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# Chapter 2: The Creaking Floorboards
The gate to Grandmother’s house was made of wood. Faded brown wood, its surface bearing the unmistakable marks of decades spent beneath the sun and rain. The moment Eun-seo reached out to grasp the handle, it swung open. No resistance. As if someone inside had been waiting to let her in. She stepped back, her heartbeat suddenly tangible against her ribs. Her eyes snapped to the gate, then back toward the house.
“You made it,” Grandmother’s voice drifted out, warm and familiar against Eun-seo’s chest.
Beyond the gate lay a small courtyard. At its center stood a single persimmon tree, its fruit still green. The same shade she’d glimpsed from the bus window. Eun-seo stepped inside, luggage in hand. The scent of earth and persimmon blossoms filled her lungs—nothing like the sterile smell of Seoul’s food delivery boxes.
“Hello, Grandmother.” As Eun-seo bowed, her grandmother came into view. She was smaller than Eun-seo remembered. People seemed to shrink with age. Grandmother barely reached her shoulder. Her white hair was neatly arranged, her face etched with deep wrinkles—like a map drawn by decades of emotion. Eun-seo couldn’t look away from those lines.
“You travel light,” Grandmother observed, not asked. “What were you doing in Seoul that you packed so little?” Her voice filled the air around Eun-seo, but the younger woman didn’t answer. Instead, she studied the house. It was a renovated hanok—traditional Korean architecture with modern updates. Tile roof, concrete foundation, wooden frame. Eun-seo had seen photographs before, whenever Grandmother visited Seoul. But photographs lie. They’re always either more beautiful or more decrepit than reality. This house existed somewhere in between.
“The floorboards creak,” Grandmother continued. “I don’t have the money to fix them anymore. We’ll just leave them as they are. It’s fine.” Eun-seo climbed the wooden steps at the entrance. They did look worn. The railing was wood too, and when she grasped it, warmth flooded her palm. The kind of warmth that comes from wood soaked in sunlight. The sensation startled her. In Seoul, everything was cold. Steel and plastic and concrete. Warmth only came from heaters.
“Come inside,” Grandmother gestured for her to remove her shoes. Eun-seo obliged. There was no shoe rack—just three pairs arranged neatly by the entrance. Grandmother’s slippers, black indoor shoes, and now Eun-seo’s sneakers. Three pairs. That was the entirety of this household.
The interior was brighter than expected. Windows everywhere. Facing the courtyard, the neighboring house, the hills beyond. Sunlight streamed in from multiple angles, bathing the entire space in warm amber. Dust particles danced in the beams. Eun-seo stood transfixed.
“Living room here, kitchen there,” Grandmother gestured. “Two rooms upstairs. You take the left one. I use the right.” Eun-seo nodded. She opened her mouth to speak, then stopped. What could she say? Thank you felt too formal. That’s nice felt wrong. Silence seemed better.
Grandmother appeared to read that silence. She walked toward the kitchen. “You need to eat. Everything improves after a proper meal.” Eun-seo watched her grandmother’s back disappear. Instead of the delivery app notifications of Seoul, she heard the sounds of cooking. The aroma of doenjang-jjigae—soybean paste stew—tickled her nose. Nothing like Seoul’s food deliveries. This was a living smell.
“Doenjang-jjigae. I made it yesterday,” Grandmother said, lifting the pot lid. Steam rose up. “It’s the perfect temperature—hot enough to burn your fingertips just slightly.” Eun-seo watched her grandmother ladle rice. It was hot, still steaming. The rice was pristine white, finished with a light drizzle of sesame oil. Eun-seo had never cooked rice at home. In Seoul, it was always delivery or convenience stores—pre-made rice. This rice was made in that moment. Rice still alive with warmth.
“Sit,” Grandmother placed the rice bowl and stew on a low traditional table. Eun-seo settled before it. The table was low, wooden, traditional—not a modern dining set. Beside the rice and stew sat several side dishes. Seasoned vegetables, nori in a small dish. The seaweed looked fresh. Eun-seo couldn’t remember when she’d started distinguishing such things. An editor’s habit? Or just exhaustion? The compulsive measuring of everything’s freshness.
“Why are you just staring? Eat the soup,” Grandmother said. Eun-seo lifted the spoon. The stew was genuinely hot. Her tongue nearly burned the moment it touched. She pulled back quickly, sipping at the broth instead. It was hot and deep. The taste was nothing like the doenjang-jjigae she’d eaten in Seoul. Richer. More complex. The flavor of beans, of salt, and something else. The taste of time, perhaps. The taste of how long this had been simmering.
