The Calligrapher's Daughter (36 page)

When I finally reappeared, it was wonderful to see Calvin sitting in the armchair, looking completely relaxed and strikingly handsome. “Comfortable?” he said. My tongue had apparently died in the suddenly intimate and still room, and I nodded, self-consciously smoothing my hair. “It flatters you,” he said of my bob, which made me happy and abashed. “Come and see.” He had arranged the photos on the table.

Unable to look at him further, I gladly studied the pictures. I was surprised to see his hand resting on my shoulder in the portrait where I sat and he stood behind me, not remembering his touch then. He looked as appropriately solemn as I, and I loved seeing the sharp clean lines of his face, polished with the glow of the photographer’s flash. My solo portrait
for the passport seemed foreign to me, the dress making me seem more Chinese than Korean. I frowned at an unruly dent in my bob, and at my nose which appeared even larger in the two-dimensional image. Calvin named the half-dozen men and women who had posed with us at the altar, describing their relationship to him or his father. I gazed longingly at the image of Dongsaeng and my mother in this group shot. He divided the pictures and slipped a copy of my passport picture in his pocket, a tiny gesture that encouraged a blossoming sense of closeness to him. “I’ll give these to my father to show my mother tomorrow. You keep the rest until we can frame them.” I thanked my husband, glad to have in my possession the photograph with my mother and Dongsaeng in it, and hoped I’d have a chance the next day to send one of the images home.

To become accustomed to walking in raised heels, I decided to wear the leather shoes handed down from Mrs. Bennett, tying them tightly. We went out. Lit with electric lights, the streets were quiet, a few automobiles and a tram passing now and then as we strolled the paved sidewalks. The stars loomed high above the cluster of tall buildings, the night breeze cool and gentle on my arms.

“A full day,” Calvin said presently.

“Yes.” I thought hard to say something else but was feeling stupidly shy. We passed the stone and brick church where I’d been joined to this man. “A big church. Beautiful,” I offered.

“I’m very pleased.” He touched my bare forearm.

Instinctively I withdrew and crossed my arms, then regretted my reaction. I disengaged my arms and smiled at him. “A good day.” His eyes reflected streetlight and calm, and I relaxed. “Thank you,” I added. His smile warmed me to my toes, and I wondered if this was what love was.

We approached a large stately building fronted with pilasters, surrounded by tall iron railings and draped with a huge imperial flag. “Perhaps this is the Manchu palace,” said Calvin, pausing as if to take in the enormity of change that fact elicited. If it was indeed where the last Chinese emperor resided, we were witnessing the home of the end of the Qing Dynasty, as ignoble an end as our nation had suffered.

We walked on and passed other buildings newly built in European styles, their austere profiles brightly lit. I looked to the heavens and noted how few stars were visible from beneath the streetlights, and I thought
that maybe the price of progress was too high. “It’s as modern here as downtown Seoul.”

He smiled. “The government office in Pyeongyang is not as prominent as any of these. Yuhbo, here’s the plan. Tomorrow early, we’ll take the train and I’ll pick up the trunk I stored at the Pyeongyang station. My father will meet us, then he’ll take you to the passport office while I travel on to Busan. After you get your papers, he’ll help retrieve your luggage from the stationmaster and you’ll follow me to Busan. I hope you’ll have time to visit my mother. I’ll give you the cable address of the Presbyterian mission, and you can wire when I should meet your train.”

“Thank you for thinking of everything.”

“We’ll see. I’m afraid it might take more than a day to secure your papers. You’ll have to wire in any case. There’s a telegraph near the passport office; my father will show you.”

“Yes, thank you.” Our footsteps fell quietly side by side.

“If you’re delayed, at least you’ll have a few days with my mother. I do want her to meet you.”

“It would be an honor to serve your parents.”

“I’m afraid the house is small, not at all what you’re accustomed to, but it would only be for a short time.”

I wondered what happened to the two-story house busy with patriots and serving as a sock factory. “Please don’t worry. I already regret that I’m not entering your household properly.” We turned a corner where the buildings stood short and squat and the streets narrowed, and instinctively we turned back toward the hotel.

“We should practice English,” he said. “Where can I send a cable?” He repeated the phrase in English, as did I, savoring the consonants in my throat. He corrected my pronunciation with new phrases pertaining to travel, and I recorded them in my mind in phonetic Korean. By the time we entered the lobby, we were laughing lightly from the lessons, and I didn’t flinch at all when he took my elbow to climb the stairs.

