이 포스팅은 쿠팡 파트너스 활동의 일환으로, 이에 따른 일정액의 수수료를 제공받습니다.
# Chapter 124: How to Lose Your Voice
The fluorescent light in the convenience store flickered again. Seo-ah heard Hae-neul’s voice, but she had no words left to answer. On the other end of the line, Hae-neul sighed. It wasn’t an angry sigh. It was a sigh of resignation. The sigh of someone who has lost a friend.
“Hae-neul.”
Seo-ah spoke.
“Yeah.”
“Am I doing something wrong right now?”
Seo-ah asked.
The silence stretched long. No mechanical hum came through. Hae-neul had stopped tattooing. Or perhaps brought the phone closer. Either way, only breathing remained. Hae-neul’s breath. Seo-ah’s breath. The only signal they shared across the phone line.
“What do you think?”
Hae-neul asked.
“I don’t know.”
Seo-ah answered.
“Tell me exactly. What are you doing right now?”
Hae-neul asked.
Seo-ah looked around the convenience store. Boxes of ramyeon. A coffee machine. The blue light of the freezer. The part-timer was organizing something at the register. Counting bills with quick, precise fingers. Fast, accurate hands. Seo-ah used to do that once. She couldn’t remember how many months ago.
“I’m at a convenience store.”
Seo-ah said.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“Seo-ah. Really, why are you there?”
Hae-neul asked. This time, more gently.
Seo-ah picked up a box of ramyeon again. Shin Ramyeon. When was the first time she’d arranged this box? A month ago? And how many people have picked it up since then? Where have their hands gone? Where are they now? Someone is probably eating this ramyeon while missing someone. Someone is probably comforting themselves with this ramyeon after failing an exam. Someone might be thinking about death while eating this ramyeon.
“I used to work here. I did work here. So it felt like… this place was right. Familiar.”
Seo-ah said.
“Familiar places aren’t always good places, Seo-ah.”
Hae-neul said.
“I know.”
“Then leave. Now. Get out now.”
Hae-neul said.
“Now?”
“Yes. Now.”
Seo-ah put down the ramyeon box. It was placed back on top of the restacked stack. Red paper the color of Shin Ramyeon. Looking at it, Seo-ah realized for the first time why she had come here. This was where she had disappeared. The smallest place. The most invisible place. She thought that if she came back here, she could become small again. Transparent again.
Seo-ah left the convenience store. The automatic door opened. Beyond Hapjeong Station, the night streets came into view. The city was still awake. Someone was still working, someone still couldn’t sleep, someone was still waiting for something.
“You out?”
Hae-neul asked.
“Yeah.”
“Where are you going now?”
Hae-neul asked.
Seo-ah walked down the street. Without any particular destination. Wherever her feet took her. She passed the subway entrance of Hapjeong Station. She could have gone down the stairs. But she didn’t. If she went down, she felt she’d fall deeper. So she kept walking.
“Come to the tattoo shop.”
Hae-neul said.
“Right now?”
“Yeah. I’m going to pull an all-nighter anyway.”
Hae-neul said.
Seo-ah realized which direction her feet were heading. Hongdae. Where Hae-neul’s tattoo shop was. The path there was automatically memorized in her body. How many nights had she walked that way? How much time had she spent there? Sitting next to Hae-neul, watching people get tattooed, listening to the sound of the tattoo needle, searching for her own music in that sound.
The tattoo shop door was open. Stairs leading down to the semi-basement. The smell came first. The smell of disinfectant. It was similar to a hospital’s smell, but different. A hospital smelled of death, but here it was the smell of change. The smell of something becoming new.
Hae-neul was sitting in the chair. In front of her, a young man lay down, and in her hands was a tattoo machine. The machine was still whirring. A humming sound. The acoustic signature of pain and transformation. When Seo-ah entered, Hae-neul stopped the machine.
“Sit.”
Hae-neul said.
Seo-ah sat on the waiting sofa. This was where people waited to get tattooed. How long had they waited? How many people sat here waiting for their transformation? What mindset did they have? Fear? Excitement? Or simply the desperation to remake themselves?
