All Woman and Springtime

by Brandon Jones

  Men cheered and clapped.

  “Daisy, please step up to the stage,” Mrs. Cha said in Korean.

  Daisy’s face darkened, and she did not move.

  “Does Asshole need to show you where the stage is?” Mrs. Cha was all smiles—most of the men in the room could not speak Korean—but the threat was plain to everyone else.

  Daisy cleared her sour expression and made her way to the low stage at the end of the room.

  “Gentlemen, we’re going to try something new today,” Mrs. Cha once again addressed the men in English. “We’re going to auction off a whole evening of Daisy’s company. The highest bidder takes her upstairs. We’ll start the bidding at two hundred dollars.”

  Gi could see Daisy straining to maintain her composure. She could not understand English, but she understood that Mrs. Cha was getting the better of her. She caught Gi’s eye, and for the briefest of moments, Gi thought she saw Il-sun, fractured, just below the surface.

  72

  MRS. CHA SUMMONED JASMINE before breakfast. Jasmine had been working all night, and the command to go down to the bar was unwelcome. What could she possibly want? Jasmine dressed and went downstairs.

  Jasmine blamed herself for the fate of her three Chosun friends. Her plan to leave Seoul had been desperate, and not thought through—but she had needed to act fast. There was the offer of marriage on the table, and her mother had already left to live with her fiancé. She had to tell her mother some of the awful truth to get her to agree to go—that she was in trouble and needed to flee a dangerous gangster. Now what would become of her mother? She hoped that her fiancé would continue to take care of her, but she doubted he would feel much obligation to do so after Jasmine failed to arrive when promised. Deep down, she even wondered if the offer of marriage had been some kind of scam, but she would have dealt with that once she got to Kwangju.

  She could not have lived with herself if she had not done something to try to help Gi, Cho, and Il-sun. She had seen too many enslaved girls cycle through Mr. Choy’s sex galleries, aware of their fate without doing anything about it. But finally, working so closely with her three friends, she could not deny the truth: that being a witness, she was involved, and being involved, she had a responsibility to act. She hated feeling helpless. Were her friends worse off here than in South Korea? It was difficult to tell. In either place they would have spiraled into madness, eventually, and the strain was starting to show.

  Cho was now continually hunched over, clutching a cigarette and muttering to herself. It was as if the bottom had dropped out of her mind and she had fallen into the abyss of herself. She had seemed so strong, but the loss of hope had crushed her. She kept saying, over and over under her breath, “Where do we go from here? Where do we go from here?” She was not eating much anymore, and she was getting frighteningly thin. Jasmine worried that if Cho did not pull herself together, at least a little bit, she would be unable to work. There was no telling what Mrs. Cha would do to a woman who could not earn her keep.

  Il-sun had become a completely different person. Jasmine knew that the drugs could do that. Daisy had discovered soon after their arrival how to barter herself for hiroppong from the bartender, but the transformation began even before the drugs appeared. Jasmine had seen this kind of personality shift before, working for Mr. Choy. Sometimes the only way for a woman to endure the pressures of the flesh trade was to seal away some small kernel of herself where it could not be corrupted, and protect it with a tough external shell. Il-sun had done just that, by changing her name so that all the abuses happened to Daisy, a brash, confident, completely self-serving woman, instead of to herself. That way she protected her innocence with the hope that, someday, she would be able to return to it. Sadly, Jasmine knew that she could not.

  Jasmine did her best to try to steer Il-sun away from hiroppong, but there was little she could do. Il-sun avoided her, and when confronted, she became defensive—communicating with her was impossible. Jasmine had seen many girls hit a rapid decline on the drug, corroding both inside and out within a matter of months. It was a substance that sapped youth and tarnished souls; and Il-sun was already exhibiting signs of its abuse. She was tetchy and sometimes paranoid. Her color was perhaps a little ashen and her eyes were getting colder and harder. The drug had not yet claimed her beauty, but it was beginning to close in on it. Jasmine’s heart broke for the inevitable track Il-sun’s life had taken.

