The calligrapher's daughter_ a novel - Eugenia Kim [173]
He shook my hand energetically, saying, “Me too!” I was glad my English was understandable even if it was apparently funny enough to make him laugh so heartily.
That evening, after a plain supper of fishbone soup and millet, I told my family about Pfc. Forbes and the possibility of writing to Calvin. Necessity had erased the habit of separate living quarters, especially on the coldest nights in winter when there was only enough fuel for a single brazier. To preserve fuel, we had also used the braziers to cook in the sitting room. Venting the awful fumes sometimes made it as cold as if there were no embers, but then the wind would die and warmth would glow on our faces. On warm summer and fall days such as this, we reclaimed the kitchen and gathered as usual in the sitting room for meals, all of us by now completely accustomed to eating together. Grandfather sat with Sunok happily ensconced on his lap, her favorite place of late, and his favorite place for her as well. The child had done more for my father’s health than any combination of herbs. Next to Grandfather sat Ilsun, with Meeja a little behind him, and on the other side I sat with Grandmother. We three women picked the few flakes of fish from our bowls and popped them in Sunok’s mouth.
I asked Dongsaeng if he could spare two sheets of paper for me to write a letter and craft an envelope.
He shook his head. “I’ve nothing left.”
“In my study,” said Grandfather, “there’s a history book on the middle shelf. Its end papers would do.”
I looked at him appreciatively. These five years in Seoul, either something in my viewpoint or something in his had changed. I worried at first that he’d given up completely, that time had defeated his personal battle for the righteous old way. But when I learned that the cause of his refusal to leave the house was to avoid speaking Japanese, I felt reassured. I also guessed that some of his reticence to go out resulted from the catcalls and stares directed at him as he walked the streets wearing yangban hanbok, as threadbare as mine but always clean and pressed.
After my father had turned sixty, without fanfare much to everyone’s regret, I’d noted his steady withdrawal into woodcarving until his tools were sold or “donated” to the cause. I had also assumed that his retirement age and status as grandfather were the roots of his inner calm and steady good health, rather than a submission to Japanese rule. Or perhaps scarcity in material life had accented for us both the richness we shared in family. I also attributed it to Sunok’s blissful presence among us, and how a simple origami frog or a crumpled ball of paper tied to a string could give her joy. This was the cause of Ilsun’s lack of available paper for letter writing and therefore Grandfather’s willingness to deface a precious book of history.
I saved a few grains of millet to use as paste, and after the sun had set and the house was quiet, I composed my letter, writing tightly with a narrow brush, filling every centimeter of the thin paper.
September 17, 1945, Seoul. Husband, if this letter finds you we must give thanks to an American G.I., Neil Forbes, a Christian angel, who kindly offered to post it through U.S. Army mail. Forgive the funny paper. You will see from the return address that we moved. We came here at winter’s end in 1939. I could not let you know this because of the China War, then the big war. Although I received no letters from you for many years, I learned later that you had written frequently. That knowledge