by Sonya Chung
Dennis said nothing. He was still looking off in the distance.
Charles realized he had something to say, it was on the tip of his tongue. Something along the lines of, Aw, D—not you, too? First Alice, now Dennis. They were all surrendering their right minds.
But Charles didn’t say it. He too said nothing, and this conveyed something unnatural between them. Dennis cleared his throat and looked over Charles’s shoulder, up the hill. “You goin’ back up?”
“Yeah, man. C’mon. We can run the girls back up when they come down. I ain’t been to the gym since the snow started.” Dennis nodded, and they jogged up halfway, then crossed through the trees and followed the high-pitched sounds of little girls in flight.
Afterward they all came to the house. Alice served Swiss Miss with mini marshmallows on top, and the men stood by the back door in a row, holding their mugs. Everyone’s cheeks were glowing, they’d all gotten a good workout; even Rick had taken a couple of turns dragging the girls uphill. Karen took a turn sledding, and Rick tried to drag her up, too, but she jumped off and said, “Don’t even try it.” Alice watched mostly, though she clapped her hands when the girls went speeding down the hill. She played along with the girls now as they dipped their upper lips into their mugs and came back up with foamy mustaches.
Dennis had been quiet, and Charles had an urgent feeling—like he was losing his friend. Like everyone around him was being lost. There was something sinister out there, getting to everyone, and they were all giving in—acting helpless, like children. Mindlessly offering themselves up to be swallowed whole.
Dennis elbowed Charles. He said, “Hey man, I should get going. Need to shovel the driveway, straighten up the house. My moms is bringing Lawrence by tonight.”
“I’ll walk you out,” Charles said.
On the porch, before Dennis reached the steps, Charles grabbed his shoulder from behind and pulled him around, a little too hard. “Yo, man, what’s going on with you?”
Dennis put his hands up, showing his palms. “Yo, what’s up? What I do?”
“What I do?” Charles mocked. “You ain’t done nuthin, man. You ain’t done shit. What’s that old man feeding you? That bitch ran out on you, and for what? A fancy car and a Jacuzzi bath? You ain’t done shit, you hear me? Don’t let that old man tell you different.”
“Whoa whoa, take it easy. It ain’t like that. Reverend Haywood, he just … I got myself into this.”
“Sherisse got you into this.”
“No man, listen. Just listen. I lost it last night. I met up with Teddy over on Fourth. I bought some skag offa him, and then, I dunno. Then I ended up over at Brother’s.”
“Brother’s?” Charles shut up and listened now. This was going somewhere. Brother Dee’s was a dive bar across the street from the church, and Dee’s back room was where serious junkies went to shoot up. For decades, the reverend and the deacons had been going over there to witness—Fridays, every week. Every so often they fished someone out and cleaned him up for Sunday service; but soon enough, whoever it was would be right back on the other side of the street.
“Yeah, man. I was thinkin bout Sherisse and that motherfucker and their Lincoln fuckin Navigator; and about gettin fucked up. And when I got there, I thought, yeah, I’m as hopeless as these shitsacks. But it was Friday, you know, the day Haywood and the deacons come by. And they found me. The reverend grabbed me up by my armpits and took me back to the church. I slept there, and when I woke up, he gave me coffee and food. And then we got to talkin, and I was a mess, you know. Blubbering like a pussy. And he says to me: ‘You knew where you were going. You knew where the Lord would find you. It was your cry for salvation.’”
Dennis pointed his finger in Charles’s face, the way Rev. Haywood had pointed it in his. Charles put his hand up and leaned away from Dennis, as if he’d caught a whiff of something rancid.
But Dennis kept talking. “I’m sayin, there are other forces, you know. Bigger than us. Maybe it’s the Holy Ghost; maybe it’s somethin else. At some point, it just don’t matter. When you’re between living and dying, when you’re drowning and someone pulls you out, are you really gonna ask for ID?”
It was unclear who realized first what Dennis had said—drowning—but both of them turned away. “Yo, man—I didn’t mean …”
But Charles had already moved on to other things in his mind. It wasn’t any use, thinking about the unidentified bigger force that did or did not pull someone out.
