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142 Korean wedding ■ Hubert Ahn I’m in Philadelphia for a wedding this weekend. The groom is Jason Choi. He’s an investment banker in New York. The bride is Hannah Lee. She’s a management consultant. I don’t really know what either of those mean. “Just imagine the sound of a cash register opening, twice,” Perry Kim tells me. We’re standing together outside the First Korean Presbyterian Church of Bretford, the day before the wedding. He’s a groomsman; I’m going to play the organ and the piano during the service. Perry’s doing his residency in radiology in San Francisco. I think it’s funny, him talking about cash-register noises in reference to other people. “He makes more money than you?” I ask. “I make peanuts, man.” “I mean when your residency’s over.” Perry seems to consider seriously for a moment. “It’ll be close.” I laugh. We haven’t seen each other in two years. Perry knows I’m poor. Thank God he doesn’t seem to care. “You seeing anyone?” I ask him. “No, no. No time.” “What happened to that girl?” “Cancer girl? We’re done. Anyone who takes up oncology’s a little too ambitious for me.” “Weird. You know what John told me when I saw him?” John Kim is the best man. He’s a lawyer somewhere in L.A. “What?” “Ambition’s a draw for him. He wants an ambitious woman.” Perry smirks. “John’s too fucking serious. Always has been. He’s rolling in the dough, man. He wants someone to back up a second dump truck full of money onto his lawn?” Korean Wedding ■ 143 “I kind of brought that up, too. But he wasn’t having it. I guess I see his point. I mean, what’s he gonna do? Marry a stripper?” “Who’s marrying a stripper?” Sarah Park squeezes her way in between us. Sarah’s about five foot two, which is five inches shorter than me and more than a full head shorter than Perry. She’s always been kind of pretty in a big-eyed, childish way, and, while I knew her, was constantly fluctuating between chubby sexy and just plain sexy, depending on whether or not she had a boyfriend, was trying to attract a new boyfriend, was on a last-boyfriend-induced eating binge, or had quit or started smoking again. She looks pretty good now. Either she’s got a new man, or hasn’t had one in a while. “John would, if he knew what was good for him,” Perry says. He wraps a brotherly arm around Sarah’s shoulder. “Ms. Park. Haven’t seen you in forever.” “Mr. Kim . . . Apparently you have a short memory, or you’re not really all that fond of me. We were both at Karen Chung’s wedding, in September . . . by the way, are you going to David Son’s?” “It’s gonna be a close call. I told him already, I won’t know until about a week before. I want to, though. Especially ’cause she’s white. Never seen a Korean man and a white woman joined in holy matrimony. She must be some kind of crazy.” “You’re horrible.” Sarah play-slaps his shoulder. Perry glances at me, realizing I’ve been temporarily frozen out of the conversation . He knows I wasn’t invited to Karen or David’s wedding. I was never great friends with either of them, but neither was he. I’ve fallen off almost everyone’s acquaintance wheel since graduation. Thumbnailed photos of me do not appear on their Facebook sites, I don’t take weekend golf outings with the guys, like Perry did with John and David and others two weeks ago in Georgia, and I avoid the semireunions when a bunch of them come home to Illinois during the holidays. Money is only an excuse for the golf, I guess. I don’t think it’s embarrassment, either. They might be embarrassed when they find out I work in a dry cleaner’s. Mostly I think I stay away because I would expect each of them to be the person I remembered, and not the person they’d become. And they would see this, and maybe find it a little pathetic. Maybe. Sarah is now turned toward me. “Aren’t you gonna insah to your noo-nah?” Noo-nah means older sister. She wants me to bow to her. For...

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