by Eugenia Kim
Inja sat up straight.
Uncle sighed and pulled out his handkerchief to dab his brow. “This happened just one month after my little girl died, so I thought God had given us a great gift, and I devoted myself to helping the baby survive. Those first months she was very weak and couldn’t eat. The doctor thought her digestive system wasn’t fully developed, but there was no fixed reason, just as there was no reason for my Sun-ok to die. I stayed up countless nights dripping rice water into her mouth, praying. Then by late spring she was fine, a sweet and loving baby with milky skin, her personality watchful and calm.”
Inja had an internal sense of descending quiet, like going into a dark cavern where a door would open. She untangled a memory of a story Grandmother had once told about a sick baby who almost died. This baby in Uncle’s story was an orphan. Kids teased Inja by calling her an orphan, but the baby in Uncle’s story had it worse—her mother didn’t want her. Then she remembered those stories were told when they were fleeing Seoul and heading to some orphanage where her mother had once worked. Were they going there to visit this girl? The orphan girl would have been a little older than herself . . . An image of broken looms and spindles from Grandmother’s dream flashed behind her eyes. Inja looked at Uncle and knew what he would say next.
“Yes, little one, that was—that is your unnee, your older sister.” He turned and clasped her hands. “Your father embraced the child as his and named her Miran, which means beautiful orchid, because her delivery to us was rare and foreign, and therefore all the more precious. I wanted to adopt the child myself, but your mother was already attached to her from having delivered her. None of us were surprised that your father was gentle and loving with his surprise daughter. And then your mother was pregnant with her own first child, and they named you Inja, which means revered and benevolent daughter.” He paused and gave her space on the pew. “Do you understand?”
She took time to think. Each thought and memory opened the door wider, and windows flew open in her mind. It made complete sense. From what she could remember of the few photographs from America, Miran didn’t resemble her, and she now wondered how much her sister resembled their parents. Miran’s eyebrows were straight, her nose cute and little, her face a pleasing heart-shape unlike her own rounded cheeks. Grandmother had said that her sister was a sickly baby, which was why—and because she was the eldest—they had taken her to America. She said to Uncle, “Ajeossi, is she still sick?”
“No longer. But more than once we thought we’d lose her.”
A little explosion of memory connected this to Grandmother’s unfinished story about her sister almost dying. And now she didn’t know what to think. She loved her uncle and her grandparents, but even if Miran was a sick baby, why, if she wasn’t a real sister, a real daughter—why had she been the one to go to America with her parents?
Uncle must have read her thoughts. “It shows something about your mother’s love for us, for her family, for me.”
Her mind swirled with questions and something dark she didn’t like feeling.
“They meant to stay in America for two, three years at the most, but the war . . .”
Always it was the war. This war, the war before, the one before that. It seemed everyone used it as an excuse for all ills. And perhaps it was.
Uncle touched her arm to make her look at him. “Though you were a baby of an age that would have made overseas travel difficult, the truth is your mother loved us—Halmeoni and all of us—your mother loved us so much that she left behind her blood child for us to love. Had she left the adopted one, we would have doubted that she would return. Neither of your parents could have predicted this war, but I want you to understand the measure of the sacrifice your mother made for our sake. I consider it a special gift of love that she gave us her favored, her blood daughter.”
He drew his finger down Inja’s cheek, and she tried to smile beyond her confusion.
“She’s always taken care of me in more ways than an older sister should,” said Uncle. “And to me, your being with us is a testament of that great love, a love greater than human limitation—that she would give her most loved child to me to raise until she could be reunited with you.”
Inja’s uncertainty melted in the intimacy that shone from his eyes. He made her feel special to have been the one chosen to be left behind, and she felt grateful for Miran, for Miran’s being an orphan, for Miran’s infant sicknesses that had made it possible for her—Inja, her mother’s true firstborn—to be with this most beloved of uncles, this most beloved of men, who clearly loved her more than any living thing on this earth. All she could do was meet his eyes, those depths of acceptance and joy, and clutch both arms around his neck to show that she did understand—and that she was grateful, too.
