The Boy Who Escaped Paradise

by J. M. Lee

  Dash giggled, grabbing his stomach. “Long time no see! I’ve forgotten what it’s like to fart.”

  We laughed, passing gas with each guffaw. We pulled our pants down to take a shit on a low hill. The sky was touching our behinds as the grass tickled our backs. Our shit was speckled with small red seeds.

  The sun set. Our red lips and hands would reveal our clandestine activity. Dash sucked the tips of his stained fingers and grinned. “Let’s go. At least we’ll be full when Straw Cutter beats us.”

  Back home, Straw Cutter made us get down on all fours and used a big stick to beat us. Each time the stick made contact with my back, I licked my lips for the tart taste of wild berries. Next to me, Dash twisted in pain, tears flowing down his face. That night, I dreamed of a multihued world filled with wild strawberries.

  Fists ruled the market—merchants chased away the grasshoppers, who threatened us with clubs. Merchants, for their part, kowtowed to the senior patrol, who sniveled to the SPSD. When the SPSD appeared, everyone scattered. From our hiding place around the corner, Dash would peek at the SPSD agents stomping around in polished leather shoes. “They actually help us work the market,” he whispered. “Straw Cutter pays them off once a month so we can sell things that come from the camp, like vegetables and wild greens. We hand off pine mushrooms and rabbit pelts to smugglers, and they take it across the border. If you upset them, you can’t stay around anymore. That’s why merchants and grasshoppers who don’t buy their wares or miss rent disappear the very next day. Everyone knows that we’re close to the SPSD, so that’s how we can pretty much do whatever we want here.”

  The patrol, however, still flexed their muscles when the SPSD weren’t around. They took our dirty rice cakes and puny steamed corn and tiny rotting potatoes, threatening us with clubs. After one incident, Dash offered me his sleeve as I spat blood out of my mouth. “Just give them what they want,” he advised. “They’ll take it whether they beat you for it or you give it up. Assholes. I wish we could unleash the SPSD at them.”

  But we had to keep a low profile; if the SPSD got involved, they might figure out that I’d escaped from the camp. When the patrol took my things, I poked through the trash until it was late. That meant Dash had to stay with me and help; if he went back alone, Straw Cutter would be incensed that he left me behind; if we went back together with nothing, he would also get a beating for bringing nothing home.

  “I wish I were in the prison camp,” Dash grumbled, rubbing his sore ass after a beating one night. “I’d go anywhere to get three hundred fifty grams of corn a day.”

  “No, you don’t. And anyway, we have to find Yong-ae,” I told him.

  “Who’s this Yong-ae?”

  I took out a picture of Yong-ae from my shirt pocket. In the photograph, she was wearing a dark school uniform, wearing her hair parted in the middle. “She said she was going to cross the Tumen.”

  Dash stared at me. “Cross the Tumen? That’s an act of betrayal to the republic and the Dear Leader! Border guards will shoot you without warning. And a girl crossing alone?” He shook his head, looking troubled. “Are you in love with her?”

  What did it feel like to love someone? I did like doing things for her.

  “Don’t bother looking for her,” Dash continued. “She’s probably done for.”

  “Like she’s dead?”

  “Well—for a girl . . .” he trailed off.

  We were each in our own space and time. If I could fold time, if I could bend space, we would meet at a point in the universe. I had to find her somehow.

  Not long after, we were all hanging out in an abandoned building when Straw Cutter came up to Dash. “Keep the idiot close,” he said, ignoring me completely. “He’s valuable.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Dash said lazily. “He’s not going anywhere.”

  Straw Cutter slapped him across the cheek. Dash crumpled to the ground. Straw Cutter ripped a page out of Review of Revolution and rolled a cigarette using stolen tobacco leaves. He blew bluish smoke into Dash’s face. “Listen up. The kid’s an unripe plum. Do you understand? When we find this girl and hand both of them over, we’ll get a reward that’s three times larger. Don’t lose him, now, okay?” He took out a photograph and flashed it.

  Dash wiped the blood off his face and squinted at the photograph.

  “The warden wants to capture this girl along with the kid. They were in the camp together. When she left, apparently that’s when the kid broke away, trying to go after her. The warden really needs him, but since he’ll keep following the girl, he won’t leave again if the two of them are together. Who knows why he needs this dummy? Watch him closely. He must know something about where the girl went.”

  The other kids gathered around to study the picture, which was handed from dirty hand to dirty hand. Straw Cutter snatched it away before it got to me. “All right, everyone remember her face. Come right to me if you see her anywhere.”

  A couple of older kids murmured among themselves. Straw Cutter’s eyes flashed angrily at them. A mustachioed kid nervously piped up. “I think I’ve seen her at the market.”

  Straw Cutter shoved the kids aside to get to him. “When?”

