Page 137 of Wicked Fox

“Answer it,” she said. “I need some fresh air to think.”

Jihoon picked up with an impatient, “Hello?”

He listened to the formal voice on the other line as his eyesfollowed Miyoung to the front door. It opened with a blast of cold air.

“What?” he asked sharply. Miyoung glanced at him curiously.

“I’m sorry,” the person on the other line said. “I hate to tell you this kind of news over the phone. It’s your halmeoni.”

64

THE TWO BLACKlines on the white band around Jihoon’s arm indicated he was the family of the deceased. He stared at them as he accepted the bows of his halmeoni’s doctors, who had come to pay their respects.

Halmeoni’s funeral took place in the hospital’s jangryesikjang. It was filled with rooms for viewings and memorials, a hallway where every door led to death and grief.

Rooms down the hall hosted funerals of other patients. Some had dozens of wreaths lining the entrance, as if showing the social status of the deceased.

Jihoon stood in a daze beside the portrait of his halmeoni that sat on a table among chrysanthemums and incense. He watched the bows of mourning from each visitor.

“We bow once to the living, twice to the dead,” his halmeoni had always told him at his harabeoji’s grave. Jihoon’s grandfather had died before he was born, so greeting his grave had felt natural. But now, each time a mourner bowed a second time to his halmeoni, Jihoon’s heart skipped a beat.

He barely noticed the people who came through to greet him, to eat the funeral food at the tables adjoining the memorial room, to offer condolence money.

His mother stood beside him, greeting each mourner with a demure nod.

He tried to keep up appearances, show that he was a good, dutiful grandson, even as he knew he’d failed his halmeoni. Everything he’d done made her suffer. He refused to be a good student despite her pleas. He went to the PC room after school instead of coming home to help at the restaurant. And she got hurt because of him. She’d given her gi to him. And now she was gone. Because of him.

He glanced at Miyoung, who bustled between the tables of mourners eating the memorial food, clearing dishes and handing out soup. Having her here comforted him, but he didn’t know if he deserved it. His halmeoni was dead because of them.

Maybe if he’d swallowed his pride and called Miyoung back, then she would have told him about the bead. Maybe if Miyoung hadn’t lied and run away, this could have all been solved. Maybe if she’d let him die like he was supposed to, his halmeoni would still be alive.

So many maybes and none of them worth dwelling on, because the fact was his halmeoni was dead and he wasn’t. And he wished with all of his heart that it was the other way around.

65

MIYOUNG SERVED FOODto the mourners. It was polite for them to eat some before they left—rice, soup, and banchan. She carried around a tray to collect the empty dishes. It was all she could think to do. Even Somin, who served alongside her, didn’t protest Miyoung’s help.

Beside Jihoon, his mother wore a traditional mourning hanbok, with white hemp tying back her hair. Her pale face was drawn. She greeted all of the visitors while standing beside Jihoon, whose eyes were aimed straight ahead, not looking at his mother and not truly focusing on any of the guests. A boy with nothing left he wanted to see.

It was enough to bring tears, but Miyoung held them back. This was no place for her grief.

After everyone left, Miyoung sat awhile, watching Jihoon and his mother in the receiving room, unmoving statues. Jihoon looked like a supplicant in a church, head bowed, so she could see only the dark crown of his head.

“You can go now,” Jihoon said.

His mother didn’t respond, her expression calm.

“I said you can go.” Jihoon’s voice echoed in the empty room.

His mother didn’t reply.

Jihoon finally looked up. “Are you not listening to me?”

“She was my mother.” It came out quiet, but firm.

“Since when do you act like a dutiful daughter?” Jihoon asked. “Were you acknowledging your mother when you let her work her joints raw to take care of me? Or were you being a filial daughter when you left her to rot in the hospital?”

“Jihoon-ah.” Miyoung grabbed his arm. “Stop it.”

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