Human Acts(21)

“It’s always been my job,” Eun-sook repeated, but firmer this time. She attempted a smile but the pain rendered it a sorry affair, and she twisted away to save the boss from being troubled by the sight of her swollen cheek.

—

Once everyone else had left the office and headed home, Eun-sook wound her ink-black scarf around the lower portion of her face, making sure that her cheeks were covered all the way up to her eyes. She gave the kerosene stove one last double-check, switched off all the lights, and even flicked the fuses to the down position. Standing before the door, its glass darkly mirroring the lightless office, she closed her eyes for just a moment, as though steeling herself before stepping outside.

The evening wind was bitter. It chilled the skin around her eyes, the only part left exposed by the scarf. Still, she didn’t want to take the bus. After a day spent sitting at her desk, she took pleasure in an unhurried walk home through the streets. This was the only time of day when she chose not to shut out the inchoate thoughts that surfaced, unbidden, as she threaded her way through the streets.

Was it because he is left-handed that the man hit my right cheek with his left hand?

But when he tossed the proofs onto the table, when he handed me the pen, he definitely used his right hand…

Is it that the specific emotional rush when you attack someone sparks a reflexive response in the left hand rather than the right?

The bitter taste at the back of her mouth was identical to the bile that surfaced before a bout of carsickness. Swallowing saliva was her usual trick to quell this familiar nausea, the sensation occurring simultaneously in the back of her mouth, her throat, and stomach, and unaccountably tied to thoughts of you. Yet it wasn’t enough, this time, so she got some gum out of her coat pocket and started to work it with her teeth.

Wasn’t his hand a little on the small side, compared with most men?

She threaded her way between men in monochrome blazers, schoolgirls wearing white surgical masks, women whose skirt suits left their calves exposed to the biting wind, walking with her head bowed.

Wasn’t it a hand like any other, not especially large or coarse, one you could see on any man?

She walked on, conscious of the scarf’s slight pressure against the swelling. She walked on, the strong scent of acacia coming from the gum she made sure to keep on the left side of her mouth. Remembering how she had sat there, neither seeking to flee nor uttering the faintest cry of protest, merely waiting, holding her breath, for that second slap to come flying toward her face, she walked on.





Slap Three


She alights from the bus at the stop in front of Deoksu palace. Just like the day before, her scarf is wound around her face all the way up to her eyes. Beneath the scarf, the swelling has subsided, leaving in its place the clear imprint of a hand-sized reddish bruise.

“Excuse me.” A robust-looking plainclothes policeman stops her in front of City Hall. “Please open your bag.”

At such moments, she knows, a part of one’s self must be temporarily detached from the whole. One level of her conscious mind peels away, a sheet of paper folding with the ease of habit along an oft-used crease. She opens her bag and displays the contents—a hand towel, acacia gum, a pencil case, the bound proof that the publisher’s niece brought to the office the day before, Vaseline for chapped lips, a notebook, a purse—without the slightest flicker of shame.

“What is your business here?”

“I have an appointment at the censor’s office. I work for a publisher.” She looks the policeman directly in the eye.

She produces her resident’s card when instructed to do so. She looks on, unmoving, as he rummages through the pouch containing her sanitary towels. Just like what had happened two days ago, in the interrogation room at the police station. Just like that sleet-streaked April four years ago, after her cramming had finally paid off, and she’d passed the university entrance exams second time around and moved up to Seoul from Gwangju.

She’d been eating lunch late in the university cafeteria when the glass door banged open and a crowd of students raced in. The hand clutching her spoon had frozen as she stared blankly at the sight of plainclothes policemen pursuing them through the cafeteria, roaring threats and brandishing clubs. One of their number seemed especially worked up—skidding to a halt in front of a chubby boy whose mouth was hanging open above his plate of curry and rice, he snatched up a chair and swung it over the table. The burst of blood from the boy’s forehead gushed down over his nose and mouth. The spoon dropped from Eun-sook’s fingers. Unthinkingly bending down to pick it up, her hand closed upon a flyer that had fallen to the floor. The thick font swam in front of her eyes. DOWN WITH THE BUTCHER CHUN DOO-HWAN. Just then, a rough hand grabbed hold of her long hair. It tore the paper from her grasp and dragged her off her chair.

—

DOWN WITH THE BUTCHER CHUN DOO-HWAN.

Those words feel seared onto her chest as she gazes up now at the photograph of the president hung on the plaster wall. How is it, she wonders, that a face can so effectively conceal what lies behind it? How is it not indelibly marked by such callousness, brutality, murderousness? Perched awkwardly on a stool beneath the window, she tears at a hangnail. The room is warm, but she can’t remove her scarf; the brand on her cheek is flushed from the radiator’s heat.

The man behind the counter wears the uniform of the Defense Security Command. When he calls the name of her publisher, Eun-sook goes up to the counter and hands over the book proof. She asks for the manuscript proofs to be returned, which she gave in for inspection two weeks ago.