The Queen of Tears

by Chris Mckinney

Kenny’s face turned serious. Won Ju knew, despite everything, Kenny loved his son dearly. “What happened?”

  “Are you sure you want to know? I mean, you could sleep it off first.”

  “Won Ju, stop fucking around and tell me what happened.”

  “Evidently Crystal’s fucking our son.”

  Kenny’s face, for a split second, flickered with relief. Then Won Ju read anger. No jealousy. Then, his next split-second twitch shocked her. He smirked. Not enough for anyone else to notice, but as a woman who had been married to this man for over fourteen years, as a woman who could see more than anyone else she knew, she swore she saw a smirk. Why would he smirk? Was it insignificant to him? No, it was something else. It was pride. It was an overwhelming pride that his fifteen-year-old son was screwing a beautiful twenty-something stripper. That time he’d stepped on Crystal and woke up the entire house, he probably didn’t step on her at all. He’d probably caught Crystal and Brandon, so she screamed. But he lied. He was so proud of his son that he let the relationship continue. Won Ju walked to the kitchen and pulled a gallon bottle of Clorox out from under the sink. There was still about a third left. As she walked back to the living room, she heard Kenny ask, “You’re gonna do laundry now?”

  She stopped at the fish tank and twisted off the blue cap from the bottle. The smell jolted her, sending a burning sensation up her nostrils. It really woke her up. She tilted the mouth of the bottle over the edge of the tank. “I’m taking Brandon and leaving you,” she said, as she poured the contents of the bottle into the tank. First the oscars twitched, then floated to the surface. The clown loach lasted a bit longer, swimming rapidly, to and fro at the bottom, but soon it was floating too. She felt bad about killing the fish, but felt satisfied after the loach floated to the surface. Suddenly her favorite fish was the one she wanted to see die the most. She put the cap back on the bottle and placed it in the tank. Now all four objects were floating on the surface.

  Kenny was quiet throughout the entire process. And when she looked at him, she sensed a bit of fear, and it made her feel good. She imagined it was the first time in her life that anyone feared her. She didn’t see him as being petrified or anything like that, nor did he seem like he was afraid of bodily harm. Perhaps it was the cruelty of it; knowing for the first time that she could be cruel. She just found out herself and it scared her. Or maybe it wasn’t even the action, instead it was the words, “I’m taking Brandon and leaving you.” Her question may have been answered when he asked, standing very still, “Why? He was the one fucking her, not me.”

  The answer to her was perfectly clear. “He got it from you.”

  “What?”

  “He got it from you.”

  Kenny sighed. “Fine. Leave. Cool off. Go run to mama.”

  Won Ju walked to the bedroom and quickly packed a suitcase. When she carried it out, Kenny was sitting at the dining-room table drinking a bottle of water. She turned around to wake Brandon up. She sat at the edge of his bed and shook him. “C’mon,” she said, “we’re leaving.”

  With his eyes half-closed, he said, “What?”

  “We’re leaving. Get some clothes. We can come back and get the rest tomorrow.”

  “Where are we going?”

  Won Ju wasn’t sure. All she knew was the apartment got that crowded feeling again, only worse than before. She felt like she’d burst if she and her son didn’t get out of there soon. “Just grab some stuff.”

  He sat up and scratched his head. After sitting for a few seconds, he stood up, put on a shirt and pair of jeans, and grabbed his shoes. “That’s good enough,” Won Ju said.

  When they walked out of Brandon’s bedroom, Kenny was still sitting at the table. “Son, you know you can stay,” he said. “She’s being crazy right now. Look at the fish, for Christsakes.” He pointed at the four floating objects. “It makes no sense for you to leave tonight.”

  Brandon looked at the tank, then his father, then Won Ju. “No, Dad. I better go with Mom.”

  Brandon walked to the door and waited for his mother. She knew his guilt made it easier for her to get him to do what she wanted. As she walked by Kenny, she heard him mumble, “I’m not going to wait for you forever.”

  She paused in front of him. Then she walked quickly to the door. She wanted to get out of the room that seemed to be overcrowded with dead things to her.

  When she closed the door, she put down her suitcase. Brandon looked at her, obviously wondering about their destination. “We’ll go to Grandma’s,” she said.