  Gi had won a special place in Jasmine’s heart. She had been through so much in the months that Jasmine had known her, and clearly much more before they met, and yet she still possessed a small, unquenchable fire. The stresses of captivity and forced prostitution were visible on her as well, but she seemed to be holding up better than the other two. She had a way of disassociating that served well to protect her, though if she ever escaped this life, she would have to overcome that, too. For now, however, her ability to retreat into her mind was saving her life.

  From her best guess, four months had passed in Seattle, and time loomed endlessly. Nobody ever talked about leaving, and after her previous failure, Jasmine was wary to plan another escape. They were too well guarded. Women came and went without explanation, many of them in their teens, stolen or tricked from their homes, smuggled or lured thousands of miles away from their families, where they had no contacts and could not run back. Jasmine listened to their stories of kidnapping or betrayal in the early morning hours after work was done, when exhaustion lowered defenses and the bouncers were more likely to overlook hushed conversations. Women often disappeared from the brothel without warning, and nobody knew what happened to them. They had probably been moved to another brothel, maybe in another city or country where Blue Talon had a presence. Jasmine had met several women who had been relocated more than once—it was a large organization that had tendrils everywhere, it seemed.

  Mrs. Cha was waiting for Jasmine at the bottom of the stairs.

  “You’re one of the clever ones,” said Mrs. Cha with her sandpaper voice when Jasmine reached the bottom step. “It’s better for a girl like you to keep moving.”

  “Better for whom?” Jasmine asked. She had a sinking feeling.

  Mrs. Cha smiled her cold-blooded smile. “You’re one of the clever ones,” she repeated, and walked away.

  “You’re coming with me,” said a muscular young man. He was one of the sharp-dressed Blue Talon thugs. There were two other women in the room, both wide-eyed and frightened. With tears in her eyes, Jasmine followed them out the door.

  73

  DAISY DESCENDED THE STAIRS, crossing one leg sensuously in front of the other, pointing her toes enticingly as she stepped. It was all in the attitude, and even though no one could see her until she reached the bottom step, it was important for her to already be in character when she got there. She felt nervous, but she knew it could not show. Today was a special day.

  Most days when she made her entrance it was the same old thing. She would linger at the bottom step and strike a pose—if she had learned one thing from Mr. Choy, it was how to strike a pose. If the crowd did not turn their attention soon enough, she would shout one of the English phrases she had learned. Some days, if Mrs. Cha was feeling particularly vindictive, she would say something sharp in response, knocking Il-sun off her pedestal with a slight in perfect English, and everyone in the room would laugh at her. Normally, however, Mrs. Cha said nothing and collected the money.

  Daisy’s heart was racing. Maybe it was her nerves, or just the hiroppong. She had hit the pipe, just a little, in her room only minutes before. If any day she needed it, it was today. She needed to feel that way if she was going to pull off the seduction of Uncle Lyong.

  Mrs. Cha strictly forbade her girls to use hiroppong or any of the other substances that the bartender guarded and dispensed behind the bar. She said it made them edgy. But Mrs. Cha was not always around—even serpents need to sleep—and when she was not there, things relaxed. Il-sun had been plying the bartender with sweet promises and
occasional favors, and now he gave her a steady supply.

  Uncle Lyong had been to the brothel only once in the five months Daisy had been there; this was but one of Blue Talon’s pleasure houses. He had come specifically to see a girl from Vietnam who had caught his attention, and he came through so briefly that Il-sun did not have an opportunity to impress him. But now that girl was gone, like Jasmine and so many other girls were suddenly gone, and Uncle Lyong would be looking for a new consort. It was rumored that the girl had so captured his heart that she convinced him to let her go home. Daisy found that difficult to believe, but it never hurt to hope that it could happen. For the vague promise of release, and for the expensive gifts Uncle Lyong was known to dole out to his favorite girls, there was a tense, competitive atmosphere among many of the women. Mrs. Cha had announced in the morning that Uncle Lyong would be coming in.