  “A few months ago. I went to the Chinese peddler to sell rabbit pelt. I saw her there.” The boy hesitated.

  Straw Cutter motioned for him to continue.

  “She looked older than the picture, but she couldn’t have been more than sixteen or seventeen. She was wearing makeup and tight clothes, and she was flirtatious. The peddler was leering at her.”

  Straw Cutter grimaced. “So she sold something.”

  “What was she trying to buy?” asked the boy, puzzled.

  “She must have already crossed the Tumen. Those peddlers can cross any time, because they bribe the border guards. They certainly could cross with a girl like that if they wanted to.” Straw Cutter crossed his arms in anger and turned around.

  I studied his worn wristwatch, counting my heartbeat. One hundred twenty-three times a minute. She was here a few months ago. In the very market I roamed every day. But she was no longer here.

  Rats clambered along the ceiling rafters. They became dogs with burned-off tails in my dreams. She walked among them, wearing a fluttery yellow dress. I walked along behind her, watching the sunlight slide down her curls. Her shoulders squirmed and sprouted wings, which broke through her thin dress. She flapped her wings. The breeze was warm. She was standing on a tall cliff now, and she flew up, entrusting herself to the wind. Yong-ae, I called. I don’t have wings. I leaped off the cliff after her, but I fell at the rate of 9.8 m/s2. Was I going to die?

  Someone shook me. “Wake up, Gil-mo.”

  My eyes flew open. I stopped falling.

  “Pack your things,” Dash whispered. “We have to leave. Now.”

  I flung my knapsack over my back and crept out of our hut behind him. A Jeep was parked in front of Straw Cutter’s hut.

  “He called for you,” Dash said, pulling my sleeve to get me to move. “The warden is here. Straw Cutter wants to hand you over.”

  Outside, we became one with the darkness. We skirted behind Straw Cutter’s hut, peeking inside through a crack in the wall. Straw Cutter was taking out a bundle of dollars from his inner pocket to hand to the warden. The warden counted each bill and put it in his pocket.

  “I have the kid you’re looking for,” Straw Cutter said ingratiatingly. “I sent for him. I couldn’t get both him and the girl, but I’m sure you’ll still be generous.”

  “Bring him now!” snapped the warden.

  Straw Cutter’s lip twitched.

  “Run, Gil-mo,” whispered Dash. “If we’re caught, we’re dead.”

  We sprinted toward the hill behind the maze of alleys. Darkness slammed into our faces as overgrown weeds scraped our legs and tree branches whipped our heads. We were out of breath by the time we made it to the top of the hill. The wind threw itself at us as we looked down. The warden’s Jeep turned on, the headlights b
right against the night. We could hear Straw Cutter’s annoyed voice and kids being woken up to look for us. We slid down into soft, slick darkness on the other side of the hill.

  “Speed is proportional to gradient and inversely proportional to friction,” I informed Dash as we scooted down.

  ON THE ROAD

  We tumbled into mud. Venomous insects bit us. Blisters grew and burst, and we slept in the gutters and stumbled on. We headed toward the Tumen River, stepping over the dead pebbling the streets, collapsed against walls and crumpled over in crumbling staircases. I pasted stamps of prayers on them when I could.

  As we made our way toward the Tumen, Dash told me more about himself than he ever had. He wanted to be a novelist—his stories would be something nobody had ever even imagined. He would shock the world, he vowed, with his sad but hilarious and beautiful but frightening novel. You would root for his characters, but you would also secretly hope that they be placed in great danger, and you would be devouring the book but wishing that it would never end. Our voyage would be the basis of his great novel. When he talked about his future, he turned suddenly youthful and full of hope.

  We ran along the bumpy unpaved road overgrown with weeds and carved with puddles. We moved constantly, away from the warden and Straw Cutter. When we became hungry we collapsed and slept, and when we woke we staggered to our feet to walk on. We didn’t even have dreams, as that required energy. We floated along in our dreamless sleep.

  One day, we woke to two gruff soldiers poking us with the muzzles of their guns. Both were skinny, though one was tall and the other short. Neither looked older than twenty. “Where are you from?” snapped the short one. “Take out your passes.”

  We of course didn’t have travel passes. A look of momentary panic flashed across Dash’s face.

  The tall soldier glanced at me as I gaped at them. “This one looks a little slow.”

  “Oh, him? He’s a math genius,” rambled Dash. “He went to Pyongyang First Middle School according to a special order by the Dear Leader. He went to the Math Olympiad as a representative of the republic.” He began rummaging through my knapsack, messing everything up.

  I plugged my ears and screamed.

  Dash took out my thick notebook filled with formulas. “See? He’s been researching this for the past year. Topology problems. He solved it, even though nobody else in the entire world has.”