14
* * *
Fallout
Since first grade Miran walked the six blocks to and from school by herself. Though the war in Korea had ended, the Cold War escalated and the civil defense drills continued. By third grade, keen on spotting the signs with the three yellow triangles in a black circle, she’d identified every fallout shelter in her neighborhood and around the downtown church they rented for afternoon Korean service. She hoped when the bombs dropped she’d be near the library’s designated shelter—the reference room encased in the basement’s thick cinder-block walls. Not only did it have a bathroom and a water fountain, but she could also read the encyclopedias from A to Z and learn about the world.
When Miran began fourth grade in September 1955, Najin had a job on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays teaching the Korean language to intelligence officers at Fort Holabird—work procured by an American military man her parents had met before Miran was born. On weekends, Najin continued to make kimchi for a few restaurants as well. By the basement utility sink, she washed and salted cabbage in a big galvanized tub, added garlic and radishes, paprika and hot pepper, then stuffed the kimchi into gallon jars and let it ferment beside the cool concrete walls until it could be sold at four dollars a gallon.
Calvin had been promoted to translation editor at the VOA and now worked regular nine-to-five hours, so Miran came home to an empty house three days a week. On the afternoons Mrs. Bushong caught her going around to the mud porch, she’d invite her over for cinnamon toast, but Miran tried to avoid the chatty neighbor, no longer interested in her salt and pepper shakers, and all the more uncomfortable with adults. She’d been told to practice an hour on the old upright piano Najin had bought earlier that spring, and do the laundry or other housework and homework, but as the weeks passed, she discovered she could do what she liked as long as the visible chores were done and she was home by five to make rice.
To expand her personal domain, Miran explored different routes home and discovered a corner store frequented by the sixth-grade safety-patrol kids. If she saved her milk money, she could buy a 3 Musketeers. The crosswalk before the store was monitored by a tall girl with wiry brown hair. One afternoon in October, Miran lingered half a block from the store and learned the girl’s name from two boys who defiantly walked through her stop-and-wait signal. One said, “Janet, Janet, alien from a retard planet,” the other said, “Planet Moron,” and they laughed. At least someone else was being called that, a label attached to Miran because her unfamiliar name slipped so easily into “moron.” She felt a strange mix of disdain and sympathy for Janet.
“I’m going to report you,” Janet shouted, red-faced. She turned, saw Miran, and glared. Though Miran felt bad for her, that look made her afraid, and she went home. She played fingering exercises on the piano and swept the front steps and sidewalk.
On Monday the week before Halloween, Miran’s saved pennies burned in her palm, and she ventured to the corner. She stopped behind Janet’s correctly spread arms blocking her from crossing the street. A long time passed and Janet didn’t put her arms down, though not a single car was in sight. The girl stood stiff as an arrow, eyes front.
Miran said, “Hi,” and stepped next t
o Janet on the curb.
“I’ll report you if you cross,” Janet said.
Miran turned and left, and by the time she got home, she was hot and frustrated. She fumed at her cowardice of Janet. Had she always been so weak? Teachers who remarked on how quiet she was made it sound like praise, but they couldn’t see the vast room of silence inside, its walls as thick as a fallout shelter, smothering her words.
On Wednesday she trudged down Maple Avenue, telling herself to go ahead and cross over to the store no matter what, as a test of her courage. She saw Janet’s back—and also the cute boy who was the captain of the safety patrol on the opposite corner. With such monitoring, Janet would be forced to allow her to cross, and Miran approached with bravado. Janet didn’t move her head, but her eyes slid down to meet hers. The patrol captain waved all-clear, and Janet turned sideways to swing one ushering arm.
Victorious, Miran stepped off the curb.
Janet sing-songed below her breath, “Ching-chong Chinaman.”
Miran’s neck flushed, and she whirled and threw the pennies at the patrol girl’s face. Janet’s eyes opened wide and she round-housed both hands, striking Miran on the head and shoulder. The patrol captain shouted, ran across the street, and grabbed one of Janet’s wrists. Another blow landed on Miran’s neck, and she fell, more stunned than in pain—furious to be crying like a child. She caught her breath and wiped her tears with a sleeve. Her knee stung from scraping the asphalt, her skirt was torn, and a dull pain throbbed on her collarbone. Another safety patrol boy had appeared and was picking up her pennies.