  Daisy knew that she was considered the prettiest girl in the brothel, but would she suit his tastes? Men could be so particular. Jasmine had a special knack for peering into the motivations of men, and Daisy did her best to recall what she had learned from her. It was not only for the extra gifts that Daisy wanted to seduce Uncle Lyong. She wanted to reach above Mrs. Cha, to poison his mind against her. She wanted to hold Uncle Lyong’s arm and watch Mrs. Cha squirm in obligatory politeness. And who knew? Maybe Uncle Lyong would be so taken by her that he would lift her, too, out of the brothel and give her a life of her own.

  Daisy had planned carefully for this night for many weeks—she knew the opportunity would come, eventually. She had sized up Uncle Lyong in the two minutes he had spent there, and she believed she knew what kind of man he was. Her plan would be either a smashing success or an abject failure. While all the other girls were daubing on heavy makeup and squeezing into their skimpiest outfits to try to lure him with wild, dirty sex, Daisy was applying a simple skiff of white powder and donning a Chosun-ot, a traditional Korean outfit consisting of a loose-fitting, long-sleeved blouse and a floor-length, high-waisted skirt. She had saved her tip money and then requested the Chosun-ot when one of the bouncers did the shopping. There had been confusion at first, because in South Korea the same thing is called a hanbok—another perversion of the language no doubt orchestrated by the imperialist puppet government, but she no longer cared about those differences. She had originally asked that he take her with him so she could choose her own, but that was out of the question—she had not set foot outside the brothel since her arrival. So then she described the colors she wanted, and hoped he would get it right. In the end, the bouncer had done well enough. He said that shopping for a hanbok outside Korea was not an easy task, and that he did the best he could. Daisy was sure he had not put much effort into it, but she had to work with what she had. The Chosun-ot that the bouncer brought had a white blouse with black trim, and a royal blue skirt. It was simpler than she would have liked, but it would do.

  After bathing, dressing, and applying powder to her face, Daisy spent a good long time fashioning her hair into a perfect bun on the back of her head. There was not a strand out of place—there could not be. Then she waited. She had to time her entrance perfectly. When Uncle Lyong arrived, there was a frenzy of activity downstairs. The women, the ones who were interested, anyway, were scrambling to be the first in the bar, but Daisy sat in her room and lit the hiroppong. Ten minutes later, after Uncle Lyong had had a chance to get an eyeful of all the women in the brothel, she descended the stairs.

  She struck a pose in the frame of the stairway and stood stock still. As a course of habit, the women in the brothel turned to look at her on the stair, and as she had hoped, their collective gaze drew Uncle Lyong’s attention. The women would expect her to shout one of her loud English phrases; but instead she was silent. She kept a neutral expression on her face, purposefully keeping her eyes averted from Uncle Lyong. After a moment, she glided into the room, her Chosun-ot swishing on the air behind her, and sat at one of the empty tables across the room from him. Her head was bowed, and her gaze lowered. Daisy had made herself the image of conservative Korean innocence, perfectly virginal; and against the backdrop of raw flesh and base sexual provocation she was easily the most compelling woman in the room. That she sat aloof only served to set the hooks more deeply into him. Her plan was working. Uncle Lyong peeled himself away from the shell of women around him, walked over, and sat down next to her.

  74

  GI WATCHED MRS. CHA watching the brothel. Mrs. Cha had keen eyes and a sixth sense and seemed to know everything that was going on, even the things that went on behind her back. She was patient, and acted in quick, decisive strokes. She was an ambush predator, a master of concealment and the surprise attack; and she seemed to enjoy manipulating her pretty playthings, occasionally savoring the act of ripping into the flesh of one of them with her sharp, hidden teeth.

  As Daisy became bolder and louder, Mrs. Cha became quieter and more observant. Daisy mistook this as her own victory, and flaunted her disregard for the rules with greater and greater gall. She shirked her cleaning and kitchen duties, showed up for work in the bar as much as an hour late and manipulated the bartender for more than the allowed number of drinks. Watching from the sidelines, Gi could see that Mrs. Cha was not retreating or giving in, as Daisy assumed, but coiling even tighter, sharpening her senses, readying her aim—the more audacious she allowed Daisy to become, the more dramatic her downfall would be. This was a game to Mrs. Cha that she played, perhaps, to make her own life interesting; after all, if she wanted to, she could simply send Il-sun away as she had done with Jasmine, as she often did with girls she did not like or to make room for new ones.

