Your House Will Pay

by Steph Cha

Monique’s head lifted a bit at the sound of the curse word. Shawn and Jazz made a point of not swearing in front of the kid, but she still recognized the tenor of a bad word.

  Shawn could picture it: Ray at work, chatting up customers. Ray led away, head down, in handcuffs.

  “I haven’t talked to him. Nisha talked to him some, but there wasn’t time for telling stories.”

  “They said he shot Jung-Ja Han. That’s what they got him for, yeah?”

  Shawn nodded.

  “That’s what I thought.” His mouth contorted and he gripped the wood of the bar like he was in pain. “Shit,” he said.

  Shawn wondered if he’d been summoned to give Duncan the inside scoop. He wouldn’t put it past him, the trifling son of a bitch. “Didn’t you have something to tell me?”

  Duncan hesitated, then nodded. “I know he didn’t do it.”

  “What do you mean, you ‘know’?”

  “I mean, I was with him when the bitch got shot.”

  Shawn felt his chest loosen. The relief was so powerful he slumped in his stool. Ray had an alibi after all. “He was at work?”

  “No. I put Marv in charge of the bar. It was a Friday night, cuz. We were out.”

  Duncan chewed his lip, his face clenched, and it struck Shawn that his cousin could be innocent and still be undone. The reality was Ray was in custody and his best friend was here, talking to Shawn, instead of shouting his innocence from the rooftops. The alibi had to be dirty.

  “You were supposed to be taking care of him,” he said, glaring at Duncan.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I mean we all trusted you to look out for him, and now what?” He looked at Monique and kept his voice even. “You got him banging again?”

  “Hold up.” Duncan laughed, a meager sort of laugh. “No, it ain’t like that. You know I don’t do that shit, man.”

  “Then what’s that mean, you were ‘out.’”

  “You’re not gonna like this.” He gave his head a theatrical scratch. “Have you met my girl Cindy?”

  It turned out Duncan had a girlfriend of sorts, a twenty-five-year-old hairdresser named Cindy he met on a dating app. Nothing serious, but they hung out sometimes, and last week, she came into the bar with her friend Denise.

  “She was this girl Cindy knew from L.A., thinking ’bout moving to P-dale, and she wanted to show her a good time. So I decided, why not have us a little party, right?”

  Shawn listened, dreading the rest of the story.

  “Ray wasn’t working Friday, so I called him up, and the four of us decided to meet up at my place.”

  “What time?”

  “It was early, man. Five, maybe five thirty.” At least two hours before the shooting. “We were gonna have a drink and go out, get food somewhere.”

  If they’d gone to a restaurant, there was a good chance someone would remember seeing Ray. “You went out?”

  “No, and see, this is the problem. We stayed in.” He shot Shawn a guilty, suggestive look: one raised eyebrow, a wince at the mouth. “Know what I’m saying?”

  Shawn felt his jaw go slack. “Ray and this girl Denise . . .”

  “It wasn’t my fault, alright? We all had a couple drinks, and me and Cindy went to my room for a minute, and when we came out, we heard them in the bathroom.”

  Shawn thought of Ray sneaking into a bathroom with a girl like a horny high school kid and shook his head in disgust.

  “So then what? Ray just went home?”

  “We chilled for a bit. Ordered pizza, had another drink. Then Ray went home.”

  “What time?”

  “Not late. Before nine, probably. He was gone by the time I heard about the shooting.”

  “He couldn’t have—”

  “What, driven to Northridge drunk, with his dick still wet, and tried to kill someone? I doubt it. Anyway, they said it happened around closing, and that store closes at seven. He was with me at seven, I know that.”

  “And your girl Cindy and Denise, they were there, too.”

  “Yeah, if the man wants an alibi, he got an alibi. So you tell me. What do I do?”

  Right now, Nisha was at her job while her husband sat in jail, not because she wanted to be there, but because she needed that job to support her family, especially now that they had a lawyer to feed. Shawn thought about Nisha, about the ten years she’d waited for Ray, raising their kids and standing by, patient and lonely and faithful. He knew Ray had strayed before. Nisha told him it had been a problem when the kids were little, and Shawn could tell it was the one thing that made Nisha think about leaving him in the long years he was away. But Ray was a middle-aged man now, probably getting plenty from his wife. Shawn was younger than his cousin, and it had been a long time since he’d been tempted to misbehave in the name of desire. He was settled and content, grateful for Jazz—no ass in the world was worth taking what he had and lighting it on fire.

