I met my mother early that evening at the jjimjilbang. She was waiting for me in the changing room, naked, holding two cans of strawberry milk, egg mask on her hair. In the bath area, I sat on a stool and scrubbed her back, then she scrubbed mine.
‘You’ve lost weight again. You need to eat more.’
My hands began to shake. I hated it when she talked like that. You’re too thin. You should eat more. Don’t get too fat. It made me feel like slamming myself against the wall.
Three women were padding about, pink leeches glued to their shoulder blades. The youngest was my age, her breasts already sagging. I looked at mine. Firm, like two upturned ladles. Feeling reassured, I went to join my mother in the sulphur bath. She’d wrapped her hair in a plastic bag. Through the steam she looked like a mushroom giving off smoke. Her chest rose and fell spasmodically. I told her to make an appointment with the doctor. She waved my suggestion aside with a gesture of irritation.
‘Tell me about the guest house.’
I told her about the girl with the bandages.
‘I’ve got some money saved up,’ my mother said. ‘If you want to have an operation too.’
‘You think I’m that ugly?’
‘Don’t be stupid, I’m your mother. But an operation might help you get a better job. I hear that’s how it is in Seoul.’
I wasn’t looking for another job, I said, just to provoke her. Working in the guest house gave me a chance to meet people. There was an artist there, I liked his work. I didn’t say he was French.
I didn’t know how my mother had been spending her time since I’d moved out. I tried to remember what we did together when I was younger. Television. Beach. We didn’t see many people. She never stopped to chat with the other mothers at the school gate when I was in primary school. It wasn’t long before my classmates began asking me why I didn’t have a father. As soon as I was old enough, I started taking the bus home on my own.
Back in the changing room we put on our pyjamas to go into the mixed section. We lay on the ground, our heads on small wooden blocks, sipping barley porridge and peeling hard-boiled eggs. When the time came to leave, I said I couldn’t go home with her. I had to get back to the guest house, I had lots to do. The truth was I couldn’t stand sharing a bed with her any more. She looked upset. I found it painful to see her like that. But I’d made up my mind, I wasn’t going to be swayed.
In the alleyway, Mother Kim gave me one of her meatballs. I was looking pale, she said. I imagined the meat thawing and being refrozen. In the next alleyway, I threw the meatball to a dog rooting around in the bins.
There was a note pinned to the door of my room, in French. Kerrand was asking if I’d like to go with him to the nature reserve in Seoraksan the following day. My day off. He’d remembered.
SNOW CAME CRASHING DOWN, loosened by the beginnings of a thaw, plummeting into the streams, bending the bamboo beneath its weight. A windless day. Kerrand was walking up the hill behind me, following in my footsteps. I’d lent him Park’s snowshoes. He kept stopping and taking off his gloves to run his fingers over a tree trunk or an ice-covered rock. He’d listen for a moment before putting his gloves on again and carrying on up the hill, more slowly every time.
‘Winter isn’t very interesting,’ I said, beginning to lose patience. ‘Soon the cherry blossoms will be out and the bamboo will be green, you should see it in spring.’
‘I’ll be gone by then.’
He stopped again and looked around.
‘I like it this way, unadorned.’
We’d reached the grotto, a small cave temple with statues of Buddha set into alcoves. Kerrand studied them closely. He wanted to know about Korean mountain myths and legends. For his character. I told him the story my mother used to tell me when I was little. The one about Tangun, son of the Lord of Heaven who was sent down to the highest mountain in Korea, where he took a she-bear for his wife and became the father of the Korean people. That mountain had symbolised the bridge linking heaven and earth ever since.
We climbed for two hours and then stopped to rest on a rock. Kerrand tightened his laces, took out his pen and notepad. He began sketching bamboo.
‘Do you always carry it with you?’ I asked, pointing to the sketchpad.
‘Most of the time.’
‘For your rough drafts?’
He frowned, irritated. He didn’t like that expression. It meant nothing to him. A story evolved constantly, every drawing was as important as the next.