He excused himself to the bathroom, and I busily packed the photographs and turned down the bed. He appeared in shirtsleeves, his tie unknotted and draped like a minister’s shawl. I lowered my eyes and slipped past him carrying my nightgown. “Dear God,” I said silently disrobing. “Help me to not be afraid.” Trying to banish anatomy textbook images
of reproductive organs that floated behind my eyes, I tied my nightgown over breasts swelling helplessly to quickened heartbeats, and scrubbed my feet, face and hands. Noiselessly, I hurried across the empty hallway and was grateful to see the room darkened and him beneath the covers.

The silhouette of blankets lifted to welcome me. I placed my dress over the chair, my fingers shaking, and lay beside him, flat and scared and as far away as possible. Shifting near, he drew a finger from my ear to my chin as my eyes adjusted to the dark. I saw his full lips smiling, his lopsided front teeth, and focused on his night-deepened eyes. His hand traveled to my neck, over the knobs of my collarbone, sending coolness through my body. Putting his lips to my ear, he fumbled with the ties of my nightgown and whispered, “My wife.” His hands slid to caress me.

Surprised that my body warmed, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to push him away or embrace him, but I lay still, conscious of my duty to my new husband. He tugged the gown aside and caressed me, his hands fumbling across my hips. On their own, my legs parted and bent. I gasped when his fingers pressed against me, opening. He lifted the blankets and moved on top, while my unwitting hands gathered him close and my legs received him. I cried out with fullness, then pain that made me grimace. He pushed once, twice, more, and in the confusion of sheets and sensation, I opened my eyes, flushed with unexpected pleasure as he moved.

“Najin,” he said. I felt a pulse on my thigh, then wetness. I loosened my body and he breathed against my neck, his lips soft. He turned on his side with a contented sigh that pleased me. He touched my face, then threw his arm across my chest and fell asleep. Worried about the mess below, I gently raised my hips and tucked my nightgown beneath. When he breathed deeply with sleep, I crept out of bed, donned a slip and tiptoed across the hall. I washed the nightgown and myself, then by the pale streetlight filtering through the curtain in our room, spread a hotel towel over the wet bedsheet. Lying wide-awake, I smiled at his throaty snores. My thigh tingled as if remembering him there, and I was grateful he hadn’t released himself inside me—pregnancy would be impossible for a college student!—although I wasn’t sure if it was intentional or not. The ceiling fixture seemed to form the characters for woman. I closed my eyes to unweave the feelings trapped in my body. A small ache below caused me to clench my pelvic muscles, and the wave of deepness recalled my
solitary nights in Changdeok Palace down the hall from the princess. Now a married woman, I gave myself permission to continue until my hips tensed, then lightened, and a small sound sprang from deep in my body. After checking that Calvin’s breathing remained unchanged, I lay flat and straight on the too-soft mattress, and slept.

I woke in complete darkness as Calvin pressed against me. His legs guided mine apart and he hovered above. His lips brushed my lips and his rough chin scratched my ear and neck. I hoisted my pelvis to straighten the towel, and he grasped my hips. I willed my body to comply with his and hid involuntary cries in his shoulder. He moved faster, and as I felt his tension mounting, I pushed him out with my legs. He splashed on my belly and I reached down to contain it. My fingers raked across his sex. Frightened by his sharp intake of breath, I said, “Are you all right?”

“Yes, thank you,” he murmured and rolled to his side. I lay still, my hand cupped on my sticky belly and waited for him to fall asleep, but he tossed a while, tugging the sheets. Eventually he said sleepily, “And you, Yuhbo. Are you all right?”

Struck by his consideration, I thanked him and said that I was. I felt grateful to him for asking, and so blessed and undeserving all at once that tears filled my eyes. I waited until he slept then sneaked out of bed again, this time wearing his jacket to cross the hall. I put a luxurious two inches of warm water in the bottom of the tub, deathly afraid that the splashing faucet would wake him or another hotel guest. I’d paid scant attention to my womanly nakedness before this night—too unchaste an act—and I studied my body as if seeing it for the first time. The hot water burned between my legs and my body shuddered with the memory of him.
So, this is marriage
, I thought. It made me feel full and warm, and I believed this most certainly was love.

