The Underground Village

by Kang Kyeong-ae

  Sitting on a swivel chair, the doctor glanced up from his medical journal but quickly pretended the man was not there. Irritation knitted his brow as he pretended to read. The whispering nurses stopped chattering and stood silent.

  The oldest nurse among them almost shouted out, ‘Oppa!’ but upon closer inspection, he was not her older brother. Young-sil forced herself to lower her gaze. The floor was dark. Her ears rang, and her heart beat fast. She was sure he had been her brother, but in the blink of an eye, he had turned into another charity case, the kind she hated dealing with. Was she going mad? What a disaster it would have been if she had not stopped herself from calling out! She looked up at him again. Did her brother truly sacrifice himself to save people like him? A flame of deep frustration burned in her as she picked up some clean cotton and alcohol and approached the man to tend to his bandages. How could her brother care so much about people like this? The dizziness in her head made her hands tremble. A putrid smell coiled up from the man’s unravelling bandages.

  Had her brother really been executed? Or was that a lie? Her mind kept busily asking these questions as she pressed down on the man’s leg to make the pus leak out before cleaning the wound. Red blood mixed with the pus as it flowed. She pressed her fingers harder, and could feel the bone beneath. Spots of blood and pus came off on her fingertips. She thought of her brother’s face. She thought of how her brother had sacrificed his life while she complained about dealing with patients. Darkness descended over her eyes and an inexplicable feeling welled up into tears.

  The pus stopped and only blood flowed. She scrubbed the wound with alcohol and gauze using a pair of pincers, covered the wound with more gauze, and bandaged it. The patient wiped the sweat from his forehead and leaned on his cane as he stood up. The stink of his old sweat jumped at her from his dishevelled hair as he turned and left the room. The unkempt hair that came down to his tunic, his trousers crusty with dried pus and blood – clearly a man with no parents or wife. The nurse washed her hands by the basin near the radiator. I only have a mother, too, she thought as the cresol solution splashed her hands. Tiny beads of sweat studded the skin behind her ears.

  She surreptitiously glanced at the doctor. He frowned as he continued to read his medical journal. Bad mood today. She could not tell if it was because a repulsive patient had come by or because there was a difficult sentence on the page. She could not help but snort at an old, unwelcome memory.

  Ten years ago, when the doctor was first appointed to the hospital, he was full of enthusiasm for his work. He would charge poor patients only half, and sometimes if they begged him enough, he charged them nothing at all. He constantly fought with the head of the hospital over this and had been rumoured to be leaving soon.

  Time passed. Perhaps his passion passed as well, as he had turned into the doctor before her today. He was hardly the only thing that had changed; since her brother left, Nurse Young-sil’s body and mind had also altered considerably.

  ‘Listen, sister. We are have-nots, and we have to look out for other have-nots. And more than that, we have to keep fighting to get out of this living hell.’

  She had begged her brother that night not to go, feeling that something terrible would happen. Indeed, since that day he had never returned.

  ‘Oppa, it’s not right what you did, if you could only see Mother now. The whole world thinks the worst of us and wants us dead …’

  Her gaze moved towards the curtains. They were infused with orange light, and through her tears they looked dim and yet beautiful at the same time.

  The noon bell rang. A siren followed. It sounded through the halls of the hospital. She thought it was saying, ‘Waaaaaaa – your brother has been executed!’

  The siren made the floor ring before ascending into the sky and fading out.

  The doctor closed the medical journal, took out a clean white handkerchief, wiped his face, and left the room. The sound of his leather slippers dragging on the floor made Young-sil realize she had had her ears open for the sound of his footsteps. But the doctor had long forgotten about her and was engaged to another woman. Why could she not forget him, too? Now that he was gone, she let out the sigh she had been keeping to herself all day.

  Lovers change. The older brother you waited for day and night is gone forever. She had yearned to tell her brother the secret she had hidden from even her mother, but now that hope was taken from her. She could feel her eyes getting bloodshot, so she blinked and sat down on the edge of a bed. The smell of cresol crept up from her hands.

