“You’re not going to die. I’ll make sure you’re safe. Come on, let’s go home.”
Those last three words—among the sweetest words one can hear from a lover. There were no lights in the house when they arrived, hand in hand. Without going to see Dani, Jade led HanChol to her room. She was surprised by their urgency, how much they wanted to feel each other after all the years of absence. But when they were fully naked, HanChol stopped touching her just so he could gaze down at her whole body. She didn’t feel shy because she knew he would only see her as beautiful, even now when her jutting ribs and pelvis held dark blue moon shadows in their hollows. He softly touched the sharp bones above her breasts, before lacing his hands with hers and kissing her in the mouth.
It was the deepest part of the night when they were finished and lying in each other’s arms.
“I’ve missed you so much,” she said then.
“I’ve missed you too.” He gave her another kiss.
“So what now? Where do we go from here?”
“What do you mean?” HanChol asked, furrowing his eyebrows.
“I make you happy and you make me happy. When life is so short, why do we keep wasting time like this?”
“Ah, Jade.” HanChol sighed, and Jade felt his arm slacken around her a bit. “I’m getting married in two weeks,” he said.
Jade’s heart started to hammer uncontrollably. “What do you mean? To whom?”
“Miss SeoHee.”
“She’s basically a child! And you’re telling me this, when we’re still lying naked together in my bed?”
“She’s twenty-three, which is well past the age when most girls like her get married. And I’m sorry if I’ve offended you—” he said. Jade was pressing herself up and away from him. “But I didn’t plan on seeing you today or coming to your house, did I? It was you who showed up unannounced. And yes, I was attracted to you and acted on it. Was that wrong of me? Perhaps to SeoHee, although in the grand scheme of things, I don’t think it matters. But I didn’t lie to you. If you’d asked me earlier I would have answered the same way, we wouldn’t have slept together, and that would have been the end.”
“The end? The end!” Jade was sitting up, her black hair lapping around her gaunt shoulders. The ease with which he pronounced those words shredded her insides.
“Do you even care for this girl? You like her young and pretty face? Or is it about her money? You prefer her to me because of her rich father . . .” She balled up a bit of the comforter and squeezed so that the veins popped on top of her withered hands.
“Don’t. Please don’t,” HanChol said quietly.
“I loved and ached for you every single day, all these years. You know this is true because you feel it, this constant warmth and light inside your heart, everywhere you go. But I will try my best to stop loving you now. One day you’re going to realize that the sun isn’t shining inside you anymore and you’ll know I no longer think of you.” She got up and pulled on her threadbare clothes. Shrugging into her blouse, she turned around.
“When I come back, you won’t be in my room anymore. And just one more thing—for every bit of love you’ve given me, you’ve also caused me an equal amount of suffering. So I have nothing left, in all senses of that word. Please see yourself out,” she said, then stepped out of her room.
Jade walked quickly to the garden and sat facing the weeds for a while. When she came back, her cot was empty but still dented in the shape of HanChol’s body. She lay down fully clothed and quickly fell asleep, as though her body knew that it was the only thing that could help her.
About an hour later, just before sunrise, Jade woke up and immediately went to her aunt’s room. Dani didn’t answer when Jade called her name and sat down next to her.
“Wake up for a moment and drink some water. The heat’s finally broken and it’s a beautiful morning . . .”
There was something about the way that her words scattered unheard that reminded Jade of the white seeds of plane trees. In the summer, when the sun shone just a certain way, the fluffy particles sparkled like stars in the air, each seed tracing a resolutely different path, although the wind blew only in one direction. Jade once watched for a long time to see if they came down to the ground; and they did not, they just kept floating between the earth and the sky. It was the way her words hung in the air like seeds that let her know that her aunt had died.
23
The Beginning of the End
1944
AFTER THE MORNING MEETING AT THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT ended, JungHo descended the staircase and walked out into the courtyard. As he blinked a few times at the alabaster light, one of his comrades caught up to him.
“Brother JungHo, are you coming with us to play tennis?” The comrade was a son of an academic family, the end of a long line of white-bearded scholars and ministers. Unlike his progenitors, he was more of a physical type, a star athlete back in high school. He was only twenty-two and constantly raring to do things, which was all in keeping with the directive that they spend plenty of time exercising. Sometimes he even looked disappointed that he had to sleep at night. At thirty-eight, JungHo both envied and doted on that puppyish energy.
“I can’t today. I have to get the soles of my shoes fixed,” JungHo said with a smile.