The captain crouched by Miran. “Are you hurt? Can you get on the sidewalk?”
Miran scrambled to her feet and suppressed the twinge from her scraped knee. “I’m fine.”
He said to Janet, “She’s just a kid. You’re twice her size!”
“She started it! Dumb Chink hit me with that money.” Janet rubbed her arms.
“Did she call you names like that?” the boy asked Miran. “You can tell me. My name is Daniel Walczak, and I’m the captain of the safety patrol.”
His attention almost made her cry again. Now she was more afraid of her parents finding out than anything else. The other boy gave her the pennies, and she slipped them into her pocket.
Daniel leaned in. “She’s a troublemaker. Did she start it? That’s demerits for Janet.”
Something recognizable flicked across Janet’s features, and it unleashed in Miran an unplanned barrage. “It’s my fault, not hers. We were pretending to fight. I tripped. It’s not fair to get her in trouble. We’re friends! I have to go home. Bye, Janet!” She tried to smile as if they were longtime buddies and turned to go, careful to not limp.
“Wait, what’s your name?” called Daniel to her retreating back.
“Sarah. My name is Sarah Kim.” She waved, ran, and hurried left at the corner, where she cried a little more to calm the wordless jumble inside.
At home she applied mercurochrome and a bandage, changed out of her school clothes, and washed her face. The mirror revealed a bruise forming on her collarbone. Miran practiced scales on the piano and prepared a story. She had run home, not paying attention, and tripped on a fire hydrant at Philadelphia and Grant—the need for specificity while lying was instinctive. She’d scraped her knee on the concrete and bruised her neck on the fireplug. She was fine, but it still hurt a little—could she stay home from school tomorrow?
Later, she basked in her parents’ concern, but felt guilty and didn’t ask for the day off.
Over the weekend she and her mother worked on her Halloween costume, sewing dozens of brown-paper-bag “feathers”—simple oblongs—in layers onto a long jacket and a boy’s cap from the donations. Miran pasted round reptile eyes on the cap, yellow construction paper on its visor for a beak, and skinny yellow triangles on her shoes for claws. When she tucked her head down and flapped her feathered arms, she did look like a big brown owl or at least some kind of bird, and it made Najin laugh the whole time they worked on it together. “You’ll win first prize this year, I’m sure of it,” said her mother.
At the annual Halloween parade in the schoolyard, Miran won the blue ribbon but was embarrassed because the school principal kept asking for her mother to join them on the platform. Of course Miran had brought the mimeographed flyer home, but she hadn’t shown it to her parents, knowing they’d be working. When she stepped down and rejoined her class, only the teacher said, “Congratulations.” She bowed her cap to hide her sad eyes.
“Sarah Kim? Where’d you come up with that name? Great costume!” Rescued by Daniel Walczak, the captain of the safety patrol once more! But he wasn’t alone—a tall witch with green goo smeared on her cheeks was behind him. “Once I saw it was you, I got your pal Janet to come over, too.”
“Um, hi—” Miran said. She couldn’t tell if he was sincere, accusing, or teasing. A hank of dark hair fell over his forehead, and her stomach did a turn, a sensation utterly new to her. She liked it and was afraid of it at the same time.
Janet narrowed her eyes but dug into her trick-or-treat bag and stuck out a full-size Milky Way bar. “Here, take this.”
Miran stood still, wings at rest, owl eyes wide.
“Come on, I got it for you. It’s from outer space, from Planet Janet.” She blushed crimson under that green goo, dropped the candy in Miran’s bag, and sauntered off.
“Neato,” said Miran, trying out the trendy phrase.
“Right, cool, whatever-your-name-is,” Daniel said with a wide smile, saluting her.
She walked home, wearing her costume and a goofy smile, the blue ribbon pinned to her owl chest. But no one was home to see how happy she was until suppertime, by which time the curtain of silence had already dropped. Still, Najin was thrilled that she’d won, and her father taped the blue ribbon to the kitchen door.
