Endy- Reaching for the Missing Moon

by Jiny Lee

  Endy

  Reaching for the Missing Moon

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Prologue

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  35

  36

  Epilogue

  Prologue

  I should've listened to her. She must've known that all these things were to happen anyway. Even though she didn't know what exactly was to happen, she must've been worried that something bad like this was definitely going to happen to me.

  Now I'm lying here on this cold roof top, 200 stories high on this colossal building. I'm watching the full moon slowly setting. I'm trying to reach for the moon but I can't. Literally, I can't. I'm just waiting for the burning Sun to come up and tear down my flesh and bones into ashes.

  This is it. This is how this story ends. The Sun will come up in anytime soon and I, as one of the people living in this monstrous building, should be dead after only a minute of exposure to the sunlight. A long painful minute it surely will be. But, before the Sun crawls up to end it, I'd like to tell you the rest of the story other than this rather disappointing ending.

  1

  Where should I begin... Okay first, from the very beginning.

  When I was young, I heard a lot of stories about the people living outside the building. One of the stories goes like, the reason we're stuck inside the building and forbidden to get out is because we did something wrong to the gods in heaven. The mighty sun god got so mad at us that he put a curse on us, a curse on our skins. Ever since, we can't get outside or be exposed to the sun light. Bye bye, summer holidays on the beach.

  So we live in this building. To be honest, I don't believe in any god or what people say about the curse. It's not a curse. It's a disease and the symptoms are real. The moment our skins are under the sun, it starts to burn down, and in about a minute or so, there's nothing left of us but clothes and some remnants under them.

  The sad part is, the process isn't a noble one like in some sort of a vampire movie. We don't quickly turn into ashes without any pain. We starts to boil. To be more specific, our skin starts to evaporate and melt at the same time. Our eyes are the first to melt inside. Like a hot liquid. A lava. We have to endure the pain it gives when our skins are turning into hot molten pieces of gelatin. As it dissolves. As our internal organs become external organs.

  And, there are people who are not like us. People living in the city outside the building. People who can walk under the sunlight. People who are 'clean, and non-cursed.' They're the ones who are believed to be chosen by the gods in heaven. They're the ones who get the privilege of living without worrying about dying the day after.

  They get all their necessities and luxuries from us. The factories inside this giant building run twenty-four-seven and their fancy parties celebrating the lives of the chosen go on for twenty-four-seven as well. Maybe we have to go on a strike and raise our voice to shout out loud our complaints to get our rights not to be exploited and dying but to whom? To whom while we are trapped in this 200-story high prison cell and the walls are massive concrete? We are nothing more than bolts and nuts. We're just a bunch of components composing a factory machine with a label saying 'avoid direct sunlight.'

  ...

  Living inside the building, we can't self supply food sufficiently. We have to get it from the people outside. They get the maximum of us, and give the minimum. Their choppers come every day when the sun is on its highest. They pick up the things we make and drop a tiny parcel on its place.

  Inside the parcel are supposedly some snacks, processed food, drinks, appliances sometimes, clothing, and some medicine. Medicine is of the greatest importance. Vitamins. Since we can't be under the sunlight, they say we lack in vitamin D. We have to get an injection every once in a while, but not all of us can have the fortune to get even a shot. Only those with power, those who have access to the top of the building can have that privilege.

  If you were one of the people on the top floors, you could have a godly power. People living outside the building don't care a damn about what's happening inside the building. They don't care about the fair distribution of resources in the building. All they ever care is whether there are products every day at the exact same time. They get the products we made by grinding our flesh and bones and drop off the necessities that would never be handed down to the bottom. Those with power living on the top floors, they had them all. They look down on the rest of the residents as if we were the slaves and they were not. They controled everything. Everything from food and medicine, to, why not, women.

  Sorry for the long introductory. This story begins with a girl too. My Diane. We were born on the same floor, 13th. She was born about 8 months earlier than I did. Just like the other kids in the building, we used to hang out a lot, exploring the building up and down the stairs. The highest we ever got was the 49th because it was highly restricted for us to go up the stairs. The floors were like classes and castes, and those on the top floors didn't want the system to be interrupted. They even controled the religion in the building and made a religious ceremonies to control us. They formed a huge cartel and called themselves religious.

  Anyway, Diane and I, we grew up together. We always hang out together wherever we went. We were invincible together. All until the day we became 14 years old.

  Little boys and girls, until they reached the age 14, were excluded from all the works and duties for a several reasons. First, there was a health issue. The birth rate is seriously low inside the building so, they should preserve every possible hand. The second reason was a little bit more religious. According to the code, the religious code, it's considered a sin to work or participate in any kind of activities designated only for the grown ups before reaching the righteous age.

