Yuzu

几位？(How many?)

就一位，吧台就行。(Just one. Counter is fine.)

不好意思，今晚单独来的客人只能站位。(Sorry, standing room only for solo guests tonight.)

Cool. Great. A speakeasy that you had to Xiaohongshu, by the way, that doesn't even have a sign, that made you walk up a staircase that smells like fifteen different colognes, doesn't have room for you. On a Saturday. Standing room only for solo guests. What does that even mean. Who is coming to a speakeasy in a group. The whole point is that it's supposed to be lowkey. Whatever.

This has been the whole week though. Monday your pitch died. Wednesday a client just stopped answering. Hinge is Hinge. And now a bar you didn't even want to go to that badly is telling you no. At some point you'd think the universe would get bored of this bit.

You're not going back to the hotel. You've ordered the same room service pasta three nights in a row and eaten it on the bed watching CNBC Asia.

Fuck that.

You keep walking down the street filled with neon lights.

And then Leo's. Warm yellow light, people, jazz through the glass. A girl at the counter by the window.

You go in.

The woman behind the bar spots you and smiles like you're the person she's been waiting for all night. It catches you off guard. You weren't expecting anyone to be happy to see you tonight.

"Just one?" she asks.

"Yeah. Just one."

She leads you to the counter, pulls out the stool on the left, gestures. You sit.

The woman from the window is right next to you. Of course she is.

She's on her phone. Up close she's worse. Not worse. Whatever the opposite of worse is. You forget what you were going to order. You forget you were going to order. She doesn't look up and you're honestly grateful because you need a second to get your shit together.

The bartender says something in Korean to her, voice warm and quick. She looks up. Looks at you. Then at the bartender. Something passes between them in about four seconds, and then she gives the bartender a look that could freeze a drink.

You don't speak Korean. You don't need to. Two women just had a conversation about you and arrived at opposite conclusions, and you're pretty sure you lost.

What you don't catch: 언니, 나 옆에 왜 앉혔어. 우리 둘이 보내는 날이라며. (Unnie, why did you seat him next to me. This was supposed to be our night.)

What the bartender says back, already moving away: 잠깐만 봐. 귀엽잖아. (Just look at him. He's cute.)

She watches her go. Looks back at her phone. Her jaw tightens.

You look at the menu. You speak three languages. Not one of them helps you figure out what a smoked plum fizz is supposed to taste like. You put it down.

You glance sideways because she's right there and you're not thinking about it. "What's good here?"

She looks up. Looks at you properly for the first time and it hits you somewhere stupid. Like right behind your ribs.

"The yuzu sour," she says. Like you should already know this.

"Okay. That."

She goes back to her phone. You face forward. The bartender is polishing a glass that's already clean. She's watching.

The yuzu sour arrives. You take a sip and your face does something involuntary because holy shit that is sour.

"You made a face," the woman next to you says. Still looking at her phone.

"It's sour."

"It's a sour."

You take another sip. Still sour. Also really good. "Fair point."

She puts her phone down. Turns to look at you fully and you get the whole version of her all at once and your brain just goes quiet for a second.

"You've never had a yuzu sour before?" she says.

"I've had sours."

"That's not what I asked."

"No. First time."

She nods like this confirms something she already suspected about you. Picks up her own drink. Puts her phone in her bag.

"How'd you find this place?"

"Got rejected from a speakeasy up the street."

"Which one?"

"Speak Low."

"You went to Speak Low by yourself on a Saturday?"

"It seemed like a good idea at the time."

"It's one of the most popular bars in Shanghai."

"I'm learning that."

"On a Saturday."

"You said that already."

"Because it bears repeating."

"In my defense, the internet said it was a hidden gem."

"The internet lied to you."

"The internet lies to everyone. That's what it does."

She almost smiles. Almost. "So you got turned away and just walked into the first place you saw."

"The first place that looked like it'd let me in and plus it had a nice view."

"That's a very low bar."

"And yet here I am. With a yuzu sour. Talking to someone. Night's going better than it was twenty minutes ago."

Something shifts in her face. Small. Like she wasn't expecting you to say that and hasn't decided what to do about it yet.

"You ordered it without knowing what it was," she says.

"I asked what was good."

"I told you what was good. You trusted a stranger at a bar."

"That seemed like the right move."

"That's either very confident or very reckless."

"Probably the second one."