I was starting to feel a chill. After a while I leaned over to look at his drawing.
‘They look like dragonflies.’
He held the drawing at arm’s length to examine it.
‘They do, don’t they. It’s a terrible drawing though. I can’t use it.’
‘Why not? I like it.’
Kerrand looked again at the sketch. He smiled. Then he walked over to the cliff edge and looked down at the valley below, its outlines blurred in the mist. Crows cawing.
‘You’ve lived in Sokcho all your life?’
‘I went to university in Seoul.’
‘That must have been a shock to the system.’
‘Not really. I lived with my aunt.’
Kerrand looked blankly at me. Sokcho was crawling with people in the summer, I said, because of its beaches. Seriously, it was just like Seoul, especially since they’d filmed that drama series here with the famous actor. Fans came in their coachloads. First Love. Had he seen it? No, he hadn’t.
‘Why did you come back?’
‘It’s not forever. Park needed someone to work in the guest house.’
‘And you were the only person he could find?’
I had the feeling he was making fun of me. Yes I was, I said sharply. The truth was I could easily apply for a grant to study abroad, but I didn’t mention that. Then he asked me if I intended to spend the rest of my life working at the guest house.
‘I’d like to see France some day, maybe spend some time there.’
‘I’m sure you will.’
I said yes, maybe I would. I didn’t tell him I couldn’t leave my mother. Kerrand looked as if he wanted to say something else, but then he changed his mind and asked why I’d wanted to study French.
‘So I could speak a language my mother wouldn’t understand.’
He looked taken aback but made no comment. He took a mandarin out of his pocket, peeled it and offered me a segment. I was hungry. I said no thanks.
‘What’s it like, France?’
He couldn’t sum it up. It was such a big country, everything about it was so different from here. The food was good. He liked the light in Normandy, grey and dense. If I ever visited, he’d show me his studio.
‘You’ve never set any of your books in Normandy?’
‘No.’
‘I’m sure there’s more going on there than in Sokcho.’
‘Not really.’
‘Plenty of artists have used Normandy as a setting. Maupassant, Monet.’
‘How much do you know about Monet?’
‘A little, not much. Our professor told us about other artists from Normandy when we were studying Maupassant.’
Kerrand squinted up at the sky, contemplating the clouds. He seemed suddenly far away. We made our way slowly back down the mountain. Kerrand in front. Whenever I felt myself slipping on the snow, I held on to him.
On the beach in front of the guest house, a haenyo was sorting through her catch. Her diving suit steamed in the cold air. Kerrand crouched on a rock to watch, one hand on the ground to keep his balance. Waves lapped at our feet. I told Kerrand about the diver women. They came from the island of Jeju. They dived down to ten metres all year round, in all weathers, fishing for shellfish and sea cucumber.
The haenyo started scrubbing her mask with a sprig of seaweed in her calloused hand. I bought a bag of shellfish from her. Kerrand wanted to stay and watch but I was shivering. He followed me over to the main building. I asked him if he’d be at dinner that
evening. No, he said, he wouldn’t.
I made miyeokguk, seaweed soup, and served it with rice, cloves of garlic marinated in vinegar, acorn jelly. The girl sipped it from a teaspoon. She seemed to be enjoying it even though she could barely chew. She’d been staying in her pyjamas all day since her boyfriend had left. Her bandages were thinner every day. Soon they’d be gone.
I was putting on my nightshirt when Jun-oh messaged me. He was really sorry, he wouldn’t be coming back for Seollal, model school was intense but exciting. He missed me, he wanted to lick me all over, suck on my breasts, he’d call me.
I heard Kerrand come in, take off his coat, go into the bathroom. He went into his room, leaving his door ajar, and sat down at his desk. I walked over and stood by the door to watch him.
His fingers skimmed tentatively across the page. The brush stuttered, unsure of the figure’s proportions. The face, especially. A woman, she didn’t look Western. He probably wasn’t used to drawing women, I hadn’t seen many among his characters. She started to spin, her dress swinging. Skinny one moment, curvaceous the next, arms reaching out, pulling back, the twisting form taking shape beneath his brush. Every so often, Kerrand tore off a scrap of paper and chewed on it.