  Every year when the full moon is the brightest at January, we have a huge ceremony including a rite of passage. We call that day 'Chigan Sar.' A boy becomes a man and joins the work force. A girl becomes a woman and also joins the work force if she's lucky. The unfortunate girls selected by the moon has to serve the goddess for the rest of her lives. They're called the sisters and lead the religious march on the ceremonies.

  They lived on the top floors with 'the religious leaders.' Religious leaders holding a gun in one hand and holding a leash on the other, telling us to live according to the code while enjoying everything from drugs to young girls. If you turn 14 and you're chosen to be a sister, well, what should I say. There's a life worse than death. Nobody even dares to speak about the life of being a sister but...

  The first time I remember I saw the sister's march was when I was age 5 or something. I was playing hide and seek with Diane and some other kids from the 13th floor. They told us that the sister's march was coming down the stairs right now and we got to see them.

  They were beautiful. People were cheering for them, and some people were even crying. I tried to get close to them. It was not allowed to get near the sisters during the march but I guess no one noticed me since I was only a little boy, and I was particularly small for the age. I got real close to one of the
girls and happened to get trapped on her white gown. She didn't fall but I clearly saw her legs which were hidden under the white veil. It looked severely bruised and hurt.

  The guards quickly took me apart from her but I clearly saw it. I told this to my mother after I came back home and she made me promise not to tell anybody about this. I thought like I'd found out a horrible truth which was kept in secret but I realized not so long after it that it wasn't a secret at all. It was an obvious thing that everyone knew, just that it wasn't allowed to be said in public.

  It was a weird concept for my five-year-old brain. Something should be kept secret not because it is a secret but it should be a secret. Everyone knows it but it should be kept a secret because it should be a secret. That puzzled my little boy brain. That's the first time I began to question everything in this world. In hindsight, that was exactly why my mom told me not to tell anybody. She didn't want me to question, but just wanted me to live without harm. Maybe I shouldn't have told mom, either. I didn't want to make her feel worried about me.

  2

  Until Diane and I were about 7, we still played hide and seek. There was not much of an entertainment in the building. So the building became our playground. We traveled every corners of it, and it was large enough for us to find some decent places to hide. Naturally, there were a few other kids joined in our group.

  Danny was three years older than us. He was a born leader. He refused to get his hair cut for some reasons he also refused to tell. I guess it was just to look cool. Everybody else was saying like 'please cut your hair, Danny. It looks terrible and messy,' but I kinda thought it was badass. It always reminded me of an episode in 'Samurai Jack' where he untied his hair, if you remember that cartoon. Back to the past, back to the past Samurai Jack, remember?

  Danny was brave like him, too. Whenever we played hide and seek, he voluntarily became the seeker and pretended he could smell us, like doing some sort of a wolf impression.

  Chen was a year younger than us. He was sick from the day he was born. He was really bad at playing hide and seek because he couldn't stop coughing. We would pretend not to hear his cough. It was a difficult acting since he was also terrible at hiding as well. Sometimes we went too far at acting and we pretended as if we weren't able to find him until like really late and then we totally forgot about him and found him still crouching under a table the next morning. He was a good kid. He didn't even get mad at us but instead he said 'I won' with an innocent smile.

  It was a shame that he had to die early. He didn't make it till his rite of passage. He died at the age of 13. The rest of us didn't mention about his death after he died. We kept on pretending like he was hiding under a table and we couldn't figure out where he was.

  Kimmy's about a year older than me and Diane. She was the only one in our group who wasn't not from the 13th floor. She was from the 20th floor. She came all the way down to the 13th floor everyday to just hang out with us. Thinking how difficult it must have been for a little kid to travel up and down the stairs every single day, she really liked us. In fact, she secretly liked Danny. She always said no, but maybe all of us knew by the way we let her walk or sit by him. I guess it was also the kind of a secret that everyone knew but pretends they didn't.

  When she had her rite of passage a year ahead of us, we all quietly celebrated her not being chosen as a sister. She was handicapped. She only had two fingers and a thumb on her left hand and three fingers and a thumb on her right hand. She didn't have any parent since they were killed by the guards. Guards were the name we call the people from the cartel who were like the police, tax collector and religious executors as well. I was curious but none of us asked her directly why her parents were killed by the guards. I was told by the people in the market place later that her parents were siblings and her handicap was because of that. Of course I didn't believe them. Or even if I had believed, nothing would've made any difference to me.

  Kimmy was nice to me. She was caring. She was only a year older than me but I felt like she was 5 to 6 years older. One time when we were playing hide and seek, I happened to hide in a kitchen. They were boiling a big pot of oil to prepare a huge dinner. I can't recall the menu but I'm pretty sure it was fried heads. Chicken heads, to be more specific. All the good parts went up the stairs and the rest of it like heads, or feet were all that we could get. It tastes like chicken anyway so we could call that a dinner.

