It was the night after Fang Tong’s wife had left to go to her mother’s home. The woman was mending Fang Tong’s underclothes that his wife had washed and laid out to dry. There was no telling when his wife would be back, but she would want the mending work to be done by the time of her return. The woman had to work the sewing machine day and night. She had only learned how to use the machine since coming to that house, so she was still unused to it. She was anxious should the needle break or she somehow harm the machine.
She heard the sad strains of Fang Tong’s reed flute coming from his room. Fang Tong usually played the flute or the zither at night. The zither sounded like a puppy scratching at the door and whining for its mother. But the flute was somewhat tolerable.
She sighed as the end of the needle energetically sprang up and down against the fabric.
‘Oh Bongshik, why aren’t you looking for your mother …’ she mumbled. She thought about her son all the time. Whenever someone visited the house, she listened in as much as she could in case they came bearing news of him. Her diligence was unrewarded as there was no news of him that day either. Fang Tong seemed grateful to them, but his wife made her dislike of them very clear. This made the woman resent and miss Bongshik more, and cry more times than she could count. The longer they stayed, the more she was sure that they would have to move on from this house. But she kept her anxious thoughts to herself as she could not think of a better situation. Should she get Fang Tong alone and ask him to get her a rented house? She thought of his fat face blowing the flute in his room. But how could she ask him for such a thing, and even if she did find a house, what about bowls and other household goods? How was she to run a house with nothing? She stared into the light of the candlelit lamp.
The sound of the flute stopped, and the house became silent. The only thing she could hear was Bongyeom’s breathing as she slept. Sometimes, as she gazed at a cloud of mayflies tenaciously holding on to life by the light of the lamp, she thought of her husband’s short life. He never once got to eat a good meal, all he had were chilli flakes that made him sweat profusely … Why was salt so expensive here? Although this house seemed to use it liberally enough. Of course, that was because they had money. Money? Money can help you do anything. Money could buy all the expensive salt she had so longed for. Why had they not managed to save any of theirs?
She heard the sound of heavy footsteps, and the door slid fully open with a crash. Fang Tong entered, wearing black trousers and a white tunic, smiling. She quickly stood up with her sewing in her hands.
‘Sit down! Have you been working?’ Fang Tong’s gaze moved from her face to her sewing.
The woman came and sat down by the lamp, wondering if she should ask him to find her a rented house or not. She clamped down on the words that threatened to leak from her lips as she tried to discern his mood, watching his face.
‘Whose clothes are these? Mine?’ Fang Tong fondled the clothes and said, ‘Mine, I see … Are you hungry? I have tea and sweets in my room.’
He pulled at the sewing. Any other time she would have followed him, but the fact of his wife’s absence made her hesitate.
‘I’m not hungry.’
She felt a strange shame that seemed to brush against the ends of her eyebrows. Fang Tong snatched her sewing away from her.
‘Let’s go. Come on, come on.’
Staring at her sewing, she felt trapped. Should she ask him about the rental now or not …?
‘Are you coming?’
Fang Tong had raised his voice. She jumped to her feet. But as she looked at the fold of flesh over the back of Fang Tong’s collar, she felt a sudden distaste, and her feet refused to follow him. Fang Tong turned around at the door. His face then had a fearful anger that she could not put into words. Defeated, she came down from the kang.
Looking back at the sleeping Bongyeom, her heart was so heavy that she wanted to weep loudly.
Leaving
It was sunset one late summer day. The woman looked up from her sewing, rubbed her eyes. The shadow of the roof awning fell long over her red door. Was Fang Tong coming tonight? Where had he gone all day? She wanted to ask Fang Tong’s wife this whenever she saw her, but his wife always seemed listless now. She dared not disturb her. But whenever it got to this time of day, she wondered whether he would visit her that night. Not that she was happy when he visited, but somehow, she missed him when he did not come. How nice it would be if he came… I must say something to him this time, but what? Her ears turned red. Did he even know how she felt about him? Of course not, men were like that; they were not interested in her feelings. She imagined Fang Tong’s face, and in her mind, she gazed at it with resentment.