“What do you want to see here?”
The man getting the tattoo asked.
Seo-ah couldn’t tell if the question was directed at her or at Hae-neul.
“How they endure silence?”
Hae-neul answered.
“Right. Enduring silence. That’s beautiful. Seeing what kind of change that silence brings.”
The man said.
Hae-neul turned the machine back on. The whirring resumed. A new line began forming on the man’s arm. One stroke at a time. A permanent mark. It was an irreversible change.
Seo-ah watched the process. The tattoo needle piercing the skin. It was a wound, but also a creation. A moment when destruction and creation happened simultaneously.
Time passed. How long? Thirty minutes? An hour? Seo-ah’s sense of time was still blurred. But that didn’t matter. What mattered was the movement of Hae-neul’s hands. Precise, fast, sometimes pausing. The pauses were moments of thought. Moments deciding where to draw the next line.
The tattoo was complete. On the man’s arm was now the shape of a tree. From root to trunk. And at the top, there was fire. Burning flames. It was part of the tree and yet simultaneously trying to destroy it.
“What is this?”
The man asked.
“Life and death. Together.”
Hae-neul answered.
The man stood up and went to look in the mirror. While he examined his arm, Hae-neul looked at Seo-ah.
“You like it?”
Hae-neul asked.
“Yeah.”
Seo-ah answered.
It wasn’t a lie. Seo-ah really did like that tattoo. She liked its imperfection. She liked its permanence. She liked its contradiction.
After the man left, Hae-neul began cleaning the machine. With alcohol. Wiping. Disinfecting. It was like a ritual. A purification ritual. A ritual of cleansing oneself for the next transformation when one ends.
“When did you lose your voice?”
Hae-neul asked while cleaning.
“I don’t know. When it started.”
Seo-ah answered.
“When you met Kang Ri-woo?”
Hae-neul asked.
“No. It was before that. When I started working at the convenience store? When I started taking care of Do-hyun? Or was it from the beginning? Maybe I was born without a voice?”
Seo-ah said.
Hae-neul stopped cleaning.
“You’re saying something very strange right now, Seo-ah. You had a voice. Definitely.”
Hae-neul said.
“Where?”
Seo-ah asked.
“When you sang. You had a voice when you sang. That voice was big enough to save the entire world.”
Hae-neul said.
Seo-ah touched her neck. There was a collage there. A tattoo. Hae-neul’s tattoo. Flames. Below those flames was her neck. Inside the neck were vocal cords. When those vocal cords vibrated, sound came out. But at some point, those vocal cords had stopped moving.
“What are you going to say in court?”
Hae-neul asked.
“I don’t know.”
Seo-ah answered.
“The prosecutor will ask. What Kang Ri-woo did. To you. Exactly. Then you have to speak. You can speak. Because you have a voice.”
Hae-neul said.
Seo-ah remained silent.
“Seo-ah. Can you hear me?”
Hae-neul asked.
“Yeah.”
“Then speak. Say anything. Speak now. What Kang Ri-woo did. What he did to you.”
Hae-neul said.
Seo-ah opened her mouth. But no sound came out. Her throat was dry. Like a desert. No one could cry there. Everything had evaporated.
“Seo-ah?”
Hae-neul asked again.
“I…”
Seo-ah began to speak.
“I… don’t know… where to start…”
The words cut off. Like a broken tape.
Hae-neul approached Seo-ah. And took her hand. Seo-ah’s hand was cold. Like ice. Like dead. But it wasn’t a lifeless hand. It was a hand enduring everything. Enduring all emotion, all sadness, all anger.
“You’re holding something back right now.”
Hae-neul said.
“Yeah.”
Seo-ah answered.
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then when did you start holding it back?”
Hae-neul asked.
Seo-ah thought. When had it started? When she met Kang Ri-woo? No. It was before that. When she started taking care of Do-hyun? No. It was before that.
“When Mother went into the water.”
Seo-ah said.
Hae-neul looked at Seo-ah. Something glistened in Hae-neul’s eyes. Tears? Or something else?