  Two teenage kids, over twenty years of marriage—that’s what Ray had pawned for a one-night stand with a young stranger. Shawn mourned the hard-earned loving calm that had finally come to their family. He thought of the strife to come—Nisha heartbroken, the kids in confusion, the lines that would have to be drawn. He wondered if they’d ever all gather at Aunt Sheila’s again, and he hated Ray then, for his weakness and evil.

  “You got an alibi, you gotta give it to him,” he said.

  Duncan nodded. He’d needed the permission. “You think Nisha would walk out?”

  “She might. Hell, she probably should.”

  “It was just the one time. Nigga was locked up ten years.”

  Shawn cast his eyes pointedly toward Monique, who had abandoned her notepad and was now resting her head on the bar, watching them listlessly. Duncan gave no sign of noticing.

  “Girl came on to him and he caved. He’s only a man, Shawn. Nisha knows that.”

  Shawn couldn’t tell if Duncan was lying. He probably was. This was Ray’s best friend, a forty-four-year-old bachelor who still talked about women like he did when he was in high school. It was amazing to Shawn how much he’d looked up to him then. But that was a long time ago now. “Nisha made it through the same drought.”

  “It’s different for men. Come on, Shawn, I gotta explain this to you?”

  He knew how hard it had been for Nisha, but he didn’t have the energy to lay it all out. Besides, Nisha wouldn’t like him telling Duncan about her low days, her weak days, her moments of wretchedness and need.

  “You gotta talk to the police,” he said instead. “He threw a grenade at his marriage when he slept with that girl, and he’ll have to deal with that. But they’re trying to get him for attempted murder. That comes first.”

  “I guess I don’t have to tell them every damn thing.”

  “Don’t be stupid. They’ll question you. Probably question those girls, too. They’ll get the whole story, with time stamps, and it’ll be better for Ray if you just come out with it.” He thought about Ray, back in a jail cell, getting more and more desperate. “I’ll bet he already told them anyway. But if he lied first, they might not believe him. You can get him out.”

  “I guess the police ain’t gonna tell Nisha.”

  “But Nisha’s smart. She’ll know Ray’s not telling her something, and she’ll find it out.”

  “From you?” Duncan’s face twisted with something like distaste, like after all they’d talked about, it was the idea of Shawn betraying Ray that offended him most.

  It didn’t sit well with Shawn either. Ray was his cousin, his brother. He’d always had Shawn’s back, and he was first in line for his loyalty. What good would it do to upend his life, when Ray showed himself perfectly capable of doing that on his own? Shawn thought about his niece and nephew, both parents home at long last at this fragile age. This would devastate them, and of course they’d side with their mom. What if they cut ties with Ray, this father who had, after all, been gone most of their lives? How could Shawn play a part in that?
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  He wanted to erase what he’d just heard, let Ray and Nisha be Ray and Nisha. She would be happier not knowing, there was no doubt about that. But the idea of keeping it from her made him feel sick.

  “I don’t know, man, I gotta think about this.”

  There was a silence, and Monique piped up to break it. “Papa Shawn. Did Uncle Ray do something bad?”

  Both men stared at her. It was startling, how much this kid picked up, even if she was sure to lose track of it within a few hours.

  “No, sweetie,” said Duncan with a panicked smile. “Uncle Ray’s just fine.”

  Shawn was relieved Ray hadn’t shot Jung-Ja Han. He didn’t want his cousin to go back to prison—not for shooting that woman, not for anything. But Jung-Ja Han was a murderer. She’d taken away their sister. How many times had Shawn fantasized about taking revenge himself? He would’ve been mad at Ray’s stupidity, his impulsive selfishness, but he would’ve understood. He would’ve understood that a whole lot better than this.

