by Kyung-Ran Jo
He pushes my hand away coldly. “It hurts me, too, to think about us ending up like this.”
“It’s not hurt—you probably feel guilty.”
He’s silent.
“Isn’t that right?”
“I think in the future I should just visit with Paulie in the yard.”
I’m shocked.
If I bake a cake, I think I’ll make it in the shape not of my body, but hers, Se-yeon’s. Giggling, watching you shiver in disgust, I would pierce the chocolate eyes with a fork and eat them. You would ask, very seriously, How did it taste? How’s that? And since you’ll be curious about its taste, we can eat the entire cake, from the ankles. How’s that?
He’s not standing in front of me anymore. I rush out to the front door. He turns around, pausing as he slides his feet into his shoes. “Look in the mirror,” he says to me, his voice softening with pity for me for the first time.
“You, you’re about to leave the person you love the most, okay? So think about it just one more time.”
“I’m really sick and tired of that kind of talk.”
I’m stunned into silence again.
The door closes.
If I turn around, I’d be able to see him one more time, walking across the yard, kindly but sadly hugging Paulie, whispering, See you soon. I’d loved the shadow he casts, as sturdy as that of a grove of trees in the sun. I’m so worked up that all I can do is crumple onto the shoes stacked in the foyer. I’m not sure what this heavy thing is, pressing down on my shoulders—hunger, powerlessness, Paulie. Okay. Goodbye, just for now. Even if I have everything, you leaving like that—it’s like losing everything. Bye. Even when you’re with her, you will have to think about me from time to time. I’ll continue to piece together my sorrow here, like this.
CHAPTER 12
IF THERE HAS TO BE a reason for it, I think Mun-ju and I became close not only because we’re the same age, but also because I understood her appetite. Mun-ju said she was the eldest of five sisters. Pausing after revealing this, she asked me, Could you turn the lights off?
It was late at night, after her coworkers had left and I’d even told her about the pheasant I’d encountered when I was twenty years old, a story I’d never told anyone. I turned out the light in the kitchen, came back to the table, and extinguished the light hanging over the table, dangling from the ceiling above Munju’s head. Amid the honks and the intermittent flashes of headlights racing by on the eight-lane road outside the restaurant in the deep of the night, we were floating in a space of zero gravity where we couldn’t feel or taste or smell.
My father wanted to raise us very strictly, Mun-ju continued. Maybe it was because he felt unsettled that he didn’t have a son. He had rules about when we slept, woke up, studied, and didn’t allow us to wear skirts or blouses. My sisters and I had to grow up like little soldiers. But raising girls like that doesn’t turn them into boys, you know? Our relationship got worse after Mom died. My father set strict curfews and even forbade me from hanging out with friends. I think he was the worst with me because I’m the oldest. Once, after a group tutoring session, a boy walked me home, and my father caught us. For a whole month after that, he didn’t touch the food I made, like it was dirty. Food was the hardest thing for him to control. Once a week, he’d force me onto the scale and weigh me, saying a fat girl was of no use to anyone. You can’t understand how hard that was for me. I wasn’t stick skinny, but I wasn’t fat either. So I ended up stuffing myself when my father wasn’t looking. There was no other way to rebel. I used to keep a whole bag of brown sugar in my purse. When I was sad about something, I ran straight to the fridge. But the odd thing is that I gained weight every day, a lot of weight, but my father didn’t say anything about it. And I couldn’t stand that either, because it felt like he was ignoring me.
