, making a show out of it to a still-smiling Yongsun, before helping her down. She looked at Byulyi while she tied Flynn to the bike rack, as if still in deep disbelief, and then bubbled into laughter again with a squeakiness when Byulyi looked up at her. It was strange, and nice, to see her like this.

In the diner, the waitress placed Yongsun’s burger and Byulyi’s plain grits in front of them, and then looked at Byulyi to ask, “The cook wants to know if that’s your horse out the back.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Can he give it some water?”

Byulyi smiled appreciatively, “Please, thank you.”

The waitress nodded, before asking, “Truck broke down again?”

“No.” She replied, breaking eye contact with the waitress to glance at Yongsun, who was staring at her with her elbow on the table and her face against her palm. She smiled at Byulyi. “Truck’s just fine, ma’am.”

They dug into their food, eating silently for half of the Dolly Parton song playing from the electric jukebox. Byulyi kept adding more salt and pepper to the grits. “Why were you afraid of selling perfume?” She asked, suddenly.

“Have you ever worked in retail? It’s hell.”

“I mean, why did you think you wouldn’t be able to find anything else?”

Yongsun slowed her chewing. She put the burger down, grabbed a fry, and dipped it mindlessly into the ketchup. “I applied to over 300 jobs after I got my bachelor’s. I kept count. After the 304th application, I decided to put myself through school all over again. It was hell.” She nibbled on the fry as she spoke. She was the prettiest woman Byulyi had ever seen. She wondered how Yongsun saw her. “I was the first in my family to go to college and was half expecting to go through that same process again, even with my master’s. I don’t know what I would do if that happened.“

“Why did you move to Texas?”

“My parents wanted to move back to Korea, so they sold the house. My sister’s the only family I have left in the States, and she lived in San Antonio. She actually owns a Korean restaurant there, funny enough.”

Byulyi nodded, she was happy to learn just about anything about Yongsun, and clung to every piece of information like mussels to sea rocks.

Yongsun finished the last of her black coffee, and asked the waitress for another coffee to-go. “It was really nice of you to bring the horse.” She said, “Will you take me back to my car?”

They swung back onto the horse again, Yongsun looking much more comfortable with her movements than before. She was comfortable enough to put her arms around Byulyi, this time, too. They rode back, slowly, and then picking up the pace. Byulyi wanted to deliberately slow the horse down, for the ride to go forever, but knew Yongsun needed to head back home. After a while, the pair of arms around her waist no longer felt like a belt of iron and fire, and instead felt as it was the last piece of a puzzle, meant to fit so perfectly at last. In the parking lot, she helped Yongsun down again, and dismounted herself. They stood, looking at each other.

“Thanks. For everything.” Yongsun said, with a smile as soft as the lone streetlight hanging above them.

Byulyi took off the felt hat and held it to her chest. She wanted to kiss her so bad in that moment. But there was just no way she could. She wished there was an established rulebook on how to go about things like this. “See you Thursday,” was the only thing she said.

Yongsun nodded, and Byulyi took that as her sign to leave. She turned around, and was about to mount Flynn, when she felt the warmth of a hand tug onto hers. Yongsun was still looking at her when she turned back around, and, in a moment that felt like eternity, leaned forward and planted a kiss on her cheek.

Yongsun pulled away, looking shyer than she’d ever been. She was smiling so wide, then, dimples showing under her lips where her face glowed. “I assumed that’s what you took your hat off for.”

_____

Byulyi whistled tunes of all the different love songs she could think of all throughout Wednesday. She cooked bacon and pancakes for breakfast, and danced and dangled the black cat to the guitar strums in front of the stereo, apologizing to it when it growled and demanded to be let down. She sang instead of talked to the horses and cows in the shed, and felt so invincible that she forgot about all the unbroken horses and bull rides.

On Thursday, she rode in to the school with her truck again, no cowboy antics this time. She didn’t wait for the rest of the students to show up before going in, didn’t even stop for a cigarette before pushing the double doors open. She was the first person in the classroom and sat there with her leg rumbling the entire time. The classroom filled up, and then a middle-aged man with a strong mustache and a suit jacket entered the room. Instead of finding a seat at one of the student desks, he went to the front and stood behind the teacher’s desk.

