The Impossible Fairy Tale

by Han Yujoo

  On the left side of Kim Injung’s neck is a small mole. All of a sudden, she wants to pick at it, to carve it out with a knife. But a stationery knife won’t do. Something as small as a kitten can be killed with a stationery knife, but not a person. A knife, a kitchen knife, she mutters. Where’s the knife? she asks sharply. Kim Injung, who had been crouched down on the ground, gets up. Cutting board. Knife. He leads her to the kitchen. On the table that protrudes out into the hallway is a meal set for one. Soup, rice, side dishes, and water. A fork is set instead of chopsticks. There is no note. Kim Injung walks past the table, opens the drawer under the sink, and takes out a knife. The lighting isn’t good. The blade flashes but doesn’t shine. He hands the large kitchen knife to the Child.

  Knife, he says. Here. Her head empties precipitously. Her hand shakes as she takes the knife from him. Kieuk, says Kim Injung. K. Is a k onomatopoeic or mimetic? she wonders all of a sudden. Is it a kackle? But there’s nothing funny. Kim Injung fixes his dark eyes with their large irises on her. She tightens her hands around the knife handle. But her grip is weak. Her dark hands grow pale. She looks back. No trace must be left. A blue jacket hangs on the back of a chair by the table. It doesn’t belong to Kim Injung. It’s too big. She raises her hands. Kim Injung looks dumbly at her. Many times, in the shadows of the stone wall surrounding the school, she has seen him get beaten up by the rougher boys. He would cover his face with his arms and sink into the shadows, screaming shrilly.

  But today, as he stands before her, he shows no sign of being scared. No sign of terror, dread, or fear. The Child quickly grows damp. She thinks that the blue jacket hanging on the chair is watching her, that it knows everything that she has ever done, that at the very last second, it will run up to her and snatch away the knife and stab her instead. Deeply. Her blood, and not someone else’s, will soak the floor, and her feet, and not someone else’s, will leave behind footprints, and her small body, and not someone else’s, will become the evidence. These will prove that she was alive, that she existed. No. She doesn’t think about anything. She can’t think about anything. Her hands quiver. Exactly like the word. Perhaps they are quavering. Just like the letters. The knife slips weakly from her hands. The knife drops to the floor. The long, hard, sharp object drops, coldly, as though it will carve out the linoleum floor. One strike of dull silence. Knife, says Kim Injung. And with the syllable still trapped on his tongue, the clock on the living room wall chimes. Five strikes of silence. The tip of the blade vibrates imperceptibly from the impact on the floor. By the time the knife has stopped vibrating, the Child is already gone. On top of Kim Injung’s desk is his open notebook, and on the pages of his open notebook are the letters he had been writing.

  Will we ever learn the Child’s name? What will she be called?

  i Here, Injung is mispronouncing the first five consonants of the Korean alphabet, which are giyeok, nieun, digeut, rieul, and mieum. Two of his mispronunciations happen to be actual words: gieok, which means “memory,” and mium, which means “hatred.”—Trans.

  16

  We must not call that time “back then.” The words back then attempt to make the past too beautiful, something to long for. That time. Time’s grime. That time when every eye contained a glass shard. That time when I wanted to snap, trample, snip, cut, crumple, and ruin everything I saw. That time when even a narrow strand of light aimed for the throat like a knife. That time. That time when the slanted sun in the sky gripped a butcher knife. That time. That time when every beautiful thing was scattered and crushed and tangled, extinguishing every possible spark of future longing and regret. Because memories assault recollections, recollections return as memories full of objections. Therefore, no memories return without anticipation, without premonition, without sensation, without emotion. They are like a wide-meshed net, unable to catch anything.

  Could I describe you with the length of a shadow? Could I explain you with the number of teeth I lost in those nightmare-ridden nights? Could I identify you by a fingerprint left on a surface? Could I estimate you with the thickness of a stack of notebooks? Could I recognize you by the wounds scattered like the Milky Way? The wounds loosed like a constellation? These things are beautiful. But we must not be deceived by their beauty. If they can be called beautiful. Beauty doesn’t last. Only ugly, hideous things persist, doggedly, and sink people. They collapse. They are collapsing.

