The Carmichaels

Chapter Five

In the end, River paid for their meal and she and Seo-Jun left the restaurant together. The two of them stood on the busy sidewalk and were immediately surrounded by Cuban city life. It was a different world from the United States, but she quite liked how foreign everything felt to her. It was a world where no one knew her face or her name. Where no one was judging her. She wasn't the Ice Princess here, and she could walk side by side with the man at her side without tabloids snapping pictures and guessing at their relationship.

They passed through a crowd of tourists who were snapping pictures with their phones and pointing at buildings in awe. Seo-Jun's hand went to the camera around his neck when they passed a woman dancing. She wore vibrant colored clothes and her skirts beautifully fluttered in the breeze.

"You can take the photo, if you'd like," River said to him. She smiled a little, just a slight quirk of her lips, hoping it made him feel a little more at ease. "Cuba has so many beautiful sights and sounds. It would almost be ruder not to take a picture."

Seo-Jun shook his head. "It's not that. I'm just... I'm thinking about things back home."

His face looked so somber, her smile faded. "Oh?"

He nodded. His gaze stayed focused on the dancing woman until he spoke again. "I don't know how much longer I'll stay in Cuba."

This wasn't surprising to River. Truthfully, she didn't know how much longer she would be in Cuba either. With any luck, she wouldn't have to be here longer than a few days. It wasn't the sights and sounds of Cuba that made her anxious to return--truthfully, she wanted to stay a little longer and she might have done just that under different circumstances--but she needed to get home quickly before her vicious aunt could do anything more to the company her father had worked so hard for.

But Seo-Jun looked so...forlorn that she couldn't help herself.

"Why?" she asked. "Why can't you stay? You seem like you're enjoying yourself here. Why leave now?" And that was true. Although she didn't know him well, she did understand what pure, unadulterated joy looked like. And Seo-Jun seemed to thrive under the Cuban sun and among the people. His tone also implied that leaving wasn't a decision he wanted to make, but rather one he had to make.

She meant it as a friendly question, but his face fell even farther. He bit his lip. "Because I'm afraid I won't be able to come back."

Her eyebrows came together in her confusion. "What do you mean?"

He was quiet for a long while before finally, he sighed. "I haven't told anyone this yet, and I don't know if I should tell you." He smiled shakily. "Especially since you're a woman I just met yesterday."

River returned his shaky smile with one of her own. "You don't have to say anything if it's difficult for you to--"

"No. I..." he trailed off and sucked in a breath. River mimicked him as if she needed the breath as much as he did. The sun-scented air swirled in her lungs. "I need to tell someone. I want to get it off my chest." He looked down, took another breath, and said, "I need to go back to Japan...to find out who killed my mother."

River looked at him in shock. She wasn't sure what she had expected him to admit. That he had to hurry back to his wife, that something unexpected had come up at his job. What she was a hundred percent sure of, though, was that she hadn't expected that.

"What?"

He nodded, his face somber before he shook his head in disbelief. "I can't believe I said that. To a stranger. Maybe it's because you're a stranger that I could say it." He looked directly at River. "Tomorrow is my last day in Cuba. After that, I'll go. But before I leave to take on heavier tasks...I wondered if...are you busy right now? Do you have anything you're supposed to be doing?"

"No," she answered. She was still reeling at the admission of Seo-Jun's mother being murdered and him leaving to find her killer, but she tried to refocus on the subject at hand. She'd think about what he'd just said later on when she was alone.

Seo-Jun dimpled at her, his eyes warming. River's entire body turned to lava under his gaze and she averted her eyes from him at once to regather herself before she met his eyes again.

"Will you spend the day with me, then?"

Her eyebrows rose. "The whole day? What would we even do?"

"Anything you want to do. Or nothing at all. I've been wanting to see Havana for a while now," he said. "And I'd love to show you around."

River thought for a moment. She didn't have anywhere else to be, and she liked the way Seo-Jun looked at her. His eyes were warm and sweet, and although she wasn't sure what to make of him, she enjoyed spending time with him. She had also never done something like this before; traveling around a foreign country with a man she'd only just met who looked at her like she was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. Surely, just this once, she was allowed to throw caution to the wind, to pretend for just a moment, that she was in love with a man she would never see again.

So she nodded and did her little smile that was no more than a quirk of her lips. "Okay."

River and Seo-Jun took a cab to Havana. Luckily for them, the city they were in was only a thirty-minute drive away. Seo-Jun insisted on paying for the cab ride, reminding her that she had paid for dinner as a form of repaying him for his help yesterday, and now they were even. River relented, but it was weird for her nonetheless. She wasn't used to anyone paying for her. Her family was one of the richest families in North America and, even around her fellow rich kids, everyone kind of just expected her to pay for herself and others. Not like she ever minded.

But Seo-Jun was different. Everything about him was different. The way that he smiled, his slender, graceful fingers, his handsome face, the hair tucked behind his ears. The way he spoke. The way he looked at her, even after seeing the hotel she was staying in. For the first time in her life, she was with someone who didn't seem to be looking at her status, but at her. It felt good.

Seo-Jun had promised her endless fun in Havana. He had promised to open her eyes to sights she had not seen before. And he delivered on his promise. From the moment their hired car dropped them off in Havana, Seo-Jun took her hand, dimpling as he did, and led her through the capital city. They walked down the streets where the Spanish colonial architecture stood tall, soaking in all the history. River felt like she could feel it in her veins, like the history attached to those walls was a palpable thing.

"It's beautiful," said River.

"You haven't seen anything yet."

He led her down the winding streets of Havana. The buildings were colorful, each one unique and the cobblestone roads were uneven.

They passed by a cafe with a sign reading Cafe de Los Amigos. A group of people sat outside, laughing loudly and clinking their glasses together.

As they walked, Seo-Jun pointed out various landmarks. "That's the Capitol Building," he would say, pointing to a small two-story building. Or "There you go! That's the Hotel Nacional."

It was like he could feel her excitement at seeing these historical landmarks up close and his excitement grew when hers did. She couldn't help but smile. She couldn't help but find him kind of adorable as he pointed at one building and the next, dimpling all the while.