Authors: Ong Xiong
It was hard to be
insouciant at moments like this. After the music video ended, Sue turned to
Jae.
“What do you
think?” Jae asked.
“I…” Since the
dam was already broken, tears welled in her eyes and the knot in her throat
prevented her from speaking any further. So instead of fighting, she went into
his open arms and sobbed.
In New York,
Michael tried to contact Sue after the wedding to no avail. He called her cell
phone and was immediately directed to her voice message, which was full. He
called her at the townhouse. No answer. Maybe she was still sleeping or just
not accepting calls, he thought. Then again…
An hour later,
Michael sat in his townhouse office, debating whether he should “drop” by
Minnesota. He had seen the reports about Khyba and Sue, knew they had a
history, knew his chances… but that childish joke she told him and that cute
body of hers, he couldn’t stop thinking about her. Her laughter. Her
candidness. He had seen the uninhibited, unguarded side of her that she tried
to hide and that glimpse into her tiny world made him realize he would never
forget her.
He had liked her
when he met her. Katie had been right, she was cute. He had experienced the
fierceness of her love that night she was drunk, even though it was meant for
someone else. He realized then he could love this woman because she could love
with passion. Was it because she didn’t try to impress him that captivated him?
Perhaps at first that’s what made his time with her so entertaining. Maybe it
was the idea of having her that had now captivated him.
Michael picked up
the letter Sue left for him on his desk.
Dear Michael,
Thank you for
your hospitality and endless patience. Please forgive me for not being able to
say goodbye to you in person and instead leaving you this letter. I learned a
long time ago that life is unfair and often times painful. You deserve to be
loved and I’m afraid I’m too broken to give you that. I’m sorry.
Take care.
Sue
P. S. Khyber
was the love of my life, the life I lost and the owner of my soul.
Michael picked up
his phone and called his secretary. “Get me the earliest flight available to
MSP.”
In Japan, Cherry
Yuki Sanada was on the phone with Khyba’s assistant Jackie, losing her
patience, trying to locate the whereabouts of Khyba.
The news can’t
be true. Khyba married? That lying son-of-a-bitch
! “Where the hell is he,
Jacko?”
“I’m sorry, Ms.
Sanada. I cannot divulge such information,” Jackie said through the phone.
“Stop being so
formal!” she hollered. There was a brief pause before she continued in a calmer
voice, “Fine! Just tell me—it’s not true is it? He’s not married, it’s only
media garbage?”
“I’m sorry, Ms.
Sanada, I’m not at liberty to discuss—”
“Damn it, Jack!
Tell me where the bloody hell he is!” she repeated her request, gone was the
calm.
“I’m sorry, Ms.
Sanada—”
“Chuck it, Jack.
Don’t you dare use that generic line with me again! Ugh…” she groaned in
frustration. “Fine! I’ll find him myself!” she told him forcefully, closing her
phone to disconnect the call. She was breathing heavily. Khyba was married to
that nobody?
No
, she silently, desperately screamed to herself.
Cherry pressed
the rewind button for the recording on her television. She unconsciously bit
her manicured nails. She stopped the rewind then pushed play.
“Where is Khyba?”
asked a female reporter excitedly. “That seems to be the big question everyone
is asking today. There have been reports that the popular singer and actor
disappeared after a promotional press conference in New York for his upcoming
film
Empire
and have not been seen since. What is going on and why all
the hype?” The reporter asked a male reporter who was reporting from New York.
“Khyba caused an
international uproar when he publicly announced his marriage to Dr. Sue Thao
Thursday night during his interview with Daniel Larry on his television show.
Ordinarily, such announcement would not be such a phenomenon except in this
case, Khyba has a reputation as Asia’s most eligible bachelor and playboy whom,
until recently, has never publicly confirmed or acknowledged any kind of
romantic relationships. Khyba has been so guarded that not even his real name
is known to the public. Since his announcement, he has evaded the subject of
his alleged wife, refusing to give further information about this woman. No one
has seen or heard from him since his press conference on Friday, and his people
are not talking.”
