by Alana Terry
When I first started going to school here, Miss Sandy asked me near every day if I made any friends yet, and it was so important to her that when I told her once how Becky Linklater shared a fruit roll-up with me at lunch, she was so happy I near expected her to cry. But back in the old days, if you’d asked me if me and Ji-Hoon were friends, I woulda said no, he’s a meanie. But it got to where when he was out during the day and I couldn’t find him, he’d come looking for me later. And sometimes if he weren’t around for too long, my chest would get all small, and I’d worry he musta froze, except he never did, ’least not that I ever knowed.
I already said Ji-Hoon had a family, except not a mama, but I never learnt why. I’m not sure I even thought to ask. A family with two kids and two parents woulda been pretty rare those days ’cause that’s four people needing to eat. So what families did is split up, and one parent would go live with an aunt or grandma or something further south where the famine weren’t as bad, or a sister would leave for China where they had tons of extra food, and she’d promise to come back with enough rice to last the winter. And sometimes she did, but most often she never come back at all.
So Ji-Hoon had a smaller kind of family, and I got to meet his dad and his teenage brother, who was ugly too, with all them red bumps on his face like older kids get, and it looked so bad you woulda thunk he had some sorta disease or something if you didn’t know better. His brother’s name was Min-Ho, and you’d figure with him being so much older than me that he wouldn’t be all that important to my story, except he were on account of inviting me into his gang.
CHAPTER 12
Like I said, I didn’t know too much about being a flower swallow at first, but after that winter, I learnt so much I could probably go live in Boston Common right now and never get hungry or cold, except ’course I wouldn’t on account of me staying with Pastor now and him and Miss Sandy feeding me so good. Anyway, that winter I seen people starting to die, and you remember how much I hated looking on Grandmother’s body after it happened to her? Well, that’s another one of those things you get sorta used to even if you don’t ever think you could. But I noticed right away it was the flower swallows who stayed all by themselves that was dying the most. There were others that formed gangs — not the bad kind of gangs like the ones that the policeman preached to us about not joining but the kind that’s more like those groups of animals that stick together so they can help each other out. You teached us all about them in science class, remember, them animals that like to live together (I forget what they’re called just now), and some do it so they can fight back if an attacker comes after them, and other times it’s the hunting ones living in a group so they can catch their food all at once. Well, I knowed right from the beginning what you was saying on account of that being how it’s like for flower swallows, too, ’cause those kids in gangs weren’t the ones getting froze in their sleep. For a little while, I wanted to ask Ji-Hoon to make a gang with me, only he still had his brother and dad, so he didn’t need one quite so much as me, and the other gangs had mostly older kids, and I hadn’t ever had nothing but bad luck with them kinds.
Well, ’course I weren’t eating much those days, so it’s a good thing about Ji-Hoon’s brother asking me into his gang. You know how sometimes you can go back and figure out exactly how you ended up at a certain point? Like if I hadn’t gotten into that fight with Chuckie Mansfield a few weeks ago, you wouldn’t have had to keep me inside for recess, and if you hadn’t kept me inside for recess, me and you wouldn’t have got to talking. And once we got to talking, I mentioned how I was a flower swallow, and you asked me what that was, and I said it’d take too long to explain, and you said I could write it all out and get some extra credit. So that’s why I’m here working on it now, ’cause Chuckie Mansfield said Pastor weren’t my dad on account of him having brown skin and mine’s more tan-like. And if that hadn’t happened, I’d probably be in the kitchen making Christmas cookies with Miss Sandy or stuff and nonsense like that.
Well joining the gang was kinda like that, I figure, and it started once I found that rat after the blind lady gave me her blessing. And since I found the rat and wanted someone to share with is why I started hanging out more with Ji-Hoon, and that’s how I met his brother. And if I hadn’t ever met his brother, I wouldn’t have ever joined that gang, and I swear on the Dear Leader it was on account of the gang that I lived through my first winter on the streets. So when you look at it like that, you might even think the blind angel’s blessing was enough to erase the curse from the mudang, only I’m not sure if I believe that, ’cause some things got better (like the gang I was just getting ready to tell you about), but then some things got worst.
