Kyung-sook Shin

O love, so long as you can love.
—FRANZ LISZT

How far back does one’s memory of someone go?

There are moments one revisits after something happens, especially after something bad happens. Moments in which one thinks, I shouldn’t have done that.

Something had happened to Mom. That was the view of someone who wanted to think of Mom as the old mom.

Either a mother and daughter know each other very well, or they are strangers.

The word “Mom” is familiar and it hides a plea: Please look after me. Please stop yelling at me and stroke my head; please be on my side, whether I’m right or wrong. You never stopped calling her Mom. Even now, when Mom’s missing. When you call out “Mom,” you want to believe that she’s healthy. That Mom is strong. That Mom isn’t fazed by anything. That Mom is the person you want to call whenever you despair about something in this city.

But you were the one who had moved away and left your mom’s side

your aunt fed rabbits with you and braided your hair. She cooked a pot of barley with a scoop of rice on top and saved the rice for you. At night you lay across her lap and listened to the stories she told you. You remembered how your aunt used to slide an arm under your neck at night to fashion a pillow for you. Even though she had left this world, you still remembered your aunt’s scent from those childhood visits.

“I can’t cry anymore.”

With the setting sun warming your back, you gazed down at Mom’s face cradled on your lap as if it were the first time you were seeing it. Mom got headaches? So severe that she couldn’t even cry? Her dark eyes, which used to be as brilliant and round as the eyes of a cow that is about to give birth, were hidden under wrinkles. Her pale, fat lips were dry and cracked. You picked up her arm, which she’d flung on the platform, and placed it on her stomach. You stared at the dark sunspots on the back of her hand, saturated with a lifetime of labor. You could no longer say you knew Mom.