“Then what do we
know about this woman? How did they meet and what is her relationship to him
prior to Thursday night?” the female reporter asked while images of Sue in
hospital scrubs flashed on the screen.
“Besides that she
is a pediatrician at Children’s Hospital in St. Paul, no one seems to know much
about the relationship between Khyba and this doctor. But here’s the million
dollar question—why now? Why all of a sudden do we hear about this mysterious
woman and marriage? So far, no one seems to have an answer to that. And what
about Khyba’s longtime relationship with Japanese supermodel Cherry Yuki
Sanada? What does she have to say about his marriage?”
Cherry rewound
the recording and watched through images of Khyba. There were images of Khyba
with Cherry and Khyba with other alleged women of his past and present, except
there were no images of Khyba with Sue Thao. There was no footage of the two
together, only separate images, shown together on the television screen.
Maybe the reports
were false. Maybe Khyba was up to something to promote his new movie. That
didn’t sound like him though, she told herself.
Cherry paced her
living room, still biting her nails.
Where’s Khyba?
Where
?
Cherry’s eyes
widened and she stopped pacing, then her eyes narrowed. Doctor, yes! The doctor
was a pediatrician at some hospital. Cherry replayed the recording. Children’s
Hospital in St. Paul. Khyba was in St. Paul. He was with the doctor, Cherry
knew it. St. Paul, St. Paul…
Cherry opened her
phone and searched for St. Paul. Yes! St. Paul, Minnesota. That’s sounded
right, that’s where Khyba was. She shut her phone and felt disgusted. Khyba
told her just weeks ago that he was not interested in marriage or any long-term
relationship. That lying…
Khyba couldn’t
be married, could he?
There was only
one way to find out. Cherry ran to her bedroom to pack.
CHAPTER
44
It was Monday
morning and Jae was hanging his clothes in Sue’s closet. The rest of last night
had been wonderful. Sue decided she had enough of his publicity and since both
of them didn’t feel like going to sleep, she suggested they go grocery
shopping. There was no food, except for instant noodles and according to the
forecast, a snowstorm would be arriving soon.
Sue took him to
Cub Foods, a local store chain that was open twenty-four hours, near her
apartment. The other stores were closed, considering it was well past midnight.
“What do you like
to eat?” Sue asked.
He shrugged.
“Whatever tastes good.”
“That really
narrows it down,” she said, picking through some oranges that were on sale.
“Speak now or forever hold your complaints,” she warned, placing an orange into
a plastic bag. He watched her carefully inspect the oranges before placing them
in the bag. He picked up two oranges, without inspecting them, and placed them
in the plastic bag with the three she already had. He thought she was going to
take them out, but she smiled, proclaimed that five would be enough then tied
the bag and placed it in the cart.
Sue asked for
Jae’s opinion often and he found he rather enjoyed it. He had gone grocery
shopping before but it had been a long time since he last shopped for food. As
for Sue, she found the chore rather daunting.
Soon Jae was
enjoying himself and helped Sue pick out items for meals. There was hardly
anyone in the store. Jae jumped on the back of the cart, going through the
aisles. Sue laughed when he went too fast and almost crashed into a display of
two-liter sodas that were on sale. She warned him not to break his pretty neck.
When they returned to the apartment, they made love and finally fell asleep
sometime around five in the morning.
Jae was
remembering the way Sue had responded to him this morning when he came upon a
shoebox with “Khyber” handwritten in broken cursive on the front. It was a
small cardboard shoebox made for children’s shoes. The box was set atop other
shoeboxes that were neatly labeled. Had it not contained those familiar English
characters resembling his chosen stage name, he probably would have missed it
completely.
Curious, he
reached for the tiny box and lightly laughed at his own
nosiness
as he
pulled it off the shelf. He could see a thin layer of dust on some of the
surrounding boxes, except for the box in his hands. He opened the box.