Anyway, Ji-Hoon and I spent our days together like I said, but he didn’t do much else after that, ’cause one day I went to his house, only he weren’t there.
“Ji-Hoon home?” I asked the brother, the one with the ugly marks on his face.
“He moved.” And back in Chongjin, if someone said you moved, that might mean you went to China where there was plenty of extra food, and you could eat as much as you want, and the only problem was how to get there without getting arrested. Or it could just as easily mean you went to some relative’s house and hoped they’d have a little to share once you got there. And I never learnt which kinda moved away Ji-Hoon did, and maybe it sounds strange to you that I never asked, but when your stomach’s feeling like someone’s twisting it inside out on account of famine, and you’re only eating a bite of something every day or two or sometimes longer, you forget to wonder about that sort of stuff and nonsense.
So once I heard Ji-Hoon weren’t there no more, I planned to go walk around by myself some, and I probably woulda forgot to say thank you to his older brother too on account of manners working different during famine. But Min-Ho — that was the brother — well, he scrunched up his eyes, and before I could turn away, he said, “Hey, do you want a job?” So I asked, “What kinda job?” That’s when Min-Ho told me about his gang, except he didn’t say gang, he just said he had some friends who helped each other find food to eat, and now that Ji-Hoon was gone, they could use someone little like me. I never knowed about Ji-Hoon being part of their gang or stuff and nonsense like that, but it did help explain how sometimes he’d be at the school, and sometimes he’d be at home, and sometimes he wouldn’t be nowhere.
So Min-Ho told me they were starting their meeting in a few more hours, and it got a little embarrassing ’cause I didn’t know if that meant I should wait with him at his house or come back in a little bit. And when he didn’t say come in but he didn’t say go away neither, it got even more confusing. So I finally said, “I’ll be back later” and found a place near the train station to take a nap. That’s where a lot of flower swallows lived, there at the train station, including a bunch of older ones who knew about making fires and whatnot, so I hanged out there sometimes if there weren’t nothing better to do. You might ask why I didn’t sleep there too, but that was on account of the bigger flower swallows grouping themselves into gangs, and they’re the ones who controlled who got to sleep by the fire and who didn’t. Since I was littler and didn’t belong to no gang yet, it woulda been just as cold for me there as anywhere else.
Besides, if you don’t sleep around all them flower swallows, you never see which ones end up froze in their sleep.
After my nap that afternoon, I got that sorta groggy feeling where you can’t really remember if it’s morning or evening, and at first I was worried I missed my meeting with Min-Ho, but then I could tell by the sky that the sun was setting and not rising. Once you’ve lived as a flower swallow for a while, that’s just something you know, which way the sun goes, and that’s why your geography quizzes aren’t quite fair ’cause I always know which way the sun is depending on the time of day, but sometimes I forget if that means I’m looking west or east or whatnot. It’s kinda confusing when you hafta put a label on it like that, at least it is for me.
Anyway, I went
to Min-Ho’s, and the whole time I was walking there I was scared he’d started the meeting without me, but when I got to the house, he said, “There he is,” all happy-like. And I looked around, and there were four of them in all, sitting around a table, and they were each as big as Min-Ho, and I got pretty shy. Then Min-Ho put his arm around me, and it was one of those times I mentioned when you don’t mind that on account of no one really touching you nice at all, and he said to his friends, “See, I told you he’d work out.” And I remember feeling so proud-like, near as proud as when I got that question in social studies right after you called on Chuckie Mansfield and he got it wrong. That was the first time I was glad for Pastor listening to them boring talk shows ’cause you can’t listen to that kinda junk for more than a few days without learning the names of the President and the Vice President and all sorts of other stuff and nonsense only certain kinds of grown-ups seem to care about.
