Sublimation(11)

You go to the couch and open the envelope without any ceremony before shaking the contents onto the coffee table. Papers slide out. Folded letters, heavy cardstock, notebooks. A very official-looking piece of cream-colored paper, sealed with a red stamp. Soyoung sits across from you, leaning over the document. She unfolds it.

“It’s a deed to the house,” she says.

You pause from where you’re picking up one of the cards.

“Shut up,” you say.

She passes it to you wordlessly. It’s all in Korean. You think it’s talking about property, and it lists an address. Your grandfather’s house. The house you grew up in.

“It’s his house,” Soyoung says, like you wouldn’t remember his house. “He gave you his house.”

“But I don’t want his house,” you say. You’re not sure how to feel about this. Your grandfather is a man mostly faded from your memory. You remember him in the way he sat in his armchair and crossed his arms, you remember him in the house like they are one and the same. Your childhood memories are in that house. You grew up there. You don’t think about that house a lot, not every week, not every month. Only when you see forsythia. You don’t need to own property in Korea. You really don’t need to own an antiquated house that hasn’t been updated since you were a kid.

“I don’t live here!”

You toss the deed on the table. You can’t read Korean legalese. You can speak Korean conversationally. You couldn’t read a dense novel, or have a business discussion. You can talk about family things. Friend things. Restaurants and where the bathroom is and where you’re going, you can talk about your feelings, a little, but you wouldn’t know how to write any of it down properly. This says something about a transfer. Legal ownership. You don’t know how this works or what the document is supposed to have—you really wouldn’t know in English, either. She picks it up.

“What does it say?” you ask your instance. Her knuckles are white.

If this were a movie, this would be the moment she told you about your grandfather’s last request. To reintegrate. She’d tell you like it was a relief to have the secret out, and she’d say that she thought it was a fucked-up request from a fucked-up old man, and you’d say, “Yeah! This whole thing is super weird,” and you’d tell her that you still don’t know why you agreed to come.

And you would tell her that you had been hoping for some sort of closure, maybe. And she would nod, because she understands closure. And seeing you would be closure for her, final proof of what-could-have-been, and then she’d translate the deed and the will and understand what’s going on, and you could bond over that, and you would say that you’re sorry for never getting in contact, it’s just that you thought that she wouldn’t want to talk to you, because if you were the one left behind you would have been mad about the whole situation, and you had never really wanted to think about how there was a whole other life being lived by someone who is you.

But this isn’t what happens. Soyoung stands up. She walks away.

“Soyoung,” you call. It’s odd to be calling another person Soyoung. To you, you’re Soyoung. Soyoung for your mother and your late grandfather and the one white ex-boyfriend who insisted on using your real name and for no one else.

Soyoung turns. She tilts her head.

“Are you okay?”

She smiles.

“Honestly? I’m really pissed off, and I don’t want to say something I’ll regret. So I’m going to go to bed. Good night.”

You’re too tired to chase her. Fine. Let it lie. There’s all of tomorrow, and you’re angry too. Not at her, but maybe at yourself.





SOYOUNG


When you wake up, Rose is gone. Her suitcase is open and her pajamas are neatly folded on top. She’s left a note: I went for a walk. Here’s my number, in case. I have international roaming so OK to call.

You don’t see the envelope. She must have taken it with her. You’re still angry in the clear light of morning. Not at her, but at your grandfather. He gave her the house. The house you grew up in. What do you get? You get the mandate to reintegrate with her. And the documents stipulate that the house belongs to your instance, or your future reintegration. Not you. You wonder if your grandfather’s playing some sort of complicated game from beyond the grave, or if these are a bunch of loose, unconnected threads that you’re creating a nonsensical map out of. What does he want from you? What does he actually want you to do?

In the warm wet embrace of washing your hair, you’re awake enough to run through a laundry list of questions. Why was your instance so mad about the house? If she was so mad about getting the house, why did she come back to Korea? Why are you mad that you didn’t get the house? You hadn’t expected the house to begin with, you didn’t know anything about your grandfather’s finances and you had thought that if anyone was going to get anything, it would be your mother. You don’t even want the house, you just want her not to have been given the house. Your mind conjures plots, schemes, tangled webs. But you already know the family secrets, and most of them are about dead people.

You step out of the shower and towel-dry your hair. You think about how most of these questions aren’t really relevant. You wipe condensation from the mirror and brush your teeth. You think about how mostly, people don’t know why they do things or why they want them.