He finally understood why Kaya told him to innocently and purely listen. Even though she said to do so, he couldn't help himself from having improper thoughts. Jo Minjoon stared at Kaya with a blank expression before slowly starting to speak.

"……Am I supposed to interpret that like a teenager in puberty?"

"No. Take the puberty out of it."

"Even before puberty, boys normally……"

Kaya's expression started to get colder. As if saying he understood, Minjoon just started to crush a poor french fry with his fingers with a sad expression. Kaya pushed him to hurry up and make up his mind.

"So what will it be. WIll you stay with me or not?"

"Hold on."

Jo Minjoon took out his smartphone. He then immediately sent Rachel a text. [Me: I'm not coming home tonight.] Kaya started to shake her head.

"Are you a kid? Why do you have to report your every move?"

"She might be worried if I don't contact her and stay out. What about you? Are you going to contact your mom?"

"…… I don't know. Later. If I call her now, I don't know what to tell her."

"Did you say Ms. Grace was still in New York?"

"She lived a rough life, but she spent half of her whole life in New York. I do want to take her away from the rough East and bring here here to California…..but I will have to wait and see."

"What about you? Are you going to keep living in California?"

Kaya hesitated for a moment. Nothing had been decided yet and she couldn't answer. However, the fact that she could leave California meant that she would have to leave Minjoon again in the near future. She didn't want to say that.

For Minjoon's feelings, for her own feelings. If it is an uncertain farewell, she didn't want to bring it up if she didn't have to do so.

"I will live in California for at least the next six months. Of course I would be traveling here and there frequently, but since they said they'll pay the rent, I might as well find a house……but why are we suddenly talking about this?"

"Then shall we talk about the night we will be spending together?"

"Don't say it like that. I told you to become innocent."

"What? All I said was the night. Isn't it your ear that is not innocent?"

"……The nuance was completely weird."

As Kaya said that, she grabbed a handful of fries. As he was wondering whether she was going to eat all of it, Kaya quickly grabbed Minjoon's back with her other hand and reached out her hand full of fries.

"Open your mouth."

"I don't, ah!"

He was planning on saying he didn't want to, but now that he thought about it, he had to open his mouth to respond. Kaya shoved all those fries into Minjoon's mouth and spoke with a triumphant voice.

"Swallow that puberty stricken teenager inside of you along with those fries."

He had a ton of things he wanted to say, but he could not say anything. It wasn't only because of the french fries. Kaya's face was right in front of his nose. She opened her mouth. Her lips approached slowly and bit one of the french fries that was sticking out of Minjoon's mouth. Her head started to turn, and the sound of her teeth biting the french fry felt like it was echoing in his ear.

"The puberty stricken teenage girl inside of me, I will swallow her with this as well."

€

Kaya did not have a house in California yet. That meant that she was currently staying at a hotel. That also meant that the place the two of them would have to spend the night together was none other than a hotel.

It wasn't weird for the atmosphere to become awkward. A man and a woman entering a hotel together. They both knew what that usually meant… Kaya planted her butt on the couch and started to speak.

"……The female worker at the counter, didn't she look like she recognize us?"

"If she didn't recognize us, I'm sure she wouldn't have given us such a sparkling gaze."

"Oh my gosh……what do I do if they post it on the internet? Do I need to sue them?"

"If you're worried about that, you'll first need to take care of all those people at the hot dog shop that took pictures of us."

Kaya hugged her knees with a depressed expression at Minjoon's