So then the rest of the gang had to decide if I was all right, and one said I looked awful weak, and another said that was the whole point, and another asked Min-Ho if I was stupid or something, and Min-Ho said, “No. Back when he went to school, my brother said he was the smartest one there.” I figured Min-Ho was making that part up on account of his little brother teasing me so bad before I learnt to read, but I wasn’t about to correct him.
Next the gang members started arguing about whether I needed to proof myself or whether they’d just take Min-Ho’s word about me, and Min-Ho kept telling them I was the smartest kid in school back in the old days when I still went, and not only that but I was a good thief too, and sometimes his little brother came home bragging about the things I stole. I knowed that part weren’t true neither, ’cause back then I was still the kind of flower swallow who eats what he’s begged for, and not the kind that’s learnt how to take things proper-like.
Min-Ho wasn’t the leader of the gang. That was a boy they all nicknamed Snake on account of him once eating a live snake, swallowing the whole thing tail-first. Eventually Min-Ho had Snake convinced I was as good a thief as any of them. So the gangsters decided I didn’t need to proof myself, which made me glad ’cause I’d never stole nothing before. It wasn’t that I woulda felt bad about stealing. It’s just that I didn’t think I could do it right without getting caught, so I’d never tried, except every once in a while I sneaked into a house where I knowed the people had moved away, and sometimes I found a few crumbs of something, and sometimes I didn’t.
Well, one of the other boys — and they all had animal nicknames, like this one was named Hawk — he said, “So what sort of stuff have you stole?” And I was scared I’d have to come up with a lie, which I didn’t have much practice doing, ’least not in front of a bunch of big teenagers. But Min-Ho spoke up and said once me and his brother had sneaked into the school on the Day of the Sun. That’s the Dear Leader’s birthday, and the teachers give treats to all the kids, and they come straight from Pyongyang, so it’s real good stuff like potato chips and candy and whatnot. And Min-Ho said me and his little brother sneaked in before school and swiped a dozen bags of chips and about twice as many packs of chewing gum, and we did it so good we never got caught. And I was afraid one of the gangsters would ask me to proof it by telling them what them potato chips tasted like, except I didn’t know ’cause the bigger kids always stealed my bag after school, and one year it was Ji-Hoon who done it, only I didn’t say that. Thankfully, they all believed Min-Ho’s story, so I didn’t have to proof nothing. Then the gangsters got to talking about their plans, except I couldn’t follow too well, but right in the middle, Min-Ho leaned over and whispered to me, “I’ll explain everything later.” That meant I could shut my eyes and pay half attention, kinda like after lunch when you read us the story of that little orphan girl, except she weren’t never a flower swallow, and the old folks she lived with worked on a farm, so there musta been plenty of food and she never woulda needed to do something like steal.
Well, I figure I dozed off ’cause next thing Min-Ho was shaking me awake, and I was afraid his friends would laugh and call me a baby for napping, except they didn’t. I got to thinking maybe working with gangsters could be a good thing. Min-Ho told the others to go on ahead, that he’d give me my instructions on the way, so they walked in front, and me and Min-Ho walked behind. He explained the particulars of their gang, which even though they were stealing, I know it’s not near as bad as the Boston ones that the detective came and warned us about or stuff and nonsense like that.
“We figured out a system that’s been working pretty well for us all winter long,” Min-Ho said, and I was past the point on the starving scale when your tummy growls, but every once in a while my mouth would still water, and that’s what happened when he was talking. He said, “Hawk’s job is to go up beforehand and choose the right neighborhood and scout out the right houses.” And by scout out, he was talking about the gangster called Hawk sneaking out a few days earlier and watching the neighborhood real good to see which houses were worth stealing from and which weren’t. “Then when the others are in place,” Min-Ho explained, “you knock on the door and make yourself look real sad and scared, and tell them you lost your sister and try to do what you can to make them get out of the house and go looking with you.”