She smiles. Actually smiles. It lasts about one second before she catches it and turns back to her drink, but you saw it and now you know what it looks like and you're going to spend the rest of the night trying to make it happen again.

"You drink the same thing every time?"

"Yes."

"So you already knew it was good."

"Obviously."

"You just wanted to see if I'd make a face."

"I wanted to see if your taste could be trusted." She picks up her drink. "The face told me what I needed to know."

"And? Can it be trusted?"

She looks at you over the rim of her glass. "I haven't decided yet."

"What would help you decide?"

"Time," she says. "And maybe a second drink."

You wave down the bartender. "Two more yuzu sours."

She raises an eyebrow. "You're ordering for me now?"

"You said it was the best thing on the menu. I'm trusting the expert."

"That's the smartest thing you've done tonight."

"Low bar. I started the night at Speak Low."

She laughs. A real one. Short and surprised and she covers her mouth with the back of her hand like she didn't give it permission to happen. You stare at her hand and then at her mouth behind it and she catches you looking and drops her hand and doesn't say anything about it.

The bartender's friend appears down the counter. "I like him," she announces to no one in particular, sliding the drinks over.

"Nobody asked you," the woman next to you says.

"I'm offering free opinions."

She disappears back down the counter.

You look at the woman next to you. "I don't even know your name."

She blinks. "You ordered me a drink without knowing my name."

"You told me what to order."

"Wonyoung," she says.

You give her yours. She repeats it once, like she's checking whether it sounds right.

Then her eyes drop to your wrist. Your watch. Then your shoes. Back up.

"So. New York. Finance."

"That's a lot from a watch and shoes."

"Patek on the wrist. Common Projects on the feet. You dress like money but not like you're trying." She picks up her drink. "It wasn't hard."

"Yeah."

"What kind?"

"I check things. Before they go places they can't come back from."

"That sounds careful."

"It is careful. That's the whole point."

"And yet you walked into a bar you've never been to because a stranger in the window looked interesting."

You look at her. She said that on purpose. She knows she said that on purpose.

"I didn't say interesting."

"You didn't have to. You're here."

You pick up your drink. She picks up hers. You're both very aware of what just happened and neither of you is going to acknowledge it directly.

"So what do you do?" you ask. "When you're not testing strangers' taste in cocktails."

"I don't test. I curate." She tilts her head. "Creative direction. Luxury brands. I tell people what something should feel like before it exists."

"That sounds like you're professionally vague."

"I'm professionally convincing. There's a difference."

"And if someone doesn't buy what you're selling?"

"I make them feel like not buying was their idea. And then they buy."

"That's terrifying."

"Thank you."

"I didn't mean it as a compliment."

"And yet you look impressed."

You are. You don't tell her that. She already knows.

"So you make things exist," you say. "And I make sure things don't fall apart."

"Opposite ends of the same thing."

"You could look at it that way."

"I'm looking at it that way." She holds eye contact for a second longer than she needs to. You hold it back. Neither of you blinks.

"Do you like it?" she asks. "Your job."

You open your mouth. Close it. "I'm decent at it."

"That's not what I asked."

You think about it longer than you want to. "I'm good at it. The hours are long. You stop noticing at some point."

"Stop noticing what?"

"That it's late. That everyone else left. That you've been eating at your desk for the third night in a row."

She's quiet for a second. "That's not liking your job. That's just being used to it."

You look at her. "Yeah. Maybe."

She reaches for her drink without looking and takes a sip. Puts it down.

You look at your glass. Then at hers. "That was mine."

She looks down. Looks at yours. Looks at hers, still full, sitting exactly where she left it. "They're the same drink."

"And yet."

"Are you really going to make this a thing?"

"You drank from my glass."

"It's the same drink. Same recipe. Same bartender. Same ice."

"Still mine."

She tilts her head. "Most guys wouldn't call it out when they get an indirect kiss from a pretty girl."

You open your mouth. Close it. She smirks and giggles.

Your face goes hot. Not warm. Hot. The kind where you know it's visible and there's nothing you can do about it.

"You're red," she says.

"I'm not red."

"You're very red."

"It's warm in here."

"It's not warm in here."

She picks up her own drink. Takes a sip. Doesn't stop looking at you.

"Favorite meal?" you ask, because you need to change the subject immediately. "Not fancy. Just the thing you actually want to eat."

"Tteokbokki at two in the morning from the place near my apartment. The owner starts making it when she sees me coming."

"What makes it the best?"

