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“Seo Min Hee isn’t just an incredible visionary and businesswoman, she’s also a mother.My mother.I’ve been with her from the beginning. Well, at least my beginning.”

The audience laughs, indulging me.

“I’ve seen her at her highest highs...”—the opening of Joah, the first major award for XOXO—“and her lowest lows...” My father’s affairs, the night after Hyemi’s scandal broke...

“No matter the occasion, she rises to the top, with tenacity, with power, with grace. I’m grateful for my mother for many reasons. But most importantly, I’m grateful because she shows me, by example, all that I can be, that my pathways are endless. She’s a true trailblazer. I am so proud of her, can you tell?”

The crowd laughs.

This whole time I’ve been worrying about her, but she’sSeo Min Hee. I don’t need to fight my mother’s battles; she can fight her own. She always has. Why did I ever think she couldn’t?

Everyone believes in her, the ASAP members, the XOXO members, Director Ryu and Secretary Park, but what about me?

When did I lose faith in my mother?

I need to believe in her. I need to trust that she’ll find a way, like she has before.

“She’s the strongest person I know...”

It feelsfreeingto remember that, like letting go of a weight I’d been carrying.

My gaze travels to where the XOXO members are sitting. Ican’t see them from here, but I know they’re watching, thathe’swatching. “I should be strong as well.”

A few people in the crowd shift in their seats, probably wondering what I mean.

“Please join me in honoring tonight’s recipient of this year’s Trailblazer Award, Founder and CEO of Joah Entertainment, Seo Min Hee.”

Everyone rises to their feet as my mother stands and makes her way up the stairs to the podium. As she approaches me, I see that there are actual tears in her eyes. She grabs me in a fierce hug, not caring that she’s ruining my makeup and her own.

“Thank you, Sori-yah. You have always given me the most strength. I love you.”

My tears match her own. “I love you, Eomma.”

There’s another award presentation after my mother accepts hers, but I don’t stay to watch it, not when I see that Nathaniel and the others have already left their seats.

I race backstage and into the hall that circles the arena.

We make a good team, he’d said.We do, I want to tell him,the very best. I couldn’t see that until tonight. I’d been pushing him away for so many reasons, because I was afraid of what could happen with us being together, scandals and heartbreak and regret, because I thought our lives were too different—he knows how to love and be loved, but for me, love feels like a threat, like something that could be taken away at any moment. Because I thought he was good and I was bad. But I was wrong. We are both bad. He’s a flirtand a delinquent, and I’m very much a girl who would risk it all for him.

I catch up with him in the parking lot behind the arena. He’s with the other members, walking toward the car service that’ll take them back to their dorms.

“Nathaniel!” I call out.

He turns, catching sight of me on the stairs. I quickly walk down them—not too fast, as I’m still wearing stilettos.

He’s waiting for me at the bottom. “Did you run in those?” He sounds both afraid for me and a little impressed.

“I need to talk to you,” I say, breathless from my run. “Alone.”

His eyes meet mine, his expression guarded, giving nothing of his thoughts away.

Finally, turning to the others, he says, “Wait in the car. I’ll be right there.”

He follows me behind a partitioned wall, out of view.

“Sori,” he says. “What’s going on? Are you—?”

I cut him off. “You said you’ve wanted me for half your life, but I think, for me, it’s been even longer. I’ve wanted you my whole life. You, with your sincerity and your teasing and your passion. You, who makes me feel safe and loved and beautiful.