  I'm sorry. Anyway, I was hiding there and somehow, I was hiding real good. Even the cooks didn't notice me. One lady was cooking right in front of me when I was crouching there like thirty minutes or something and I tried to stretch my legs, since it was tiring. And for Goddess's sake, I scared that poor lady and she dropped the boiling pot out of her hand. I know it was my fault. She dropped the pot of boiling oil and I got burned real bad on my legs. My left leg was especially more serious than the right. So I started to cry like a baby and Kimmy ran straight to me. She was hiding in the kitchen, too! We called it a day and she took care of me. She was next to me all night long, watching the burns, changing the wet towels and all that. My mom thanked her and apologized her for the things people were saying about her. She said it's okay.

  From that day on, she kind of began to live with us. It turned out that her house had been taken by the guards long before. She came down every night to hang out with us and went back to the 20th floor to get some sleep anywhere possible. One day at the dark corner of a factory, and the other day on the empty hallway.

  My mom didn't tell her anything like, 'it's dangerous for a girl to live like that' or 'you can't just sleep anywhere.' She slyly yet kindly let Kimmy live with us. She naturally became a part of our family and I began to call her my sis ever since.

  ...

  I remember one time when the five of us went to the moon watching ceremony. We had it on the 15th of every month, and one of them included Chigan Sar and the rite of passage ceremony. There was an empty room on 16th floor since there was a hole on the wall. It was prohibited to get in there. There was a huge lock on the door but Danny knew how to pick it. We sat down together in that room and watched outside the wall, being careful not to fall down 50 meters down to the ground.

  It's a wonderful memory. The moon was so bright and the stars were twinkling above. But my eyes were on the shiny lights from the buildings and the cars in the city. Kimmy said she felt like any wish would come true when the moon was that big. I closed my eyes. I wished one day I could live like that in the city. Only if it was not for this curse, only if it was not for this disease.

  I asked Diane if she wished for anything. She said it was a secret. Chen said he wished to see a real lion, so I drew a little lion on the floor with a little broken piece of stone for him. Kimmy said it looked like Danny because of the bushy mane.

  We promised to come every month, but we couldn't ever since. A few days after that, I heard a rumor that a few pagans killed the guards and jumped out of the building in that room. They were the rebels, but it was prohibited to call them that way. People from the top floors prefered the way of calling them pagans. It turned out that the room was used for smuggling by the rebels. People from the city who wanted some illegal things, especially drugs, used the hole to smuggle with the rebels. Rebels got their info, medicine, and weapons instead.

  Danny blamed himself, saying it was all because he left the door open. Maybe that was the start of all this mess we've come so far.

  That was when Diane and I were 10. Danny was 13. He was about to turn 14. We still hang out but there was something different about him. Something changed. Chen often told me that he was sometimes afraid of Danny. I knew what he meant by that and it was not just me and Chen. Diane also said sometimes that she was uncomfortable to be with Danny alone.

  I think Danny's regret somehow turned into an anger against the people on the top floors and the building, their so-called 'Code.' The day before his Chigan Sar, he said in front of us that he'll join the rebel. Chen, Diane and I could say nothing. We w
ere just sitting there and looking at him like a surprised bunch of puppies. But Kimmy, she tried to persuade him. Dissuade him actually. Kimmy didn't want him to risk his life for that. Despite Kimmy's effort, Danny joined the rebel anyway and so did Kimmy a year later.

  When my mom heard that Kimmy was leaving the house for the rebel, she said nothing but this.

  'Whenever you need a place to return, this is your home.'

  3

  To talk more about what happened around that time, Danny kept it a secret for a while that he decided to join the rebel. At first, he started not to hang out with us. We all thought it was because of what happened in that room. Then the day before his Chigan Sar, he told us about his plan, his plan to join the rebel.

  And like I said, at first, Kimmy tried to talk him out. She said that it would be too dangerous to join the rebel and that she was worried. Danny didn't listen to her. Then one day, Kimmy and Danny had a chat together in private. When she came back home, Kimmy told me everything's clear now. So I thought maybe he changed his mind.

  The next day when I woke up, Kimmy was having an argument with my mom. She was asking my mom to teach her how to use the sewing machine.

  There was a law that you can't work under the age of 14. If you get caught doing any economic activity before you turn 14, the guards have an authority to sentence you, which means, they can kill you on the spot.

  And of course, it's not for protecting kids from child labor and exploitation. It's just a clever way of controlling the mass. No girls want to be a sister and no boys want to be a slave working twenty four seven in a factory, but they can't pretend to be under 14 forever, since you have to feed your own mouth.

  Kimmy wasn't over 14 yet at that time. Her Chigan Sar was a year ahead but she was asking my mom to let her learn how to use the sewing machine.

  I still remember the conversation. Kimmy was almost crying. She said, 'Mom, you learned how to use the sewing machine from your mother, and all that I'm asking is the same thing.'