This Burns My Heart Page 0,119
hold over you.”
Soo-Ja began to weep. Her mother continued lighting the mugwort rolls, until every single one of the fingers in her left hand had one attached to its tip. Soo-Ja had watched her mother do this many times growing up. The mugworts would burn slowly, and were supposed to heal different ailments. In Soo-Ja’s mind, those sticks were as much a part of her mother as her eyes and nose. They were the kind of thing she’d remember her by, long after she passed away.
“Don’t be angry at your father. Now that you’re a parent, you must know what it’s like to fear losing your grasp over your child.”
Soo-Ja looked at her mother, as the light smoke covered her face in a thin white layer. For a moment, she longed to touch her wrinkled warm hand and feel it against her own skin. Her mother was so small and hunched, but still so strong. Her mother’s life was so different from hers.
Suddenly, breaking Soo-Ja’s reverie, the telephone on the nightstand began to ring. Soo-Ja guessed it would be Min and Hana. It was late, later than the time she usually called them at night, and Soo-Ja figured they were concerned. Soo-Ja’s mother motioned for her daughter to pick it up, as she excused herself from the room.
But when Soo-Ja answered the phone, she did not hear Min’s voice. Instead, she heard the unexpected sound of Miss Hong’s distinct cadences, the round, exaggerated phonemes of a woman from the countryside, sigol. She was half crying, half mumbling, and it took Soo-Ja a while to understand why the chambermaid was calling her. Still, even after the words became clear, Soo-Ja could not believe what she had just been told.
The shock almost made her drop the receiver.
PART FOUR
Bamboo
Hours Later
Seoul and Los Angeles
chapter seventeen
Soo-Ja arrived back in Seoul late in the evening and found a handwritten sign on the glass door of the hotel reading “Closed.” She had some trouble with her keys and struggled to get inside. Right then, she regretted refusing her brother’s offer to come with her. She’d been wrong to think she could handle all of this by herself. But during the ride on the train, she’d managed to convince herself this was simply a misunderstanding, and Miss Hong had alarmed her for nothing. Min and Hana would be in the hotel when she came in. They’d hug her from behind, and ask her why it had taken her so long to return home.
“Hana’s mother?” Miss Hong’s disembodied voice greeted her as she came in.
“Where’s Min? Where’s Hana?” Soo-Ja asked, turning the lights on.
Miss Hong’s body came out of her room and joined her voice as she hurriedly put on her slippers and rushed forward in her hanbok, putting her hair in a bun.
“Hana’s mother, I tried to stop them, I really did! Please don’t be mad at me.”
“What happened?” Soo-Ja asked her. “Where are Hana and Min?”
“I told you on the phone! They left,” said Miss Hong, her eyes growing big.
“No, this can’t be happening,” said Soo-Ja, shaking her head. Had they lived in peace for so long that she had forgotten what her husband could be like? “Even for Min—he wouldn’t do this to me!”
Miss Hong reached for her arm and pulled her toward Soo-Ja’s own room. In there, lying on top of a sausage-shaped pillow, Soo-Ja found a sheet of paper where a sleeping head should have been. Miss Hong pointed to it, her face anxious, suddenly going mute. Soo-Ja quickly reached for the letter and began to read.
Dear Soo-Ja,
So many people want to move to America, but can’t. While we—we have family there and the money. That’s why I decided we should immigrate.
Soo-Ja put the letter down, gasping. Now she could no longer pretend that her family was still home. Miss Hong, seeing the stunned look on Soo-Ja’s face, propped her up with her right hand and offered to bring her some water. Soo-Ja shook her head and reached for the letter again.
Now that your father is dead, I suppose the money from the land can go to Hana. We will spend it on her education. I promise I won’t touch it.
I have made arrangements with Gi-yong Im to transfer the funds from the sale to our accounts. I have also left behind some cash for you to buy a ticket to join us.
I know we should have consulted you before we did this. And we would have. If you were here. Are you ever