  ‘Oh Unni, are you thinking of your brother again? Don’t do that. You’ve got to accept it, there’s nothing you can do.’

  It was Nurse Hyosook, looking at her with sympathy. Her cheeks had a healthy plumpness and the white teeth showing between her thin lips were as round as marbles. ‘Come on, let’s finish the cleaning.’

  Nurse Nakagawa also gave her a gentle look over Hyosook’s shoulder. ‘Don’t be too sad, Lee-san.’

  Young-sil managed a nod. She took a deep breath. Her co-workers at least had some words of kindness for her, but the doctor was going out of his way to ignore her. This angered her and made her refuse to show any of her sadness or vulnerability before him.

  Hyosook discreetly looked away from the trembling of Young-sil’s eyes and grabbed a bucket to gather hot water. Her dainty nurse’s cap sat slightly askew on her head and her hair came down in a neat ponytail from underneath it. Nakagawa collected syringes, pincers, and other equipment to put in the sanitizing vat. She twisted a knob and the water began to boil and give off steam. She tossed in the equipment. Beads of sweat appeared under her nose.

  Young-sil dragged herself to the doctor’s desk. Her hands automatically reached out to rearrange the objects on top of it. The yellow cover of the journal gave off a scent of tobacco. It was like the doctor’s breath grazing her cheek. She frowned and turned her gaze to Hyosook to distract herself, but she was reminded of the doctor’s lab coat in the white of the nurse’s uniform. She turned her eyes to the ceiling, but even there it seemed to be written, Your brother was executed.

  Hyosook chattered away as she mopped the floor and wiped the desk, chairs, and cabinets. Her bird-like movements gave the young woman a buoyancy that Nakagawa lacked. Nakagawa stood by the vat, steam landing on her dry hair while she took out the medical tools one by one and wiped them down, and interjected an occasional, ‘Oh, yes’ or ‘You don’t say?’ Neither of them looked as if they had a care in the world.

  Once the clean-up was over, the two gave a quick bow to Young-sil and skipped out the door. The lunch bell rang soon after. Young-sil had not eaten since the evening before, but she did not feel hungry. She had begun to skip a meal or two on occasion since the doctor announced his engagement three weeks ago. She had lost her appetite the moment she heard the news.

  She closed the door to the corridor and put her hands in her pockets. Her fingertips brushed the newspaper cutting she had folded in there. She trembled, and gooseflesh travelled up her body. She touched her cheek. If only she had misread it. Who knows? Maybe she had. Her hand entered her pocket again. She began to sweat, and her arm shook. She gripped the newspaper. She slowly drew it from her pocket. Looking at it felt like knives slicing her eyes. The photograph of her brother standing among the other condemned prisoners. It could just be someone who looked like him; she would need to check the name again. Before her eyes could reach it, she threw the newspaper aside. She felt bound with steel wire, she would never be able to escape …

  ‘Oppa! What am I to tell Mother? I’ve managed to lie to her so far, but what am I going to tell her now …?’

  It was the doctor who had handed her that newspaper! The unbelievable news! She had fainted on the spot. She should have died right then and there. If she had, she would not have to endure this pain. She found herself biting the back of her own hand. Blood bloomed.

  ‘Oppa, you’re
a bad person. You let yourself die young, before Mother. How could you? How could you! What am I going to tell Mother?’

  She paced the room. If it were not for her mother, she would have swallowed some pills and followed her brother into oblivion. But her mother was seventy and needed her care. Her mother, who still waited day and night for her son’s return.

  My dear Young-sil, you must’ve seen in the newspaper that we have been executed. But we are not dead. One day, I’ll see you and Mother again, so wait for me. Please hide Mother for now. My dear sister …

  She received this letter after her brother’s sentencing. She wanted to believe in his words and in his goodness. But what good were his words and beliefs if he ended up dead? She snatched up the newspaper, tore it to shreds, and threw the remains out the window.

