by Sumi Hahn
Silently, Junja chanted the words that she had been taught, words that she once believed would summon the gods, who would respond. This time, doubt burdened her prayer. Were the gods listening? Did they care?
An unexpected clamor in her lungs distracted her. She had been diving all day without incident, so she ignored the warning. As soon as she dismissed the sensation, she realized her mistake. Trying to quell her panic, Junja kicked off the ocean floor, swimming up as fast as she dared.
Midway, a dark desperation surged through her body. Her heart drummed in her ears while blackness dulled the edge of her vision. She remembered these sensations from the first time she ever dove. She had survived that terrible dive, but her young friend had not.
Just as it did then, Grandmother’s voice came to her aid: “Do not succumb to doubt. Keep moving and do not stop. Even if you faint, your body will return to the surface, where the others will find you.”
Junja fixed her attention on the rippling sun that was guiding her back to the realm of light, heat, and air. She flew up through the depths, swooning just as she surfaced. When her head rose above the water, she did not scream or gasp. She floated, silent, head lolling, eyes rolled back.
Thirty
2001
Dong Min chattered about his family throughout the drive, which ended in the subterranean car park of a large apartment complex. He had five grandchildren: a boy and two girls belonging to his eldest son and Dr. Moon’s namesake, while both his daughters each had one son.
Dr. Moon was surprised by the sadness that welled up at the mention of those grandchildren. Junja had never felt guilty about their lack of sons; she was very much a Jeju woman that way. The failure of their daughters to marry and have children, however, had bothered her more than she ever admitted.
“I’m sorry I never came back to visit you. We made plans a couple times, but something always came up.”
Dong Min punched Dr. Moon in the arm. “Hey, I’m equally to blame. You make a long list of all the things you want to do when you have the time and money … and then before you know it, you’re out of time, even if you have the money! I haven’t gone back to Jeju since the two of us left. It’s a popular honeymoon destination now, the Hawaii of Korea. Can you believe that?”
The two men strolled the grounds so that Dr. Moon could get some fresh air before dinner. Dong Min proudly pointed out all the features of the development to his friend, whose lukewarm reaction made Dong Min shake his head. “You don’t remember any of this, do you?”
Dr. Moon glanced again at the buildings, all recently constructed during his long absence from Korea. He peered at a large hill in the background, which looked vaguely familiar. “What am I supposed to remember?”
“This is where my mother’s house and gardens used to be!” Dong Min pointed to an enormous tree shading one of the entryways. “That tree was in the center of the outer courtyard. Don’t you recognize it?”
Dr. Moon walked toward the large chestnut tree and placed his palm against the gnarled bark, looking around in shock. “This is Samseong-dong? What happened?” Dr. Moon remembered open fields and groves of trees alongside the occasional building and modest homes. The Buddhist temple had dominated the area.
Dong Min chuckled. “My old neighborhood is the ritziest part of Gangnam now. Welcome to the Beverly Hills of Korea, my friend.”
The last time Dr. Moon touched this tree, he and Junja had joined Dong Min and Yoonja to sit under its branches on a warm autumn night. He was in scrubs, and Junja was wearing a dress she had made while working in his aunt’s sewing shop. Yoonja and Dong Min were still in the aprons they wore at the restaurant they had started with funds from Yoonja’s sister, who ran a sandwich shop in Chicago with her GI husband. The four of them had talked about their day while gazing up at the green spiny nuts, wishing they were ripe enough to roast.
The round man looked around to make sure no one was in earshot and leaned in close, pitching his voice low. “We held on until after the Olympics. Land prices had already gotten crazy by then, but they went up even more after that. When we sold, we became millionaires overnight.”
Dong Min thumped the tree affectionately. “All my children and most of my grandchildren are upstairs, waiting to meet you. We’re gonna have a huge feast, in your honor. I told Yoonja to cook all your favorites. Just pretend they are even if they aren’t, okay?”
“How is she?” Dr. Moon remembered how stoic she had been at the American hospital in Busan, where military doctors had stitched together the separate halves of her upper lip.
