Chapter 3
If Channing ran toward the future, I hid in the past. My grandfather said he understood why his son had chosen East End when he moved to the States from South Korea. It reminded him of Busan, the city by the sea. Both my uncle and my father had spent much of their teenage years on the coast when their parents moved from Namwon, which was farther inland.
On our drives toward East End from whichever town we lived in at the time, my father would talk about his school days, and my mother would add in her memories of trips with her family to the eastern shore of the Korean peninsula. Sometimes I couldn’t tell if they were talking about Busan or East End. I’d get mixed up as I fell asleep in the back seat on the long car ride.
As Harabeoji and I officially arrived in East End, I rolled down the window and turned off the air-conditioning. I smelled buttered shrimp and lobster from a restaurant nearby, late afternoon jasmine, sweet pea, Clethra that Harabeoji had pointed out but had trouble pronouncing until I searched for it on the internet and helped him. I spotted some blue violets waving in the sunlight on sand and seagrass. We coasted to a stop at a traffic light. A sign welcomed us to East End. It had faded black letters ona simple wooden placard secured to wooden posts on each side, white with a scroll at the top in imitation of a piece of parchment.
On Middle Street, there were people walking along the sidewalk, going into the stores and cafés. A Black woman and a Latino man walked along, the man pushing a baby in a stroller. A variety of teenagers piled into a Jeep parked by the curb. An Asian man walked a trio of pugs on a leash across the street. I took it all in and felt my body relax.
At a stoplight, Harabeoji pointed to a white man who held the door to a bright yellow storefront, ushering in two small white children. “Good to see Mrs. Ku’s bakery doing well.”
“Should we stop?” I asked as the light turned green. “I could find parking.”
Harabeoji shook his head. “I’m sure she’s closing soon. We’ll try another day. Let’s get to Channing.”
She was standing in Sandpiper Lane after we navigated a maze of side streets minutes later. My cousin was easy to recognize, her tall, thin figure similar to Harabeoji. In a black shirt above dark gray sweatpants, she reminded me of how Harabeoji had told us when we were children not to wear white, as if he believed dressing in white meant someone was going to die. He’d drummed it into us often enough that I felt apprehensive about wearing it, and so apparently did Channing.
The gold necklace at her collar glinted. Her thick black hair hovered just below her chin. She took scissors to it regularly, and without much effort, she still managed to get a few layers in there, so it was shaped around her face. She’d never changed it as long as I’d known her. It accentuated her long neck and high cheekbones. Mostly, I knew she valued how it required little effort to maintain. No hair ties or even a brush needed. She combed it with her fingers.
Her hand was up, pushing her bangs to the side, shielding her eyes. Sheseemed swayed by an intense wind, leaning one way and then the other. The young sweet gum trees by a house to my left didn’t seem affected. What was she looking at beyond us? In my rearview mirror the sun was bright.
“Stop!” Harabeoji shouted. I hit the brake and lurched forward; my grandfather’s arm below my neck kept me from slamming into the steering wheel. Channing had both hands on the green hood. In the split second I’d looked in the rearview mirror, we’d reached her. But what was she doing in the street?
I opened the window and yelled at her to get out of the way. Another car could hit us while we were stopped. She looked confused. She had dark crescents under her eyes, like bruises. There had been stretches in her life when she didn’t sleep enough, which produced patches like that, but these were the worst I’d seen. She had the same gold rosette earrings she wore as a child. She never took them off even when she replaced other jewelry. She pushed her hair out of her eyes again and backed away. My own long hair was always in a ponytail and held off from my face. Seeing how her bangs had grown made me reach back and tighten the band around mine as if my hair were in danger of affecting my vision.
Shaken, I inched into the driveway as slowly as I could. The house was dead center in the cul-de-sac. It was a large white two-story Cape Cod style skirted by blue hydrangea bushes.
My grandfather exited the car quickly, and I heard him call to Channing. I took a moment to quiet my hands. I sat on them for ten seconds. Then for good measure I put the emergency brake on before getting out.
Channing and my grandfather were walking around to the side of the house. Instead of following them, I took my bag from the back seat and walked to the front door. I wanted to give them a moment to talk without me. Channing had done the same for me in the past. Taking care of each other’s private time together kept us all close.
Before my hand turned the doorknob, I heard booming voices, applause, and music coming from inside the house. Channing had not told mepeople were visiting, but it sounded like a party. I braced myself and opened the door.
The white foyer was cluttered with kids’ shoes: sneakers and flip-flops, Crocs, and rain boots. They were scattered every which way on the light wood floor. Lego pieces in a variety of primary colors were sprinkled among them. I moved everything against the wall before I took off my sandals. Above me I heard the pounding of multiple sets of feet. They increased in volume and then faded.
A large television screen blared from the living room. Strewn around were a shaved-ice machine, a plastic slide, and a popcorn machine. The cushions of the beige couch were propped up on the floor in a makeshift shelter. A low Korean mother-of-pearl inlaid coffee table was covered with construction paper, scissors, action figures, and sticks of glue.
I put my bag down, found the remote on the floor, and turned the program off. The music continued uninterrupted, a band with tinny percussion, blaring trumpets, and wailing electric guitar.
It became louder as I approached the kitchen. On the counter was a round speaker that I couldn’t figure out how to silence until I accidentally tapped it, and it turned off. The rest of the marble countertops in the kitchen were full of dirty cups, plates, and bowls. The sink had the same, and I wished I could return to the foyer and put my shoes back on because the floor felt sticky to my bare feet.
Just then, boys came careening into the kitchen. Only two though they sounded like many more, the way they ran in their bare feet thumping down the hall. They were dressed in T-shirts and shorts. The smaller boy’s T-shirt appeared to be inside out with white seams at the shoulders.
The taller one kept his distance, with his hands on his hips, while the smaller one circled me silently. “Who are you?” the bigger boy said.
“Channing’s cousin. You must be Edison and—” I turned to face the smaller one, “Austin?”
“Did you bring something to eat?” Austin said.
“Are you hungry?” I asked.
He nodded slowly. Edison sprinted out of the kitchen, and Austin studied me a while longer before running after his brother. Were there other children in the house, I wondered, hearing multiple footsteps above my head again. Rather than investigate, I found myself suddenly thirsty and opened the refrigerator to find cans of soda and bottles of the kombucha brand Channing favored. The freezer held only ice cream and ground coffee. I found a paper cup on the cluttered counter and poured myself water from the kitchen faucet.
Through the sliding glass doors, I could see a robin pecking for seeds in a near empty bird feeder hanging on a branch of a tree. Farther to my right, Harabeoji and Channing appeared on the other side of the sliding glass doors and walked in. Channing gave me a tight hug. “Glad you’re here,” she said.
“If it was anywhere else, I don’t know,” I replied, and we both said together, “But it’s East End.”
“I know, I know,” she agreed, but she wasn’t smiling the way I expected.