  The garden outside hurt her eyes with its vibrant colours. The slats of the surrounding fence stood side-by-side in an orderly manner, curving with the shape of the grounds. Spring had come after all.

  The news had to be a lie. A letter was sure to come from her brother today. She looked at the clock.

  The door opened. Thinking it was an orderly delivering a letter, she held back a cry and turned her head. The doctor, startled by her presence, paused for a moment before wordlessly going to his desk. He held nothing in his hands, much less a letter. He lit a cigarette.

  Her mouth twisted from the effort to hold back her tears. She averted her eyes and bit her tongue to keep him from seeing the poison in her heart. She tasted salt and felt the beginning of a headache. The doctor had gone to the sink and was wiping his hands with alcohol-treated cotton.

  ‘Did you have lunch?’

  Young-sil’s eyes opened wide at the doctor’s question.

  ‘No answer?’ The doctor smirked. He was mocking her! She glared at him to prevent her tears from spilling out.

  She was repulsed by the stray, wafting strands of his pomaded hair, and his eyes exuded distasteful arrogance as he avoided her gaze and concentrated on scrubbing his hands. Where had the conscientious doctor of the past disappeared to? There was not a trace of him in the coward that stood before her. She could not believe she had given him her precious virginity and, more importantly, her soul; her innocent soul that had once been the exclusive purview of her good brother. It was her own foolishness she was disgusted with. She wanted to run up to that man and stab him to death.

  Perhaps detecting her feelings, the doctor shuffled out of the room. She stared daggers after him until he was out of view and went up to the reception room herself.

  The windows opened wide on to a sky that looked down on a world without her brother, and two lilies in a vase on the table had their heads tilted towards that sky. She sat down and stared at the sky herself until she heard footsteps coming up the stairs. Suspecting it was the doctor, she whipped around in her seat. But it was only Mr Kim, an orderly. She turned away, unwilling to show anyone her eyes swollen from crying.

  Mr Kim silently walked up to her.

  A sudden hope welled in her heart. ‘Is there a letter?’

  He scratched his white hair with his knobby knuckles and looked away. ‘No letters.’

  ‘There simply has to be a letter today!’

  She stared at him, and Mr Kim hesitantly returned her gaze. His eyes, usually full of smiles, were only sad today. He must know about her, too. This time, Young-sil did not bother wiping away her welling tears. She stared at him harder, as if to defy him, and the scraggly white beard of the orderly blurred in her vision.

  ‘There, there. You must be brave,’ consoled Mr Kim, bowing over her.

  She wanted to call out, ‘Mr Kim!’ But her throat had closed.

  She and Mr Kim were the people who had worked at the hospital the longest, and they were also its poorest employees. They understood each other, and of course he would know about her affair with the doctor and her brother’s execution as well. He understood her better than anyone else.

  *

  It was nine at night.

  Hyosook and Nakagawa had gone to the baths and only Young-sil remained at her post. She checked patients’ temperatures and pulses, writing them down with blue and red pencils. Her hands kept nervously fumbling over the charts. She was worried her mother would have heard the news by now and was perhaps running towards her this very minute or had fainted in the streets. She tossed aside the charts, and the pencils fell to the floor. If she asked the doctor on the night shift to let her go home, he would only force her to tell him the whole story. He would not be understanding, anyway. Why were those girls taking so long with their baths? The rowdiness of the pool table downstairs carried up to the ward. She felt like she was in a different world from all of them.

  Burying her face in her hands, she sighed as she thought again about her brother’s execution. It simply had to be a lie, he had to still be in prison. If no letter came tomorrow, she was going to ask for leave and go to Seoul. She had to get to the bottom of it herself; the newspaper was printing falsehoods! She felt she was spinning round and round where she stood.

  But if it was real? She went to the window and opened it. Unconsciously, she asked out loud, ‘Can it be true?’