“Can you believe her cooking has gotten even better over the years?” Dong Min patted his belly. “Look at me! That woman could make dirt taste delicious. Her soup got better, too—hard to believe, right?”
Yoonja’s red seaweed soup had been the unlikeliest of love potions. During their first night on Jeju, before they were posted to Junja’s village, Gun Joo and Dong Min had gone to the Yum Yum Café for dinner. As he listened to her recite all the items they could order, the fat boy had stared at Yoonja so earnestly that the girl turned bright red, convinced he was repulsed by her harelip. But Dong Min hardly noticed the girl’s disfigured mouth. He later claimed that he had fallen in love with her spirit, which he swore he could taste in her food.
“I’ll never forget that dinner she made at your mother’s house, when you first introduced them.” Dr. Moon’s stomach rumbled. “Some nerve, making your girlfriend cook for your mother on the first day they meet!”
“How else was I going to convince the old witch that Yoonja had to be my wife?”
“The look on your mother’s face would’ve turned anyone else to stone!”
He and Junja had accompanied the hopeful couple to the imposing house. The three of them had waited outside in the large courtyard, with its vegetable beds, fruit trees, and rock gardens. After greeting Gun Joo more effusively than her own son and complimenting Junja upon her attractiveness, Dong Min’s mother had glared at Yoonja’s bandaged mouth with her disapproving lips pressed tight.
When the formidable woman finally spoke, her voice sounded like cracking ice. “Did you bring this girl to my home because you have some sort of interest in her?”
Dong Min, who was kneeling alongside Yoonja, had lowered his forehead to the floor. “Yes, mother. I would like your permission to marry her.”
“What happened to her mouth?”
“She had surgery to fix a cleft palate.”
“You want to marry a woman who has nothing but a very obvious flaw? Why can’t you find someone like her?” Dong Min’s mother had gestured to Junja, who was pretending to examine a chestnut tree.
Dong Min had gulped before blurting out, “Mother, can you please allow her to cook dinner for you? You’ll understand everything then.”
“Typical man, relying on your lower half to make decisions for you.” The expression on her face had been fearsome, but Dong Min’s mother had allowed Yoonja inside her kitchen.
“Wanna hear something crazy? Mother willed everything directly to Yoonja and not to me!” Dong Min tried to sound indignant, but pride warmed his voice. “She told me that marrying Yoonja was the smartest thing I ever did. And then she told Yoonja that she had to die after me, so that I would always be well cared for. What kind of crazy mother wants her son to die before her daughter-in-law?”
Tears stung Dr. Moon’s eyes. “When did your mother pass?” After their escape to the mainland, the generous woman had cooked more meals for him and Junja than his own mother had. Dong Min had been more like a brother, sharing his mother so easily.
“Last year. She would’ve been so happy to see your handsome mug again! She had a good long life. Who gets 98 years these days? She told me the night before she died that she was going to stop doing shaman work and take a vacation. Said she wanted to see Hawaii. The next morning, she was gone.”
Dr. Moon swallowed. What was he going to do now? He had come back to ask for her help. It had never occurred
to him that she might not be able to. “You’ve never gone back to Jeju? Not even once?”
The portly man shook his head. “No. But Yoonja has. Says everything’s changed so much I wouldn’t recognize it. Swears I’d really like it. But I just can’t.”
“I don’t want to go back either, but I think I have to.”
“Why do you have to?”
“I wish your mother were still alive. She’d know what to do.”
“Wait, what’s wrong? Do you need to see a shaman?”
Dr. Moon rubbed his nose, feeling self-conscious. He crossed his arms and stared up at the chestnut tree, as if searching for the right words. When he finally responded, he was stuttering. “It’s g-ghosts, Dong Min. Ever since Junja passed, they t-talk to me and won’t leave me alone.”
The fat man sighed with gusto. “What a shame you missed my mom. Ghosts were her specialty.”
