Authors: Ong Xiong
Her eyes roam to
his lips and his jaw, feeling guilty for biting and hitting him. Without
thinking, she bent down and placed a kiss on the corner of his mouth. It was
tempting to kiss his lips. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
He stirred but
didn’t open his eyes when she kissed him. She stared at him and fought the urge
to touch him again. She sat down on the armchair adjacent to him and watched
him sleep, trying to memorize every part of him until it became too painful.
She couldn’t lie to herself. She still loved him. She always did and she always
would.
Sue turned her
gaze toward the window and something by the window caught her eye. His Gibson.
She got up and quietly made her way toward the guitar.
The Gibson was
perched up against a stand, holding it upright to display the splendid
instrument. She gradually lowered herself to the floor, bracing her weight with
her uninjured foot and her hand bracing the window. Sitting down with a short
dress and twisted ankle was more work than she could imagine. She leaned her
back against the window and took a sigh of relief. She stretched her legs in
front of her before she turned her attention back to the Gibson.
Sue cautiously
placed a finger on the guitar and traced the smooth curve of the Gibson. He had
kept it in a perfect condition, she thought. She resisted the urge to pick it
up and play it. She turned to look at Jae, remembering that he wasn’t her Jae
anymore. She closed her eyes with a shuddering breath.
In her memories,
she saw the coldness in his eyes and heard the harsh words he had spoken to her
the day he left her crying beneath that willow tree. Tears trickled down her
cheeks and she quickly brushed them away. Those darn tears fell easily tonight.
Then again it always did when her thoughts involved Jae. As much as she fought
them, as much as she told herself long ago on that warm fall day at Indian
Mounds Park to never shed tears for him—she still did. And now that he was so
close, tears fell like an open dam she couldn’t mend.
In her mind, she
continually told herself that she hated this man. She hated him for hurting
her. She hated the way he had touched her, body and soul. Most off all, she
hated him for making her love him so much. But her stupid, stupid heart
wouldn’t let go of him and for that, she told herself she hated him more. “God,
I hate you,” she whispered, returning her gaze to the Gibson, brushing more
tears from her cheeks.
Please forgive
me Lord, for I have used thy name in oh, so vain, she prayed. Please forgive me
and give me strength. I need to get away from him. I can’t let him touch me. I
can’t fall apart. Not now. Not again…
Jae watched her
limp to his Gibson and watched as she struggled to sit down. She shouldn’t be
up walking on that ankle. Jae was about to say something but stopped himself
when she began touching his guitar. Then she looked straight at him. At first,
he thought she could see he was awake but she didn’t seem to notice him. It was
as if she was looking straight through him. She looked so dejected he wanted to
take her into his arms and kiss her hurt away. Something glistened and she
looked away.
When he returned
to the bedroom to apologize, she was already asleep. He had watched her sleep,
listening to her slow, steady breathing. He didn’t remember how long he watched
her before he took off his sweatshirt and lay next to her on his bed. He took
her into his arms and held her. She might be fighting him, but when he was next
to her, she moved closer to him. He had kissed the faint scar on her left
shoulder. Her arm had healed but he could see the faint line from her shoulder
to her elbow. It was barely there, only a tiny scar here and there, but it was
there nonetheless.
He had placed a
cold pack on her ankle and reluctantly left the bed before he loses control of
himself.
“Play for me,” he
said.
Startled, she
immediately retracted her hand from the guitar as if she had just been caught
doing something she shouldn’t. “No—I mean, I can’t,” she stumbled out.
“Why can’t you?”
he asked in between yawns.
“I haven’t played
the guitar for so long… I don’t even know if I remember how.”
“Let’s find out,”
he said, getting up and off the couch. “Play for me Suzy,” he added as he
crossed the room to her.
“No.”
“Why?” He rubbed
his eyes and yawned.
“Because I said
no,” she answered.
“Why haven’t you
played—for so long?”
Sue shrugged. “I
didn’t have time,” she lied. Truth was, the guitar reminded her of him and it
was just too painful to even see a guitar without her memory straying. Jae sat
across from her, staring at her. “Please don’t look at me like that,” she said.
