The Girl Who Wrote Loneliness (9 page)

Because I work slowly and often put the screw in the wrong place, one of the skilled workers on our line, who has to connect another part to the screws that I insert, keeps bringing the plates that I have finished back to me, pointing out the wrong screws. Foreman gets impatient and frequently stands behind me. With him watching from behind my back, my work slows down even more. Getting impatient, Foreman takes the air driver from me and attaches the screws himself, or brings over the plates from the prep line and piles them next to me, but at least ten fewer stereo systems make it to the test division that day compared with other days. Because our output is less than that of the B line or the C line, at the end of the day those of us on the A line receive, from the operations chief, words of admonishment.

A letter arrives. It is from Chang
in the country. When I see that the sender is Chang, my face blushes abruptly. Chang is the boy who lives at the end of the newly paved road back in our village. Outside Chang’s gate, different flowers blossom each season. Forsythias, azaleas, clavillias, cosmos. Chang writes:

I learned from your younger sister that you moved to Seoul, that it has already been two months, and that you have already visited once. I noticed that I haven’t seen you around but had no idea that you had left for Seoul. If you had told me you were leaving, Ik-su
hyeong
and I would have arranged a farewell party or something—it’s a pity. I realize you will be surprised by my unexpected letter. I asked Ik-su to go over to your house and find out your address. Your mom doesn’t like me but she’s friendly with Ik-su
hyeong
. And since you and Ik-su are related, I guessed she would give him your address. I hope we can exchange letters. The things that happened in the past are now bygones, and I hope we can stay good friends from now on.

I am so happy to receive Chang’s letter that I can’t sit still. The bygones that Chang mentioned in the letter went like this. Chang and I have been friends since we were young, but when we got to middle school, each time we saw each other, our faces flushed for no reason. Mom dislikes my befriending Chang. I do not know why she does, but since Mom disapproves, I find Chang dearer. Because he knows that Mom disapproves of him, Chang does not even come by to offer a bow to my parents for New Year. I might go over to Chang’s, but Chang never comes over to our house. One night coming home, I run into Chang. Chang is on his bike and I am walking. Chang gets off his bike and ties my schoolbag to the back of his bike
and we walk together. On the bridge where the lights in the village come into view, Chang stops the bike and says, Let’s talk here for a bit. Let’s talk a bit, he says, but Chang is quiet in the dark. Stars twinkle in the sky. It occurs to me that the starlight is blue.

“Do you know why your mom dislikes me?” Chang’s voice is gloomy.

“No.”

“It’s because . . .” Chang is about to say something but stops. He stops, then begins again.

“It’s because of my father.”

“What about your father?”

“My father’s alive.”

I glance across at Chang in the dark. In the thick darkness I cannot see what kind of expression Chang has on his face. Chang lives with his mother. I have never heard anything about his father but have assumed that he had passed away. When people pass away, they cannot live with you.

“Where is he?”

Chang answers, Gyeongsang-do. Gyeongsang Province? Where can he mean by Gyeongsang-do?

“Where in Gyeongsang-do?”

“That I don’t know. Mother would not tell me. She just said Gyeongsang-do.”

“Why doesn’t he live with you?”

Chang says nothing. I say nothing. When the silence starts to feel awkward, Chang speaks again.

“Father cannot live with us.”

“Why not?”

“He has an illness that prohibits him from living with us.”

Illness? I grow more and more puzzled and say nothing. I remembered, out of the blue, what Mom once said, trying to express her disapproval of my befriending Chang—that illness is inherited. Chang pulls out a white envelope from his pocket.

“Would you keep this for
me?”

“What is it?”

“It’s a letter from Father . . . It’s been weird. I keep thinking about him, and I can’t focus on my studying. I might flunk the high school entrance exam if I keep this up. Would you keep this for me and give it back when I’m in high school?”

I say nothing.

“Mother promised me that if I pass the test, she’ll tell me where Father is and pay for my trip so that I can go see him.”

When I reach out my hand and take the letter, Chang speaks again.

“Please keep it safe. You mustn’t lose it. It’s very important to me.”

I nod.

“Can I read it?”

Chang says that I may. We start walking again slowly and arrive at the village. Mom is waiting for me out by the new paved road, and when she sees me walking side by side with Chang, she snatches my hand, as if Chang is not even there. When we get home, Mom presses me about Chang, asking exactly where we started walking together.

“We met on the bridge.”

“You arranged to meet there?”

“No,” I said. “We ran into each other. He was riding his bike and I was walking home.”

