Shelter

by Jung Yun

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to criticize. I understand that my family’s situation is—complicated.”

  “Well, at least you have each other, right? You’re all in this together.”

  “Yes,” he says, having resolved not to cry in front of Gertie again. “We all have each other.”

  SIX

  Kyung unlocks the door to his office and turns on the lights, bracing himself for the noise and flicker of the fluorescent tubes hanging overhead. One by one, they buzz to life, rendering the walls an unpleasant, tobacco-stained shade of yellow. He assumed things would look different when he returned to work, but his books and papers are exactly where he left them, scattered in their usual disarray across the length of his desk. The only thing that’s changed in his absence is the smell—a musty shut-in odor that reminds him of a warm attic. Kyung opens his window, which overlooks a tree-lined quad of office buildings. The campus below is barely awake. A handful of maintenance men and early-bird secretaries travel the sidewalks, their pace leisurely, not yet hurried by the start of the day.

  He deposits his mail on the ledge and turns on his computer, knocking over a row of picture frames like dominoes. The cluttered display of family photographs is Gillian’s doing. When he was first hired at the university, she decided they should decorate his office, insisting in a way that she’d rarely done before. She said she wanted him to feel at home there, and he understood the source of her excitement even though he didn’t feel it himself. None of the men in her family were the office type. He wasn’t about to take that from her, so he let her do what she wanted, organizing the bookshelves and hanging his diplomas with care.

  The computer takes longer than usual to boot up, but Kyung doesn’t mind the wait. He’s afraid to see how much got away from him during his absence, the missed meetings and deadlines and requests for recommendation letters from anxious students. Classes ended in mid-May. He’d intended to take a week or two off after commencement, but over a month has passed, and he forgot to set up an auto-reply while he was gone. Now every e-mail will demand an apology or explanation, depending on how serious the delay. Despite not looking forward to this, Kyung dreads the thought of something else even more. He sits down at his desk and rolls his chair toward the aquarium in the corner. The lights in the tank are off, the water black and still. He stares inside, searching for the school of zebra fish. The fish are purely decorative—they have nothing to do with his research—but they’re living, breathing creatures nonetheless. At least they used to be. He expects to find them floating at the top, cocooned in several weeks’ worth of mold, but all twelve are alive and well, zipping from left to right and back again. He gives them a liberal pinch of food, surprised that they managed to survive for so long without it.

  “Marcy took the liberty of feeding them while you were away.”

  Kyung recognizes the voice before he turns to see his department chair standing in the open doorway.

  “Oh. I’ll have to thank her for doing that.”

  Although he doesn’t like the idea of Craig’s secretary letting herself into his office, he’s not in a position to complain. His absence has been noted—that much is clear—and he struggles to come up with a reason for it.

  “It’s early,” Kyung observes. “You’re here early, I mean.”

  Craig walks in and puts his gym bag on the floor. Tucked in the outer pocket is a tennis racket. “My rec league gets together before work. I just played two sets.”

  “Did you win?”

  He runs his fingers through his damp hair and smiles weakly. “Yes, but not by much.”

  At six feet six, Craig is all arms and legs. It’s hard to imagine him playing a sport like tennis, with a racket that extends his reach even farther, but the man is constantly in motion. He walks to work every day, swims laps in the pool during lunch, does hundred-mile bike races on the weekends. At fifty, he probably does more exercise in a week than Kyung does all year.

  “It’s getting harder and harder to beat him, though.” Craig opens his bag and takes out a bottle of ibuprofen, swallowing a pair of pills dry. “Don’t tell Steve you saw me taking these. I’ll never hear the end of it.”

  Kyung doesn’t know which of the many Steves in their acquaintance he’s referring to, but right now he doesn’t care. He just wants a chance to think. In retrospect, he knows he should have handled things differently from the start. He should have called or e-mailed to say he was taking time off to handle something personal. Had he made an effort to do this, his reentry would be so much easier now, but after disappearing for nearly five weeks without so much as a word, he knows he doesn’t deserve easy.

