A Cab Called Reliable (10 page)

But my father thought it was more important to get on the old man's good side by working on the farm. The old man would call him,
Shin-ah! Shin-ah!
My father mistakenly believed that working for the old man and his wife would somehow earn him some points—love points, he called them. But they called him only when they needed wood chopped, land plowed, water fetched. He would hear
Shin-ah! Shin-ah!
And he grew to hate the sound of his name.

But it wasn't my father who had it the worst in his family. Han-il
noo nah,
she was driven out of her mind and out of the house. After Grandmother was kicked out, my father said that Han-il
noo nah
lost it. She was wetting herself and listening with her ear pressed close to the walls. The old man's back wasn't strong enough to pull her away from the walls day in and day out, so he sent her away to marry one of his friends' sons. It was a business deal. He owed his friend some money, and this way he got his debt canceled. My father didn't see his sister for about a year. Then he got news that she was wetting herself and listening to the walls again. My father told me that she was now working at a Buddhist temple. She cooked the meals for the monks there. It was a beautiful temple, built on the side of a mountain, facing the sea. My father had visited there, a little outside Pusan. He said that Han-il
noo nah
seemed happy there.

For the rest of the afternoon I sat in the passenger's seat, telling myself never to go to the
World Book
for stories, and thinking about my poor aunt Han-il and how she was terribly wronged by her family, my father included. Behind me came the sound of coins being dropped into the metal money box and my father trying to tell his customers to have a good day. I wanted to write a story about my aunt Han-il, giving her another life because I did not believe she could be happy cooking meals for a bunch of silent men. I refused to participate in her suffering; she would be redeemed from that life into another by my imagination. When my father visited his sister, he had not noticed the unhappiness in her eyes. He was betrayed by the beauty of the mountain, the sea, and the temple.

I turned around and asked, “Did she have children?”

“Who?” he asked, wiping off the counter.

“Your sister,” I said.

“She had a son,” he said, and explained that the father would not let her near the baby because he was convinced that her insanity was contagious.

That evening my father closed shop after selling the final egg roll. He tossed me a blueberry pie before starting the engine and said we would pick up cheeseburgers for dinner. As my father drove through the streets of D.C., he talked of having made this and this much money today, and if we kept this up a little longer, we would make this and this much by Christmas, and in no time we would have our own grocery store and live in a big brick house somewhere far away from Burning Rock Court.

“Do you like the sound of that?” he asked.

I told my father that yes, yes, it was all fine with me, but I was not listening to him. My mind had been on my aunt Han-il all afternoon, and during the drive back home she was still alive somewhere between my memory and imagination. I could not stop thinking about her and how I would save her from her misery. The sentences I had memorized and planned to write for the school contest were forgotten, and I began mouthing new words, new phrases, new sentences. As my father talked about good weather being good for business and bad weather being bad for business, I traced letters onto my left palm with my right index finger. I formed the first words of my new story that would surely win first place.

9

My teacher usually loved anything I wrote that was about Korea. But my submission for the Young Writers Contest disappointed her. She told me that the writing in my story about aunt Han-il was technically just fine, nearly professional. However, the story itself was difficult to believe. “One is required to suspend an unreasonable amount of one's disbelief,” she said with a friendly frown.

Within three pages, I had written my aunt's life story. She was abused and driven to insanity by her father, stepmother, and brothers. Her father sold her into a marriage in order to have his debts canceled. Her husband tormented her emotionally, physically, and mentally. My aunt then ran away from her home to live in a Buddhist temple, where she cooked meals for the monks. Haunted by past memories, she returned to the family with poisoned rice cakes. Her father, stepmother, and brothers gladly ate them and died instantly. Aunt Han-il burned down the house, emigrated to America, worked as a secretary in a doctor's office, married a Ph.D., had two daughters, and lived happily ever after.

My teacher said that I had enough material for an entire novel, and I could not possibly do justice to my aunt's life in three pages. The ending was artificial and contrived. Returning my story to me, she asked, “Ahn Joo, do you ever hear voices?” Without giving me a chance to respond, she told me to listen to them.