Dr. Moon relaxed, relieved that Dong Min didn’t think he was crazy. “When I confided in a Korean friend in Philadelphia, that person recommended that I see a psychiatrist!”
“We went through some really hard times because of that kind of limited thinking.” Dong Min shook his head. “When Western medicine became fashionable, Mother had to put up with all sorts of nonsense. People would cross the street to avoid her. One time, when she was at market, one of those pious Christians spat in her face and told her she was working with the devil.”
Dong Min frowned, remembering. “The seventies were the worst. Mother had to go into hiding then because the government was putting shamans in jail! Crazy, right? When I think about it, my blood still boils. People changing their beliefs overnight like they were changing their underwear!”
Dr. Moon squirmed. Junja had done the same, and he had followed. They were living in America, after all.
Dong Min crossed his arms. “Turns out Western medicine couldn’t fix everything after all. The work of healing, Mother always said, had to start with forgiveness first. Slowly, her customers started trickling back. Those pious Christians showed up, too, disguised in scarves and sunglasses. Broken hearts, cancer, toothaches—it was all the same to Mother. She always got results.”
Dong Min interrupted himself to squint at his watch. “Yoonja will kill me if we’re late for dinner. I’ll think about your problem while I eat. That’s when I do my best thinking.”
* * *
Dr. Moon lowered himself onto the sleeping mat in the guest bedroom that used to belong to Dong Min’s mother. He could hear Yoonja cleaning up the dishes from dinner, helped by her two daughters. He loosened his belt and sighed with exhaustion, noticing for the first time that he hadn’t heard any voices since entering Dong Min’s home. Surely, they were going to start up again. He cocked his head to listen.
A loud rap on the door made him jump.
“I’m coming in,” Dong Min announced as he opened the door. He settled himself on a floor cushion with a groan. “Yoonja did some research. Apparently, all the best shamans live on Jeju. Convenient, eh? She got a recommendation for someone who should be able to help you with your problem.”
“Thank you.” Dr. Moon squeezed his friend’s hand.
“I can’t let you go by yourself, though.” Dong Min took off his glasses to clean them. His face looked strangely youthful without the wire frames.
“What do you mean?”
“I’m going with you.”
Was that a ghostly cackle? Dr. Moon nodded absently.
“Hey, are your ears going bad? I just told you I’m going too!” Dong Min grabbed Dr. Moon’s hand and held their clasped hands up high. “You and me, together on Jeju, just like old times. Whaddya think of that, my friend?”
Dr. Moon looked up. “Really? You’re serious?”
Dong Min lowered their arms, grinning. “After everything we survived down there, I can’t let you go by yourself. Yoonja would never let me hear the end of it.” A sudden frown creased his wide forehead. “This time, however, we’re flying. No more ferry crossings for me.”
* * *
While the plane circled Jeju to land, Dr. Moon scanned the shoreline, wondering where the old boat landing used to be. Fifty-three years earlier, Jeju City had been a modest seaport with wooden buildings. He and Dong Min had arrived in October; seven weeks later, they took the same ferry back to the mainland. Dong Min had somehow convinced Yoonja to join them while her sister helped Junja sell a silver hairpin to an American soldier for an exorbitant sum. A winter gale had ambushed them on open water. As the boat bucked on the roiling waves, he and Dong Min had lain in the hold, retching and shivering, while the girls braved their way to the deck to beg the sea god for safe passage. They all survived the crossing, but Junja never prayed to the sea god again.
The taxi deposited the two men at an intersection where someone’s laundry rack full of kitchen towels was drying in a patch of sun, ignored by passersby in the street. Yoonja had reserved a hotel room for them inside the shaman’s quarter, which the driver refused to enter because he had a fare on the other side of town.
“Did Jeju City have a shaman’s neighborhood back then? Or is this something new?” Dr. Moon was trying to ignore the pain in his right heel, which twinged with each step.
Dong Min stopped to dab his forehead with a handkerchief. “Back then, the entire city used to be smaller than this neighborhood. Don’t you remember?”