  You are already being documented. You’re not you and you’re not like anyone else. No trace must be left. Because the traces you’ve left behind so carelessly will one day pursue and catch you and then scratch you. The footsteps you’ve left behind must disappear before they begin to chase you. But is it possible for you to completely disappear? What will you be called?

  You must grow a little more, you must weigh a little more. So that you no longer fit into the clothes you are wearing, so that you can wear new clothes and hide your ragged body. Your feet, too, must grow a little more. You must change out of your bloodied shoes. The gaze collapses. There is no sentence that can save you. While you escape the page and are not seen, there is no sentence that can describe what happens to you. There is no sentence that can describe what you’re thinking or feeling. You must keep moving. Then the sentences that don’t yet exist will become your shadow. May those sentences never pursue you, attack you, kill you, or bury you.

  17

  The Child moves on. It’s raining. The sun has set. She checks the time with great care. Thursday. She sticks her hand in her right pant pocket to check once again that the key is there. One hour will be enough. Enough to slip out of the apartment complex and run all the way to school, slide open the window she’d secretly left open on the first floor earlier that afternoon, creep up to the fourth floor, open the door to the Grade 5, Section 3, classroom, and walk up to the teacher’s desk. One hour is plenty. No. She must also account for the time it takes to get back. She needs time to run home and catch her breath, to wipe her damp face, and to hide the redness of her cheeks. But still, one hour should be plenty. She doesn’t need to write anything today. Now that she has thought about time, she must think about space. Where can I throw them away? she thinks. Should I burn them? But that would draw too much attention, because the sun has already set. More than anything, the Child wants to keep the journals. Rather than get rid of them. But there is no suitable location. She jogs slowly. She must be back by nine o’clock. She must be sitting at her lamp-lit desk, quietly reading her textbook. Then today’s beating can be pushed back to tomorrow, perhaps the day after tomorrow. There isn’t room on the Child’s bookshelf for the journals. Not because her own books already crowd the shelf, but simply because objects that don’t belong to her should not attract any attention. No. The names that don’t belong to her, the sentences that were never once hers—they should not attract any attention.

  Instead of carrying an umbrella, she covered herself in a nylon jacket and hat. She could have covered her face if she had used an umbrella. But she thinks she can’t run quickly while holding one. She doesn’t hear the splashing rain. She runs past pedestrians. They will forever exist as pedestrians. She doesn’t look at their faces. They disappear from her sight. Should I burn them? But it’s raining. I can’t burn them in my room. Because ashes will fly around. But more than anything, the room would reek of burned paper. The key moves in her pocket, according to her movements. She is aware of the key’s movement. I can throw it out anywhere. After I’ve wiped it clean. This time, it really doesn’t matter if I chuck it into the drain. There are so many keys out there. There are probably more keys than doors in the world. That’s right. Even if I throw it out anywhere, even if someone finds it, no one will know what door it opens.

  The Child walks past a produce market and glances at the clock hanging above a pile of fruit covered in plastic. 8:05. There is still time. The cold April night air pushes out her breathing. She doesn’t think, Will this be the last time? She doesn’t think, Why did I do this? She doesn’t think, Why did I th
ink of something like this? While she thinks about the thoughts she doesn’t have, the mice and ants pursue her noiselessly. The sound of the pipe doesn’t reach her ears. From time to time, cars shine their headlights on her and her shadow, and drive by. Then each time, the procession of mice and ants behind her disappears in a flash. Like a lie. Like the lies she had to invent without hiding anything. Like the lies she forgot to prepare. I should have brought a flashlight, she thinks. No, I won’t need one. Because all I have to do is carry them out. She tries to guess the thickness of the stack of notebooks. She won’t be able to hold them all with one hand. But she must leave one hand free. She must shut the door and window, but more than anything, she must throw away the key. Should I throw the journals into the incinerator? Disposing of them that way seems to be the most realistic solution. But can a realistic thing become a real thing? The Child steps into the alley. All the stores in the shopping arcade are dark. Streetlights illuminate the raindrops, making them transparent. But they hit the ground before they can be completely illuminated. She reaches the school gate and catches her breath. A raindrop drips down her nose. A diagonal line becomes etched on her cheek. Knife. She looks back. No one is there. She looks back only when no one is there. But is that really true?