“Mother?”
Hae-neul asked.
“Yes. Mother is a haenyeo. She goes into the water and holds her breath. I don’t even know how long she can hold it. But Mother always comes back up. Always. So I kept waiting. For Mother to come back up. That waiting made me who I am.”
Seo-ah said.
“So?”
Hae-neul asked.
“So I learned how to hold my breath. I’ve been holding it ever since. Until something breaks. But nothing ever broke. I just keep holding on.”
Seo-ah said.
Hae-neul embraced Seo-ah. It was an embrace, but also a binding. A determination not to let Seo-ah go. A vow that Seo-ah would not disappear again.
“When you go to court, you have to breathe. You have to come up. Like your mother. Come up and breathe. And speak. You can speak. Because you have a voice.”
Hae-neul whispered into Seo-ah’s ear.
Seo-ah leaned against Hae-neul’s chest. There she heard Hae-neul’s heartbeat. A pump. The sound of being alive. It was what Seo-ah had lost. Proof of existence. A pumping heart.
“You have to speak before the fire goes out.”
Hae-neul said.
“The fire goes out?”
Seo-ah asked.
“Yeah. All fire goes out. Before that, you have to light your own fire. With that light, you have to speak. In court. And after.”
Hae-neul said.
At that moment, the fluorescent light in the tattoo shop flickered. Once. Then brightened again. But not as bright as before. Something was changing. Very slowly. Almost imperceptibly.
Seo-ah saw a new tattoo on Hae-neul’s arm. That tattoo had a name. It wasn’t a tattoo Seo-ah had seen before. Something new. What was it?
“What is this?”
Seo-ah asked. Pointing at Hae-neul’s arm.
“You wouldn’t know.”
Hae-neul laughed.
“When did you get it?”
“When you were in the hospital. Alone.”
Hae-neul said.
Seo-ah looked closely at the tattoo. They were musical notes. Multiple notes connected together. A melody. It was Seo-ah’s melody. A melody from one of Seo-ah’s songs.
“What is this?”
Seo-ah asked again.
“You forgot?”
Hae-neul asked.
“What?”
“The song you sang last winter. At the club in Hongdae. I wanted to remember that song’s melody. So I did this. Permanently. On my arm.”
Hae-neul said.
Seo-ah began to trace the notes. With her finger. From note to note. And gradually, those notes began to become music. In Seo-ah’s ear. It was a memory. A memory Seo-ah had forgotten. Her own voice.
“In court, think of this. These notes. Then you’ll be able to speak.”
Hae-neul said.
Seo-ah lowered her hand from Hae-neul’s arm.
“I promise.”
Seo-ah said.
“Huh?”
Hae-neul asked.
“In court… I’ll speak. All of it. Exactly.”
Seo-ah said.
Hae-neul laughed. For the first time. Through all these days, through all these nights, for the first time Hae-neul laughed.
“Let’s go home now.”
Hae-neul said.
“Alone?”
Seo-ah asked.
“No. With me.”
Hae-neul said.
They left the tattoo shop together. They climbed up the semi-basement stairs. The night streets of Hongdae were still awake. But this time they looked different. Seo-ah was looking at them now. Not disappearing. Not transparent. Actually present.
At a corner of an alley, Seo-ah passed the place where she first met Kang Ri-woo. It was still the same. Same sign. Same light. But Seo-ah was no longer bound to that place.
Hae-neul took Seo-ah’s hand.
“This isn’t the end. This is where it begins.”
Hae-neul said.
“What begins?”
Seo-ah asked.
“Your fire. From now on, you have to burn for yourself. With that fire, you have to speak. In court. And after that too.”
Hae-neul said.
Seo-ah touched her neck again. There was a tattoo there. A flame. That flame was still burning. She could feel it. The heat from inside. A small heat, but one that definitely existed.
Would that heat reach the courtroom?
Seo-ah couldn’t know. But as she walked, hand in hand with Hae-neul, she thought for the first time.
Ah, I was burning. All this time. All along.
End of Chapter 124