Ever since that night, Fang Tong’s attitude, no matter how she considered it, had gone cold. At first, she thought it was because he was a stately older man and his finicky wife was by his side, but as the days passed, jealousy began to rear its ugly head. On the other hand, she felt an affection towards him that was careening down a path into the unknown. She sighed and wiped the sweat from her forehead. When would she be able to talk to Fang Tong comfortably and receive his love? The more she thought about him, the worse she found herself wanting him. The thought brought tears to her eyes. She envied his wife no end.
Her thoughts then fell to the fact she was with child. Her head dropped in silent despair. That night seemed to conjure itself up from the point of her needle. Did not Fang Tong jump on her like an angry tiger? And was she not so afraid that she had accidentally ripped the tarp over the windows of that dark room, and was that not why she was with child now? She had committed no sin. But why was it so difficult to talk to him? She could not even ask for the noodles in icy broth that she so wanted. Everything felt like it was her fault. Why could she not talk to him, why was she hesitating? She would talk to him this time for sure. She would! She was going to ask for a bowl of noodles, too. Her mouth watered at the thought. This was all just a fantasy, she thought as she gave out an empty laugh. It was almost funny that despite the mountains of difficulties that lay ahead, all she could think of were cold noodles. But she wanted them badly. Her throat itched at the thought of them, and she could barely sit still.
When she had first realized she was with child, she tried to do everything in her power to miscarry. She punched her belly, tripped over her own feet, and beat herself against a wall. When that did not work, she thought of drinking the caustic soda used for laundry, and almost did so several times, sitting up in her bed in the middle of the night. Even in those moments, she wanted cold noodles. She kept feeling as though people were hiding them from her nearby. In the end, it would just be too sad to die without having had the noodles she wanted so much. That and the thought of Bongyeom made her throw the bowl of water mixed with caustic soda away from her lips.
The rounder she got, the more she was unable to think of what to do. She wrapped her stomach as tightly as she could and ate only one or two meals a day. She tried to avoid others as much as possible and worked alone when she could.
Suddenly, she heard the sound of a carriage. Then she heard Fang Tong’s children run out of his room, all shouting, ‘Baba, baba!’ He was here! Her heart beat so quickly that the baby in her belly kicked her. She pressed down on the folds of her skirt that were skipping to the baby’s kicks. She heard footsteps, and quickly stood up, thinking it was him.
Bongyeom popped her head through the door. ‘Mother, Fang Tong is here. He wants to see you.’
Relieved yet disappointed at the same time that it was not Fang Tong himself, the woman suddenly felt a wave of shame hearing that he wanted to see her. She could not speak, and her hands and feet shook.
‘Mother, are you sick?’
Bongyeom had cut a neat fringe into her hair like a Chinese girl. She blinked at her mother through the fringe, staring.
The woman turned her head away. ‘I’m fine.’
Bon
gyeom seemed to think for a while. ‘Mother, I think Fang Tong is angry about something.’
‘About what?’
‘I wish I knew.’
Bongyeom thought of Fang Tong’s face a moment before as she stared at her fingernails that were in a bad state from tending the stove.
Fang Tong’s wife shouted, ‘What’s keeping you! Come this instant!’
They went into Fang Tong’s room together. The tone of Fang Tong’s wife’s voice was not a good sign. Fang Tong was surrounded by his children. He frowned at the Korean mother and daughter.
Fang Tong’s wife pouted her lips. ‘Hmph, so it seems that you’ve raised your son a communist. Ten deaths aren’t enough for such scum. We don’t associate ourselves with communists. They are our sworn enemies. You can’t live in our house anymore. Get out.’
Her eyes were like daggers. The woman and Bongyeom were completely taken aback. Their minds turned blank.
‘My husband and Zhang were in town today. They saw Bongshik being publicly executed.’