  “I honestly didn’t expect to see you here, Kyung.”

  “Yes, well…”

  He doesn’t know what he’s doing here either. He couldn’t work even if he wanted to. His family left for the Cape earlier this morning. Kyung dreaded the idea of going with them, so much so that he lied—to his parents, to Connie, even to Gillian. He said his department chair called, upset that he hadn’t spent any time in the office all summer. He said he needed to show his face at work and he’d join them on the Cape the following day. What he couldn’t say was the truth—that he didn’t want to sit in a car with all of them, trapped on a drive that might take two hours or six, depending on traffic.

  “I’m sorry I haven’t been around for so long. I’ve had some personal things going on?” The end of his sentence lifts into a question, as if to test whether such a vague explanation will suffice.

  “Kyung, I know what happened. I’m not even sure what to say about it. It’s just … horrible. Unbelievable.”

  He blinks for a second. “How?”

  The only other chair in his office is covered with books, so Craig takes a seat on the edge of the desk. “You know how this place is.” He looks down at his wrist, at the pale white strip of skin where his watch should be. “Faculty are nothing more than a bunch of gossips. It doesn’t take long for news to travel from the engineering building to this one.”

  “I see.”

  Jin never mentioned telling anyone in his department. Kyung is surprised that he did. His father should have known how quickly the word would spread, but maybe he didn’t care. Maybe he knew there was no point trying to hide what had happened to him, that some secrets would be too hard to keep.

  “So how are your parents doing? How are you?”

  “We’re all right, considering.”

  “Is there anything you need?”

  What he needs is for Craig to leave. The area around his desk is tight enough without someone sitting on top of him like this. He turns on his monitor, hopeful that Craig will take the hint and go away.

  “Thanks for asking, but I’m fine. I think I just need to—refocus.”

  Craig reaches over and turns off the monitor just as the desktop pattern begins to appear. “Shouldn’t you be with your family right now? Whatever you’re working on can wait.”

  Kyung blinks again, staring at the black screen. He can’t even remember what he was working on before all of this happened. “I probably have a thousand e-mails to catch up on.”

  “Given the circumstances, I’m sure people will understand if they don’t hear from you for a while.”

  “So everyone in the department knows?”

  Craig nods. “I think so. But I haven’t made any announcements about it, if that’s what you’re asking. Obviously, I wouldn’t do that.”

  As far as department chairs go, Craig is actually a good one. He’s honest and organized. He knows the names of everyone’s spouses and kids by heart. At five o’clock, he always encourages the workaholics to go home, have a life. If Gillian or his parents knew Craig better, they never would have left for the Cape without him. They would have realized that Craig Tunney doesn’t make irate phone calls demanding that his faculty do this or that.

  Kyung reaches for his monitor again. “I’ve been gone too long. I can’t just leave.”

  “Yes, y
ou can. I’m telling you to. Think about it, Kyung. In five years, it’s not going to matter if you finish an article now or a month from now. But your family, the time you spend together this summer—that’s going to make a difference.”

  Suddenly, the dread that Kyung felt while driving to campus, parking in front of the building, taking the elevator up to his office—all of it dissipates, replaced by an unfamiliar resolve to stay where he is. He understands what Craig is saying—agrees with it, even—but the weight of his responsibility keeps him anchored to his seat.

  “What’s the matter? You don’t look well.”

  “I don’t?”

  “No, you’re really pale. Have you eaten?”

  “Not yet. But I will, though.”

  Craig taps him on the shoulder. “Come on. Get up.”

  Kyung remains seated, not certain what would be worse—to refuse or to do as he’s told.

  “Let’s go get some breakfast.”

  “But—”

  “If you come to the cafeteria and have breakfast with me, I’ll stop pestering you. I promise.”