When I laid down in the center of my room with my palms pressed on the floor and my eyes closed, I heard the voice of my mother. She told me to do this and do that, don't do this and don't do that, you're good enough for this, but not good enough for that. I memorized the way she sounded, so that when I woke up, I could go to my notebook and record it.

*   *   *

Third place went to a Japanese girl, who wrote a diary comparing and contrasting her life in Kyoto with her life in Arlington; second place went to a boy, who wrote about his blind father reading him and his little brother bedtime stories in the dark; runner-up was awarded to an essay called “How to Save the World Through Arts and Crafts,” written by my classmate, Jennifer Beechum, whose father was a well-known painter of some sort; and I was awarded first place for my piece, “The Voice of My Mother.”

My teacher returned it to me with a gold star on the top right corner of the first page. She said that it was a mature, honest, powerful, poignant, and sophisticated piece of writing, and I should give serious thought to becoming a writer some day. Jennifer Beechum and I were to read our writings during our graduation ceremony.

My father could not attend my graduation ceremony, which was held on a Wednesday in the middle of the afternoon, because he was working in Washington, D.C. When I showed him my report card for the final marking period and told him I had won first place for a story I had written about Mother, he asked, “What did you say? What did you say about her?” To put him at ease, I lied and told him I had written about the time she made me mussel soup for my birthday.

“I'm reading it tomorrow for graduation,” I said.

Glancing at my report card, he poured more milk into my glass and said that graduating from elementary school was only the first step. Graduating from college, now that would be a real accomplishment. He looked at my report card again, pointed at all my A's, and told me I was his only hope.

“I hate milk,” I said.

“Drink it or you'll stop growing,” he said and put a spoonful of rice into his mouth.

That night I went to bed early because I could not hold back my tears. In bed I told myself to stop or else my eyes would swell and reading with swollen eyes was impossible. Clearing my throat, I practiced saying aloud: “My name is Ahn Joo Cho, and my essay is called ‘The Voice of My Mother.' I have written something called ‘The Voice of My Mother,' which I will be reading to you today. ‘The Voice of My Mother,' a prose poem by Ahn Joo Cho…” And I reminded myself never to say thank you. Why should I, like a leper, beggar, orphan, thank them for listening to me?

*   *   *

When the principal called my name, Ahn Joo Cho, as the recipient of this year's Young Writers Award, I stood up and walked with bowed head to the podium where the microphone was waiting for me. Jennifer Beechum had already read her essay and she had received great applause that I did not think my reading would match. She had family in the audience, who clapped and yelped and blew sharp whistles her way. The auditorium was full. At the foot of the stage the school band was getting ready to play the closing song. My teachers were scattered throughout the room. The clock on the opposite wall read 12:30. I pulled down the microphone, cleared my throat, and in my most confident voice said, “This is The Voice of My Mother.' She passed away a year ago.

