Everything Belongs to Us Page 4

  She followed the guard through the holding area to the front of the station, an open area arranged with gray metal desks. There, another officer was waiting to collect her, a baby-faced young man who appeared flustered by her tears. Awkwardly he tried to pat her elbow as if she would be grateful, like a child separated from her parents at an amusement park. Undoubtedly this junior officer had been sent by his superiors to save face, told to do or say whatever was necessary to smooth out the “misunderstanding.” The captains would hide behind their big desks and closed doors until Jisun was safely collected and kowtow to her father or whoever had made the call, promising that it would never happen again.

  Never. Always. Jisun’s father had a way of pulling those words out of people’s mouths.

  The young officer was trying to offer her a tissue. Jisun said, “Do you think it’s right, jailing honest women for exercising their rights?”

  His expression hardened, aging him suddenly. “I know who you are and who your father is,” he said roughly. “You made a fool of us—what right do you have? Not everything is your plaything. Not everything belongs to you.”

  Her father had sent his driver, Ko, a former dock employee who had gotten his left foot crushed in an accident six years ago. All the way to her father’s house, Ko filled the rearview mirror with sour, disapproving looks. Jisun rolled down the window to let wind gust through the vehicle, disturbing his carefully oiled hair. Since his promotion, Ko had taken to affecting a “gentlemanly” appearance, which to him meant a 1930s Shanghai hairdo slicked to match the polish of his patent-leather shoes. In his early tenure he had also tried to grow a mustache, but Jisun’s father forbade it. I am a businessman, not a Mafia don.

  “Kindly give me advance notice of your next little spree,” Ko said now, one hand tamped over his rebellious part. “I’m missing a visit to my mother.”

  “You should have gone to see her. I would have preferred that.”

  “I would have preferred that also. Unfortunately—”

  “I know, Ko. I didn’t choose this, either.”

  “Didn’t you? Now close that window.”

  It was a strange thing, obeying the orders of her father’s staff. Ko’s loyalty to her father was absolute, and he seemed to take particular pleasure in thwarting her desires, as if each instance of shoving her back in line proved the strength of his devotion to the boss.

  When they arrived at the house, he stopped the car in front of the first gate and waited while the heavy iron bars slid open. The machinery made a rumbling sound that always triggered a sense of panic in Jisun, a tightening in her chest that forced her to search for air. It had been three months since she’d left home to live in factory housing and work with the Urban Industrial Mission—a lifetime in some ways, but not long enough to override the years of feeling caged. There was beauty here, which she could plainly see and sometimes even admire: rare indigenous trees, a sunken garden with a duo of resident peacocks, and a pond glazed with lotus leaves as wide as circus rings. But after the months she’d stayed away, the carefully tended grounds no longer touched her. She had felt more life in words printed on cheap yellow paper, pages circulated and handled so often that they became translucent and tattered like lace. She read and reread the diaries of jailed workers, whose yearning for the education she took for granted shamed her to the core. She memorized poems by the dissident poets Kim Chi-ha and Ko Un, satirical lines so true they made her laugh aloud. These experiences—not the peacocks or the iron gates—had made her rich for the first time.

  Pulling into the driveway, Ko said, “From this point forward you are to speak to me before leaving the grounds. Outside the house, he wants you to be accompanied at all times. There will be no exceptions.”

  But Jisun was only half listening. She was staring at the topiary in the front garden, which had been recently shaped so that the branches appeared to be balancing heavy plates. In her absence, even the shrubs had become servants. “I see the gardeners have developed a sense of humor,” she said. “Very nice.”

  Ko loudly snapped his fingers inches from her face. “Did you hear what I said? You’re to tell me before you go anywhere. I suggest you give me plenty of notice. I have no intention of being at your beck and call.”

  This time Jisun heard him. “But that’s ridiculous,” she protested. “How can I do that? I’d never go anywhere that way.”

  “I’m sure that would be my preference also.”

  “That’s fine,” she said. “I’ll be out of here in a day or two, anyway.”

  Now it was Ko’s turn to laugh, a sly, nasty sound that foreshadowed exactly how unpleasant his next words would be. “And live where? On the street? You might find arranging shelter a little more difficult in the future,” he said. “Your factory housing has been notified. If they choose to take you back, there will be consequences for them, which I’m sure they will be very eager to avoid. Any other dorm or boardinghouse will face the same unfavorable options—your father has made certain of that. And another thing, you will resume classes at the university immediately since you seem to have neglected them of late. Your father has arranged for that also.”

  Finally Jisun understood. He would not let her go back to her freedom so easily. She had been locked in these tactical battles with the man all her life and there was no need to be surprised. In a way, she was grateful to Ko for having given her a head start. Now she had time to prepare.

  “Do me a favor, Ko,” she said. “The next time he sends you to get me, just tell him I was shot dead in the street. Save us both the trouble.”

  Ko switched off the engine and carefully fixed his disheveled part in the rearview mirror. “Doesn’t save me any trouble,” he said. “I believe I would still have to collect the body.”