“Hot, isn’t it?” Grandmother laughed—a small laugh, but warm. “Everyone does that at first. Rushing to eat. But you have to eat slowly. Food has no flavor when you hurry.” Eun-seo lifted her spoon more deliberately. She took a scoop of rice, chewed slowly, tried to taste it. It was in this moment, she realized, that rice became something with actual flavor. In Seoul, rice was background. A vessel for side dishes. Here, rice was the protagonist.
“Grandmother,” Eun-seo said slowly, “this rice is really delicious.” Grandmother laughed again, louder this time. “Of course. I made it myself. It’s not like Seoul rice. This rice has time in it.” Eun-seo continued eating. Grandmother watched her across the table, her gaze warm yet somehow measuring. She was studying Eun-seo’s face. What does my face look like? Eun-seo wondered. Tired? Pale? Just the face of someone who came from far away?
“Was it very difficult in Seoul?” Grandmother asked suddenly. Eun-seo’s spoon paused. She considered the question. Was it difficult? Or just busy? What was the difference? “A little, yes,” she answered quietly.
“A little?” Grandmother laughed. “There’s no such thing as a little. Either it was or it wasn’t. And that face of yours—that’s not a ‘little difficult’ face. That’s a ‘very difficult’ face.” Eun-seo didn’t respond. She returned to her rice. As she ate, she thought about how unfair it was that expressions revealed emotions. She’d always worked to hide hers—as an editor, as a person. Showing emotion meant showing weakness. Weakness meant losing trust. Without trust, you couldn’t work. So every morning in Seoul, she’d faced the mirror and arranged her features. Created a face without emotion.
But even that face had been read by her grandmother.
“Finish eating and go to your room,” Grandmother said. “Unpack your things. Then rest. When the body is tired, the mind is tired too.” Eun-seo nodded and continued eating. The tofu in the stew was soft, almost dissolving—evidence of long cooking, as Grandmother had said. The zucchini was the same, nearly collapsed. In normal circumstances, this would be called “unattractive.” But Eun-seo thought of it as “perfectly cooked.”
When she finished, Grandmother cleared the dishes. Eun-seo started to help, but Grandmother raised her hand. “It’s fine. You go to your room. Unpack. Then sleep.”
“Let me help.”
“No. This is my work. You need to rest.”
Eun-seo said nothing more. There was something in her grandmother’s voice that brooked no argument. She stood, gathered her luggage—a rolling suitcase and backpack. That was all.
The stairs to the second floor were narrow, wooden, ancient-looking. With each step Eun-seo took, the wood cried out. Creak. Creak. The sound wasn’t unpleasant. Rather, it felt like the house announcing itself alive. A living house makes sounds.
Upstairs, two rooms flanked a narrow hallway. The left one was Eun-seo’s—the one Grandmother had indicated. She opened the door.
The room was small but clean. One window overlooked the courtyard and the persimmon tree beyond it, and further still, green hills. Spring-touched hills. The bed wasn’t traditional Korean—it was modern, dressed in white sheets. Clean sheets that Grandmother must have prepared in advance.
There was a small wooden wardrobe with a mirror above it. Eun-seo caught her reflection and looked away quickly. She looked exhausted. Pale. Exactly the expression Grandmother had described: very difficult.
Unpacking didn’t take long. She’d brought so little. A few black pants, white shirts, a gray sweater. Editor’s clothes. Gray and black loungewear. Almost no color. As if reflecting her emotional palette.
Once her clothes were stored, Eun-seo lay on the bed. The sheets were softer than expected. Sunlight streamed through the window, illuminating the mattress. She closed her eyes. The exhaustion from the bus ride pressed down on her body. But sleep wouldn’t come.
She opened her eyes and stared at the ceiling. It was wooden, its grain visible like tree rings. The rings that showed this house’s age. Eun-seo traced them with her eyes, though her hand wouldn’t move. Just staring.
Time passed. How much, she couldn’t say. The sunlight through the window shifted gradually. Afternoon was fading. She looked outside. The persimmon tree remained where it was. Unmoved. Unchanged. Simply existing.
What am I going to do here? she thought. How am I going to survive three months?
