LOS ANGELES — I was about 9 years old when I first met him. My mother had just opened her first restaurant in Koreatown, and the beauty salon a few doors down had a big sign above the awning that read, “Addy Total Beauty.” I had never heard the name Addy before, but I remember liking the way it sounded.

Walking into his salon for the first time, everything looked really cool — the walls were decorated with black-and-white portraits of models with new wave and mod hairstyles and asymmetrical bobs. It was the mid-’80s, and it all seemed so futuristic.

At 9, I was painfully shy, with a short bowl haircut, and had just started wearing glasses. I was in the beginning stages of an inherent awkwardness that would rule my life for years to come. I felt so dorky and out of place in the salon, flipping through magazines with photographs of beautiful women wearing sexy clothes. I looked around the room, uncomfortably pushing my glasses up off my nose, and saw that I was the only little girl there. My mom, busy at work a few doors away, had just dropped me off to get a haircut. So I waited there quietly on the couch, trying my best not to look too self-conscious. 

Addy Kim wore baggy black pants and a fancy black shirt, with beautiful bracelets, earrings and necklaces. I looked down at his shoes — steel-toed platform creepers. His hair was bleached blond at the top and cut funky. His face was definitely a man’s, but I found him to be sort of pretty. He moved with grace and poise; his gestures and movements were like that of a woman. I didn’t quite understand at the time what it meant to be gay, but I knew for sure that Addy was different from any other Korean man I had ever met.

He stood behind a female customer in his styling chair and put the final touches on her hair. Then, he turned to me, smirking, and asked if I was the daughter of the restaurant owner next door. His voice was low and smooth like velvet. I answered, in Korean, “Nae,” and quickly looked down at my feet. Addy giggled to himself and gently directed me to the changing room, where I slipped on a silky black robe that was too big for me, and then had my hair shampooed by one of his assistants.

Then Addy motioned to me, so I walked over and sat down sheepishly in his chair. He pumped the bar by my heels a few times and the seat bounced up. I giggled, and so did he. Looking me over, he delicately removed my glasses and combed my hair down around my head and over my face. I felt safe here, hiding inside my hair. With my glasses off, I couldn’t really see how people reacted to me, so I didn’t care so much about what I looked like or what the world thought of me.