Jennie
LAX was just as I remembered it. Hot and crowded and smelling of immense body odour mixed with questionable street food. I pulled my little green suitcase through the terminal, while dodging the hawkers selling their City of Angels tee shirts, as I unlocked my phone and checked my messages for the thousandth time today.
I'd texted Lisa after the Homeland Security agent had called to warn her that I was coming back at the agent's behest. But she hadn't answered. I supposed she was still just as busy as before or maybe she'd changed her number. I didn't know. I wasn't sure that it even mattered. I sent a text to my group chat with Chahee and Jimin to let them know that I'd made it and then tapped out of my messages and opened the Uber app just as I stepped onto the escalators that led down to the main entrance. But my phone started ringing just before I bought my ride.
"Hyun-suk?" I asked into the receiver, having read the name of the caller on my screen before answering.
"Kim!" he barked, calling me strictly by my last name as he did with everyone at the studio. "Where are you? Why is Mike bringing me the finalised script this week?"
"Oh, I asked Nayeon to tell you, sir. I'm temporarily working remotely due to an emergency situation back home and I..."
"When will you be back?"
"Well, I'm not sure. Once everything is resolved."
"I don't like this cheeseburger joke."
"What?"
"The cheeseburger joke. On the last page. I'm telling Mike to cut it."
"The cheeseburger joke tested very well with our focus group, sir."
I was only half paying attention at that point. As my boss, Hyun-suk, launched into an explanation of how vital it was not to offend vegetarians, I noticed a man in a classic black suit and matching cap holding a little white sign that read Jennie Kim in large, scrawled letters. I approached him warily.
"Hyun-suk, I'm sorry. I've got to go. Discuss the change with Nate. I trust him."
"Kim..."
I hung up.
"Um, I'm Jennie Kim." I told the well-dressed man, uncomfortably. He smiled broadly at me and lowered his sign, stepping toward me. A moment later, he'd taken my suitcase from my hand and led me graciously through the exit to a waiting limousine. I stared at it while he settled my suitcase into the trunk and opened my door.
"Sorry." I said, while hesitating on the sidewalk. "I really don't want to be one of those girls on the eleven o' clock news who somehow walked into her own kidnapping so can I ask who sent you?"
"Ms. Manoban." the man told me, still smiling.
"Lisa?" I asked, stunned. "She sent a limousine?"
"Oh yes. Ms. Manoban always wants her guests to be comfortable."
I wanted to call bullshit on the whole thing and start searching for the hidden cameras in the nearby bushes but the way this man was nodding emphatically at me made me think that perhaps it wasn't a joke at all.
"Miss Kim?" He asked. I'd spent the last minute mentally calculating the possibility of this stranger having gotten his paws on some American Airlines manifest and identified the one woman flying alone to LA but in the end decided that I watched too much 'Investigation Discovery' and just shook my head and climbed into the backseat of the limo.
I sat awkwardly alone in the enormous backseat while the driver slid into the seat up front and put the car into gear.
"So you're a driver." I called up to the front, having to practically shout to be heard across the distance. The pathetic attempt at conversation sounded even more ridiculous out loud and I shook my head at the stupidity of it.
"Oh yes, I've been driving for Ms. Manoban for three years now." the man answered proudly. I paused, with my lips parting slightly in surprise. Driving for Ms. Manoban? Not some limo company with cars that could be rented out to pick up estranged wives from airports? That meant that this was Lisa's personal limo. But how... I fumbled with the pocket of my leather jacket, digging desperately for my phone. When I pulled it out, I tapped Lisa's name immediately into the search bar at the top and my jaw dropped at the results that popped up.
Billionaire Lisa Manoban donates thousands to cancer research...
Dynamo Mano, and CEO Lisa Manoban, report highest earning quarter yet...
Forbes' 40 Under 40, Lisa Manoban...
I stared at my screen, scrolling past article after article, in stunned awe. She'd done it. She'd actually done everything that she said she was going to do back in college. I couldn't help my smile as I read about the history of her company, her smash hit game called 'Retribution', her philanthropy, and finally, most recently, her wife. I stared at the picture of me exiting my New York City office building. My makeup was minimal, my hair was a disaster from a night spent on my office couch, I had a crook in my neck from the same experience and was hobbling like it. I sighed and started to click out of the article when I saw the photo just below mine. I froze.
A ridiculously attractive person posed coolly in an expensive suit that hugged her body so tightly that I could practically draw the outline of her abs with my finger on the screen. Her jawline was still as sharp, pronounced and her immaculate cheekbones led right up to her piercing green eyes... wait. I glanced at the caption of the photo.
Lisa Manoban, CEO of Dynamo Mano.
"No." I said out loud. "No, no, no."
"Everything alright, Miss Kim?" The driver called curiously from the front.
"Everything's fine! I'm... it's fine. Mister... sorry I don't think I got your name."
"Kevin, just Kevin." he replied with that same beaming smile.
"Kevin, right. I'm fine. Thanks."
I tapped out a quick Google image search and scrolled through the results.
"It's not possible." I hissed. "It can't be possible."
Gone were the wire-rimmed glasses, the shaggy mop of unkempt hair, and the occasional zit. Lisa had packed on at least fifty pounds of muscle, gotten a proper trim, and contacts. I squinted at my screen. That green was augmented contacts, right? It had to be. I would have remembered eyes like that. I felt a shiver course through me when I remembered that this person was Lisa Manoban, my best friend from college, my spouse. Suddenly, I felt my cheeks heating up and realised that I was blushing for the first time in years.
"Miss Kim?" Kevin interrupted me. I blinked, while looking up from my screen, realising that I'd been hunched over my iPhone in the back of this dark limo like a hermit in a cave. "We're here."
I scrambled to the windows, peering out at the enormous, sprawling modern mansion. It was made almost entirely of windows and faced the ocean which lapped up at the rocks at the bottom of the cliff it sat perched atop of. My exhale fogged up the window a split second before the door opened to reveal a beaming and waiting Kevin.
I smiled uncertainly up at him and stepped out into the blazing California sun.
What, exactly, had I gotten myself into?