The doctor had prescribed three months of rest. “You need rest,” was all he’d said. The pills were for insomnia. She took them sometimes. Sometimes they worked; sometimes they didn’t. She still woke at 3 AM. It had become her body’s habit. The Seoul habit. Working from midnight to 3 AM.
She heard Grandmother moving around outside the room. Footsteps. Activity. Grandmother didn’t seem tired. She was seventy-eight. Eun-seo was thirty-four—younger—yet her grandmother seemed more vital. Why? Purpose, perhaps. Grandmother had things to do. Rice to cook, a house to maintain, a life to live. What did Eun-seo have to do? Rest, they said. But resting was torture for someone who didn’t know how.
She closed her eyes again. This time, sleep seemed possible. The exhaustion of the bus ride, combined with everything accumulated in Seoul, crashed down on her all at once. She surrendered to the wave.
When night came, Eun-seo woke. 2:13 AM. Three hours and forty-seven minutes until dawn.
She got out of bed, dressed quietly so as not to wake Grandmother, and descended the stairs. The floorboards still creaked. With each sound, Eun-seo paused. Grandmother didn’t stir. She slept deeply.
The living room downstairs was dark, lit only by moonlight through the windows. Eun-seo looked outside. The persimmon tree was black beneath the moon. The hills beyond it the same. In Seoul, night was never this dark. Streetlights, building lights, car lights—night was bright. Here, night was truly night.
She went to the kitchen for water. There was a refrigerator with cold water. She opened it. The light was so bright, she blinked. Inside were numerous side dishes. A rice cooker with rice grains still clinging to it, containers of banchan. Things Grandmother had prepared in advance.
Eun-seo poured herself a glass of cold water and drank. The chill was refreshing. The sensation of her throat waking. She poured another.
Then she heard Grandmother’s voice.
“Did you wake in the middle of the night?”
Eun-seo startled. Grandmother was awake. She’d emerged from her room in white pajamas, her white hair matching the fabric perfectly. “Yes, sorry. Did I wake you?”
“No, I was going to the bathroom.” Grandmother came into the kitchen. “You know, waking in the middle of the night isn’t the problem. The problem is not being able to fall back asleep afterward.”
Eun-seo didn’t respond. Grandmother was exactly right.
“Are you hungry?”
“No, just water.”
Grandmother opened the refrigerator and retrieved something. A container. Eun-seo wondered what it was. Grandmother opened it. Inside were white rice cakes. “Hotteok. I made them yesterday. They’re good warm.”
Grandmother placed the cakes on a plate and put them in the microwave. It beeped. The microwave hummed. Traditional and modern, blended in this kitchen.
“Grandmother, it’s fine. I should sleep.”
“Eat these while you rest. Rice cakes ease the mind. And if you eat rice cakes before sleep, you’ll have good dreams.”
The microwave finished. Grandmother retrieved the plate. The cakes were warm. She slid the plate toward Eun-seo. “Eat.”
Eun-seo picked one up. Warm. And flavorful. Sweet. The taste of sugar, and something more inside. Nuts? No—sesame seeds. Black and white sesame seeds mixed together.
“Did you make these?”
“Of course. Who else would? It’s labor-intensive, but it has to be done. Food made with your hands is good for the heart.”
Eun-seo continued eating. The rice cake slowly dissolved in her mouth. Sweetness spread across her tongue. Grandmother watched her, warmth in her gaze. She didn’t speak. Just watched. That was enough.
“Finish eating and sleep,” Grandmother said. “I’ll see you at breakfast. I need to sleep too. Your grandmother is tired.”
“Thank you, Grandmother.”
Grandmother laughed. “Thank you for what? Just being here is enough. Isn’t that thanks?”
Grandmother climbed back upstairs. The floorboards cried out beneath her feet—the slow, gentle sound of her ascending. Eun-seo finished the rice cakes and returned to bed.
As she lay down, she closed her eyes again. This time, sleep seemed certain. The sweetness of the rice cake lingered in her mouth. And Grandmother’s voice remained in her ears. “Just being here is enough.”
Just being here is enough.
Those words slowly pulled her toward sleep. At 3:47 AM, Eun-seo fell asleep again. This time, she would dream. As Grandmother had promised. Because of the rice cakes made by hand.
When morning came, sunlight filled the room again. Light rising beyond the persimmon tree. Eun-seo opened her eyes. She’d forgotten, for a moment, about waking in the dark. That was progress. Small progress, but progress nonetheless.
The floorboards still creaked. But now the sound was different. Not a signal of decay, but a signal that this house was alive.