Yolk(67)

I still held the ring when I woke up.

I felt as though I’d failed a test. That I’d sold her out for a piece of jewelry. I needed to fix all of these acidic, roiling feelings that arose in me. I needed to undo my mistakes. Be forgiven for my sins. I was desperate to get rid of the salty, unctuous, sick, thick bribe inside me. I pulled the cord.

There was this dream I used to have during those months after Mom vanished. That I was standing up to take Communion in an enormous, Gothic church. It was cold and bright, and I had to climb hundreds of steep stairs into the light. I was always too scared to look down, and when I reached the top, I offered up my hands, one exposed palm over the other, to receive the dried-out wafer of sacrament. And that’s when I’d feel the searing heat of a sting on the outstretched flesh of my palm and watch the bee disembowel itself.

While Mom was gone, I tried rubbing my own ear and was shocked by how loud and insistent it was, how unpleasant. It never occurred to me that she might not be experiencing the exact soothing, quieting sensation I was. I hadn’t known I was a nuisance.

I never told June or Dad that I’d seen her go. It became so clear what she’d meant when she’d screamed “You girls don’t get to have everything,” gesturing wildly to the dress I’d defiled. June stayed up for her night after night, but I knew she wasn’t coming back. And each time Dad called when he thought we were asleep, I lost a little more respect for him. I had seen the look on her face. She’d given me her ring, and I’d betrayed her by taking it. I’d given her permission to leave when my sister or father would have demanded she stay.

When June left, my secret exploded.





chapter 30


Mom turns to me with an expectant face. I sense she’s been talking to me.

The harsh lighting casts heavy shadows at her cheeks, filling the grooves by her lips, her neck. She rarely wears makeup, just a chalky film of SPF one zillion sunscreen, and her hair is heathered in between light brown and gray.

I shake my head. “I couldn’t hear you,” I tell her in Korean.

“Doesn’t matter,” she says, seemingly annoyed as she busies herself with saucepans. Chopsticks in hand, she sets down trivets on the table and plants saucepans atop them.

For a brief moment I wonder why we’re eating in the kitchen and not at the dining table. Why the only time the dining table has ever been set was the day she left.

“Wow,” June says, coming up from behind me. “What a feast.” She dangles a small robin’s-egg-blue Tiffany’s shopping bag by its white handles. “This is from both of us,” she says, nodding at me. Mom looks to June, then to me, and wipes her hands on her apron before taking it.

“Oh, it looks expensive,” Dad says, smiling.

Mom cuts him a sharp look. “I’ll look at it later,” she says, visibly embarrassed. “Dinner first.”

“Just open it,” says Dad. For an unsteady second, I’m convinced it’s a ring.

Mom takes off her apron and slings it on the back of a chair. She hands the bag to Dad as she tugs her scrunchie off and gathers the loose strands into a tighter ponytail. She wipes her hands on her thighs again and reaches for it. My heart aches when I recognize her actions for what they are. My mother felt the need to change, to be presentable, before she could receive such a fancy gift. If she weren’t so self-conscious about her self-consciousness, I know she would have excused herself to put on lipstick.

She carefully removes a flat, square box from the bag. She stares at it for a moment, almost suspiciously. “Thank you,” she says, to the box, unable to look at either of us. When she tugs at the ivory satin ribbon gingerly, it’s as if she half expects it to detonate. Set atop a rectangle of cottony fluff is a delicate chain with a tiny diamond-studded cross. Mom lifts it and holds it to the light. It’s beautiful.

“Thank you,” she says again. In the same breath, she adds, “You shouldn’t have spent so much money.”

“Do you love it?” asks June, grabbing Mom’s shoulders from behind, jostling her until she smiles. “It’s an early birthday present.”

Mom’s birthday isn’t for a month.

“I love it.”

Mom hands it to Dad for him to fasten, turning and carefully lifting her ponytail.

“It’s not like anything else you have,” says June, crowding them, casting a shadow so Dad can’t see.

Dad ushers Mom into the light. “The little clasp is so small,” he says, frowning and craning his neck away to help his farsightedness. My parents seem so old and June seems so needy, I can’t look at any of them.

“It’s platinum,” says June.

Finally, Mom touches the cross where it falls on her chest. “I can tell it’s platinum by the weight,” she says, smiling at all of us. “A woman my age shouldn’t have to wear silver.”

She says it so silkily that we all laugh. June loudest.

“Now, that’s enough,” she says, hurriedly unwrapping all the dishes covered in plastic. The moment is over. “Everyone sit. I timed it all perfectly.”

I take my usual seat at the square kitchen table. “You should stop losing weight,” she says, setting down yet another earthenware pot of stew. “It makes you look older.”

“I am older.”