The woman and her daughter heard a ringing as if they had been struck with a steel bat. The woman slowly turned her head to Fang Tong. Fang Tong avoided her gaze and looked down at his children, but he seemed to agree with what his wife was saying. A shock ran through her body. It can’t be true, she screamed inwardly.
‘Get out! In Manchuria, communists are put to death!’ Fang Tong’s wife’s earrings jiggled as she pushed the woman and her daughter out of the house. The two still could not believe what they had heard, and the woman still wanted to hear it from Fang Tong himself, but Fang Tong only felt distaste when he looked at her. From the moment he had satisfied himself with her, he had felt a strange compulsion to kick her behind. He avoided her as much as he could. They needed help around the house because his wife was not good at housekeeping, but that would have meant providing board and wages, so the woman and her daughter had presented a temporary solution that he had delayed replacing until now. Simply put, there had not been a good excuse to kick them out.
Then he saw Bongshik’s public execution. The police would be after all the family members of a convicted communist, which would mean danger for him. The other thing was, the mere mention of communists made him shudder with absolute disgust.
As he watched his wife push mother and daughter out of the house, he thought of the scene of Bongshik’s death.
He had been in town with a friend when he heard there was to be a public execution of communists. By the time they got there, ten or so had already been killed, and only one was left. Regretting he had come so late, he pushed his way through the crowd for a better view. Just then, a man was being led before them by a policeman – it was Bongshik! He rubbed his eyes several times, not believing what he saw. He cursed Bongshik loudly enough for him to hear. Fang Tong despaired at the loss of his hope that Bongshik would repay his pitiful act of charity when he made some money and returned for his mother and sister.
The yellow-uniformed executioner poured water over the blue steel of his blade. The sword shone as the clear water dripped off it like pearls. Examining his blade, the executioner grinned. He turned to Bongshik. Bongshik’s face was white, but he stood tall and calm. There was a hint of a sneer on his lips. Fang Tong found it more than a little disturbing. He thought of the time his life had been threatened by communists, and he was suddenly sure beyond all doubt that Bongshik was one of them. Bongshik shouted as the blade swung towards him. His head fell to the ground and the crowd, feeling a chill as if they had been splashed with cold water, took a step back as his blood spurted out into the air.
The memory made Fang Tong shudder as he drew his children closer to him and wished the mother and daughter were gone.
The woman had thought Fang Tong would come to her defence, even as she was now over the threshold and out the door. But even as they stepped out with their bundles hugged to their chests, Fang Tong did not appear. Enraged, the woman turned around and glared at the back of Fang Tong’s head through the window. Just as she was about to shout at him, Fang Tong’s wife and a strange man turned her around and pushed her out of the main gate.
They wandered the streets before leaving the town and came upon the banks of the Hailan River. The river seemed to block their path. Where could they go? The question refocused their thoughts, scattered by anger. The sun was about to set over the mountains, and the willow grove by the nearby village resembled the one by their own old hamlet. The woman felt if she went back there, Bongshik and her husband would be waiting for them. But she only rubbed her eyes and collapsed to her knees where she stood. She stared at the river flowing noisily before her and thought of throwing herself down into it. The news of Bongshik’s death was sinking in; her heart was cracking in two. She did not want to believe it. Bongshik was a clever child. He would never join the communists, whom his father had hated so much when he was alive.
It was all a lie to drive them out of the house!
The woman whipped around and glared at the town behind them, gritting her teeth. ‘That bitch, saying my son is a communist. Huh, they’ll get struck by lightning someday … Who are you calling a communist? The day will come when you’ll die for your words. Who are they calling a communist!’
All those houses in that town, and not a single one they could go to. No doubt, they were each filled with terrible people like Fang Tong. The woman despaired. Despite her hatred, every time she saw a faraway figure approaching, her heart ached with the hope that it was Fang Tong coming to take them back.
When twilight descended, they were more dismayed than ever. Bongyeom sobbed and said, ‘Where are we going to sleep tonight, Mother?’