“Why?”
“Go back to
sleep. I’m sorry for disturbing you.” She was already making a poor attempt to
get up. Darn ankle. She gave a groan of frustration and settled back on the
floor, fixing her dress to cover as much of her bare legs as she could. She
wished she would have worn something sturdier, something longer.
“Answer me,
Suzy.”
“You’re making me
nervous,” she confessed.
“Really?” He
tousled his hair, cracking a smile. “Why?”
There was a hint
of amusement in his voice and that paired with that arrogant smile on his
handsome face made Sue turned away.
Please lead me from temptation
.
Sue needed
something to focus on and decided that the guitar was a nice enough distraction.
Turning her eyes to the Gibson, she spoke. “Do you know that two of North
Korea’s most popular flowers are the
Kimilsungia
and the
Kimjongilia
,
name respectfully for their two beloved rulers? Of course you do. Anyways, I
once gave begonias to my science teacher and a friend called me ‘stuck up’. I
was so surprised that she would call me such a thing. I demanded she explained.
You know what she said?”
“What did she
say?”
“She said that
not only do I get perfect grades, I also gave perfect flowers to a teacher. I
was ‘stuck up’ because I gave flowers to a science teacher who had asked for
them. And because of that I was teacher’s pet. I had no idea I would cause her
to believe that I was doing this to be ‘stuck up’ or to be ‘teacher’s pet.’”
“What did you say
to your friend?”
“I was too hurt
to say anything at the time. I learned what ‘stuck up’ meant that day and what
being a ‘teacher’s pet’ was, though.”
“What happened
afterwards?”
“I received an A
in the class and was teacher’s pet.”
Silence.
“Am I still
making you nervous?” Jae asked.
“We loved that
plant. Katie and I used to take turn watering it before the weekend. Sometimes
the room would get too dry through the weekend and we would discover the plant
wilted by Monday morning. The first time this happened, we thought it had died,
but we watered it anyway. By the time class ended, the plant was back to life.
Eventually our classmates came to love that plant, too. We even named it
Petunia.” Sue shrugged, seeing his eyebrow rose. “Katie used to have this ugly
cat named Petunia that seemed to have nine lives so Katie and I named the plant
in his memory,” Sue explained.
“His?”
Sue nodded.
“Katie thought Petunia was female. Turns out Petunia should have been Mark.”
“I see.”
“Anyways, Petunia
the plant was accidently left on the heater after being watered one Friday and
by Monday, it was so dry, the leaves were falling off. We watered it anyway,
waiting to see if Petunia would revive. Unfortunately, Petunia had used up all
its nine lives like its predecessor, Petunia the cat.”
Jae smiled and
Sue cracked a smile despite herself.
“Not nervous
anymore?”Jae asked.
“I see your
hearing has been restored.”
He shrugged,
still smiling. “Comes and goes.”
Silence.
“How are you,
Suzy?”
“Are you always
this persistent?”
“Only with you,”
he said. “Are you always this evasive?”
“Only with you,”
she said quietly.
“What have you
been doing these past years?” Jae asked.
“Living.”
“Did you miss
me?”
She didn’t answer
him right away. When she spoke again, she still didn’t answer him.
“Did I ever tell
you that my grandmother was scared of coming to America? She heard stories of
cannibal giants who ate the young and healthy while the old and weak were
cleaned and displayed in white sterile homes. For the longest time she was afraid
to leave the house. I think if she were to meet you, she would be happy to know
there are other giants.”
“What about you?
Happy to know
this
giant?”
Sue smiled
wearily at Jae. “Did you know that, at one point it was illegal in Minnesota to
launder men and women’s underwear together?” she asked in a conversational
tone. “I’m imagining a room filled with whiny little old women who had nothing
more to complain about than the improprieties of seeing men’s and women’s
underwear together—oh the horror!”
