The Queen of Tears by Chris Mckinney Read Free Book Online

daisies, and roses grew out of the darkest soil she’d ever seen, while several bees buzzed around them. To the right of the garden stood an enormous ginko tree, its yellow blossoms covering every branch. A black and white magpie flew from one of the branches. To the left of the flower garden, several bamboo poles were staked into the ground. Vines of ripe, purple grapes wrapped themselves around the poles. Kwang Ja walked to one of these vines and pulled off a grape. She bit into it and tasted the sweet-sour juice spread on her tongue. This was what the woman meant by diamonds, she thought. Suddenly she felt like crying. This garden, this house was what Seoul was supposed to be to Kwang Ja. To her it was the heart of Seoul. Though the body, the city may be contaminated, the heart was pure. She held in her tears, swallowed the grape, turned around to the old servant woman and asked, “What is expected of me?”
    The woman hissed. “Only that you become a lady.”
    Kwang Ja wasn’t sure what that meant, but she did not care. She had been tempted effectively, and was willing to pay any price.
    It was difficult at first. Kwang Ja had to learn how to read better, not only hangul , women’s writing, but also han-mun , men’s writing. She had to learn all of the graces of a South Korean aristocratic woman, which meant she had to learn how to ingratiate herself to men, which was difficult considering there were no men at the house. She was forbidden to take one step outdoors so her dark skin would lighten. This meant she did not spend any time in the garden. She had to lose her northern country accent, and cover it with a more genteel one. What they wanted her to do was forget who she was and where she came from. As far as they were concerned, she was reborn during the hot summer of 1952. The Year of the Dragon. And except for not being able to eat the grapes or watch the fish outside, this was all fine with her.
    One of the first things Park Dong Jin had done to her was have her calluses removed. Her feet were soaked in water for days, while two women scrubbed the skin off. Every day the soles of her feet were worn down to a bright red, and like a shedding snake, she left a trail of skin wherever she moved.
    She also shed her peasant clothes. She was given clothes she didn’t even know how to put on. Layers of thin material of white, green, blue, and pink had to be put on a layer at a time, in a particular order. Covering these layers was the chogori and ch’ima , the loose, long-sleeved blouse and high, wrap-around skirt which hovered less than an inch from the ground. The material was unusually soft, unlike anything she’d ever touched before. Silk canoe-shaped shoes finished the ensemble. Then there was her hair. The matted texture was combed out by the same two women who scrubbed her feet. For the first week, every day, she left tufts of hair in the teeth of combs. But she did not cry. She acted as if it didn’t even hurt, and the two women who combed it believed her. Finally, after her hair was straight and silky, the servants showed her how to make the simple, long braid worn by unmarried women.
    For that first year, she didn’t even see Dong Jin, the man who had put her in the fancy black car. But she heard his name constantly. Whenever she did something good, like recite the story of “The Old Man Who Became A Fish,” or “The Old Woman Who Became A Goblin” flawlessly, or commit to memory Newton’s laws of gravity, her sabu , her teacher, a middle-aged man with an unusually long graying mustache, would say, “Master Park will be so proud.”
    Whenever she did something bad, like forget to brush her hair, her nurse, the old woman who had led her into the house, would say, “You stupid girl. If you are not careful Master Park will throw you back out on the streets.”
    This Master Park for that first year was an entity she’d neither seen nor heard. To her, he became this faceless figure who held her fate