“What happens then?” I asked ’cause like I said, I really didn’t know much about stealing back in the old days.
Min-Ho said not to worry about it, that he and the others would take care of the rest and that my only job was to keep my target — that’s the word he used, target — out of the house for as long as possible, and if I could get him to go into the woods, that was even better. He finished by saying I had the most important job of them all, and that got me feeling so proud I made myself a Pyongyang promise to do an even better job than his little brother had, just to make Min-Ho happy on account of him being so nice to me and giving me a chance like this.
So once Min-Ho and the rest of the gang was hiding, I went up to the house that the scout (that’s Hawk) had picked out, and I knocked on the door, and it was a man who answered, and I already told you how I felt about them kinds. But I knowed Min-Ho and the rest of the gang was depending on me, and that was saying something ’cause up until then I’m not really sure anybody had ever counted on me for nothing. I was still so little, I figure nobody expected me to be able to do much, but Min-Ho, he needed me, and that’s why he got me into the gang in the first place.
So the man looked at me, and I tried not to look at the area where I knowed Min-Ho was hiding on account of him saying that would give the whole thing away, but I sorta glanced over anyway, and I seen Min-Ho there except he weren’t mad at me for peeking. He gave me a smile and jerked his head, just like he was saying, “You can do it,” and so I did. I said, “I’ve lost my sister.” Except after that I was supposed to ask, “Can you help me find her?” I’d even practiced it with the gangster called Donkey, and I could tell you why he got that name, but I’m guessing I’d get in trouble. But I forgot that second line and only said the first, so the man said, “Why should I care?”
And then I started to cry on account of me feeling like I was getting everything all mixed up and now Min-Ho and the others wouldn’t be friends with me no more, and when he saw me crying, the man said, “Where was your sister when you saw her last?” And that’s when I remembered I was supposed to get him out of the house, and if I could get him into the woods that would be even better. So I thought up real quick and said, “We was in the woods here looking for twigs for a fire.” And the man sorta grunted and grabbed a coat, a big, heavy one I knowed musta come from China ’cause in those days anything fancy like that came from over the river. That’s when I realized how important Hawk’s job was as the gang’s scout. He probably seen the Chinese coat, and that’s what clued him that the man would make a good target.
So I got him to follow me in the woods, and we were out there for a little while before he said I should go home and maybe she was already there. By that time, the g
ang had gone in and out of his house and got what they wanted, and we all met back at Min-Ho’s. The gang all told me what a good job I’d done and how it’d been the best target they hit all week. I figure Min-Ho musta thunk I started to cry at the doorstep on purpose ’cause he gave me a big pat on the back that nearly made me choke, and he said to the others, “Did you see those tears? I told you guys he’d make out.” And they all agreed, and when we all split up the food and there was one leftover pancake, they gave me the biggest piece of them all once it got split.
And that’s how I went from being the kind of flower swallow that just lives and dies all lonesome to being part of a gang, only gang still reminds me of that detective and all his talk about gun fights and stuff and nonsense like that, so you’ll just have to keep remembering I’m not talking about the bad sort.
The gang looked out for me, and things got to be so good I didn’t miss Min-Ho’s little brother with his cross eyes. In fact, I was glad he had moved on account of it giving the gang a reason to keep me around. And that’s what I liked most about the gang, I figure, how they made me feel so appreciated. ’Cause the others — Snake and Hawk and Donkey and Min-Ho (they called him Fox, but I couldn’t never get used to that for some reason) — they needed me, and I needed them right back. We took care of each other. If one of us was feeling poorly, the others’d go out and steal the food and bring some back and split it up just like we’d all gone out together. And sometimes I got to missing Granny so much I’d feel real down, and Min-Ho, he’d offer me some of his corn discs on account of him hating them even more than me. Other times he asked me if I felt like going out together on a walk so we would, and I wondered if he missed his brother then, too.