Charles was thinking instead of Hannah. Her cry for salvation.
She’d shown up at Veda’s school. Maybe, like Dennis, just finding herself there. This part was true—that sometimes you found yourself acting without thinking. If you thought too much, you were bound to ask Why. Why do it, Why not do it? And when you couldn’t satisfy yourself with reasonable logic, you didn’t do it, whatever it was you had the instinct to do. Why mattered less and less. Why didn’t mean the everything most people thought it did. So what if you knew why. So what if you didn’t. Why was the boy dead; why were the rest of them alive.
Why did Hannah come to Veda.
Why think of Hannah now. Why not.
Dennis said, “I’ll see ya later, man,” and then he left the house. Charles went inside and closed the door behind him, already forgetting Dennis’s story, but hearing in his head, like a mantra, cry for salvation.
7.
They would be home for Christmas Day, as usual. Alice went alone to a Christmas Eve service at All Saints; she did not ask if either Charles or Veda wanted to join her. She’d put on a skirt and stockings and her favorite heeled boots. She was eager and upbeat when she left, but returned spent, flattened. Sitting in his recliner, Charles watched from the corner of his eye as Alice pulled off each boot, dropping them on their sides by the stairs. She was asleep when Charles came to bed. Charles lay awake for a long time, first with the light on, then off. Alice didn’t stir. She was really sleeping. Charles hoped that somehow this was a good thing: Alice hadn’t slept soundly, not at night, for months.
Rhea and Marcus would be by for supper at five, after they’d had Christmas lunch with Marcus’s mother. They’d all agreed on Chinese takeout from Peking Palace, which had been Benny’s favorite. It was Veda who’d suggested it, two days before. Alice and Veda were making Christmas sugar cookies, and Veda was standing on a footstool stirring the batter. She spoke thoughtlessly, licked her finger after she said it. Alice was measuring out vanilla and said, “That sounds good,” and Charles was confused for a moment. He’d been prepared for the air in the room to go tight and brittle. “Yay!” Veda said. Charles had stood outside the kitchen and listened. A woman and her daughter were making cookies. The mother was praising the daughter for using a rolling pin for the first time. Everything seemed very normal, and a wave of aloneness washed over him. He really didn’t know who that woman was.
Early Christmas morning, Charles set to making breakfast. Pancakes and bacon. Later on he’d do eggs made-to-order. He’d hardly slept. It was still dark, but he was wide awake.
While the bacon sizzled on low, he walked into the parlor with his coffee. He’d gotten the tree and done his shopping before the storm. Alice and Veda had not done theirs. Veda was disappointed, said she’d been saving up her allowance; but Charles told her he didn’t need anything, and she should save her money for other things, though he was hard-pressed to think of what. He and Alice had agreed to keep gifts to a minimum, which they both understood meant only gifts for Veda. But Charles didn’t like the idea of the two of them watching Veda open presents by herself. So he bought Alice a few small things—a pair of bedroom slippers, some bath bubbles—and even bought himself a new shaver, from “Santa” (whom Veda had outgrown years ago, and Benny had never believed in).
Charles put Nat King Cole on Uncle Marvin’s old turntable, switched the volume down to low. He never liked “The Christmas Song,” so he put the needle ahead to “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.” When it got to verse two, he could smell t
hat the bacon was almost ready. O tidings of comfort and joy, comfort and joy, he sang along in his head. He turned to leave the parlor but paused as the King started on verse three: there was a dramatic modulation, an upswinging change of key. He wondered that he’d never noticed it before; playing the record low seemed to bring it out.
The bacon was crispier than he liked, but then Alice preferred it that way. Charles mixed the pancake batter and put it in the refrigerator. It was 7:15, the sun just coming up. It was going to be a clear but cold day. Once Veda came down, they’d get right to opening presents. Then breakfast. Then the whole day to pass before Rhea and Marcus arrived.
7:25. Charles pulled on a sweatshirt and laced up his boots. Grabbed his parka and hat. Wrote a note and tucked it under the plate of bacon on the kitchen counter: Gone to Dennis’s to check on him. Dennis would be heading to his mother’s today, to spend Christmas with her and Lawrence. Alice might or might not find the note strange. It was hard to predict these days.