"The sauce isn't too sweet. And she puts extra fish cake in mine without me asking."

"That's a person who's been paid attention to."

She looks at you. "Yeah," she says, quieter. "It is."

"Yours?" she says.

"Fried rice. My mom's. Whatever's in the fridge. No recipe."

"The best things never have recipes."

"That sounds like an Instagram caption."

"It sounds like an Instagram caption because it's true." She's smiling again. Softer this time, like she forgot to be careful about it.

"What does she put in it?"

"Whatever's there. Last time I visited it was leftover char siu and an egg and whatever vegetables she was going to throw out."

"That's not fried rice. That's your mom cleaning out the fridge."

"It's fried rice with no plan. Those are the best ones."

"You're a very specific kind of person."

"What kind?"

She looks at you like she's deciding something. "The kind I don't usually meet at bars."

At some point you realize the bar is empty and you have no idea when that happened.

"There was someone," she says. You didn't ask. She's looking at her glass, not at you. "For a while. It didn't have a name. It just took up a lot of space. And then it didn't anymore."

"That sounds like it sucked."

"It did suck." She almost laughs. "Thank you for not making it poetic."

"I would never."

"You absolutely would. You're a fried-rice-with-no-plan person. You'd find a metaphor."

"I was going to say it sounds like a bad lease."

"It was exactly like a bad lease." She looks at you. "You stay because moving is worse. And then one day moving isn't worse anymore."

"So you moved?"

"Last time I checked, we're in Shanghai right?"

"Is it working?"

"Tonight more than the other nights."

You look at her. She doesn't look away.

"What about you?" she says. "What are you going back to?"

"The thing about a year and a half of Hinge," you say, "is that at some point you stop blaming the app and start wondering if you're just bad at this."

"You're not bad at this."

"You've known me for two hours."

"And in those two hours you've made me laugh twice, ordered a drink you didn't understand, and told me my taste was trustworthy based on zero evidence." She turns her glass. "That's not bad at this. That's just not doing it the normal way."

"What's the normal way?"

"Boring. The normal way is boring." She takes a sip. "You're not boring."

You're going to remember that for a while.

The bartender sets two glasses of water down and looks at Wonyoung with the expression of someone who's been watching this whole thing and has opinions.

"We're closing the bar side," she says. "But you can sit in the back if you want."

"Since when do you close the bar side?"

"Since I said so. My fiancée's bar." She looks at you. "I'm Yujin."

"She's my best friend," Wonyoung says. "Since we were seven."

"She moved in next door," Yujin says. "First thing I told her was that her shoes were ugly."

"They were ugly," Wonyoung says.

"They were so ugly." Yujin picks up their empty glasses. "Back corner. Bean bags. Go."

You both move to the back.

The bean bags are enormous. You sink into one and before you can say anything Wonyoung drops into the same one. Your whole side presses against hers. She smells like something expensive and clean and she is very close and neither of you is acknowledging how close.

"There are other bean bags," you say.

"This one looked comfortable."

"You didn't even look at the other ones."

"I didn't need to." She shifts and her knee ends up against yours and she leaves it there. "First time I sat in one of these I was here until four in the morning."

"With who?"

She looks at you sideways. "Jealous?"

"I've known you for three hours."

"That doesn't answer the question."

You think about it. "A little."

She smiles. The real one. The one she keeps catching and killing and tonight it's getting harder and harder for her to catch in time.

"You don't even know who it was and you're jealous."

"I said a little."

"You said it fast."

"Are you going to tell me or not?"

"Yujin. We just sat here and talked until neither of us could keep our eyes open."

"You let me sit here being jealous of your best friend."

"It was fun."

You laugh. She leans into you when you do it, just slightly, and doesn't lean back. For a minute neither of you says anything. The bar is quiet now. Just glasses clinking in the back and Yujin humming something while she closes up.

"Twenty years," you say. "That's a long time to keep someone."

"She's the only person I never had to perform for."

"I don't have that," you say. "Someone since seven. Someone who just shows up."

"Is that lonely?"

"Mostly I'm just busy enough that I don't notice. And then you stop being busy for a weekend and—"

"And there it is."

"Yeah."

"You can be lonely with someone and not even know until it's over."

You look at her.

"I ate alone for four months," she says. "Even when I technically wasn't."

"That's worse."

"It is worse." She shifts in the bean bag and her shoulder presses into yours a little more and she doesn't correct it. "But I'm not eating alone right now."