Dr. Moon stumbled on a cobblestone. Everything around him seemed to shimmer, like a mirage. The echoing vastness of Junja’s absence expanded, even here, in this place that no longer resembled anything they once knew. They had walked by each other’s side for so many years, crossing an ocean and a continent of time together. He had circled back, alone, to the place where they started their journey. He had hardly known Junja when he last stood on these shores. Now that he was back, he hardly knew himself, without her beside him. How could he remember anything without her?
A sensation swelled in Dr. Moon’s chest, surging toward his throat. He tried to speak but could only manage a gasp. The words he wanted to say were obliterated, washed away by the tears he had been holding back since the funeral. Dong Min, seeing his friend sob in such a forsaken manner, started to cry as well. The pedestrians walking by the two weeping men turned their heads and pretended, out of respect, not to notice.
* * *
After a short stroll through the neighborhood to stretch their legs, Dr. Moon and Dong Min ate dinner in a small restaurant with five tables.
“You know, whenever I eat anything made with beef, I remember that cow we had to walk all the way to Lonely Rock Village. Remember how we had to camp outside with nothing to eat but sweet potatoes?” Dong Min slurped a long tangle of noodles and stuffed some spinach into his mouth. “I like to believe that all the pleasures of my old age are a kind of payback for the suffering I had to endure in my youth.”
The two of them had ridden their first motorized vehicle together on Jeju Island: a large green military truck. They had whooped with excitement as it rumbled down the road with thrilling speed. At their second stop outside the city, an officer had climbed into the rear of the truck to ask if anyone had experience with cows.
Dr. Moon wasn’t going to admit that he knew more about cows than he wanted to. He and his mother had worked for a wealthy farmer shortly after their harrowing experience crossing the border in a straw cart. They had milked the beasts, cleaned stalls, and harvested hay from the fields, among other lowly tasks. At the end of the season, the farmer had refused to pay them, saying that the milk they had drunk for lunch had been deducted from their wages.
Dong Min had poked him, asking in a whisper if he knew something about cows. As soon as he nodded, Dong Min’s hand had shot up. The officer, who wore gold spectacles and smelled like oranges, introduced himself as Lieutenant Lee. After interrogating the two boys, the lieutenant assigned them the task of walking the beast he had just acquired to its final destination, Junja’s village.
Dr. Moon crunched on a cube of pickled ra
dish as he remembered that two-day trek. His feet had started bleeding in the new leather boots, and the pain had grown excruciating with each step. Just when he thought he couldn’t bear it any longer, a numbness had crept over his feet, and he had continued walking.
“I’ve never been able to wear boots since that time.” Dr. Moon tilted the bowl and swallowed the broth.
* * *
The shaman’s home was a small hut with a corrugated tin roof and stone walls. A strip of garden dense with foliage and cluttered with black volcanic stones formed a green buffer between the busy street and the modest home.
“Must be an ancient crone who cooks everything the old-fashioned way.” Dong Min gestured toward a basket of sweet potato slices drying in the sun and a clothesline heavy with dried mackerel.
The owner of the noodle shop had directed them to the place, dismissing the name Yoonja had given them as a fraud that only out-of-towners consulted. This shaman came from a venerable family and was a favorite with locals. “The best shaman on Jeju. Doesn’t take shortcuts and respects tradition.”
Dong Min sniffed as he studied the modest surroundings. “If she’s so good, why does she live like this?” He gestured at a pile of wood. “Still using wood to heat her house and cook? That’s beyond traditional—it’s crazy backward.” He nonetheless spoke politely as he shouted through the front door.
“Hello? We’ve come to see the shaman!”
A middle-aged man with a comb-over opened the door. His voice was pitched low. “Do you have an appointment?”
“We came from the noodle shop. The owner recommended this place.”
The man nodded. “My sister is with another client now. Please, come inside and wait.”
The two men ducked as they stepped through the low doorway. They took off their shoes and put on faded plastic slippers from the shoe shelf. A faint muskiness clung to the air, a familiar scent that Dr. Moon couldn’t place.