  The mood shifted, however, the night that Daisy descended the stairs wearing her Chosun-ot. Uncle Lyong drifted right over to her, forgetting for a moment to be manly, being pulled toward her as if by the softness of his own feminine lips. This struck a nerve with Mrs. Cha, and she visibly stiffened. Daisy had, either accidently or by design, tread across a boundary that Mrs. Cha would not abide. It was one of the few times Gi ever saw real emotion on Mrs. Cha’s face. Anger. Revenge. As soon as Uncle Lyong whisked Daisy away from the brothel to take her to his private nest, Mrs. Cha descended upon the bartender, who shrank as she approached.

  “I want you to give her more hiroppong,” she said to him in English.

  “What?” he said, looking shocked. He had believed she did not know about his arrangement with Il-sun.

  “Don’t play dumb with me or I’ll have your balls on a platter. I know you give it to her. I want you to give her more. A lot more.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he replied, shaking.

  75

  AS WINTER CAME ON, the rain never seemed to stop. The old building was a poor barrier against the damp and Gyong-ho was always cold. Sometimes she welcomed the extra body heat provided by her clients as they satisfied themselves on her. For a few days there was even snow, and traffic all but stopped in the brothel. It was a welcome reprieve.

  Then the sun gradually returned, and for some time in the afternoons it would shine through Gi’s window, where she would soak up its rays. The days got incrementally longer, the rain stopped, and the winter slowly turned back into summer. The air was once again rich with the smell of life. She lingered by open windows to inhale the change of seasons—she had been in the brothel for an entire year.

  Cho smoked and mumbled to herself almost constantly. For no apparent reason she would blurt “Where do we go from here?” and “I’m not that stupid.” It was distressing, and Gi wished she could talk to Jasmine about it. Jasmine would have had something insightful to say, she was sure—she had been a beacon of strength, and without her, since Daisy had claimed the better part of Il-sun, Gi was awash with loneliness. Gi found herself at a crossroads: Would she be pushed under and destroyed by the crush of captivity, or would she find her inner strength and continue to push against it? She could go either way. She looked inside and asked herself the question, Do I want to live? And, to her own surprise, the an
swer came back a resounding, Yes! She would do whatever it took to get through this.

  Gyong-ho rarely spoke to Daisy. There were almost no recognizable traces left of Il-sun, though Gi was sure she still lingered there, under the surface, below the hiroppong and posturing. Il-sun had aged so rapidly that she could have passed for a rough forty, even though she had barely turned nineteen. Her eyes bulged and maintained a wide, hard stare. Her skin had lost its youthful color and sheen and hung loosely around her eyes. She picked at her face and arms constantly, and open sores wept on her sunken cheeks and her dry lips. Her teeth were a dark yellow shade, and some were even starting to turn black near the gums. Even with makeup, now, few men chose to lie with her. Mrs. Cha looked at her with smug satisfaction as Daisy sat, unaccompanied, at the bar.

  For two months Daisy had been Uncle Lyong’s pet. He had come often to take her away for the evening; and as she was walking out the door on his arm, she would pass Mrs. Cha a sweet and condescending smile. Daisy’s air of superiority hit its peak at that time, and she outright refused to perform chores or work in the bar. She began ordering everyone around, like a princess; and though Mrs. Cha was immune to her commands, she did nothing to put her in her place. Then, without warning, Uncle Lyong stopped coming to the brothel. Daisy waited to be summoned by him, but the summons never came. When he finally did come back, he selected a newly arrived girl from Thailand to entertain him. Uncle Lyong was not going to save her from this life, and with that realization Daisy began to implode. She hit the pipe without restraint, and the bartender’s supply of hiroppong for her was limitless. In her drugged ranting, she often made references to her superior beauty and excellent songbun.