  —

  SHE HAD EXPECTED her father to be sitting in his chair in the living room, his favorite seat outside his study where he could observe visitors as they entered without being seen himself. He would be waiting with the crease in his pants leg aligned over his knees, a finger of Chivas Regal in his cut glass. His only casual allowance would be the lack of a tie, the top button of his shirt open to a perfect V.

  When Jisun did not see him she headed toward the study, asking the housekeeper ajumma, “Is he there?” No use putting it off. She was still her father’s daughter; she never liked to draw out an unpleasant encounter.

  Even though her brother was home—she had noticed Min’s wallet and car keys, his impeccably shined Ferragamo shoes by the door—she knew ajumma would know whom she meant by “he.” She and Min had never been close and had not spoken since he’d left to study in Germany after graduation last year. Ajumma had mentioned he was home for the time being. Something about having blown through too much money too quickly. Min’s profligate tendencies were no secret, but their father usually tolerated it with silent judgment. He must have achieved a truly impressive level of recklessness—even for him—to warrant being called home.

  “Wait.” Ajumma pulled her into the hallway, the two of them uncomfortably close in that confined space. Forced to look at her, Jisun realized these past months had been their longest separation since she had been hired when Jisun was four years old. She suddenly saw how ajumma had grown old. Not just in her absence, but in the unknown length of time in which she had stopped noticing. The roots of her dyed hair were coming in gray and white, that thick, translucent white that would not hold dye for long. The skin around her eyes drooped like mismatched hoods. Underneath her cheap beige makeup, Jisun could see dark shields of pigmentation across both cheeks. They appeared almost shiny, like an artificial application of dirt or fine soot.

  It frightened Jisun to see this familiar face so altered. It had happened right in front of her, day by day, but she hadn’t noticed. Now here it was all at once. Fifteen years in a glance.

  “Well, what is it?” she said, harsher than she’d intended.

  “He won’t see you.” Ajumma’s eyebrows pinched at the true arch, not the
one she had penciled in. “Go ahead to your room.”

  “He knows I’m here?”

  “He does.”

  A new game, then. New game, new rules.

  She turned to go.

  “When you’re ready, lunch is on the table.”

  Jisun knew better than to argue or to claim she was not hungry. Ajumma had been in her father’s employ long enough to know that she should mimic his tactics, using quiet, persistent moves that battered people into submission. If Jisun did not come down for lunch, the tray would appear outside her door as if she were a prisoner. If she ignored that, a larger spread—lunch suitable for four—would appear on her vanity in the morning. Freshly prepared food that would get tossed into the trash without a second glance. Any waste or consequence, her fault.

  Fifteen years. Jisun had known the housekeeper longer than her own mother. On the hall table outside her bedroom door was a framed portrait of her mother sitting stiffly in a photographer’s chair, wearing a black skirt suit. At her throat was an oversize silk bow, the center of the knot jabbed with a brooch, a diamond-studded lily. The photo had been taken before Jisun could remember, years before her mother died. Her face still had a touch of roundness, the wariness in her eyes not yet dulled to apathy.

  Jisun flipped the frame facedown on the table. She had long ago given up trying to replace the studio photos with better ones, the photos that showed her mother wearing clothes she was comfortable in, her eyes settled on something off frame, never exactly smiling but reposed. The good photos disappeared as soon as her father noticed them. Sometimes the photo would be returned to her, surreptitiously tucked into her underwear drawer where only she would see it. Jisun knew this was ajumma’s doing. But most of the time the photos never reappeared, and Jisun was forced to give up. Her father would never relent and she could not afford to gamble with rare memories.

  She picked up the frame and set it right on the table. After a moment, she opened the back and removed the photo. An empty frame suited both mother and daughter much better.

  The next morning, Jisun asked Ko to drive her to the bathhouse.

  “You have your own bathroom. Use it,” he said curtly. “Anyway, I’m busy.”

  “Your job is to be my chaperone, not my jailer,” Jisun said. “And I know it’s not up to you to decide where I practice my hygiene. I’ll meet you in the garage in five minutes.” She didn’t stick around to see his reaction. They both knew his only recourse was to bring it up with her father. On her first day back, even Ko would not dare to disturb the boss over such a petty thing.

  There was no bathhouse in their immediate neighborhood, which was too secluded to require one. She made Ko drive twenty-five minutes into the city, claiming she had a favorite location where the steam was scented with mountain herbs. Ko rolled his eyes but did as she asked, stopping the car in front of the dark gray building indicated with the usual red neon bathhouse sign—tendrils of steam rising like a flame. “One hour,” he said. “I’ll be right here.”

  “Three,” she countered quickly. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been here. Go ahead, you don’t have to stay here and wait.”

  “Absolutely not,” he said. “Ninety minutes and that’s final.”

  It was more time than she had expected. Jisun quickly agreed. She ran into the building and was grateful to see there was a back exit—she would not have to wait for Ko to pull away. After exiting the building from the other side, she hailed the first taxicab she saw. She had never taken a taxi to the UIM office and would have been mortified if anyone saw her, but even in a car, it would take at least another twenty minutes to cross the river and make it to the office. She didn’t have time to wait for a bus.