The first item he
encountered was a Polaroid picture of Sue holding a tiny, sleeping baby. Her
hair was pulled back into her signature ponytail with several loose strands of
hair plastered to her forehead and neck. She wore a hospital gown and what
looked like bandages on her right hand. Even in the picture, he could tell she
had been crying and the smile she had on did little to hide the sadness in her
eyes. The tiny baby in her arms was wrapped in a white blanket. “Khyber Park”
was written on the white portion of the Polaroid with the date 2/23/02 written
beneath it.
“Khyber?” he
whispered, as he walked to sit down on the bed. He was still looking at the
Polaroid. He placed the picture next to him while he looked through the other
contents in the small box.
There was a
small, blue hospital band on top of several ultrasound pictures. Jae’s heart
was already beating rapidly as he looked through the dates on the pictures and
saw the small prints pointing out the baby’s various body parts. At the bottom
of the printed pictures was the string ring they had exchange vows with. The
pale yellow yarn was now brown and worn thin but it was still intact. He picked
up the Polaroid again. On her left ring finger was the string ring, barely
visible, but it was there, right where he had tied it.
“His name was
Khyber Thao Park,” Sue said from the bedroom door. “A nurse was nice enough to
take that picture. It’s the only picture I have of him when he was born.” She
had been watching him go through the contents of the small Nike shoebox that
once contained a pair of baby shoes she had purchased for their baby. The shoes
were gone now, donated long ago among other things.
“I always liked
the name Khyber. It reminded me of you at the time. He had your nose…without
the bump.” Sue smiled wearily at the memory. She came to sit next to him as she
continued. “It was my hope that he would inherit your height.”
“What happened?”
Jae asked, still looking at the picture of his son.
Every painful
detail, she told him. She told him how she fought the nurses and doctors to
keep her awake so she could see her son. She told him how she felt holding
their son’s tiny, lifeless body in her arms. She told him how alone and empty
she felt and how she didn’t want to wake up afterwards.
Jae felt a strong
sense of loss as he listened to her. He could have provided for them. He could
have, at least, been there for her.
“Tomorrow would
have been his eighth birthday,” Sue told him. “Every year, on his birthday, I
bring him flowers. I think that’s why I hate winter so much. Snow always covers
his…the headstone.”
“Were you going
to tell me?” Jae asked, feeling the pressure in his chest increasing with every
detail he discovered.
“No. I thought
about it, but honestly, I thought it was best if you didn’t know. After this
week is over, you’ll go back to your life and I’ll try to continue mine.”
“And so you
believe I don’t deserve to know?”
“No,” Sue said
painfully. “I believed what you didn’t know wouldn’t hurt you.”
“Still trying to
save my soul?”
“No,” she said
softly, as if saying the word softer would take away the hurt they both felt.
She took the Polaroid from Jae and touched their son’s face. “He was perfect. I
still wonder what he would look like today. Would he have light brown eyes like
yours or dark brown like mine? I never saw them, so I wonder. I think about him
and I think about you, every time I see a child, every time I hear a baby cry,
every time I listen to music, every time…“ Her voice cracked. “It was hard
losing you at the time, but losing him was much harder, more painful, I think.
Perhaps, because a piece of me died that day as well. I never believed that
before, that a person could die and still live. A walking zombie…only
difference was, I didn’t go around trying to eat people.”
Jae cracked a
smile.
She sadly smiled
too. She continued. “I hated you. I hated the world. I mourned and I mourn
still. I kept myself busy to drown the hurt. I studied and I stayed away from
my family and friends. I…”
He wrapped his
arms around her and drew her to his chest. Tears poured down her cheeks. She
was still amazed at how easy she cried these days, how freely those tears could
fall.
“I still think
about him and I didn’t…I didn’t want you to have to go through that.” She
pulled away to look at him. “It was so unfair. I felt him, Jae. I heard his
little heart beating and I felt him moving inside me. I could tell when he was
antsy, when he was hiccupping. I held him.”
He pulled her to
him again and buried his face in her hair, holding her. She felt something warm
and wet on her neck and more tears rolled down her cheeks.