  Fifteen

  Friday, August 30, 2019

  Grace sat at her desk reading over the list of instructions Paul had handed off to her. The nurse had explained them to him in her presence, but Grace, her mind a roaring jumble, hadn’t been paying close attention. She knew what medications to give and when to give them, but everything else seemed new and terrible. She googled “how to give sponge bath” and found an illustrated how-to guide and listened for stirring in her parents’ room.

  It was strange being back home. The tidy, quiet house now felt like a haunted place, a place of secret violence. Grace couldn’t help thinking the house itself had betrayed her, in league with the rest of them, masquerading all her life as a normal house and not the house of a murderer. Even her room made her uneasy. It looked like a child’s room, her bed a daybed lined with stuffed animals, her walls still hung with the posters that had moved her in high school—the cartoon girl group Sailor Moon, the Korean boy band Big Bang. She had a plastic Dragon Ball alarm clock that used to get her out of bed every morning, and it still sat on her desk, though it had long since stopped—God, she thought, was that on the nose. It was hard to believe this room had felt so comfortable so recently. Grace would be anywhere else if she had the choice.

  Less than twenty-four hours after Yvonne came out of her coma, her doctor had cleared her to go home. It had taken Grace by surprise—she’d never known anyone who’d been shot and fallen into a coma before, but she would’ve thought that was serious enough to warrant more time in the hospital. A month, at least. Certainly more than a week.

  But last night, they brought Yvonne home from the hospital, not strapped to a stretcher, but buckled into the front seat of Paul’s car, without special caution or ceremony. Miriam picked up dinner from the Hanin Market: plastic-wrapped packages of ddukbokki, soondae, and kimbap, with a sweet potato cake from Tous Les Jours for dessert. It was a thoughtful gesture that let her avoid the homecoming for an extra thirty minutes. They’d had a wan celebratory dinner in Paul and Yvonne’s bedroom, the first meal they’d all shared in over two years. Just a week ago, Grace would’ve been thrilled to know such an event was in her near future. But of course, everything was shit now.

  Yvonne had gone to bed early, and when Miriam excused herself to go home to Blake, Grace thought about going with her.

  But Paul had stopped them both. “I have to go back to the store,” he said. “Can you girls take care of Mom tomorrow?”

  Grace had to stop herself from rolling her eyes. Paul didn’t report to anyone; the store had been fine without him all week. He’d spent most of that week pacing the halls of the hospital, and no one had been blowing up his cell phone, demanding his return to Woori Pharmacy. Paul just didn’t want to be the one to attend to his wife, now that he’d have to do more than fret from a different room. Grace had noticed his eyes glaze over as the nurse went over the litany of instructions. Apparently, he didn’t see them as his concern.

  Grace looked at Miriam, the only one in the family who was neither employed nor gunshot.

  Miriam’s mouth curled, like this was unexpected, unwanted, and unfair. “I have a lunch meeting tomorrow. Blake set it up for me. It’s with this showrunner with a deal at Netflix.”

  “Okay, so you have lunch plans?” Grace asked in disbelief.

  “They’re not just ‘lunch plans.’ It’s a work thing. This guy might hire me down the line. It’ll look bad if I cancel. For me and Blake.”

  “You can’t say, ‘So sorry, but my mom just got out of a coma’?”

  “He’s never met me, and he’s kind of an important guy. He doesn’t want to know all about my life.”

  “Grace,” Paul cut in, his voice stern and scolding. “You stay with Mom.”

  “What? Are you serious? I’m the one who should go back to work.”

  “Joseph will understand. Miriam doesn’t need to explain everything to this showrunner.” He pronounced “showrunner” uncertainly; Grace was sure he’d never heard the word before.

  Uncle Joseph did understand. “Your mother comes first,” he said gently into the phone. “Take as long as you want. I’ll be fine here.” This goddamn Confucian culture. If Grace quit her job to take care of Yvonne, Uncle Joseph would understand that, too; if Yvonne’s condition were permanent, he might even expect it.

  Yvonne spent most of the day sleeping. There wasn’t much else for her to do; she had to lie down, and the drugs kept her tired. Grace passed the time playing game after game of Candy Crush. She’d bought a book about Ava Matthews—written by that Jules Searcey guy, it turned out—and had it open on her laptop, hidden behind the game. She’d meant to start reading it before Yvonne got out of the hospital; now, she found it impossible to look at with her mother in the next room.

