by Lee Ki-ho
The male caretakers took out some bread and milk from their pockets and began to eat. Si-bong and I looked at them frequently.
“Let’s get a move on, you little shits. If you keep this up when is your apology ever gonna be done?”
Si-bong and I shoveled faster. However, we soon slowed down again. Si-bong even fell down once in his hole. I helped him stand up. We kept on shoveling.
The taller caretaker spoke with a mouthful of bread. “Still, doesn’t it seem a little faster than last time?”
The shorter caretaker spoke, drinking his milk. “Yeah, but that was winter, so the ground was real hard.”
“Was it? That was back in winter? I thought it was sometime around spring.”
“I think it was December, maybe. It was really cold then.”
I stopped shoveling for a moment, looked at the caretakers, and spoke. By this time the hole was almost waist-deep.
“To be exact, it was January 17th.”
Just then the male caretakers stopped what they were doing and looked at me. Then they looked at each other.
The shorter caretaker came up to the hole and asked me, “What did you say? Say that again.”
“I said that to be exact, it was January 17th. The day the man died was November 26th, and the day the woman died was January 17th.”
The shorter caretaker looked at the taller caretaker and let out a short laugh. Then he asked me again. “Heh, look at this fuck. How the hell do you remember the exact day?”
“Because I read the diaries. That’s what’s written there.”
The shorter caretaker’s expression changed. He stepped down into the hole we had been digging.
“Diaries? What diaries?”
“The superintendent’s diaries. Everything’s written down in there.”
The taller caretaker spat on the ground and said in a low voice, “Man . . . that old fogey.”
The shorter caretaker grabbed my throat. “Where are they? I said where?!”
Si-bong answered for me, “They’re at my house.”
“Your house?”
Si-bong and I nodded at once. The shorter caretaker bit his lip.
“Is there anyone else who lives with you there at your house? Is there anybody else?”
“Yeah, my little sister. Her name is Si-yeon. She’s my one-and-only sister and I live with her.”
“Did she read them? Did she read them?!”
Si-bong laughed slightly and said, “Hmm . . . That, I don’t really know.”
The caretakers did not laugh.
4. Leaving Si-bong
Late in the afternoon that day I got back into the van with the taller caretaker. My wrists were tied again multiple times with rope.
Again, the shorter caretaker grabbed my throat and said to me, “I’m gonna tell you this one more time: You fuck this up or decide to pull something funny, this guy’s as good as dead, got it? Even if you don’t get back here at the time we said, this guy’s gonna be deep in the ground. All you have to do is bring the diaries and his little sister, that’s all. Simple, right?”
All I did was nod in response.
The shorter caretaker then talked to the taller one, who was sitting in the driver’s seat.
“If anything seems fishy, just take off, okay? You’re more important to me.”
The taller caretaker as well, rather than speaking, simply nodded his head in response. The shorter caretaker took some money from his wallet and handed it to the taller one. He told the taller one to buy a few bottles of beer when he came back.
I sat in the passenger seat looking at Si-bong. He was standing next to the shorter caretaker. Of course, Si-bong’s throat and both hands were tied with rope. The shorter caretaker was holding the end of the rope.
Before getting into the van, I asked Si-bong, “Really? Are you sure I should go?”
Si-bong smiled slightly and said, “Yeah. You know how much I hate riding in cars.”
Si-bong’s forehead was blue with bruises. One of his eyes was so swollen that he couldn’t open it properly. His lips were white and seemed dried shut. I sat there for a moment without saying a word, just looking at Si-bong. And that was on account of not being able to think of anything else to say. I just looked into Si-bong’s eyes and gave a quick smile. Si-bong followed suit and smiled with one eye. That was all.
After the van set off, all I did was sit there, staring out the windshield. When the van took to the service road, the taller caretaker asked me.
“Hey, so is his little sister cute?”
I looked for a moment at the taller caretaker’s profile. I answered curtly. “Yes.”
“How tall is she? Is she tall?”
“Yes.”
“Hehe, is that so? Sounds good. Let’s get there quick!”
The van went faster. I looked at the sound barriers on either side of the road that looked like giant saws sticking up. It was the road that Si-bong and I had walked together a long time ago. I could see the bus stop where we stopped to rest, and the crossing that led off to the train station caught my eye as well. As I turned my head to look back, I looked at those things closely. Some of the people walking along the road waved their hands at us. The taller caretaker did not look at them.
Somewhere around dinnertime the van arrived at the main entrance of the apartment complex where Si-bong’s house was. The taller caretaker drove slowly as he took a good look at the surroundings. I could see the older woman from the convenience store sweeping near the umbrella, and one after the other the butcher shop and the fruit stand, both with their lights off, caught my eye. There was almost no one in sight; an old woman standing under the stop sign for the neighborhood bus was the only one. Quietly, the van stopped at the entrance of the apartment building.
The taller caretaker spoke to me as he untied the rope around my wrists. “Listen good. I’m giving you exactly ten minutes, ten. In that time you’re bringing the superintendent’s diaries and Si-bong’s little sister here, all right?”