“Miss Kim,” he began, “apparently found the drive to Amarillo too arduous, so I will be taking over for the rest of the term. I apologize for the sudden changes, but I assure you the materials won’t be too different from what you’re used to.”

Byulyi didn’t hear much of what he said after that. She stood up from her desk abruptly, making quite the ruckus as everyone’s eyes fell on her again. It was suddenly much colder when she stood outside, and the air stung when she breathed in. She got into the truck and sat there in her sadness for a long stretch of time. There were a million things running through her mind when she started up the truck to pull out of the parking lot and onto the paved road.

The road home had become almost second nature to her, but she missed the first turn that would take her straight back to the ranch, and drove right through the second turn. She glanced down at the odometer: 274,293 miles. The truck’s gotten her all over Texas throughout the years, what’s a couple hundred more?

In all the vastness, it felt as if Byulyi was the only person in the world as she drove further and further south. She’s been to San Antonio before, but had never driven straight down from Amarillo without stopping in a middling city for a couple of days. It felt as if time had slowed as she continued driving, like this was all a hopeless endeavor and she’ll never reach San Antonio for another week of driving. Her thoughts went on for miles and miles, like the roads on the highway and how it seemed to stretch towards the moon. She thought about Yongsun, and what she should say when she sees her (if she sees her). She was afraid she might’ve scared Yongsun off, but then she was the one that had kissed Byulyi, so maybe it was the drive.

She smoked the rest of her hand-rolled cigarettes with the windows down, and decided to stop at a truck-stop half way through for a pack of Marlboro golds, a sleeve of saltine crackers, and a large cup of brewed coffee. Then she got back in the truck and became a prisoner of the white lines on the freeway all over again. There were barely any cars left at 1:37am and the only thing that kept her awake was the occasional headlight from an incoming car, but it was getting harder to fight the low hum of the highway. She tried not to think too hard about the endless nothingness ahead, behind, and to the sides of her, that all she had right now were the plains and the barbed wire fences. She turned on the radio, and then turned it off after twenty minutes when every song she came across were love songs.

The sky was still dark when she reached San Antonio. Byulyi glanced at the clock on her dashboard: 4:48am, it read. She drove through a residential area, and, stupidly, had hoped to see the yellow Focus perched on one of these driveways. It was starting to feel as if the coffee’s done all it could for her, so she stopped her car at an empty grocery store parking lot, and promptly fell asleep.

She’s woken up by a few raps on her passenger side window, instinctively reaching for the revolver she’d always kept in the center console. Byulyi breathed out a sigh of relief to see the chain grocery store logo on the man’s shirt. He told her, once she cracked open the window, that she couldn’t park here for that long unless she was a customer. Apologizing profusely, she got out of the truck and told him she actually was intending on buying a few things.

Inside the store, she walked aimlessly through the aisles, grabbing another sleeve of saltines and a small bag of roasted nuts just to make herself look busy. It was almost 1pm then, and Byulyi had a bit of a laugh at herself for passing out for that long. She was suddenly worried about the animals back on the ranch, and how this was the first time she had ever missed a feed. She couldn’t imagine what the ranch owner would think if he found out, if he’ll even let her keep this job.

An employee interrupted her again, asking if she needed any help with finding anything. She told the female employee that she actually did need help, and asked her if there were any software design firms here, to her knowledge. She felt stupid as soon as the sentence left her mouth, even more so when the employee looked back at her with more confusion than answers.

“Um,” the employee began, trying her hardest to be helpful, “I think there might be a few in downtown.”

“Where’s that?” Byulyi cringed again.

The girl stared at her. "It's downtown," she said, and pointed off to her left in the vague distance.

Downtown was a fifteen minute drive from the grocery store. It’s much bigger than the downtown in Amarillo, and Byulyi drove aimlessly down Main Street to observe all the businesses and compare them back to the ones back there. She stopped at a coffee shop, one of those fancy ones with low cushioned chairs and books on the tables, and tried her luck once again with the barista as he made her order of a black drip coffee.

