Then, Ms. Liu had to leave. She was running late to dinner with a friend. They said their goodbyes, and that they wanted to see each other again.
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Three days later, Mr. Choi attended an event at the New-York Historical Society, near her Upper West Side apartment. He texted her that he was in her neighborhood, so she told him to stop by her place. (Ms. Liu’s mother was staying at her apartment at the time. She can’t speak English, and he can’t speak Mandarin, so they just smiled at each other.)
When Ms. Liu and Mr. Choi had some alone time together, she asked him if she could hold his hand, and he said yes. She was hoping he would kiss her, but he didn’t. After she rode the elevator with him down to the ground level of her apartment building, she asked him if she could hug him. She was a bit sad when, again, he didn’t kiss her. (He just wanted to respect her boundaries, he said.)
On their third date, one week after they met in person, Ms. Liu made the first move and kissed him. They had spent hours at Fornino, a pizza restaurant in Dumbo, Brooklyn, and then wandered around at a nearby park, sat down and soaked in the view of the Statue of Liberty. It was here that Mr. Choi told her that he really likes her, and that he would love to date her.
She agreed to be his girlfriend on their fifth date, and on the sixth date, she met his parents.
Over the months to come, Ms. Liu got to know his parents well. “They’re also first-generation immigrants like me — we’re on the same wavelength,” Ms. Liu said. She was surprised by how similar their cultures were. She also grew up listening to K-pop and learned some Korean, which she was able to practice with his parents.