The buses were running, and Charles caught one before long. There was no traffic, and just one other person on the bus, an old woman with big white eyebrows, head wrapped in a scarf. Once Charles transferred, it was only five minutes to the stop opposite Hannah’s house.
The white Nova was parked in front. The porch light was on, and Charles guessed they were the sort to leave the light on all night. Nona used to scold the neighbors for doing that: That porch light says, I’m afraid o’ you, I know you out there. It says, I got somethin worth stealin. Nona had a brother and a cousin who were both thieves and always liked to think she understood the mind of a hoodlum.
Charles sat in the bus shelter. He blew into his gloves. His sweatpants were thick but not windproof. He stood and jogged in place. No one was around. He sang under his breath while jogging. Tidings of co-omfort and joy, comfort and joy, O-oh ti-idings of co-omfort and joy. Charles had a nice singing voice, everyone always said so, though he hardly used it. He stopped jogging, stood flat-footed, at attention. He sang two more verses and then thought, Okay. Arms hanging at his sides. I brought my tidings. He slumped a little and sighed out white breath.
Then the porch light went off. Charles froze, as if a light had gone on, shone on him like a searchlight. The garage door opened. Soon-mi came out. She was wearing a brown coat and a knit hat. Behind her, Chong-ho followed. He wore a tweed baker boy cap, like Rev. Haywood’s, gray parka, large owlish eyeglasses. Charles saw the two of them for only a moment before they got into the car. Soon-mi drove. Hannah was not with them.
Charles looked at his watch. Veda would be up by now, or any minute.
There was no question what he would do next.
The garage was open, but Charles went to the back patio, to the sliding door. He wanted Hannah to see him, fully, through the glass. He did not want her to wonder or be afraid of who was behind the knock.
At first he knocked softly. He knocked with his glove on, one knuckle. When no one came, he knocked again, glove off, two knuckles. He waited. There was a poinsettia on the table, a stockpot and a glass kettle on the stove; a large chef’s knife and cutting board on the counter. The lights on both the oven and range were lit red, and a light cloud of steam rose from beneath the lid of the pot, which was covered but not fully. Charles raised his hand to knock again, but then there she was. There she was. Hannah seemed to appear from nowhere. It was like she had been there all the time, watching him. But Charles knew that was impossible.
Hannah wore those same purple warm-up pants, and a faded long-sleeved T-shirt. Her hair was tied up in a knot, the ends sticking out and radiating like sun rays. The frayed sleeves of her shirt hung over her hands, and she looked at him, straight on, no eyeglasses. Hannah’s expression was inscrutable, but Charles decided she seemed sad. He felt that he was smiling at her but somehow wasn’t sure if he was.
They stood there, both of them unmoving, for what felt like a long time. Charles pointed to the door handle. He could see that it was unlocked, the latch was down, but he waited anyway. Hannah nodded, and Charles slid the door open, stepped inside. Frigid air blew in behind him, and Hannah wrapped her arms around herself.
There she was.
There they were.
Something was happening. Charles saw Hannah, felt her, anew. She was no longer in his employ. But it was more than that.
She’s very becoming, Alice had once said about one of her brother’s girlfriends. She’d meant it sarcastically; the girl was an airhead, and a debutante. But Charles understood the word’s meaning now. Becoming. Yes, Hannah was becoming.
The room had warmed again, it smelled of simmering meat and something else. A wonderful earthy smell; to Charles, a familiar smell.
Christmas morning, Charles thought. Comfort and joy. He did not think, My wife and daughter are at home, waiting.
Hannah spoke first. “They’ve gone to the airport,” she said. Her voice was low, it did not startle the silence, but gathered it in. “To pick up James.” Charles nodded. He knew that James was Hannah’s brother, even as he wondered if she’d ever told him.
The airport. An hour and a half, two hours they’d be gone, at least. There was time.
Time for what?
Neither of them moved, though Hannah relaxed her stance. She fidgeted with her sleeves.
“Are you all right?” Charles asked.