I looked into the taller caretaker’s eyes and asked him, “What if Si-yeon’s not home?”
“What if she’s not home? Uhh . . . then just bring the diaries. And don’t call anyone or anything, got it?”
I nodded my head.
The taller caretaker opened the passenger door and said one more time as he hit me on the back of the head as I got out, “Ten minutes. If you’re not back in that time, that’s it.”
I didn’t say anything, and closed the door.
I ran up the stairs of the apartment building. I had the keys that Si-bong had given me. I had them in my right hand and ran straight up to the eighth floor without stopping. I hit my thigh on the bicycle that was standing next to the elevator but didn’t stop. I didn’t even ring the bell and just opened the door with the key and went inside.
And then . . . locked the door right behind me. I even locked the deadbolt. I turned the doorknob a few times to make sure it was locked. The door made a loud steel sound, but didn’t open. I put my ear up to the door. I couldn’t hear anything outside.
After I turned on the light in the living room, I turned on the faucet at the kitchen sink. I stood there drinking tap water for a long time. After that, I took out cold rice that was in the refrigerator and started to eat it. The rice was as hard as stone, and difficult to scoop out. I loosened it with tap water. I stood there at the sink, eating. Grains of rice kept getting stuck in my throat. Still, I shoved down every single one.
As I stood there eating, I stared at the clock above the refrigerator. The time was passing slowly. I ate slowly. The ten minutes that the taller caretaker had mentioned had already passed. Still, I continued to eat. As I stood there eating, I thought about what Si-bong had said to me a long time ago. We’d exchanged these words:
“Hey, you know, just in case there’s ever something that you want to apologize to me for . . .”
“Then what?”
“Just apologize to yourself.”
�
��To me? An apology for you?”
“Yeah.”
“How’s that?”
“Well, ’cause you can accept it for me.”
So I think it was from somewhere around then. From the moment I heard those words, I wanted to commit some kind of wrong against Si-bong. I don’t quite know why, but it just seemed as though I had to commit some wrong against him. So I decided to do it.
Even after I finished eating all the rice I remained standing at the sink. There was no one beating at the door. Inside the house it was only dark and quiet. I put the bowl down on the counter and looked at the bedroom door. Now there would be no one else to come here.
I walked slowly toward the bedroom door.
5. The Lie
Si-yeon was lying quietly in bed with both eyes closed. The pillows had fallen under the bed, and there was a cup tipped over on the floor.
I stepped toward the bed. As I took a closer look, on her bedside table was a scattering of the pills that we had brought from the institution. It looked as though Si-yeon had perhaps taken some of the pills when we were gone. I put the pills back into their plastic bag and waited for her to wake up. As I waited, I also took two of the pills myself without any water. The pills got caught it my throat and wouldn’t go down easily. I patted my chest with my fist a few times. The spot where the caretakers had beaten me stung. I stopped hitting my chest.
After sitting next to the bed for a while I carefully put my ear up to Si-yeon’s chest. I could faintly hear the sound of her heart beating frantically, then, even softer, the faint sound of Si-yeon moaning. There was a sweet smell, the smell of sweat, and also a slightly sour smell coming from her. I looked down at Si-yeon’s face for a moment. Then I lifted Si-yeon onto my back and left the house with her. Right then, I ran to the emergency room of the hospital.
As soon as I lay Si-yeon down on the bed in the emergency room, a young doctor came up to me and asked, “Are you this woman’s legal guardian?”
I told him I wasn’t.
“In that case, have you contacted the patient’s family?”
I thought for a moment about Si-bong and answered, “No, there’s no one.”
“No one? Well then may I ask what your relationship to the patient is?”
“I’m a friend of her older brother.”
The young doctor looked me over carefully up and down. “Well then, I guess you’re her guardian.”
I looked at the young doctor and smiled. The young doctor took Si-yeon’s blood pressure. He put a stethoscope up to her chest as well.
“How long has she been like this?”
“She was like this when I got home.”
“Hm . . . Was there anything that seemed strange?”
“Well, I think she kind of took a lot of medicine, and I think she didn’t eat anything.”
“Medicine? What kind?”
The young doctor’s eyes grew wider as he asked me. Still, I didn’t know what kind of medicine it was. I looked at Si-yeon as she lay there, and answered.
“It’s medicine that makes you strong when you take it.”
“How could you possibly say that now?”
After scolding me, the young doctor called over a nurse. Si-yeon was moved to a curtained-off bed with an oxygen tank connected to it. The nurse told me to go to the waiting room for guardians. I kindly did as she asked. That word, “guardian,” stayed with me.
Si-yeon woke up sometime the following morning. She had been moved to a six-person room, and I was sitting in a chair for guardians nodding in and out of sleep. As soon as Si-yeon woke up, she asked me.
“Where’s Si-bong?”
I didn’t know what to say. After a moment I answered, “Hmm . . . I’m not really sure. He went to go meet someone and hasn’t come back yet.”
Si-yeon closed her eyes. She tried to sit up, but all she could do was lie back down again. “Who’d he go meet?”