The woman wanted to run into Fang Tong’s house and stab everyone and then kill herself. She jumped to her feet. But when she looked down at the wide road they had walked down, she thought of Bongshik coming to find her, his plodding footsteps echoing on this very pavement … But what if he was dead like Fang Tong said? She had to fight down tears again. Should she go into town and ask around if it was true? If it was, she would kill everyone and then herself! Determined, she started on her way.
They spent that night in a shed owned by a Chinese family living on the banks of the Hailan. They were allowed a night there only after mother and daughter begged them and did some work preparing spinach and leeks for the family to sell in the market. The woman’s belly felt worse as the night wore on. She realized the baby was about to come and hoped Bongyeom would go to sleep soon. But Bongyeom was too busy cursing Fang Tong and his wife to go to sleep. She and her mother should never have worked so hard for them, she grumbled.
Finally, Bongyeom muttered, ‘I wonder what Yong-ae is doing. I wonder what’s going on in school.’ She fell asleep.
Her mother sighed once more and decided that if she had the baby while Bongyeom slept, she would kill it and throw the body into the Hailan. She pressed down on her belly.
Drops of rain fell at the sound of the wind.
Good, she thought. There would be fewer people about when she went out to throw the body away. She caressed her daughter and covered her up with more of their old clothes. She moved her to a part of the shed that was not leaking and lay down underneath a leak herself. The rain began coming down in torrents. Her pain intensified.
She bit down on her lip, trying hard not to make a sound and wake Bongyeom. But her cries threatened to leak through her nose, jumping up from inside her like flames. Rainwater fell on her hair and into her collar and lips.
‘Mother!’ Bongyeom sat up and touched her mother. ‘You’re drenched.’
The mother only realized it was still raining when she felt the touch of her daughter.
‘The roof is leaking, Mother, what are we to do?’
The woman could barely hear what her daughter was saying. She kicked and groaned, ‘Unh! Unh!’ She banged her head against the wall, but when even this would not allay th
e pain, she ripped at her hair.
Bongyeom could only shake her mother in wonder and collapse into tears.
The woman pushed her daughter away and pushed with all her might – and a long time later, they heard the cry of a baby. Bongyeom crept up to her mother and shouted, ‘A baby?’
The woman groped in the dark, finding the baby’s neck.
In that moment, the mother’s eyes lit up like a pair of blue flames.
The maternal instinct that ran through her like electricity! It stifled her, and her grip on the baby loosened.
Her sweat flowed like a waterfall, and she turned to her side.
‘Aigo!’ she cried. She sobbed aloud.
Wet Nurse
She had overcome the horror of childbirth and failed to kill her baby. Now she felt a profound hunger. How much lighter her body would feel if she could have a bowl of seaweed stew! Her husband had made seaweed stew himself with some white rice, ladling it into a bowl for her … She closed her eyes. She was drenched, and the wet floor stank of earth and blood.
What was she to do? She had to eat before she could work for her children’s food, but she had to have a bowl of boiled water at least to get herself on her feet. But unless she picked up a handful of earth, there was nothing to put in her mouth. Should she wake Bongyeom and get her to ask the household for a meal? She could not bear it in her shame, having birthed an illegitimate child. Then what? It was going to be light soon, she was going to have to beg them herself …
She opened her eyes and looked around the shed again. It was still dark. When would the sun rise? Did this house not have a rooster? She listened. All was completely silent, save for the sound of insects, chirping in the vegetable patch outside, like starlight against the black of night. She held her baby against her beating heart and felt determined to live whatever the cost. She was not going to die, she would live! She was going to live for the sake of her children. She kept muttering this over and over. Talk of death had constantly passed her lips before she experienced this childbirth, this pang, and she had often wished that she would die. Now that she had stood before the threshold of death, she found herself no longer wanting it. If anything, she felt a strange joy towards life. She had experienced difficulty many times before, but until her husband was taken from her, she had never truly realized what death was like. She was no longer so mindless about death.
The Underground Village Page 4