“Suzy—”
“Minnesota has
more than ten-thousand lakes. Did you know that?” she continued in the same
tone, continuing as if he never spoke. “Though with the amount of rainfall we
received this past summer, that number might have temporarily changed. The
Minnehaha Falls in Minneapolis was—”
He kissed her,
cutting her off. He hugged her and for a brief moment, she was distracted. But
just as quickly, she regained her composure and the wall she built around
herself was erected once more. “Stop, Suzy,” he whispered when their lips
parted. She quickly pushed away as if she’d been burned.
They sat in
silence for a while. Unable to endure the silence and Jae’s scrutiny, she made
a move to get up but he grabbed her arm. “The last time we saw each other, you
said you had something to tell me, what was it?” Jae gently pulled her back
down.
“I don’t
remember,” she lied, pulling her arm free. She refused to look at him. Instead
she kept her eyes on the Gibson.
“Liar.”
She shrugged,
trying her hardest to hide the hurt.
“Whatever it was,
it doesn’t matter now.” To her horror, her voice trembled as she spoke. She
closed her eyes and counted to ten.
“Tell me anyway,”
he coaxed.
She opened her
eyes and gave a shaky sigh. Without looking at him or asking his permission,
she picked up the guitar and placed it in her lap. She strung the strings,
fighting the knot in her throat. Tears welled in her eyes again, threatening to
let loose.
I look pathetic
, she thought. She wasn’t paying attention to
what song she was playing, she just played. She needed distraction.
She told herself
this was some twisted nightmare and if she concentrated hard enough, she would
wake up. She tried to think about the job waiting for her when she returned
home. She tried to think about Katie and the reason she was in New York. She
tried to think about Michael and her thoughts came back to Jae. Always back to
Jae.
“Tell me,” he
persisted, bringing her out of her self-loathing.
She stopped
playing the guitar and finally forced herself to look at him. She took a deep
breath before she began. “I was going to tell you my brother passed away. I
received the message that morning before our meeting.”
“Is that why you
were crying when I saw you?” he asked, his voice quiet.
“Yes,” she
whispered.
“Is that why you
left Seoul early?”
“Yes.”
“Is that why you
didn’t come to the ward office?”
“Yes… and no. I
called my family as soon as I received the message and my father was furious
that I was not at the dorms. One word led to another and the next thing I knew
it was past our meeting time. By the time I made it to the ward office, I
couldn’t find you. After that, you know the rest.”
“Tell me anyway.”
“Why?” Sue asked.
“It doesn’t make any difference anymore.”
“Why did you
agree to marry me, Sue?”
Sue could only
stare at him, too hurt to respond. Tears rolled down her cheeks and she quickly
wiped them away. This man, whom she had loved, whom she still loved, was asking
her why she married him. At that moment, she wanted to get away from him, far,
far away from him.
“My reason was my
own. Good night, Mr. Park.” She returned the guitar to him. “I don’t know what
you are called these days so I presume Park is still appropriate,” she said
sadly as she got up. She didn’t care that her ankle hurt. She didn’t want to
continue talking about a past that was best forgotten, and most of all she
didn’t want to endure his scrutiny. She felt open and exposed and ashamed to be
falling for him the way she was. Just one look from the man and she went gaga.
Jae took hold of
her wrist and wouldn’t let her leave. “No Lefty?” he asked teasingly.
Sue remained
silent, looking fixedly at a painting that meant nothing to her, yet she was
looking at it as if grabbing for life. As if that painting held her grounded
and if she took her eyes off it, she might float away into darkness where she
might not be able to get back to whatever she was trying to live for.
He squeezed her
wrist but she remained silent.
“Suzy…”
The pleading in
his voice affected her tremendously. “No. No, you’re not,” she finally answered.
He playfully
asked, “Then what am I?”
She tilted her
head back to stop the pooling tears in her eyes from spilling some more. When
she finally was able to face him, she saw him smiling and mistook it for
mockery. He found her discomfort amusing. She was just another girl in his life
after all, nothing more. What she gave to him meant nothing and in all these
years, she still meant nothing to him. She was just some stupid girl who
couldn’t resist his good looks.