  In the cab, she tried to compose her thoughts on what she would say to Peter. She had been so focused on getting there that she hadn’t planned how to explain everything she needed to say. She would have to improvise and hope that the strength of her feelings made her eloquent and convincing, to defend herself against any judgment Peter might have made about what had happened at the police station the day before.

  She and Peter Lowell had spent every day of the last three months together at the Urban Industrial Mission, meeting with workers, union leaders, and church groups. Peter had arrived from a church in Oregon via his orientation in Incheon last fall with only a handful of Korean words and seemingly boundless plans. By necessity, they had been inseparable. Every morning he showed up with a new sheaf of unlined pages written closely from margin to margin, front and back—pages he wanted translated on the spot, as if he believed she were some kind of machine. Flattered by his confidence and determined to exceed his expectations, Jisun had worked harder than she’d ever worked in her life. After more than a dozen years of private tutors, she knew her English was fluent. But her fancy lessons had never included vocabulary about labor laws, nor did she know anything about Christianity. She could sense that Peter was being careful to keep religious references to a minimum until he could earn the workers’ respect, but she knew his faith was deeply important to him. Every morning at dawn, he attended a local church service, praying silently in the back pew while other worshippers made loud petitions to God. He invited Jisun to join him and she had accepted once out of curiosity, but she never felt comfortable returning. It was the one aspect of Peter’s life that felt completely closed to her.

  For long hours each day, Jisun carried out the painstaking double process of first translating his talks from English to Korean, then transliterating each Korean syllable so he would know how to pronounce them. In the early weeks when his grasp of Hangul was unreliable, this was the only way he could produce recognizable Korean words. She wondered if he ever slept. To keep up with him, she barely slept four or five hours a night herself. Yet he arrived each morning having written more work, memorized more speeches. He recited them swaying slightly on the balls of his feet, as if giving a musical performance.

  Jisun had fallen for him with the headlong absorption and obsessive hope of first love. She marveled at how they’d been tumbled together from opposite sides of the world, only to find that they were more effective, more powerful, as a team than either could hope to be alone. As partners, they were seamless. And although Peter had never said anything directly, she was certain he shared her feelings. She knew this by the way he skirted around her in their narrow space, careful not to brush against her, as if even an inadvertent touch would reveal too much. She noticed how his posture changed whenever she entered the room, stiffening and then going slack, as if he were willing himself to relax. He was as physically aware of her as she was of him. With so many words traded between them, words that required constant debate and fine-tuning, there had been something precious to her about leaving the larger emotions of the heart unspoken. These were things they knew perfectly well without doubt or translation, without even having to say them aloud.

  She didn’t have time to waste in sentimental meditation, but she stood on the street gazing at the familiar building, taking in its unremarkable brick facade and dirty windows. She wanted to file away each detail in her mind. This was where she had spent the happiest months of her life, where she had discovered a world-expanding purpose beyond the narrow confines of her former life. She ached to be in there today, working as if it were any other day. She could close her eyes and see the exact pages they’d been translating last. Her fingers itched to feel the paper Peter used to draft his notes, a cheap newsprint that was simultaneously soft and rough like felt.

  This was her home. After working with him in such proximity, Jisun felt she knew Peter intimately, from his tight, angular handwriting to the shape of his mouth as he struggled to form Korean words, to the way he smiled, a mixture of warmth and natural reserve. She knew the tea stains that would not wash out of his cherished dove gray sweater, among the few items he had brought from home. Fisherman’s sweater, he called it, though his family did not fish.

  Because he repeated the same garments over and over and live
d in a shabby boardinghouse near the steel mill where he focused the majority of his work, Jisun had assumed he must have been chased out of his own country, penniless and without prospects. They had worked together nearly a month before she heard about his family’s lumber fortune. A famous name, his family, people whispered. Jisun dismissed the talk as idle gossip, but the workers insisted that they had heard it from the previous UIM emissary, who had returned to the States after he found living in Korea too difficult an adjustment. When Jisun finally asked Peter about it, she admired the way he dispassionately confirmed the information, as if they were discussing some minor news item that did not pertain to him. But he refused to elaborate, irritated by her questions about his past and likewise disinclined to ask about hers. Knowing who her father was, Peter seemed to think the less said on the topic of their families, the better. Jisun had been as confounded as she was grateful. It was the first time in her life she felt acknowledged for her own merits.

  But now Jisun knew they could not ignore the facts. She wondered if Peter would maintain his usual policy of avoiding the issue—or would he blame her as everyone else did, holding her accountable for her father’s decisions? She hoped he would know her better than that, that he of all people would understand. Taking a deep breath, Jisun crossed the street, hoping the right words would come when she needed them.

  —

  PETER MUST HAVE heard her climbing the old creaky steps and entering the office, but he stayed seated even when she crossed the threshold. His back was to the door, his shoulders bunched around his neck. His silence and that subtle slight of pretending he hadn’t heard her communicated everything she had feared.

  “Hello, Peter,” she said, trying to quell the panic in her voice. When he finally turned to face her, she knew he had not moved from his desk all night. His light brown hair spiked in pieces around his crown where he must have pulled it away from his head as he grew tired, a gesture she knew well. His eyes, normally a luminous amber tone like the eyes of an owl, were sunken and flat.