My father would appear in my dreams and say, I’m going to eat you up because that’s how much I love you. I got fatter and fatter. At one point I was so fat that I even dreamt that my girth blew the house to pieces. My life’s purpose boiled down to this—leave home as soon as possible, which I did when I was seventeen. I think bingeing and starving are really the same. They both have the same purpose—they give you a twisted sense of accomplishment, allowing you to say, I’m the best at bingeing or starving myself. But that really was all I had. I met you at a time in my life when I was thinking that. And your cooking taught me, for the first time, that food wasn’t just for stuffing your face, but was supposed to make you feel something. That first day, the roasted duck breast you made, topped with roots of baby spinach, really got me hungry, just by looking at it. That’s why I wanted to leave as soon as possible. But then you came after me in the parking lot, asking why I didn’t eat it, how could I write an article about it if I’d never even tried it. You really cracked me up. You were so serious! That day, I thought there must be something special about your food. It’d been a long time since I’d eaten something that made me feel as if a weight had been lifted off me. I feel like I spent all of my twenties struggling with something stupid, with eating, with food. I’m really pissed about it, I really am.
I pushed napkins toward Mun-ju, who was crying.
A sated person is different from a hungry one. A hungry one can’t be persuaded to do anything, but a full person can be given boundaries and convinced. So after that, I continued to cook for Mun-ju whenever she popped into the restaurant. I just made the portions a little smaller and helped her to eat slowly, and continued to tell her what she shouldn’t eat, what she should avoid, what she must eat. Like most intelligent and creative people, she knew what she wanted and how to focus her whole being on what she wanted. She wasn’t avoiding food, she was using food to get over her fear of eating. It was unspoken, but that was what we both wanted for her.
A person’s appetite is as precious as salt was in the seventeenth century. Trying to go around the salt officials who confiscated and regulated it, women would hide chunks of it in their cleavage and corsets, between their thighs and buttocks. When the officials squeezed those parts of their bodies, the women would burst out crying in pain. The more you try to take it away, the more people try to hide it. What I could do for Mun-ju was not to hurry, but to wait and watch over her patiently as if I were waiting for the last course of the meal to arrive at the table—this was something anyone could do for a friend. If Mun-ju thought this was special, it was special for me, too. I cooked, she ate. I cooked a little, she gradually ate less.
It took about two years for Mun-ju to transform her physique into a pleasantly plump one. Now, even if there’s food in front of her, Mun-ju doesn’t attack it quickly like a starving person, but has become a woman who knows how to eat a meal leisurely—but with gusto. When she goes on dates, she doesn’t go out again with the men who rush into their food as soon as the first course is placed in front of them, and she even makes me laugh, mimicking them. She was able to get rid of a lot, but Mun-ju hasn’t been able to rid herself of the fear that she might become fat again—not just yet.
I don’t shrink from the fear of gaining weight. For me, the pleasure I get from eating trumps that fear. The taste bud is like a diamond, getting shinier and sparklier the more you polish it. The person with a good appetite is one who wants to live; in the same way, the sense of taste is the first to go when a person loses the will to live. Some people feel alive when they play music, and others feel invigorated when they write or when they shop. These days I’m energized when I eat. I’m ready to eat anywhere, at any time. And there’s something in particular I want to eat—an all-consuming desire. When you can’t have something, the desire for it becomes more powerful and intense.
I’m staring at the biggest and deepest hole in his face. His tongue moves around, supple, like the tongue of a fish, like a bird’s tongue wrapped in soft cartilage, moving carefully, with concentration, like it does when it’s eating the tastiest thing—The. Person. I. Love. Now. Is. Se-yeon, the dark hole says. Like the bumpy, scaly tongue of a four
-legged animal, it’s stiff, rough, reddish black. I stare at his red tongue, I want to suck on it one last time. Like a truffle, a tongue renders a woman and a man in a gentler state and is easy to chew on, light and soft. I take a step toward it. You told me with that mouth that you loved me. I’m close enough to swallow it whole. Hold me just one last time, I beg. Don’t, he says, and pushes me away forcefully. I’m hot, like boiling oil. Like a starving person, I crave his tongue. My throat is already lengthening and opening wide, like that of an always-accommodating goose. He pushes my puckered lips away with his hand and backs up. I’m going to wait for you, I warn him gently. He licks his lips with his dry tongue, his tongue that looks parched as if all the juices have drained out of it, and says, That’s never going to happen. At one point it was a familiar and beautiful tongue, filled with admiration and praise for my body as it understood and explored me. I grab and swallow the whole thing down. His tongue resists in my mouth, like a flopping fresh fish. I grip my mouth closed to stop it from escaping. My teeth grab it swiftly and mash it. My muscular tongue wets it with flowing saliva, works it, flips it, moves it deep into my throat. My tongue bends back to push it in deeper, to shove it down completely. Nothing, not one piece, not one drop, escapes from my mouth. It slides perfectly into my stomach. All the nerves in my body vibrate faintly like the end of a needle, and finally I heave a breath out. My tongue, remembering the dish I’ve just tasted, licks my lips.