  The Child disappears into the school. She will probably stand on her toes and slide open the window at the end of the hallway, step onto the corner of the protruding brick to climb the meter-high wall, and slip through the window and land silently on the wooden floor. She will remove her shoes and carry them so that her footsteps will be silent, and after making sure no flashlight flickers at the end of the hallway, she will tiptoe up the stairs to the fourth floor. And from time to time, her hand will slip into her pocket to make sure that the key is still there. She won’t be thinking about anything. The classroom door will open, she will head straightaway for the teacher’s desk, and pick up the stack of journals that were collected the day before. After checking the time on the clock on the back wall—8:25—and without catching anyone’s eye, she will once again walk down the hallway, once again descend the stairs, once again open the window, and once again set her feet on the ground.

  She places the thirty-five journals on the window ledge and climbs over the window. Hidden in the dark, her face can’t be seen. Rain drips from her black jacket. Her feet are wet. The raindrops she had dripped along the hallway will dry up by morning. Now back outside again, she briefly hesitates with the journals in her arms. If she is to go to the incinerator, she must cut across the field or go along the edge of the field at a right angle, following the sparsely planted magnolia trees.

  She hesitates.

  She stands.

  She does not move.

  She moves.

  Tucking the journals under her arm, she heads toward the school gate. Journal, diurnal, dirge, purge, surge, submerge, urge, mutters the Child. At the school gate, she looks back again. Everything is bound to sink. The incinerator located at the opposite end beyond the field is shrouded in darkness. And no one is there. Incinerate, degenerate, eviscerate, obliterate, she mutters. She must hurry. Before she gets home, she must hide the journals. But will she have time? The road in front of the school gate splits into three paths. She moves like an automaton. The rain is letting up. A raindrop slides down her nose. She tightens her hold on the notebooks that keep slipping from under her arm and begins to run. Most children use pencils. If only they had written in their journals with water-based pens, if only the rain could erase their childish sentences. But most children use pencils. The Child, who has slipped out from the alley, stands by the side of the two-lane road. The sign hanging from the hospital rooftop is lit up. Green. The traffic lights are lit up. Red. While she waits for the lights to change, she rummages through her pocket for the key. She takes it out, and without hesitating, she hurls it into the drain. For a split second, the key catches on the grate and then falls somewhere beyond where she can see. It starts to drizzle. Even if more rain should fall, even if the streets flood and water flows into every house, the key will not float. The trait of metal. The weight of metal. She is safe. The key will never again appear. The lights change. A car drives over the stop line and stops. The Child starts to run. She passes the hardware store, the wallpaper and linoleum store, the flower bed in front of the after-school academy, and a bicycle shop. Several people holding umbrellas walk by. She can’t see their faces. Pedestrians. As she is passing the ATM at the corner of the bank, her face lights up briefly. It’s the light. Her black nylon jacket reflects white light for an instant. From there, the road goes steeply downhill. She braces her left arm in order to keep the journals from slipping. In the distance, the shops in her apartment complex begin to come into view.

  Running past the supermarket, the Child bumps into someone’s shoulder. She instinctively braces her left arm. Until it hurts. But it doesn’t hurt. Without looking back, she tries to resume running. You! someone shouts. The Child looks back.