  “I don’t want to go there.”

  “We’ll go to Uncle Donny’s.”

  “I definitely do not want to go there.”

  “O.K., wait downstairs. I’ll call Aunty Darian from Grandma’s and she can pick us up.”

  “Mom, when are you going to yell at me?”

  “Later. Hopefully tomorrow.”

  They both walked to the elevator. Won Ju pressed the button and sighed. When the doors opened and they both got in, Won Ju inhaled deeply. She momentarily held her breath while the box descended. After she exhaled, she felt relaxed. Standing in the elevator alone with her son felt right to her. Both the loneliness and overcrowdedness she’d experienced earlier in the evening dissipated. Her and her son, it was all that she needed. She wanted to hug Brandon, but knew he would have none of that. When was the last time she hugged or kissed her son? She couldn’t remember.

  -3-

  It took Darian an hour to get to town. The beat-up Nissan Sentra had sped from the far west coast of the island. She was shocked and made curious by Won Ju’s call. She knew that Won Ju and Kenny had a fight, but she wondered what it was about. It had to be bad. She could never have imagined Won Ju leaving her husband. The good little Asian wife. When Darian finally pulled into the condo parking lot, Brandon was sitting on the curb half-asleep while Won Ju stood frozen, looking out into space.

  They put the suitcase in the trunk. Brandon got in the back and lay down. He put his forearm over his eyes and went to sleep. Won Ju got in the passenger side and asked for a cigarette. Darian gave her one and said in Korean, “Sorry I took so long.”

  “I was going to say. Where did you drive from? Waianae?”

  “As a matter of fact, yes.”

  Won Ju rolled down the window and took hard, greedy drags from the cigarette. “What were you doing in Waianae?”

  “I live there.”

  Won Ju ashed her cigarette. Instead of floating into the wind, the ashes blew back up into the car. Won Ju brushed her shirt. “I thought you lived in town with some college people?”

  “I moved out about a month ago.”

  “Why?”

  Darian had been waiting to say it. She wasn’t anxious because of fear; instead she looked forward to the outraged, class-driven reactions she felt she rightfully deserved. She loved throwing pies at snobby faces. But then it was Won Ju sitting next to her. There would probably be no physical reaction. “Don’t tell Mom, but I’m living with Kaipo,” she said.

  Won Ju smiled. Darian was having a difficult time switching her eyes back and forth from the road to her sister. “Crystal’s brother Kaipo?”

  Darian focused on the car in front of her, trying to read the license-plate number just to test her eyes. “Yes,” she said. “God, he’s so McMurphy.” It had been his tattoo that did it. When she saw the tattoo on the left side of his chest while he’d been changing his shirt at the restaurant, she saw the two hands pressed together in prayer, the wrists bound together by handcuffs. After she saw the tattoo, that was it.

  Won Ju was quiet, but Darian knew she was harboring disapproving thoughts. It wasn’t that Won Ju was a snob, but she was probably upset that Darian was doing something that was sure to upset her mother. It often surprised Darian how different from, yet protective of Soong Won Ju was. Suddenly, Darian felt defensive. Who were they to approve or disapprove? “I guess I figured I’d follow in yours and Donny’s footsteps. It’s my turn to rock Mom’s boat.”


  Won Ju threw the cigarette out the window. “So you’re not going back to school?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “It seems like a waste of money if you don’t.”

  “It could be a waste of money if I continue.”

  “Good. You can work with me tomorrow.”

  “Is Crystal sick again?”

  “Yes, she’s definitely sick.”

  Little was said after this, but Darian expected the silence. She knew she was bound to Won Ju and Donny because they were family, but she knew they didn’t really approve of her. They were real Koreans. Darian was an American. Darian had heard the stories from her father. How Soong had to go back to Korea for a while right after she was born. How Won Ju took care of her for about a year and then split to Vegas with Donny. Won Ju and Donny never really got along with her father after this. She resented this along with the fact that Won Ju had abandoned her. It was weird. She felt no resentment towards her mother for going back to Korea when she’d been an infant, but she resented Won Ju for leaving her for Vegas. Of course, as an infant, she had no resentment, no consciousness really. It wasn’t until she got to know her older half-sister a little better, as a teenager, that she began resenting her for it. Thinking about it, she wondered to herself, why am I rescuing her now? What has she ever done for me? She knew why she resented Won Ju for it. Because Won Ju would never have left Donny, her real sibling. She thought about pulling the car over and dumping her sister and nephew off at the side of the road, but she believed it was an American thought, and bit her lip because of it. Besides, they were on the freeway.