  There was no one outside. Her head was ringing, and cold air whipped her hair and snaked down her body. The scattered lights outside blurred with her tears. She could see the hospital chief’s house, the nurses’ quarters, and the house of her former lover, the doctor who was second-highest ranking at the hospital. The light at the door of that last house was especially bright against the night. His fiancée must be visiting. She shook off her useless feelings of jealousy and turned her back to the window.

  Young-sil, I can’t live a moment without you. Your beautiful, white hands clean the dirty wounds before I examine the patients, which allows me to see how I can cure them. Your hands! Your pretty hands are forever mine.

  Such were the lines in a letter he had sent her.

  ‘The devil!’ she muttered, and slammed the window shut. The myriad machines of the city seemed to whisper, The doctor’s hands! Young-sil’s hands!

  She bowed her head. Together their hands could accomplish any complex surgery. The pale, nimble hands of the doctor! They seemed to know exactly what was needed, what apparatus and what medicine, to accomplish miracles. Young-sil brought her own hand to her lips. She wanted to bite down on it.

  Was she crazy? She thought she had just heard her mother cry out for her brother! ‘Young-sik! Oh, Young-sik!’

  ‘Unni, do go take a bath,’ Hyosook said as she came up the stairs with Nakagawa. Their faces were flushed red from their ablutions, their hands giving off the scent of lotion.

  ‘Actually, I have to go home for a moment. If there’s an emergency, try to take care of it yourselves and don’t tell the doctor I’m gone. I’ve already prepared everything you might need here, all right?’ Young-sil gestured towards the surgical tray. She quickly changed out of her uniform and bounded down the steps, passed a long corridor, and left the hospital.

  It was pitch black outside. The sky was spread with stars and there was only an occasional streetlamp throwing light down to the ground. She felt as if her feet were sinking into the pavement, and her legs threatened to give way beneath her. She kept hearing the sound of her mother’s footsteps, and the street was unfamiliar despite her having walked it countless times. She kept looking behind her. Her breath turned into puffs of white steam and swept back the way she came.

  The front gate of her home was locked. Through the gap between the doors she could see a faint light. Her mother was inside …

  She turned around and took a deep breath. So, her mother did not know what had happened. But if she found out the following day, what would Young-sil say to her?

  Please hide Mother for now.

  She sank down before the gate. At least when her brother was alive he had told her what to do, but who cou
ld she listen to now? What on earth was she supposed to tell her mother? She writhed in frustration.

  She had run all this way the night before, too, but had turned back at the gate. Young-sil knew she would burst into tears at the sight of her poor mother, but she could not hold off telling her indefinitely.

  Slowly, she got to her feet. She was going to do it. She was going to cry out, ‘Mother!’ But her throat closed again.

  She rubbed her eyes, and her elbow knocked loudly against the gate.

  ‘Who’s there?’ It was her mother’s voice.

  Young-sil tried to run away but she tripped on her own feet. She sobbed. Footsteps. She bit her lip and stood up. It was now or never.

  The gate creaked open and she could see the white of her mother’s skirt.

  Young-sil’s mind went dark but she gripped the fence and cried out, ‘Me! It’s me!’

  ‘Is there news from Seoul?’

  Young-sil turned her face away from the sweet scent of her mother’s tobacco and thrust her cheek against a slat of the fence next to the gate. She could feel a splinter make its way into her cheek, but it could not distract her from the tears that were about to fall.

  ‘Your brother was in my dreams last night, so I thought there might be news today. I went to see you at the nurses’ housing, but they said you had the night shift.’

  Her mother patted Young-sil’s arm. Young-sil fought hard against the urge to throw herself at her mother and burst into tears. She held on to the fence for dear life.

  ‘Were you berated by some doctor today? What’s wrong?’

  Young-sil wanted to reassure her, but she could barely open her mouth. Her hand gripped her own throat. She stepped away from her mother and removed her hand but still could not open her mouth.