I lay down in bed and thought about what Jun-oh had said in his message. It had been a long time since I’d wanted to be with a man. I slid my hand between my legs, pressed gently then stopped, remembering that Kerrand was just on the other side of the wall. I moved my hand back. I was already wet. With my other hand, I grasped the back of my neck, my breasts, imagining a man kneading my flesh, filling the spaces in my body. I pressed harder, faster, until my thighs began to tremble and a groan escaped my lips as I came.
Shaking, I caught my breath, my hand still resting between my thighs. I drew it away sharply as if pulling a dressing from an open sore. Had Kerrand heard me? He must have done.
I suddenly remembered I’d forgotten to put the leftovers from dinner in the fridge. I couldn’t leave them out overnight. I put my clothes on, hoping I wouldn’t run into Kerrand in the hall.
All was quiet outside. The neon light over Mother Kim’s stall flickered. I jumped. A bat stirred the air.
The clock in the lounge showed almost one in the morning. The girl was sitting in front of the television, pecking at the gooey part of a Choco Pie, holding it with both hands like a hamster, touching her tongue to it lightly. She looked unnaturally stiff, her gaze directed not at the screen but a little above it. She’d muted the sound.
‘Everything okay?’
She signalled yes, a faint movement of the face, eyes staring into space. The string of lights in the room made her bandages glow, throwing the scars into relief. Eyelids, nose, chin. She’d really had herself carved up. I’d probably disturbed her. She left the room. The boy would be back with her for Seollal, he’d made the reservation that afternoon.
I went back to the other building, Kerrand’s room was in darkness.
I’D ALREADY BEEN WAITING for an hour at the health centre. In the end, I’d made an appointment for my mother myself. A nurse came to tell me the doctor was running late and my mother still needed more tests. I decided to go for a walk around the area.
I hardly ever came to this part of town. Construction work, huts, builders, cranes, sand, concrete. And the bridge where they’d filmed the famous scene from First Love, the one with the actor on the embankment. The boat they’d used was moored right in front of me. Filled with stuffed animals and bouquets of last summer’s flowers. Faded, rotting, imprisoned in ice. A gust of wind rocked the boat. Mournful creaking sounds.
I walked on, past the displays of fish tanks. Two tanks stacked one on top of the other. Long-tailed fish in the lower one. In the top one, crabs piled up as if ready to be tinned. Jiggling passively in the jet-stream, too weak to gouge out their neighbours’ eyes. One of them braced itself against another and managed to get to the rim of the tank, where it stayed, balanced, until a gush of water propelled it back down, and through to the tank beneath. The fish started swimming in rapid circles. The crab landed upside down, struggled in slow motion to get back on its legs and failed, piercing the ventral fin of one of the fish in the struggle, tearing it to pieces, bit by bit. Without its fin, the fish began swimming lopsidedly until it sank, crazed, to the bottom of the tank.
At the other end of the street, the hotel modelled on an Indian palace, pink and golden. Two girls in the doorway, displaying their curves. Leather shorts, ripped tights.
Oozing winter and fish, Sokcho waited.
That was Sokcho, always waiting, for tourists, boats, men, spring.
My mother was diagnosed with a chill, nothing more.
I DIDN’T TELL Park I was going to Naksan with Kerrand. He’d been there once before, at the beginning of his stay. He wanted to buy some more incense. We had two hours, I had to be back in time to make dinner. The bus drove along the coast. Kerrand was sitting next to me. I’d been avoiding him since the night I’d worried he’d heard me in bed. But now he seemed lost in the book he was reading, the one I’d seen in his suitcase. I tried to read over his shoulder.
‘I really like this author,’ he said, looking up. ‘Do you know him?’
‘No, will you read me some?’
He cleared his throat.
‘I don’t like reading aloud.’
