It was the time of stillness just before night turned into dawn. The sky was painted in the darkest shade of blue; birds would start singing exactly an hour later. JungHo flew through the neighborhood, where he knew every store, building, and even the jujube tree house that drew pregnant visitors around the clock. That was where he found the old midwife in her bed. Out of everyone in Seoul, she alone didn’t seem taken aback by JungHo’s appearance. All the babies of the area had long been born into her wrinkled hands, whether on the earth floor of mud huts or silk cots in mansions.
When the midwife arrived, she took a look at Luna and ordered the girls to bring her a pair of shears, some yarn, clean linens, hot water, and cold water. A few hours passed without much progress. Despite the girls’ panic, the midwife went outside to take a break and sat next to JungHo in front of the garden. He didn’t understand why she seemed so relaxed. Just before daybreak she disappeared inside again and left him to watch the gradual graying of the world alone.
JungHo dozed off for a half hour, perhaps more. He was startled awake when Jade came out and said with a smile, “It’s a girl.”
“How are they doing? And are you feeling okay?” JungHo asked.
“They’re both sleeping. The granny said the baby is the prettiest newborn she’s ever delivered—and she’s even been midwife to a royal princess,” Jade said, beckoning him to follow her to the kitchen. “Here, you can take whatever you’d like.”
“I didn’t do this to get food,” JungHo said, confused and disappointed. “I wanted to help you.”
“I know, JungHo. Thank you.” Jade reached out and grabbed his hand. Her fingertips sent blooming stars up and down the length of his arm. He wished he could stay standing there forever, holding hands with her. But then she let go and started wrapping food in a large kerchief.
“I’m sorry you can’t stay . . . I have to go back to Luna now.” She led him again by hand across the courtyard toward the gates, and suddenly stopped. “If you hadn’t come, Luna might have died. It’s strange how you showed up at that moment, because I was thinking about you. I didn’t even know how you could help but you just came into my head.”
He wanted to tell her that she was inside his head all the time, that she could very well be living there like it was her house, but a sudden wave of shyness stopped him. The morning sun was sparkling on the tips of her eyelashes; her wispy hair escaped from last night’s braid and frizzed around her face like a cloud. She shone with the promise of something far greater than the eleven years of her life, and JungHo thought he could see and love even her future self.
“I’m going to tell Aunt Dani how you helped and she’s going to reward you. She might even let you stay with us, in a spare room in the house. Then you wouldn’t have to sleep outside in the cold. You’d always have plenty to eat here, and maybe you’d even get to go to school. JungHo, I’m so happy!” She smiled and let him pass through the gates.
*
ON HER THIRD MORNING IN JAIL, Dani woke up with a nauseating wetness on her lower body and realized that she’d urinated in her sleep. Since getting arrested at the March, she had held herself instead of pissing straight onto the floor like the others. There was no chamber pot in the women’s cell. They weren’t getting water either, but she’d nonetheless felt the poison building pressure and spreading throughout her body, turning her skin yellow. Before she fell asleep the previous night, she—an intelligent and courageous woman—could think of no greater wish or pleasure than pissing like a waterfall, utterly alone.
As Dani gained full consciousness, the sheer, dumb, bodily relief turned into shame, and she cried for the first time since her arrest. No other inmate remarked on her accident or her sobbing, but they didn’t comfort her either. In prolonged destruction, there was no spirit of unity such as the one they had shared in face of a quick and heroic death.
The door at the end of the hallway clanked open, and a soldier approached with a bucket. Dani braced for him to throw the water into the cell, as he did so the past two days to dampen the putrefying smells. But he set the bucket down and called out.
“Kokoni Kimu Dani iru?”
She stood up, wobbling on her weakened legs. “Watashiga Kimu Dani desu.”
The soldier wrinkled his nose and put a fat finger to his nostrils, as if he could sense her stench growing stronger with her movement. His wispy mustache, waxed and curled like the f-hole of a violin, shook lightly as he beckoned her with his other hand.