Returning to the bed, I slept fitfully, afraid I’d oversleep. When he reached for me once more, I saw the room outlined in dawn and pulled away. “Nearly time to rise. Sleep a little longer, Yuhbo.” I washed and dressed in a plain hanbok, glad I’d thought to bring the rags needed for bleeding. I woke him cheerily and he leaned against me, groggy with sleep. We laughed as he crossed the room tripping over his falling pajama trousers. That simple, spontaneous laughter, a mere few seconds, was a moment I would come to cherish.

As I stripped the bed and listened for the toilet flushing and the faucets running, I thought of Kira that day throwing salt on my father’s bloodied shirt, and sudden homesickness burned my eyes. Gathering the sheets, I brushed aside my tears and barged into the bathroom. In the tub, Calvin raised his knees in surprise, and before averting my eyes I glimpsed his shoulder’s sylvan curves, his smooth wet skin.

He angled his body just so in the tub. “You don’t have to do that. They have maids.”

“I couldn’t! It’s too embarrassing—” I quickly ran water on the linens.

He laughed. “More embarrassing than walking in on a man taking a bath?”

“I’m not looking at my husband!” I left the sheets to soak and ran out.

A bit later I thought I heard him rinsing the linens. I hurried across. “Let me do that. That’s my work. You shouldn’t!” I didn’t want him to see my blood.

“If you insist on sharing the bathroom with me, bring my shaving kit from the suitcase.”

“Yuhbo,” I called after a few minutes. “I can’t open it.”

Dressed in his trousers and undershirt he brought the wrung linens, which we spread over the end of the bed. We bumped as he leaned to show me how to release the suitcase latch, and he held me then, my head naturally drawn to his shoulder. A sigh passed through me as quickly as his touch had awakened the ache from below, but I slapped at his hands and said lightly, “There’s time later.” Then I reddened thoroughly, for I’d meant to say there wasn’t time.

“A lifetime!” Calvin pressed his lips to my palm. He swept up his shaving gear and retired to the bathroom, and I brought my hand to my nose to see if I could smell his touch.

IN THE CROWDED SECOND-CLASS COACH TO PYEONGYANG, CALVIN spoke little and smiled often. We’d eaten the rice balls from Cook earlier in the privacy of our hotel room, with coffee and iced water he had somehow ordered to be delivered. The train stopped at the border town of Anteong on the Yalu River, and passengers quickly filled every available space. For the remainder of the uneventful trip to the city of my married residency, with food from home in my belly and his companionable jostling against my hip and shoulder, I was content.

Reverend Cho was waiting for us at the depot, and Calvin, before boarding his train, reviewed the plan once again. Conscious that my father-in-law was present, I said goodbye to my husband with a simple
bow. I needn’t have worried, for Reverend Cho grasped Calvin by the shoulders, pressed lips to his son’s forehead and they embraced fully, both their eyes wet. Stunned by the public display, I turned aside. Calvin’s train pulled out from the station and I waved once, whereas Reverend Cho held his arm high, waving long after the smoke had cleared. I remembered that on the promontory overlooking the beach Calvin had said, “I am a bumpkin,” and also, “Your father told me what a refined upbringing you’ve had.” I felt both shamed and proud and understood I’d have to work on humbleness in my marriage. But it was not an immediate concern; in America I’d be mostly separate from my husband, busy with English language studies and coursework.

The Pyeongyang station, three times the size of Gaeseong’s, bustled with vendors, porters, passengers and police. Streetfront trams rattled below their electric wires, men with carts jostled by, a few rickshaw drivers boasted speed and beggars cried for alms. I clutched my bundle to my chest and dutifully followed my father-in-law into the city. He stopped at corners to offer me a ready smile and a few words of chitchat.

“Heavy clouds coming. Perhaps just a shower this time. Maybe thunderstorms, eh? We go down this street and turn left. See that high wall? That’s the west side of our mission compound.” He pointed out a few churches and named landmark buildings, each time waiting for me to respond.

Thus far I’d merely nodded, but his persistent remarks seemed to require something more. “So big!” I tried.

He smiled as if discovering that indeed I could speak. I took note of his large narrow teeth, all the uppers edged in gold. It appeared the Cho line suffered with soft teeth. “The manse is behind the church. See that steeple? This restaurant is patronized by Westerners and that one across the way, Japanese.” He waited until we passed a checkpoint and said, “That’s their means of surveillance on the American missionaries. Not terribly enlightened tactics, I must say.” I looked around to see if anyone else was listening to his carefree talk.