The food I eat in my imagination is more powerful and particular than what I consume in reality, just as a dream feels very real seconds after you awake from it, just as a person thinking about killing someone first tries it out in his dreams. You go over it again and again in the imaginary world because you’re deprived of whatever it is you want, because there’s something in you that misses it—an unfinished piece of art. Human beings sprint toward pleasure. Unfortunately they feel pain, a joining of sensations, more easily than pleasure.
CHAPTER 13
I’M LEFT BEHIND with the silent old dog, just the two of us. When a dog realizes his noises are no longer being understood as language he stops barking and whining. Language exists between people and also between a person and a dog. Paulie’s the one who taught me that, and his silence now signifies my own. If I thought I would return to Nove after we split up, I might not have taken Paulie. It’s not that I’m not fond of him, but I would have known I wouldn’t be able to take care of a dog. Paulie no longer approaches me happily or wags his tail or whimpers. But he hasn’t turned aggressive or mean like dogs left to fend for themselves. He seems confused about the changes in his life and needs time to accept them. As a dog grows old, the smallest change in his routine becomes the source of great confusion. I gently stroke Paulie’s neck as he lies on the floor like a pile of dirty brown rags. Nervousness and unease unite us now. It’s invisible but we feel the same thing. For the first time in a very long while, Paulie’s rough tongue licks my palm and his slightly averted black eyes study my face as if to say, I haven’t forgotten all of this yet. As if he understands whatever I have to say. But it will be almost impossible to get Paulie to comprehend that he’s gone. For Paulie this concept is more difficult than understanding when he’s allowed to jump up and when he isn’t.
It’ll be okay, Paulie.
Paulie lets out a moan, the sound being dragged up from the bottom of his stomach. I hug him and he glues himself to my body. If only someone were next to me, someone who can understand everything I say. I’m glad I’m not alone but somehow I get the feeling that I will be left by myself soon.
We fall into a comfortable rhythm. When I come home from work I take Paulie out for a walk no matter how tired I am. We usually head to the playing field at the neighborhood elementary school. I didn’t know that so many people exercised in the field that late, approaching midnight. Before, we walked Paulie in the afternoon and almost never went anywhere at night. The evenings dashed by as we cooked and ate and listened to music and played fetch with Paulie in the yard and drank tea. On one of those nights, I watched him play with Paulie in the yard as I cradled a cup of tea and realized that this evening enveloping me was the pinnacle of my life, a solid and brilliant crystal. Everything was in its place and I had everything I had ever wanted and we were still so young. One final sentence was left in the story: They lived happily ever after. His whistle still rings clearly in my ears and I still see Paulie energetically leaping after the ball. And all I have left from that evening is the old dog and the ball nestled in my palm.
Was our love real? I gaze at the ball in my hand. Paulie barks. I wind up and throw it and Paulie jumps up into the sky, showing off, and catches it in his mouth. Then, his head raised high with pride, he drops the ball at my feet. I throw it again, far. His brown hair flying, Paulie darts after it. When Paulie runs he is more beautiful and more alive than when he pads along slowly, reluctantly. Paulie doesn’t tire of chasing after the ball. I want to go home. I want to know if our love was real.