"Technically we aren't eating. This is just drinking."

"Don't ruin it."

"Sorry."

"You're not sorry."

"I'm not sorry."

She looks at you. Her eyes drop to your mouth for half a second and come back up and she knows you caught it and she doesn't care.

"You know," she says, "for someone who checks things before they go somewhere they can't come back from, you're being very reckless right now."

"I told you. Tonight I'm off the clock."

She tastes like yuzu. Her hand comes up to the back of your neck and her fingers are cold and you feel it all the way down your spine. You don't know what to do with your hands so you put them on her waist and she makes a sound against your mouth that you're going to be thinking about for a very long time.

When you pull back she's looking at you like she's trying to figure out if that just happened.

"Hi," she says.

"Hi."

"That was—"

"Yeah."

"I was going to say forward."

"You looked at my mouth first."

"I did not."

"You absolutely did."

"I was looking at your jaw. There's a difference."

"There is no difference."

"There's a huge difference. One is romantic. The other is facial assessment."

"You were romantically assessing my face."

"I'm going to stop talking now."

"Please don't."

She looks at you. Her eyes are glassy from the drinks and her cheeks are flushed and she has never looked like this all night. Something behind her expression settles, like she's done pretending she wasn't going to do this. She puts her hand on your jaw and turns your face toward hers and stays there. Close enough that you can feel her breath on your mouth. Close enough to count her eyelashes. She doesn't close the gap. She just lets you feel how small it is.

Then you close it. Not like the first time.

The first time she decided for both of you. This time you stop letting her. Your hand comes up to her face and you tilt her chin and she inhales, sharp and short, right before your mouth finds hers. For one second she's still. Then she takes you apart slow. Her fingers slide from your jaw into your hair and her nails drag against your scalp and every nerve in your body wakes up at once. Your hand finds her waist and she presses into it. You pull her closer and she comes, all of her, and makes a sound against your mouth so quiet you almost miss it. You don't miss it. Her teeth catch your bottom lip and you hear yourself exhale in a way that doesn't sound like you. She tastes like yuzu and her mouth is warm and your other hand slides up her back and you can feel the ridge of her spine under your fingers and she arches into you just enough to make your brain go white.

When you pull back you're both breathing hard. Her lipstick is smudged and her eyes are heavy and half open and she's looking at you like she forgot anyone else existed. Your hand is still on her back. Hers is still in your hair. Her shirt has slipped off one shoulder and the strap of her pink bra is showing and you put it there and she knows you put it there and she doesn't fix it. Her shirt has ridden up where your hand was on her waist and her jeans have shifted low and there's a strip of pink lace above the waistband that matches exactly and you weren't supposed to see that but you see it.

She follows your eyes down. For the first time all night Wonyoung doesn't have a comeback ready. Her cheeks go red. Actually red. Not the flushed-from-drinking kind. The caught kind.

"They match," you say.

"I always match."

"Do you."

"It's a personal standard."

"You got dressed tonight expecting someone to see that."

She opens her mouth. Closes it. You watch her do it and you've never enjoyed anything more in your life because this is the woman who has had an answer for everything all night and right now she has nothing.

"Not you," she says finally. "Not specifically you."

"And yet."

She pulls her shirt down. Doesn't look at you. "I'm never speaking to you again."

"You said that about talking earlier. Then you kissed me."

From the bar, Yujin's voice, completely flat and completely done:

"Hey. I love you Wonyoung and whatever this new piece of adventure is for you. But can I go home now? It's 3 am."

"She's never going to let me live this down."

"Probably not."

She lifts her head. Looks at you. Her makeup is a mess and her shirt is still crooked and she doesn't care. "Walk me back?"

"Yeah."

She stands up first. Holds out her hand. You take it and she pulls you up and doesn't let go and you walk out of Leo's into the 3 am Shanghai air holding hands with a woman you met five hours ago, and the street is empty and the neon is off and it's just you and her and the sound of your shoes on wet pavement.

"I fly out Monday," you say.

"I know," she says.

"How do you know?"

"You're from New York. You're at a bar alone on a Saturday in Shanghai." She looks ahead. "You're not staying."

"That doesn't bother you?"

She squeezes your hand. "Ask me tomorrow."

You walk. You don't let go. And somewhere between the bar and the next block her head tilts against your shoulder and stays there, and she doesn't say anything, and you don't need her to.