  When they finally got to the house, Darian pulled the car onto the front lawn. Since the little town of Waianae had no sidewalks, it was common for the residents to do this. Darian had found this to be a charming detail when she’d first arrived. The lights in the little house went on. Kaipo opened the screen door and walked toward the car, wearing boxers and rubber slippers. His gut hung over the elastic waistband. His stomach was very different from the washboard that Kenny liked showing off. In fact, his entire body was completely different. Though flabby in some areas, the body seemed to have a natural strength, while much of Kenny’s apparent strength looked manufactured. Like he walked into a drug store and asked, “Could I get tennis balls for biceps, a couple of teflon frying pans for my chest, and a stack of strongly spined telephone books for my stomach?” His body was like those barbarians she’d see airbrushed on lowriders in Latino communities. Everyone got it so wrong. Barbarians didn’t watch their carb intake, their form on the bench press, nor were they conscious of tanlines. In fact they were barbarians because they could care less about such things. Darian liked Kaipo’s body better. It seemed more real to her, the kind of body you can hang on to. She supposed her sister never thought about how a body like Kenny’s had no elasticity. It was probably like trying to keep a grip on a polished and oiled wooden tiki.

  Darian waited for Won Ju and Brandon to enter the house before her. When they passed, she closed the door behind her. Won Ju asked where Brandon could sleep, and after Kaipo directed him to a room, Won Ju told her son to get to bed. He tried to ask how he was going to get to school the next day, but Won Ju put up her hand. Brandon went to bed without another word.

  Darian directed Won Ju to the kitchen and opened her a beer. Kaipo came in a few seconds later and offered Won Ju a seat at the small kitchen table. Won Ju sat in one of the rusting, metal-legged chairs and took a long drink from the Miller Lite can. Kaipo pulled two more beers out of the fridge and both he and Darian sat down. “So what happened?” Kaipo asked.

  “I think your sister is fucking my son.”

  Darian laughed. She couldn’t help it. She tried to picture her young nephew screwing Crystal, and the image just couldn’t appear. But then, trying to imagine her nephew naked, she saw the similarity in body structure of the father and son. Brandon was like Kenny, pre-canoe paddling and lifting weights. She looked at Kaipo, shook her head, and smiled. The praying hands in handcuffs had freckles on them. He wasn’t much of a tanner. But then, he didn’t seem to get sunburned either. He just turned more and more freckly with exposure to the sun, and the hairs on his forearms turned blond. The red hair on his head was Lucille Ball red. The sun never had an effect on it. He was the most amazing thing Darian had ever seen. A red-headed Hawaiian. Who would’ve thought? All of his features seemed Hawaiian except for his color. She loved looking at him. She turned to Won Ju. “Are you serious?” she asked.

  Won Ju took another drink from her beer. “Guess who caught them.”

  “You?” Darian asked.

  “Mom.”

  When she said it, Darian was taking a swig of beer. All of that beer in her mouth immediately came gushing out. Kaipo grabbed a dishtowel to wipe up the mess. Darian held her hand to her mouth for a second before saying, “I’m sorry.”

  Kaipo wiped up the beer. He was so nice to her. It was weird, watching this man, who was bigger than most bouncers she’d seen, and had prison tattoos to boot, clean up after her. In fact, he was meticulously neat. Each room in this tiny three-bedroom house with walls separated by a mere seven paces, with its thirty-year-old furniture, was neat. She was a slob compared to him, but he’d never got on her about it. In fact, she had her suspicions that the reason he did all of the cleaning was that he didn’t trust her with it. It was fine with her. Kaipo turned to Won Ju and asked, “Dey was, like, doing um right dere?”

  “From what I understand,” Won Ju said, “ your sister was, uh, performing in front of him.”