“Chew on parsley if your mouth tastes old. Smear chicken grease on your lips so no one will think you go hungry. Boiled dandelion leaves with sesame oil and seeds make you go to the bathroom. Raisins soaked in
soju
relax your muscles. Chew gum, it'll help you digest. But don't chew gum like that with your teeth showing. Just like those country cows. No one wants to see your crooked teeth. When you smile, keep your lips together. Don't scrunch up your nose and eyes like that when you laugh—you'll get wrinkles. Why do you laugh so loudly? What do you have to laugh about? What do you have to cry about? Did your mother die? Is that why you cry? Or are you crying because your mother's still alive? Are you going to stop the tears or not? Stop biting your nails. They'll think you go so hungry, you have to eat yourself. Who taught you to eat your fish like that? You leave all the good parts. Suck out the fish eyes, they'll make you see better. Don't make me buy you eyeglasses. Where do you go to buy eyeglasses here? Suck out the fish brain, it'll help you speak English. Then you can go buy your own eyeglasses. Chew on the bones, but don't swallow them. Chew and spit them out. America has no place to remove fish bones from a stupid girl's throat. Girls stupid enough to swallow fish bones deserve to choke. Don't hold your rice bowl in the palm of your hand. You want to make me a mother of a peasant? At home, eat slowly; outside, eat fast or everyone else will eat your seconds and thirds. But don't eat like you haven't been fed. Eat like a lady. Get your seconds and thirds, like a lady. But get your seconds and thirds. What do they feed you at school? Do you get enough? Crazy girl. Why aren't you eating? What are you going to live on? If you don't eat, you're going to be a midget. You'll never grow as tall as these American girls. Don't you want to look like them? Don't you want to be Miss America? Eat. Your hair won't grow. You won't ever need a bra. Your teeth will fall out. You'll stay ugly like that forever. Who's going to marry you? We'll have to send you back to the bridge where the lepers live. That's where we found you, underneath a bridge. You don't belong to me. No child of mine sucks on ice cubes used to freeze fish. Get away from me. You're so dirty. I can't believe you're sucking on those ice cubes. No one's going to marry you. Again? You're crying again? What do I have to do? You want butter and soy sauce in your rice? You want fried
kimchi?
You want fried anchovies, pork dumplings, kelp? Stop complaining. The cabbage here isn't the same. What do you want me to do, fly to Korea? How am I supposed to make you
shik keh
in this country? Even if I could, I wouldn't make it for a selfish, picky girl like you. You should know. You expect to find
jja jjang myun
here?
Been deh dduck, paht bing su, ho dduck
—in America? Eat what you have or starve. What do you want me to do? You want pink fish eggs, green fish cakes? You want rice cakes, don't you? You want dates and pine nuts? Where am I going to find rice cakes? Ahn Joo-yah, what are you crying for? Did your mother die? What are you crying for?”

There was an uncomfortable silence in the auditorium. When I looked up, I caught sight of my teacher, leaning against the kitchen door with her right hand over her heart. The two flute players below me yawned. There was a shuffling in the back where mothers began setting up trays of cookies, cakes, and donuts. When I said, “The end,” the audience politely applauded. I reluctantly bowed, said thank you, and returned to my seat, where Jennifer Beechum, elbowing me, said, “Way too weird. Way too dark. Way too depressing.”

That evening, my father brought home an electric typewriter that was missing its A and E keys and told me not to make any rice for tomorrow's dinner because he was going to take me to a Chinese restaurant. He asked how graduation ceremony went. Showing him my writing, proudly wearing its gold star, I told him I had read it aloud without making a single mistake, without stuttering once. He skimmed through the pages, palmed my head, tilted my neck back, and said that my writing was the prettiest he had ever seen.

10

When I told my father that a black boy on my bus was flicking cigarette ashes onto my head and telling me to bend over, he said he would drive me to my junior high school every morning. When I told him some girls laughed at my green jeans, my father said that he would buy me blue ones although green was a good color. When I told him my English teacher secretly drank Scotch out of her Dr. Pepper can and often fell asleep before finishing her sentences, and Miles the janitor was caught masturbating behind the trash bins during my lunch period, and the only thing my depressed algebra teacher ever talked about was his recent divorce, and some of the older students did not yet know the difference between a noun and a verb, a prepositional phrase and its object, the subject from the predicate, and I began bleeding, my father folded the
Korean Times
onto his lap and told me to pack, because we would be moving to Morning Glory Way in Potomac, Maryland.

*   *   *

On Halloween, my father enrolled me in my new school, called Weston Junior High, a five-minute walk from our new home. He walked me through the main entrance, dropped me off at the door of the main office, and reminded me to turn on the rice maker when I got home. Handing me a ten-dollar bill for lunch money, he asked if I had washed my hair in the morning because it looked oily. Looking at the other students passing in the hallway, he told me my blue jeans fit well on me and that I was a smart girl. I turned the knob of the door, said good-bye, and went inside.