I mime throwing the ball. Paulie leaps up and wags his tail and rubs against my legs and sends me signals—Throw it, throw the ball already. I’m tired. Let’s go home, Paulie! Paulie focuses intently on my hand that holds the ball. He’s more excited now than he had been during the actual game of fetch. I raise the ball high above my head and start running backward. Paulie springs up into the air ever more powerfully, over and over again. Not being allowed to touch the ball works him into a frenzy. Is the game of fetch not about sharing the ball but about heightening pleasure by drawing out the anticipation? I may have just discovered something new. I slowly squeeze the ball, solid and responsive to the touch.
When I first started offering cooking classes, Mun-ju guaranteed she would take care of everything, especially attracting students. Since she worked in publishing from the moment she entered college, she was the one in our group with the heftiest address book. But it turned out there was a steady demand of women who wanted to learn how to cook. Not as a hobby, but to satisfy a growing interest in eating better. These days, being a good cook is just as admirable as speaking a foreign language or playing an instrument. And after a while the number of male students multiplied, probably because women are attracted to men who know how to cook. Although it was sweet to see couples signing up for classes together, I preferred living with someone who didn’t know how to make a thing. I need to be with someone who waits for my food, who eats my creations.
One day Mun-ju brought a new student to class, a woman wearing a minidress in a large floral print, her hair tied with a retro silk scarf and holding a brown tote, so tall she stood out wherever she went. Every part of her appeared to be made with care. Her name was Lee Se-yeon. Mun-ju introduced us, explaining that she had met the former model while working for the now-defunct Fashioniste. I remembered seeing her when I worked at Nove. She was a VIP and sometimes rented out the place for a gathering or to throw a party. At first she came once a week to the Bread and Cooking class, and after about a month she registered for Italian Cooking, appearing in my kitchen twice a week. She walked into our house looking like a well-dressed mannequin in a show window, legs as long as a flamingo’s. Though she had retired from modeling she remained attuned to trends and enjoyed standing out in a crowd. She was the kind of woman who couldn’t stand not to be noticed. She was slender, as if she was terrified of eating and only lapped up the juices seeping out of fruit. It was hard to believe that someone like her wanted to learn how to cook. Deceptively, she ate more than her physique suggested and enjoyed it. When I discovered that she made a beeline for the kitchen when entering her house like the rest of us, my trepidation melted away. She appeared even more luminous—raindrops thrown into the spotlight. If I were a man I would want to take her to an isolated island and have her to myself. And she would have to spend the rest of her life there.
While we waited for the food to finish cooking in the oven, we usually gathered to drink tea or make a snack. If he was upstairs in his office, he came into the kitchen to grab a b
ite. The more that time passes, the more I think of the first time she saw him: She raised her eyebrows and widened her eyes just for a moment, then she slightly turned her face away, pretending to look elsewhere. Then she glanced back at him gently and smiled, her eyes open wide. It was an audacious and gorgeous smile. That brief second lingered for a long time; the air stopped moving. Her smile was so frank and confident that I couldn’t help but let out a laugh. He looked at me while she looked at him and I at her. She passed by and I smelled marjoram. A hint of marjoram remained in my kitchen the next day. It was early last fall.
I feel relief when I touch something firm. I grip the ball. If nobody wants what you have you might feel it’s nothing much. So the only thing left to do is to bring the ball back, Paulie. You feel it too, right? Sorrow barreling in from the left and rage rushing in from the right. I wind up and toss the ball as hard as I can. Paulie leaps into the night sky. Even though he’s tame, he’s an animal with knifelike weapons adorning his mouth—like humans.
CHAPTER 14
YOU’RE IN CHARGE of the private party tonight.”
I’m shocked into silence.
Chef stares at me, his hands in his pockets. It’s his way of putting his trust in me, scrutinizing my creativity and skills. This is the first time since I restarted at Nove. There must be a VIP coming in today. My excitement billows, like the first time I held a knife in Grandmother’s kitchen.
“What are the mains?”
“You decide.”
I’m surprised.
“The person who reserved wanted you to put together a menu.”
This is rare. If customers are this familiar with the restaurant, they reserve through the desired cook.
“Who is it?”