“Yeah, the caretakers who helped us when we were at the institution.” It seemed as though it was difficult for her to speak. Still, she continued asking questions.
“Why would he want to meet them?”
“Hmm . . . Seems like there was something he needed to help them with.”
“What about you? Why didn’t you go with him?”
I took in a deep breath. Then I spoke. “Because it was something that could be taken care of with one person. And the other person’s job was to just wait.”
Si-yeon did not ask any more questions. She fell back into a deep sleep.
6. No One
I continued to sit by Si-yeon and watch over her. She had an IV in, and slept for a very, very long time. When she was awake, she usually just lay there looking at the wall. She didn’t speak to me. I did not speak to her, either. Si-yeon didn’t really eat the food that came out, either. I would stand in the hallway and eat the food that she left. The nurses who passed by scowled at me.
Besides Si-yeon, there were four other patients in the room lying in their own beds. Some of them asked me, “So what about this young lady here, what happened to her?”
Each time this happened I would answer them politely.
“Ah, she took too much medicine.”
When I said that, they asked no more questions. I didn’t speak to them any further either.
A day after she had been admitted, Si-yeon wanted me to do something for her.
“Go home and bring me my handbag.”
“What do you need your handbag for?”
It still seemed as though Si-yeon was having a hard time speaking. Si-yeon covered her eyes with her right hand and spoke.
“I have to see if there’s somewhere I can get money. Thanks to you, I didn’t die, I’m still here, so I have to start thinking about that stuff again.”
I nodded my head. I ran home right away.
I grabbed Si-yeon’s handbag and set off again for the hospital, but on the way I got on the bus that went toward the institution, rather than the hospital. Inside Si-yeon’s bag there were a few bills. It was enough money to get to the institution and back. I didn’t know why it was that I was headed to the institution. Although I didn’t understand why, it seemed as though I had to go. It had been three days since I had seen Si-bong. I had committed a wrong against him, but I missed him very much. That was all.
I got off the bus, went down the service road, then the unpaved road, and arrived in front of the main gate of the institution. As before, it was locked with a chain wrapped around it multiple times. The “No Entry” sign was still there as well. Through the space in the main gate I took a good look at the area around the main building. I couldn’t see the van. There were no signs of people, either. Through the broken window of the office all I could see was the curtain swaying in the wind. I leaned the sign against the wall and used it to climb over. Now I was alone, so it wasn’t difficult to get over.
The first thing I did was go to the laundry room on the first floor of the main building. There was no one there. All that was there were the remains of two candles that had melted and hardened on the floor. I kicked lightly at the hardened wax with my foot several times. It flaked up like old tree bark. I stood there, kicking at the wax for a long time. Worried that someone might be around, I was a little afraid, too. However, even if I stood still, I couldn’t hear anyone’s voice. That calmed me down.
I walked out of the main building and began going up the mountain behind the institution. The earth of the mountain was damp as it was before, and the smell of pine needles was the same as well. But I couldn’t hear the sounds of the cicadas. I crunched lightly over fallen leaves and plastic bags half-covered with mud. I looked down carefully at each thing on the ground as I walked slowly. Sweat was dripping down my temples but I didn’t wipe it away. A few times the wind tossed my hair as it passed. I left my hair as it was as well. All I did was walk, continuing to watch what was below my feet.
When I reached the barbed wire fence I saw two shovels lying at the base of the trunk of the
fir tree. They were the same shovels that Si-bong and I had used to dig. I looked at the area around the shovels. I couldn’t see the holes that we had dug into the ground all the way to our waists. I continued to pace around the trunk of the fir. The ground was firm, and there were no signs of Si-bong anywhere. I looked down at my feet for a long time, and then slowly picked up one of the shovels. I dug up one shovelful of earth. Then I put the shovel back down. Without realizing, my legs were trembling. Suddenly I became somewhat afraid. I didn’t know what it was I was afraid of, but tears began to pour down and I grabbed my legs, then my trembling wrists. I began to bawl loudly. My legs and wrists kept trembling. I turned around and ran back down the mountain. Even still, the tears did not easily stop.
I passed the main building and was running toward the main gate when I heard a stranger’s voice.
“I saw it! I saw everything!”
I kept running but turned my head to look back. It was the plump, older woman whom we had seen once in the storehouse behind the superintendent’s residence. Still, I didn’t stop my feet.
“I said I saw what happened to him! I saw everything because I was hiding, you little bastard!”
The woman, half-hiding behind the corner of the storehouse, continued to yell in my direction. “Don’t you wanna know, you little bastard?! You’re not even interested in what happened to your friend?!”
I didn’t look back. I ran even faster toward the main gate. My legs were still shaking but I didn’t stop. I leaped over the fence again and left the grounds of the institution. Even after I’d left, I ran and ran until I was gasping for breath. That was all that I could do.
7. The Apology I Didn’t Know
The day after I went to the institution, I went to the detention center again to meet with the superintendent. Before I went, I stopped by the private middle school in front of city hall. That was on account of there being something I wanted to check before going.