  It’s hard to be annoyed with Craig, who’s always been kind to him, perhaps even kinder than he should be. But as they walk across the quad, Kyung feels something bubbling up to the surface, prickly and hot under his skin. All he wants to do is be alone. He wishes everyone would let him.

  “You didn’t miss anything while you were gone,” Craig says. He looks at Kyung sideways, as if to examine him without being noticed.

  “I appreciate what you’re trying to—”

  “I’m serious. You know how dead this place is during the summer. I mean, look at it.”

  The steps to the Campus Center, which are usually teeming with students during the school year, are empty except for a pair of giant stone planters. Even the cafeteria is quiet enough to hear the clink of glasses and plates. Craig hands him a green plastic tray as they enter, and heads off toward the omelet line. Kyung looks around, worried that he might run into someone he knows, but the only other people in the cafeteria are wearing name tags. They look like conference attendees, not colleagues.

  Kyung pays for his breakfast and finds a table in the corner, far from where anyone will hear them.

  When Craig joins him, he looks down at Kyung’s tray, seemingly crestfallen. “That’s all you’re having?”

  There’s a dried-out blueberry muffin, flecked with too much sugar, sitting on a square of wax paper. He doesn’t have any appetite for more. “I have coffee too.” He lifts his mug as if to prove it.

  Craig’s tray is crowded with plates. An egg-white omelet, made to order. A side of fruit. Toast and yogurt and a carton of grapefruit juice with a red straw poking out of it. Kyung is equally disappointed by the size of Craig’s breakfast. They’ll be here all morning. Although small talk has always felt unnatural to him, he’s desperate to avoid where their conversation is headed next, so he picks a subject that Craig can discuss at length.

  “How’s your wife? And the kids?”

  “Oh, they’re all doing great.”

  The Tunneys have twin girls—one now at Wesleyan, the other at Brown. Kyung met them years ago when they came to the office to borrow Craig’s car. Even as high school students, they struck him as exceptionally poised and polite. They shook hands and spoke with confidence and seemed to regard their father as a friend. If Craig had one bad habit, it was the way he wandered the halls, talking about his daughters’ accomplishments with anyone willing to listen. Whenever Kyung found himself on the receiving end of these conversations, he wondered what Craig and his wife had done to ensure that their children turned out so well. There were times when he wanted to ask, but he couldn’t figure out how to phrase the question. It felt like something he already should have known.

  “Lydia’s interning at the Federal Reserve in D.C. this summer, and Elizabeth is in Panama building ecohousing with a nonprofit.”

  “Panama,” he repeats thoughtfully, for no other reason except to buy time. “Does she speak Spanish?”

  “A couple of semesters’ worth. But she’s quick with languages. We sent her off to France a few summers ago, and she came back jabbering away like she was fluent.” Craig stops suddenly, as if he realizes what Kyung is trying to do. “But enough about the girls. Is there anything I can help you with, Kyung? Do you want to talk about taking a leave of absence next semester?”

  The thought of a leave never occurred to him.

  “It would have to be unpaid, unfortunately. A situation like this—it doesn’t really fit the university’s requirements for paid medical leave. But I’d be happy to arrange it if you’d like some more time at home.”

  The idea floats past him like a balloon. Bright and buoyant for a moment, then gone with a prick of a pin. He couldn’t afford to take a leave even if he wanted to.

  “Actually, I’m looking forward to teaching again. It’ll be good for me, I think.”

  He pulls his muffin apart to avoid looking Craig in the eye. It crumbles into a pile of dry, dusty pieces that he pinches into his mouth. It alarms him that he can’t remember what classes he’s supposed to teach in the fall—Anatomy, Physiology, Cell Biology? Every semester just feels like a variation of the one that came before.

  “Well, I’m here,” Craig says.

  “Sorry?”

  “I’m here if you need anything. Even if you change your mind and we have to make some last-minute adjustments, it’ll be fine. You just have to tell me what’s on your mind.”