  “That’s fucked up,” Darian said, smiling. Her sister seemed so calm about it. But then again, she’d decided to leave her husband right then and there.

  “I’m sorry,” Kaipo said. “My sista, she was always funny kine. Eva since high school. She do whateva she like. Den she get in trouble. She no learn.”

  Darian smiled. She loved his pidgin, or technically creole. What was it? Yes, Hawaiian Creole English. It was so authentic because that was the way he’d always talked. It was his first and only language. Some locals she’d met over the years attempted to hide the creole. Not Kaipo. Darian spoke, “And what about you, ex-con? I guess it runs in the family.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “But I feel mo’ sorry fo’ her. Me, I no care. But her, she get all guilty all da time.”

  Won Ju shook her head. “I let her into my house. I gave her a place to stay. Both women and men can’t go around doing whatever they want. Sooner or later someone close will get hurt.”

  Kaipo shrugged. Darian didn’t like the tone her sister was using with Kaipo. It was filled with that condescending tone her mother sometimes used, and it was said with that accent that drove Darian mad. Since Darian had learned Korean as her first language from her mother, she fought hard to keep the accent absent from her English. She was always scared that it would creep up one day, which was why she was always aware of the sounds coming out of her mouth. How could her half-sister and half-brother not shake the accent? They’d been in the States longer than she’d been alive. “Listen, Won Ju. Kaipo’s not condoning her actions. He’s just trying to tell you why it happened. As for me, I’m curious about what this Crystal and Brandon thing has to do with you leaving your husband. It doesn’t seem to have anything to do with him.”

  “It has everything to do with him,” Won Ju said. “He’s proud of his son. I saw it on his face. I will not raise another Kenny. But Kenny wants to raise another Kenny. I feel like Kenny is just waiting for Brandon to reach eighteen, so that they can go whoring together.”

  Darian laughed. Kaipo grabbed Won Ju’s hand. “You get one place hea as long as you like. I no like talk stink about your husband or my sista, so I goin’ go bed now. But you need anyting, you let me know.”

  Kaipo finished his beer, threw away the empty can, and walked towards the bedroom. Won Ju smiled. “He is so...what’s the word?”

  “Hospitable.”

  “Yes.”

  Darian s
miled and reverted back to Korean. “It’s called the ‘aloha spirit.’ It’s the reason why the Hawaiians got their nation taken away from them so easily. They should’ve cut off the heads of Cook and his boys and put them on stakes on the beach.”

  “Too bad.”

  “Tragic.”

  “So,” Won Ju said, “how did this happen with you?”

  She smiled and lit a cigarette. He’d been so reserved. She practically had to attack him. She’d kissed him first at the restaurant. It was an awkward kiss. To reach his mouth, she had to climb him as if he were a tree. “I chased him. Mom would have been disgusted.”

  Won Ju laughed. “You have always been very pretty. Like Mom. It must have been a short chase.”

  Darian shook her head, remembering the puzzled look Kaipo gave her after she’d kissed him and climbed back down. She’d felt so humiliated. “Actually, it took a while. I went about it the wrong way at first. I’d tell him how I’ve been reading this and that about the Hawaiians, how they totally got screwed over by white people. You know what he’d say?”

  “What?”

  “He’d say, ‘I no need one book fo’ tell me dat’.”

  Won Ju laughed. “Well, I guess it’s turn white or live in poor towns without any sidewalks. So what about you? Are you through turning white?”

  Darian took a sip of beer before responding. Bitch. “No, are you?”

  “What do you mean? I never tried to turn white.”

  Darian was surprised Won Ju couldn’t see it. “You live in, or lived in a condo with a Hawaiian who might as well be white. You send your son to a preppy private school with a bunch of spoiled white kids. You’re trying to be white, only you’re not as good at it as me.”

  Won Ju shook her head. She asked Darian for a cigarette, then lit it. After taking a long drag, she said, “Brandon going to Punahou was Kenny’s demand. The condo is, or was, a nice place to live. You don’t get it, do you? I was never trying to be white, I was trying to be Mom.”

  Darian lit a cigarette of her own. “We’d all fail. Not only in our own eyes, but hers, too. Besides, I don’t think that’s what she wants.”