  It was a hot weekend, one of the hottest of the summer, and the air-conditioning wasn’t strong enough to battle the Valley temperatures, which had been well over 100 degrees all afternoon. Yvonne had been quiet and undemanding; her one request was a bath, and Grace decided it might as well be now.

  Yvonne was awake when Grace let herself into her parents’ bedroom.

  “Did you eat?” she asked Grace reflexively.

  “It’s after four, Umma. I ate a while ago. Are you hungry?”

  Yvonne shook her head.

  “Do you want your bath?”

  She sat up in bed, wincing. “Help me up,” she said.

  Grace wasn’t sure how best to help a recovering gunshot victim get out of bed, but somehow, she and Yvonne managed to fumble up together. She held her mother’s waist, hoisted her side against her own. Even with her plodding, uneven gait, Yvonne was troublingly light, just a brittle frame weighed down by sweaty pajamas.

  Grace was accustomed to seeing Yvonne naked—they went to the Korean spa together often enough—but she had to hide her horror as she helped her mother out of her clothes. Yvonne had lost a startling amount of weight, more than Grace would have thought possible, even lying unconscious in a hospital room for a week. Her skin, soft and thin like worn leather, seemed to hang loose on her body. This struck Grace harder, at first, than the actual wounds, covered neatly with gauze and bandages.

  “Run some hot water,” said Yvonne. The tub was empty—the instructions warned against letting the wounds soak. “Just a little bit. I’m cold.”

  Grace let the tub fill up two inches while her mother shivered against her. Yvonne sat on the rim and gripped Grace’s shoulder as she swung her legs inside, testing the water with her toes. She nodded, and Grace helped lower her into the tub.

  Yvonne sighed as she sat down. “This is pathetic.”

  It was hard to argue with that. She looked small and breakable, crouched naked, spine curved, the outline of her vertebrae showing through her skin. She’d been shot in the front, and the bullet had exited her body beneath her ribs. The wound was dressed, but there was a large bruise all around it, a halo of purple and green. Grace took the mixing bowl she’d grabbed from the kitchen a
nd filled it with hot water.

  “Umma,” she said. “Lift your head. Let’s wash your hair first.”

  How many times had Yvonne bathed her daughters in this tub? Grace wasn’t sure how old she was when she started bathing on her own, but she had vivid memories of being in the tub, both with and without Miriam, their mother—never their father—squatting on the bathroom floor, washing their hair. Even after Grace started showering, Yvonne would force her to submit to ddae miri at least once or twice a year, scrubbing with a coarse cloth until great gray worms of dead skin and dirt emerged from every surface of her body, leaving her pink and raw and clean.

  Grace always disliked this painful ritual, even more so when she realized it wasn’t something most of the other kids suffered. She remembered the night she put an end to it. She must have been twelve or thirteen, not a child anymore, by her own calculation. Yvonne had walked into the bathroom while Grace was showering—back then, Miriam was the only one in the house who ever locked a door. Yvonne was singing her ddae miri song, a silly little jingle set to a Korean pop song: “Ddae, ddae, ddae, ddae, ddae, ddae, ddae . . .” It had cracked Grace up when she was younger, but that night it grated on her, the cutesy intrusion on her privacy. She snapped at Yvonne, in a way that stunned them both. What she could see of her mother’s face through the steamed glass filled Grace with shame.

  She lathered Yvonne’s hair. It felt thin and fragile between her fingers. Grace noticed the gray roots growing from the top of her bowed head, the cheap dark brown dye job turning purple.

  “You can shampoo harder. My head’s not injured,” said Yvonne. “Here, I’ll just do it.”

  Before Grace could stop her, she brushed her daughter’s limp hands out of the way and started working her scalp with unnecessary vigor. It was a sulky move, not typical of Yvonne, and it brought the sting of tears to Grace’s eyes. Her mother hated to be helpless, and Grace had no idea how to take care of her.

  Yvonne let out a yelp and dropped her arms, then wrapped them tight across her abdomen.

  “Umma! Just stay still. You have a hole in your fucking torso.”