  Lately, Kyung has been thinking about Nat Perry, wondering where he is, what his life is like. He imagines him in some barren northern stretch of Canada, trying to reinvent himself. That’s what Kyung would do if he suddenly found himself on the run. Pick a place where no one would ever look for him. Start over. Do everything differently. The idea of California still tugs at him from time to time. During his senior year in college, he applied to the medical school at Irvine, which his advisors warned was a stretch. None of them knew what to say when he was accepted but chose not to go. Kyung couldn’t tell them why he needed to stay in Marlboro, the things that might happen if he went away. He convinced himself there would always be other opportunities to leave. At twenty-two, he didn’t have the foresight to understand how one decision could affect so many others. Now that he’s older and everything has settled into a just-tolerable state of atrophy, the options he once had—options that his young students still have—feel like they’ve passed him by.

  “Are your parents back home, or are they staying with you?”

  “With me and Gillian. Actually, they all left for the Cape today. It was getting a little crowded at home.”

  “And you’re still here? Because of work?”

  He’s about to nod until he notices Craig shaking his head.

  “Give me your keys,” he says, holding out his hand.

  Kyung removes the ring from his pocket and sets it on the table. He knows what Craig is about to do before he does it.

  “There.” He slides off the oversized key to Kyung’s office and slips it into his bag. “I don’t want to see you here for the rest of the summer. There’s nothing that can’t wait for you until August.”

  Kyung has a spare key at home, not that it really matters. He doesn’t want to be here either. He eats another pinch of muffin, washing down the stale crumbs with the last of his coffee. He can feel Craig watching him, waiting for a thank-you, perhaps—and on some level, he knows he deserves it. This is his idea of being kind.

  “Thank you.”

  “It’s the least I can do, Kyung. I’m sure it can’t be easy for you right now, but trust me. Work can wait. You won’t regret the time that you spend with your family, later on.”

  Behind him, Kyung hears the metal scrape of a chair against the floor. He turns to find the cafeteria nearly twice as full as it was before. On the other side of the room, Marcy is standing in the cashier’s line. He’d prefer to avoid running into anyone else from his department today, and Cra
ig has all but ordered him to leave. Leave and do what, though? He doesn’t think the time he’s been spending with his family has helped them in any way.

  “What would you do if you were me?” he asks.

  “If I were in your situation?” Craig stares at his breakfast; he seems terrified to imagine the possibility. “I guess I’d just try to be there for everyone.”

  “Yes, but beyond just being there.”

  “I don’t know. I mean, what your family’s been through—the only word that can really describe it is ‘evil.’ Just the worst kind of human evil. I’m not sure there’s anything you can do about that other than love each other and trust that things will eventually go back to the way they were.” He pauses. “I’m sorry, Kyung. Maybe I misunderstood your question? I don’t think I’m answering it the way you want me to.”

  “No, no. That’s fine.” He pushes his chair back from the table. “I was curious, that’s all. I should probably get going now.”

  Craig has hardly touched his breakfast, but he moves his tray off to the side. “You’ll make decent time if you head to the Cape now. Reverse traffic.” He stands up and shakes Kyung’s hand, resting his other on Kyung’s shoulder. “You’ll get in touch if you need anything? Anything at all? You just have to let me know.”

  From another man’s mouth, the offer might sound hollow and perfunctory, but Craig isn’t the type to say less than what he means.

  “Thank you.”

  As he feels Craig’s grip loosen, he squeezes harder, realizing that the answer was right there in front of him the entire time. The twins turned out well, not because of anything that Craig or his wife did but because of the kind of people they are. Good, decent people who always put the needs of their children ahead of their own. It was never more complicated than love, one generation raising a better version of the next.

  “I never really had a chance, did I?”

  Craig squints at him. “A chance at what?”

  “Nothing,” he says. “I was just thinking out loud.”