“Software design firms?” He repeated back to her, his mouth twisted up in a way most people behave when they’re deep in thought. “There are three in this city.”

He took out a pen and began scribbling down on his notepad. “I’m actually in school right now for that degree. Gonna apply to all three as soon as I graduate.” He handed her the piece of paper. “You’re looking for a job as well?”

“Yeah,” Byulyi lied. “Something like that.”

He handed her the coffee. “Well, best of luck to you, cowboy,” he said, and Byulyi nodded appreciatively at that, dropping a couple loose dollars into the tip jar.

The first company she went to was a gigantic spread of concrete. It looked colorless and miserable, vaguely resembling a prison. Byulyi combed through the parking lot, scanning for the familiar yellow Focus, and turning up with nothing. The second firm, however, was almost the polar opposite. It was much smaller in size, and was very glass-y. As in, the only feature Byulyi could pick out about this building was the floor-to-ceiling glass windows. It was much easier to look through the parking lot this time, and Byulyi spotted the 2004 yellow Ford Focus almost immediately.

It was 3:04pm, then. Byulyi didn’t know what time Yongsun got off work, so she sat in the truck, and waited another two hours, until a gaggle of people began pouring out from the glass doors.

Byulyi hopped out of the truck, feeling as if she might just jump out of her own skin. She was shaking, from all the coffee and the nervousness. Yongsun was conversing with a colleague, not noticing her presence until she got closer. Then she looked up at Byulyi, then at the orange truck that stood out from the rest of the muted-colored cars, then back at Byulyi again.

“Hi.” Byulyi began, not knowing much to say after the colleague had left, even after all the time she had to think this through. “I drove over.”

“Thought I was still back in Amarillo, somehow.” Yongsun said, and didn’t say anything else for a while after, still looking as shocked as she did. “You drove here?”

Byulyi nodded. “Yeah. Felt sorry you stopped teaching the class. I really looked forward to it.”

For a long while, there was nothing between them. Byulyi kicked a pebble that bounced off the curb of the sidewalk. Then, she spoke again, because there was nothing left for her to lose. “I’m sorry for scaring you, turning up like this. I just knew that if I didn’t start driving, I wasn’t gonna see you again. And I didn’t want that. That’s all.”

Yongsun just looked at her for a moment, an indecipherable expression took over her face after all the shock was gone. Byulyi was suddenly terrified of the silence, that she’d ruined it again, after driving all this way. She wanted to beg Yongsun not to send her away, back to the animals in their stable, back to the ranch where all the dirt roads look the same, back to the vast, vast plains and the indescribable loneliness.

“I asked for a replacement on Wednesday. Hit a patch of black ice on the way home Tuesday. Almost slid into the ditch. That’s when I decided I couldn’t do this anymore. I wanted to tell you, but realized I didn’t have any other information about you other than your name and the fact that you work on a ranch outside of town.” She suddenly looked embarrassed, eyes darting elsewhere. “I had an insane thought to drive back to Amarillo when it’s sunny again and just ask around for you.”

“Well, that’s not so insane now, is it.” Byulyi said, completely serious but Yongsun laughed anyway, breaking all the tension between them.

“Yeah, I guess not.”

They fall into another silence again as they walked to their vehicles. Most of the employees had already left the parking lot by this point. Byulyi wasn’t sure how she should end it from here as they stood next to their cars, or what she should do after. She didn’t want to go back, not right now, after driving six hours and spending much longer looking for her, to only spend five minutes with her. But she didn’t want to push her luck, so maybe she should leave right now—

But then Yongsun turned to her and asked. “Have you eaten?”

Byulyi realized with the question that the saltines and nuts did absolutely nothing for her appetite. Her legs suddenly began to feel like jelly, but she smiled when she replied. “No, I’m starving. Do you happen to know any place to get some food here?”

“I know a diner just around the corner, if you’ll just follow me.”