  It’s Mia. Mia recognizes the Child. We’re in the same class, right? asks Mia. Mia’s mother is standing behind Mia. You almost broke our eggs, Mia says to the Child. Mia’s mother peers into the plastic bag. The Child bows toward Mia’s mother in apology. I’m sorry …, she trails off. Mia’s mother gazes down at her. You should be more careful, she says. What’s that? Mia asks, as though curious. The Child glances sharply at Mia. What’s all that under your arm? Mia asks. The Child flinches and backs away. Mia gives her a puzzled look. The Child backs away from Mia. To somewhere close, far, far away. Are you friends? Mia’s mother asks Mia. She’s in my class, Mia says. Do you live around here? What’s your name? Mia’s mother asks the Child. The Child turns around without saying a word. A drop of either sweat or rain runs down her back. It’s cold. It’s slippery. Mia’s mother doesn’t call out to her. Mia taps the ground with the end of her closed umbrella. The Child doesn’t look back. She moves into the darkness. Her face that has turned white can no longer be seen. Where should I go? She walks blindly toward a spot beyond the gazes of Mia and Mia’s mother. The rain has stopped. No trace must be left. But that is now an impossibility. A long and pointy triangle is drawn with the Child, Mia, and Mia’s mother as the vertices. The Child moves. The triangle gets longer and steeper. Where should I go? the Child wonders. Right then, a large recycling bin catches her eye. Throw them away, the Child mutters. Throw them all away.

  While the Child is throwing the journals into the recycling bin, Mia and Mia’s mother head home. So that girl isn’t your friend? Mia’s mother asks Mia. No, Mia answers absentmindedly. Mia and Mia’s mother step into their empty apartment. Mom, can I sleep with you tonight? Mia pleads. Mia’s mother, who had been putting the groceries into the fridge, looks at Mia. There she stands, wearing a pitiful expression. Fine …, Mia’s mother trails off. Mia beams. As she goes into her room to change into her pajamas, her thoughts turn suddenly to the Child. Then she just as soon forgets about her.

  No one is home at the Child’s apartment. Not yet. Standing before the front door, the Child takes a key out of her pocket. She sticks it into the keyhole. But the key doesn’t fit. The Child sways as though she were going to fall. The Grade 5, Section 3, classroom key is in her hand. A drop of either sweat or rain runs down her back. It’s hot. It’s slippery. There is no key. No, there is a key. A different key. Her entire body is wet. It’s 8:52, the key that she has accidentally thrown away lies at the bottom of the dirty water. But she doesn’t have the time or means to find the key. All of a sudden, she thinks of Mia and her mother. She doesn’t forget them. Mia, Mia, Mia. The Child forgets nothing. She clings to the doorknob, hardly holding herself up. Is this a dream? No, it’s not a dream. She won’t be able to sleep tonight. Because she won’t be able to sleep, she won’t be able to dream. The Child tries to come up with a realistic way to open the door and go inside. But a realistic thing isn’t realistic. A realistic thing has never once become a real thing. There she stands. She does not move. Even if it rains, she who is alrea
dy wet can’t get wet again. But still, we must go on talking about the Child. And though she may grow more dreadful, and though she may grow more wretched, and though she may grow more desperate, we must go on talking about her.

  Look and see.

  Look and see the Child.

  18

  Park Minsu remembers the bird. Pigeons and sparrows with no inkling of the fate that awaited them would sometimes fly in through the open window in the hallway. Anticipating such opportunities, the children carried slingshots in their pockets. Park Minsu was responsible for quickly shutting the window in order to trap the bird. The children loaded their slingshots with marbles, a marble bore through the bird, and the bird dropped to the ground. Then they put the dead bird in the slingshot, the bloody, nearly featherless pulp became a pellet to be flung, malicious boys aimed for the backs of girls’ necks, and the girls who were hit shrieked. The boys laughed hysterically at this sight, unaware of the fate they would share with the bird, and were in turn beaten to a pulp by the teacher.

  Lee Jiyeong constantly came across other children who had his name. For all of his twelve years but one, he was called Big Lee Jiyeong, or perhaps Boy Lee Jiyeong. Those with the same name were always girls, and if there weren’t any who shared both his first and last name, there were at least those who shared his first name. The first time he didn’t come across other Jiyeongs was when he entered the army. Shortly after starting his term, he was tasked with cutting iron pipes to make chin-up bars. He mixed the cement. A corporal cut through the bar with an angle grinder. The grinding wheel spun. Suddenly someone shouted, Pick up that skin! Hurry! As he picked up the corporal’s skin that had become a sludge of dirt and sand, Lee Jiyeong was struck by the strangeness of the expression “pick up skin.” The corporal lost 40 percent of his right arm. For the rest of his time in the army, Lee Jiyeong heard no other news about the corporal.