15
* * *
Medicines
On Seollal, New Year’s Day, everyone wore new, though used, clothes from America. A celebratory feast was supposed to be prepared to set the precedent for the coming year, but even chicken feet couldn’t be found for the special soup, vegetables impossible to locate, rice cakes a mere dream. Uncle’s worry multiplied about the family’s need for protein. The rare times they had fish, it was served to Aunt. Inja was small for eight, Grandmother was shrinking, and even Grandfather was diminished. He ate little, yet his stomach rounded. He attributed it to their diet of beans, but Uncle worried about malnutrition. Grandfather’s solution was to sit on the porch with a slingshot in hand, waiting. When robins, grackles, or even sparrows skittered across the courtyard—twang!—he’d fire and land one. Inja admired his accuracy but didn’t have his patience and wandered off. After he shot two or three, he called Inja to bring a bowl of water. They dipped and cleaned the birds, speared them on a stick, and she turned the tiny birds over a small fire. No one but Inja and Grandfather would eat the scrawny birds—more bones than meat. The two sat side by side by the smoldering fire and chewed the charred shreds that tasted of smoke, sucked on the hollow toothpick bones, and licked their fingers.
Winter blossomed into spring, and the clang of hammers, children playing, and mixed smells of city life filled the road, as did the constant popping sounds of practice gunfire from the military base nearby. Uncle entered contests to design logos for newspapers, magazines, and new businesses. He won every time and said he made a good living off the prize money, though Aunt’s expression suggested otherwise. He paid for night school for Ara, who was excited to learn to read and write. Because of Ara’s night school and Aunt’s pregnancy, the bedtime job of soaking Grandmother’s feet fell to Inja.
Most days Grandmother sat complacent, a flyswatter in her hand. She often had her Bible open, but it lay unread while she studied the daylight slanting through the window as it crawled across the floor, on the alert for insect intruders. She had been the guardian of Inja and her mother for so many years, and she remained a sentinel in their shared room. Inja no longer min
ded tending to her feet, though she wondered if it was necessary. Her nail-less toes were always dry beneath their wrappings and, though odd-looking, were scrupulously clean. She seemed to have no pain. Every night, Inja threw shards of willow bark to steep in a basin of hot water. Though the willow tree that Inja’s father had planted in the backyard had gone the way of most of the trees around Seoul for wartime fuel, it had yielded a half-dozen baby willows that they nurtured behind the protection of their walls. Until the trees grew bigger, they bought the inexpensive bark from the herbalist.
One night Inja wondered about the cause of Grandmother’s ailment. “Halmeoni, do you remember how you got frostbite?”
“Did I have frostbite? Maybe a long time ago.” Something changed in her voice, and her eyes filled with old sorrows.
Inja said, “Don’t worry. It doesn’t matter,” and dried and wrapped her water-wrinkled feet. She read aloud a chapter from the open pages of her Bible, Psalms, and helped her settle in bed, more curious than ever about how she had gotten frostbite. But Inja had homework to do and forgot about it until Saturday, when Uncle said he was going downtown.
Every weekend they went together to read the banner headlines flapping in the square, pick up a newspaper, see if any new contests were posted, and browse the open markets to “evaluate the reconstruction,” said Uncle. Sometimes they witnessed protests by university students waving placards against the president’s repressive laws that filled prisons with regular citizens accused of being communists.
On that glorious spring day, Aunt had curled Inja’s hair in an unusual display of kindness, and she wore a white puffed-sleeved blouse from America tucked into loose brown trousers, and a sky-blue sweater buttoned at the neck. Uncle, handsome and hatless in a soft gray suit and vest with a bold green-patterned tie, turned heads as they held hands and walked the Seoul streets. They entered the square, Uncle saying hello to acquaintances, and stopped at the apothecary for pregnancy medicine for Aunt. He bought Inja nutritional medicine, too, which she detested. They’d boil the root for hours, and then she’d have to drink the nasty brown-black liquid, floating with root hairs and alien specks. She held her nose against gagging for “the sake of her growing bones.” When she was done, she could hear as well as see the grit slide back to the bottom of the bowl. Inja was certain her bones would grow better without the vile slop, but, as Uncle said, she was her mother’s special gift to him, and he was determined to have her healthy and strong.