Mom sighs and says, “Don’t start befriending Chang again.” Mom’s being so unreasonable . . . How embarrassed he must have been when Mom snatched my hand out on the road. I feel apologetic and sorry for Chang. When I do not answer her, Mom raises her voice, saying, “What stubbornness!” But I still refuse to answer.

Late that night I open the letter that Chang handed me. He must have carried it in his pocket for a long time, for the letter is all crumpled. I find the stains on
the paper endearing, thinking that they were made by Chang’s hands. Old writings on an old sheet of paper. Tear stains, made either by one who wrote the letter or one who read the letter—it is impossible to tell. Because of the smears, the letter is unintelligible save for a single sentence. The sentence goes, Let’s try and make a lot of money to live together happily in one place. I fold the letter and slip it inside the pages of The Sorrows of Young Werther and put the book inside the bottom drawer of my desk. Without knowing about the letter inside, Younger Sister lends the book to a friend and the friend loses the book. Ever since the book has been lost, each time I run into Chang in the street my heart collapses. Chang’s voice follows me around, asking me to please keep it safe and never lose it, telling me that it’s very important to him.

I keep avoiding Chang even after the high school entrance exams are over. Finally one night on the railroad tracks I confess to him that I have lost the letter. As soon as I finish talking, Chang starts walking away, taking big strides, leaving me on the tracks. He’ll come back, I think, but Chang does not come back. Things become awkward between us; even when we run into each other out on the new paved road, we look away. This was how things were when I moved to the city.

Inside the genre painting, the air driver in front of me hangs in mid-space. When I hold the screw that will attach the PVC cover in my left hand, then pull the air driver and press, the screw goes in with a gush of wind:
shhk.
Cousin, at Number Two, also has to insert more than ten screws. The only difference is that my air driver hangs midair while Cousin’s is attached at her side. In other words, I attach the screws in the center and Cousin attaches the screws in the front. At first, Cousin keeps her mouth shut tight and stares down at the conveyor.

She is displeased, for she
feels this business of pulling down the air driver hanging midair and attaching the screws is vulgar.

“I’d rather be soldering. This looks like man’s work.”

I do not respond. I hate solder smoke just as much. As Cousin and I turn into skilled workers, our names disappear. I am Number One on the Stereo Division’s A Line, and Cousin is called Number Two. This is what Foreman shouts.

“Number One and Number Two, what are you guys doing? You’re holding things up.”

Even if I am not called Number One, my name no longer exists. The name that I have been called for sixteen years cannot come work with me at the company because I am sixteen years old. Being a sixteen-year-old disqualifies me to be an employee at Dongnam Electronics, Inc. One has to be eighteen years old to be hired as a worker. I don’t know how he arranged it, but somehow Oldest Brother got my documents filled out in the name of an eighteen-year-old Lee Yeon-mi, so at work even if I am not called Number One, I am Lee Yeon-mi. Miss Lee Yeon-mi! When someone calls me this, I do not realize it’s me they’re talking to and fail to respond. Only when Cousin pokes me on the side do I lift my head, with a slow “Y-yes.”

Whether it is hanging midair or attached to the side, Cousin and I are poor at handling the air driver and no matter how we try to hurry things along, the number three position on the conveyor is empty. In the evening as we walk from Industrial Complex No. 1 to our room at Industrial Complex No. 3, we massage each other’s shoulders.

“I feel I’m developing hard muscles.”

Cousin looks as if she’s about to cry.

Cousin and I earn a daily wage of 700-something won. After three months on the job we will get a 500-won raise, Foreman says, which makes about
1,200 won. Another three months will bring a 200-won raise, then after another three months . . .

It is clear that was how much we made, but thinking back today, I cannot quite believe it and doubt my memory. Manufacturing jobs were paid by the day, so excluding Sundays and half of the Saturdays, the amount would have come to, let me see, 1,280 multiplied by 25 or 24, then take away the lunch costs—so how much did I actually make?

Could I be remembering things correctly? With that money, the workers paid rent, sent some home, and even supported younger siblings who lived with them . . . Unconvinced, I do some research here and there about the labor conditions of 1978. The Labor Administration had set the minimum wage for trainee factory positions, which were mostly held by young girls, at 24,000 won, but after deducting the costs for lunch and transportation, the average monthly wage was only 19,400 won, according to records. We walked from Industrial Complex No. 3 to Industrial Complex No. 1 so we did not have to spend money on transportation; we received overtime allowance for extra hours, all-nighters and Sundays; so does that mean we made at least a little more than 19,400 won?