This Burns My Heart Page 0,10
and joy you give me.
Min Lee
Soo-Ja sighed and closed her eyes. She was happy, but envious. She wanted to be the one far away, writing letters about her own adventures to some virginal bride who would ooh and aah at her courage. She wanted to be the one telling Min how much she was fighting to keep up her strength. If getting this letter was so sweet, imagine being able to be the one to write it.
But maybe I should just be grateful for what I have, Soo-Ja told herself. There was much to enjoy about living in Daegu. Yes, half the time it was either raining or snowing, but during the glorious fall and spring, she’d lose herself in the hilltops behind her house. There, she’d race past the gingko, pine, maple, bamboo, and persimmon trees, and count constellations of lilacs, tiger lilies, moonflowers, cherry blossoms, and red peonies. She breathed in wisteria and walked on chestnut leaves. She traced trellised grapevines and caressed silkworms in the mulberry groves. Soo-Ja drew imaginary rings around the ubiquitous mountains in the distance, and pretended to be in the Scotland she’d read so much about. And when the monsoon rains came, for days at a time, creating miniature pools on the ground, Soo-Ja and her brothers splashed around, kicking water into one another’s faces.
If Soo-Ja ever left Daegu, she knew she would miss its lavender skies and peach-colored sunsets; the fresh red bean cakes from the bakery, still warm from the wood-burning oven; the Saturday afternoons spent soaking with her mother at the bathhouse, the heat as comforting as the sound of gossip all around her; and above all, the innocence of her childhood, still free of secrets, lovers, and ambitions.
It is no good to want to stay. Getting these kinds of letters only made Soo-Ja want to leave more. She prayed for Min to come back safe and come back soon, so he could help her with her plans. And in the meantime, she had to make sure to keep her father from finding out about him.
Soo-Ja put the letter away. There were few places to hide it, since her room was entirely bare except for the large nong armoire where she kept her coverlets and comforters and clothes. She decided to go to the kitchen, where her mother stored empty earthenware kimchee jars. But when she got there and opened some of them, she found that they were already filled—with money. This was an old habit of theirs. Her father gave her mother a large allowance every week for household expenses, and her mother, not knowing what to do with the extra money, often placed it in jars, where the hwan bills took on the smell of spices.
Soo-Ja went back to her room, frustrated, and took her clothes off to go to bed. She considered simply leaving the letter inside her jewel box—a small treasure chest inlaid with shiny mother-of-pearl—but it seemed too obvious a hiding place. Then, as she folded her woolen shirt, she decided to place her letter inside it, wrapped between the folds of fabric of its sleeves. She’d have to find some other place before Tuesday, when the servants did the washing. But for now it seemed to make perfect sense to leave it there, ensconced between the clothes she had been inside all day and had just cast off.
Soo-Ja’s father sounded angry when he called her into his room. He sat cross-legged on the floor facing her. He did not speak right away, and she found herself staring at the screens behind him—four large ink paintings, one for each of the four mythical animals: blue dragon, white tiger, red phoenix, and black tortoise. She imagined her father as the dragon, and herself as the tiger. She wondered which would win in the end.
“This time you’ve gone too far,” he said.
“What did I do now?” asked Soo-Ja, her eyes rolling to the back of her head.
Soo-Ja’s father reached for a stack of letters and tossed them on the writing table in front of him. Soo-Ja opened her mouth, surprised. How had he found them?
“Is this the same young man who showed up at our door that night?”
“What night?” asked Soo-Ja innocently. She avoided his gaze, looking instead at the white tiger in the painting on the screen, its mouth open in a roar, one paw in front of the other. It looked as if about to charge, and only self-control held it back.
“You must have him