The Calligrapher's Daughter (39 page)

I studied my porridge, hiding anger and the sense of violation over my opened letter, and also the horrible prospect of one more—one and a half more—bodies living in this room. We would have to share a bed. I prayed that the woman was at least well groomed.

Midday when I came home from teaching, my thoughts lingered on
the faint hopes Calvin’s letter had brought, and my resolve to try harder to make peace with the situation. I found my mother-in-law with an infant boy in her lap and the baby’s mother sitting nearby. Lim Yonghee looked puffy with postpregnancy and decidedly unhappy. We were introduced, and I said, “Welcome, Dongsaeng, Little Sister. I hope that
Ssi-umma-nim
has familiarized you with our humble home.”

“Humble indeed!” she said. “Unnee, Elder Sister, where do I put my son’s diapers to be washed? I can’t find room for my bed and Auntie said I should wait for you to fix me something to eat.” Yonghee’s perfectly shaped lips pouted and the faint vertical line between her eyes sank into a well-worn frown. When she saw my expression, she looked wounded. “Well, I would do it myself, but I’m still recuperating from the baby, you see, and such a long journey for my husband to come here. Naturally, I insisted we go to Pyeongyang because of the superior education he would receive, even though it would be a hardship on me, but I had no idea there’d be no other servants than—that there’d be no servants.”

Mrs. Cho said, “We live very simply, but you’ll see how helpful Daughter-in-law can be. It’s an honor for your husband to be here. Don’t wrinkle your pretty forehead, dear. You mustn’t sour your milk.”

I attempted friendliness and pointed to the linen closet. “That’s where your bedding goes, but come to the stove and I’ll show you how to heat water to wash diapers. I heard you were nursing, so I bought seaweed for soup. Why don’t you come and make soup?”

“I’m tired from travel, Unnee, and I need to rest. It’s only been a month since the baby, you see. Set out my bed and bring me the soup, won’t you? It sounds delicious.” Yonghee waved at a soiled diaper on the floor and displayed a sweet smile that rounded her cheeks beneath eyes glittering with ice. Aware that my next move would set a precedent, I refused to budge while my head spun to find a polite way to make this lazy girl take care of herself. I wished I were as practiced as she obviously was with the acerbic sarcasm of a spoiled brat.

Unfortunately, Mrs. Cho intervened. “Unnee will make a nice place for you to rest and I’ll watch the baby. Such a handsome boy! Come, Grandma will rock you and sing you a song.” I wanted to slap Yonghee’s smirk away; instead I efficiently unstrapped her bedroll and spread it on the floor, swept up the dirty diaper and primly went outside to make soup.

I washed diapers, gardened and prepared food while the two women fussed over the baby. When he slept, Yonghee lay beside him in bed, flipping through a cheap Japanese magazine. When my mother-in-law asked her to read the Bible aloud, Yonghee complied in a drone that I likened to a wasp ready to sting. At sundown Mrs. Cho said Reverend Cho would come home soon, and Yonghee visited the latrine and lingered in the garden so long that I had to fold her bedding to make room for the table. She sat with Mrs. Cho and the baby until Reverend Cho’s footstep was heard in the entryway. Yonghee dashed to the kitchen and brought bowls to the table. She greeted him warmly. “Auntie has kindly watched the baby all day so I could make dinner.” My eyes widened in disbelief at this trivial maneuvering. I looked at my mother-in-law, who gestured that it didn’t matter.

Yonghee had no problem with the bedtime routine and freely exposed her ample figure when she readied herself to lie in the blankets I’d repositioned next to Mrs. Cho. Once again, I stayed busy in the kitchen, waiting to hear rhythmic sleeping breaths before I undressed. With no more room for my bedding, I remained wrapped in my quilt and made myself as comfortable as I could on the linen closet floor, where I continued to sleep for all the miserable days I lived with my in-laws, days that slowly lapsed into months, then years.

Each time I gave my earnings to my father-in-law, he accepted them without comment and gave me a small amount back for food. At first I saved fifty jeon to visit the public bathhouse down the street, but saving became impossible when I saw that cash flowed through the house like smoke. Because of our dependency on the market for food and fuel, we were vulnerable to its rapidly rising prices and decreasingly available goods. Yonghee ate large portions and always asked for more, and I sometimes pretended I’d eaten at school so my in-laws would have a balanced meal. Within six months, I had sold all of the supplies I’d packed for American college. By the end of the first year, I had sold most of my books, more than half my clothes including the wedding dress, Western underwear and shoes, and then I sold the locker, and finally, Imo’s suitcase. Even as I handed it to the peddler, I wondered that I felt little emotion about parting with my beloved aunt’s thoughtful and cherished gift. I was tired, and empty.

My hands and feet became calloused and cracked as I washed diapers in all seasons, chopped wood, wove mats, mended the stove, walls and shutters. Without a proper entryway, mud, dirt and dust tracked through the house, and I was forever cleaning the floor.

Because I had asked Calvin and my family to write to me in care of the school, my father-in-law began to treat me with a coolness that grew into unfounded suspicions. He accused me of having an affair with the choral director and then, laughably, of trying to seduce Yonghee’s husband. I couldn’t fathom how such ideas entered his consciousness, but suspected that he had recognized my distaste for their way of living, and, perhaps, my despair, and had thus found fault with me. This sort of petty and calculated thinking exhausted me.

My cheeks sunk, my skin dulled and my lips were always held tight to hold resentment in and to mask my outright hatred of Yonghee. I enjoyed the kindergarten children and the choral rehearsals, which I defiantly continued attending, and even found time to study for my license to practice obstetrics. But when I came home, the spark faded from my eyes and my spirit darkened. Sometimes the baby cried at night and Yonghee breastfed him. I listened to the soft nestling of mother and child. My body ached for my husband then, for the future I’d counted on and lost, for Gaeseong, for anything different from this peasant life, this slavery. I wondered if the despicable living conditions and my despair would ever end, but I did not pray.