Hannah didn’t look up. “I thought you might come,” she said.
Charles smiled at the indifference she was affecting now. Like they were young sweethearts; like she was playing hard to get. Probably she didn’t mean to be that way, but that’s how it came off.
“Is that why you went to Veda’s school?” He played along, a light mock-scolding.
Hannah nodded, then straightened her back. It was a conscious movement, a self-correction. Her strong, narrow shoulders were now pushed back. She didn’t want to play. She wanted to be serious.
Okay, then, Charles thought. He was willing to follow her lead.
“I missed her,” Hannah said. “I missed …” Neither of them could fill in the blank.
But this wasn’t a moment for uncertainty.
Charles’s soldier’s training had taught him—to know when, in the face of doubt, to be cautious; and when to push forward. “What have they …” They. He meant her parents, but it was unseemly to invoke them. He started again. “What’s … happening?”
Hannah’s shoulders relaxed again. She knew what he was asking. There was relief in just hearing the question. She said, “Do you like barley tea?”
That was the familiar smell. There was the meat, boiling, but there was also the tea. Every hole-in-the-wall, every side street in Itaewon, had smelled of it during the daytime. At first, the smell was awful, like medicine. But then Charles grew to like it. The smell of an open field, harvest-ready, in high summer. “Sure,” he said.
They sat at the kitchen table with their hands cupped around their tea, like old friends recalling old times. Except they weren’t—either of those things. The poinsettia was large and garish, the pot wrapped in shiny green tin foil. Charles nudged it aside. Then he said, “You’re in some trouble.”
Hannah nodded. “At first they were going to go talk to you—to Mrs. Lee. They were going to … I don’t know … I guess in Korea when your family is shamed, when someone in the family disgraces, there is some kind of, like, a formal … a confession.”
Charles listened. Part of him wanted to stop listening. It was unnerving, the hard silence of the Koreans. He felt he knew well their anger. Maybe guilt and shame were the flipside, the fuel. He drank his tea and stared at the lip of the cup, where his mouth had been. The poinsettia was a red flame blazing in the corner of his eye.
Hannah told Charles that her parents had decided not to go to Alice. Hannah knew, she said, that it was partly because they did not want to meet him, Charles. She said this, and then said that her parents were not racists, that wasn’t it. It was “something else.” Charles laughed a short, sardonic laugh.
Hannah continued. “They just … they’re protective. They keep to themselves.” Hannah’s face was grave, her eyes flat. Charles didn’t laugh this time. Hannah believed what she was saying. She believed there was something else. Something hard to describe. Charles did not say, When you get older, you’ll see it’s all a lot simpler than you thought.
“They’re sending me away,” Hannah said.
It was strange, how she said it. As if she was breaking the news to him. As if it was Charles who would suffer, who needed to be gently informed. It was strange, because it was uncanny—how right she was. She knew this news would break Charles’s heart.
Good-bye, Mr. Lee.
Something gripped and yanked at Charles’s gut; something was sucking the air out through a narrow passage, a life-sustaining opening that was beginning to close.
Hannah went on. “There’s this man they know. His nephew goes to a boarding school. They know someone who helps people get their kids in. The money part, too. My swimming helped, I guess. What’s the word, when they put you out of sight, because of shame? It’s like in those scary fairy tales, like in old England.”
Charles didn’t know what word she meant, but he saw it like a cartoon now in his mind. He saw Suk-joon Rhee, CPA, in a wig and puffy pants; he saw a stockade. He saw, too, solitary confinement.
“Banish,” Hannah said, with relief and an incongruous smile. “That’s the word. They’re banishing me.”
Christ, Charles thought. That’s exactly what they’re doing. And she knew it better than they did. That in 1984, banishing was like something out of an outdated history book, or those Grimm Brothers books that Alice stowed in the basement.
That feeling was back, what Charles felt when he saw Dennis with Rev. Haywood in the park. The feeling of everyone near him being lost, of losing them—to something he couldn’t name, or clutch, or kill.
“To where? For how long?”
“It’s in Virginia somewhere.” She didn’t answer the second question. “They have summer school, too. The brochure looks nice.”