I’d already closed my eyes. He started reading, enunciating his words carefully. It was too complicated. I focused on following the inflections of his voice. He sounded different, further away, a distant echo from a body left on the other side of the world.
The temple was built into the cliffs above the beaches. The nuns were meditating, we’d have to wait. A fine rain began to fall, dampening the ground. Then, suddenly, a downpour, rain funnelling down on us, falling in torrents. We took shelter under the overhanging roof. A raspy sound of chanting filtered through the walls. Echoing across the courtyard. The building was dotted with statuettes of dragons, snakes, phoenixes, tigers, tortoises. Kerrand walked around inspecting them. He stopped in front of a tortoise, knelt down and touched its shell. A nun had told me during a school trip that each animal corresponded to a different season.
‘There are five of them,’ Kerrand counted.
‘The snake is a kind of pivot point, without it the seasons can’t change from one to the next. The tortoise is the guardian of winter. In spring, the dragon has to find the snake or the tortoise won’t allow it to pass.’
Kerrand nodded, poked his finger into the fold of the neck, studied the joint where the figure was attached to the wooden base. He stayed there, not moving, for a long time.
In the distance, up on the bluff, a pagoda in the mist, merging into the sky. We ran towards it. The rain was drumming on the ground, blurring the horizon beyond the barbed wire on the surrounding beaches. Bunkers at regular intervals, sub-machine guns protruding from openings. I pointed them out to him.
‘I imagine the beaches in France are less threatening.’
‘I don’t like the ones in the south very much. People flock to them but they never look too happy to be there. I prefer the beaches in Normandy. Colder, emptier. With their own scars from the war.’
‘A war that finished a long time ago.’
He leant against the railing.
‘Yes, but if you dig down far enough, you’ll still find bones and blood in the sand.’
‘Please don’t make fun of us.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’d never do that.’
‘What I mean is you may have had your wars, I’m sure there are scars on your beaches, but that’s all in the past. Our beaches are still waiting for the end of a war that’s been going on for so long people have stopped believing it’s real. They build hotels, put up neon signs, but it’s all fake, we’re on a knife-edge, it could all give way any moment. We’re living in limbo. In a winter that never ends.’
I turned back to face the temple. Kerrand came and stood by my side. My hands were shaking.
I looked straight ahead.
‘Last summer, a tourist from Seoul was shot by a North Korean soldier. She was swimming in the sea. She hadn’t realised she’d crossed over the border.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Kerrand.
I looked down.
‘But I don’t know anything about your country, do I? Sokcho is my home. This is all I know.’
‘Sokcho and—’
He grabbed me by the waist and pulled me back. An icicle broke off above where I’d been standing and shattered on the ground. He kept his hand on my waist. The nuns opened the doors and the perfume of incense wafted out into the rain.
SEOLLAL CAME at last. I made tteokguk for the guest house and walked over to let Kerrand know and to tell him it was a holiday, everything would be closed. He said Park had already told him, but thanked me anyway. He’d stocked up on instant noodles from the convenience store.
‘Why do you never try my cooking?’ I said, smarting from another refusal.
‘I don’t like spicy food,’ he said, seeming surprised at being asked to explain himself.
‘My tteokguk isn’t spicy.’
He shrugged, he’d try it next time. I forced a smile. I looked over at his desk, Kerrand stood aside to let me in.
Some of the drawings were in pencil, others in ink. Kerrand drew his character with the assurance that comes from knowing the strokes by heart, being able to manipulate the forms with closed eyes. The hero arriving in a town. I recognised the hotels in Sokcho. The frontier was a scribble of barbed wire. The cave with the Buddhas. He’d lifted them from my world and planted them in his imaginary one, in shades of grey.
‘You never use colour?’
‘I don’t see the point.’
I frowned, dubious. Sokcho was so colourful. He pointed to a scene of a snowy mountaintop with the sun high overhead. A few lines showing the outlines of the rocks, that was all. The rest of the page was blank.
Winter in Sokcho Page 4