  The tall soldier glanced at his shorter colleague.

  “We’re on our way home, to Musan. But we got lost.” Dash sounded pitiful.

  The short soldier snorted. “You’re in Musan. What kind of idiots look for Musan when they’re standing there?”

  Dash grinned widely and bowed repeatedly. He started to walk away rapidly, dragging me along.

  We crouched and looked at the Tumen River through the long grass. The Taedong River back home drew young lovers, sunburned boys, and flocks of doves, surrounded by deep-rooted willows. The Tumen attracted fleeing men and women, soldiers who shot them, and the dead that sank in the water, carried off by the current and nibbled on by the fish. We crawled along the river, hidden in the grassy bank. A plastic bag flew toward us across the span. I picked it up and wrapped my knapsack in it. We reached the shallows around sunset.

  Tar-painted guard posts stood sentry every thirty meters. Soldiers hitched their AK-47s over their thin shoulders, patrolling the space between the posts every ten minutes. We stayed put until it got dark. Every so often, a body floated down, its belly swollen, pale, and translucent.

  Dash pounded on his calves, which had become numb. “When the guards head back to the post, we’re going to sprint across, okay? If we make it to the water, we’re halfway there.”

  At his signal, we darted through the grass. The river flexed its black scales, pitching violently. We hesitated. The guards were about to turn around to return to the first post. Dash clenched his eyes shut and pushed me down the slope. He leaped down after me. We landed on the muddy bank. The river opened its glistening eyes, deep, cold, and mysterious. It screamed with a million small, shiny tongues. Dash tore his clothes off. He pulled mine off, too. “Let’s go!” he hissed. He tied one end of his belt to my wrist and the other to his own. The river writhed. It was cold and slippery. We inched forward. Halfway across, the water swelled and threw me down. I began to float away. Was I dying? Where was it taking me? I sank. I floated up again. I glimpsed twinkling stars. Water and darkness rushed into my eyes and mouth. My stomach grew full. Eventually, the growling river stopped thrashing and glided through the grass. Dash flailed his arms, throwing up water and words together. “We’re almost there! We made it across!” The river had sucked us in, held us, then spat us onto the opposite bank. It settled quietly to sleep.

  Banks tosses a stiff document stamped with the red official seal of the Chinese government in front of me and leaves. Apparently this proves that I am a member of a fearsome criminal organization and an illegal immigrant.

  Re: Jiang Jiajie, Drug Carrier, Yanji

  —Beijing Municipal Bureau of Public Security

  Jiang Jiajie is a North Korean refugee who illegally entered China via the Tumen River in September 2002. Operating from his base at a Yanji brothel, Jiang was part of a drug ring in the northeast, in charge of transporting vast quantities of smuggled drugs from North Korea to major cities throughout China. In February 2003, he fled to Shanghai, eluding the Jilin Provincial Bureau of Public Security’s investigation.

  Angela spoons pumpkin soup into my mouth. The pain in my leg has diminished 20 percent since yesterday. She pricks my arm with a sharp needle. The used syringe clatters on the tray.

  “They’ve confirmed your dragon tattoo to be the emblem of the Fierce Dragon Society, the criminal organization based in northwest China.” Angela studies my face.

  My body is my life’s ledger, retaining all the things I have done. The scent of lavender and the stench of a burning corpse are seared into my nose, and the sensation of an empty belly is always with me. Ugly things are carved on me. But perhaps ugly things can ultimately create beauty.

  “I have a functional formula for the relationship between freedom and weight,” I tell her. To begin talking about the dragon tattoo, I have to start with what happened in Yanji. Freedom.

  FREEDOM AND ITS ATTRACTIONS

  We walked along the ditch on the other side of the Tumen, dripping with water. By the time our clothes dried, we spotted lights. Yanji. There were fewer soldiers and more women than we were used to, and of course, everything was in Chinese. All these changes meant nothing for us, as we were still hungry. Even the trash heaps were more plentiful in Yanji, filled with food, torn newspapers, water-logged magazines, empty packs of Lucky Strike, and user manuals for South Korean color televisions. Thanks to the hours I put in combing through the trash in Yanji, I knew how to work a color television before ever owning one, and I was familiar with the American surgeon general’s warning on cigarette packs before setting foot on American soil.

  A few days later, a balding man with a symmetrical moustache and goatee came up to us in the trash heap. “You crossed the Tumen, didn’t you?” the man asked in Korean, pulling at his moustache.

  I ignored him. Dash perked up. “We’re from Musan,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

  The man’s eyes darted around. He slapped Dash on the head. “Don’t speak in Korean,” he hissed. “There are SPSD agents all around here. They’re disguised as defectors. They ferret refugees out and take them back. It’s better to be mute if you don’t know Chinese.”

  Dash turned pale. He murmured, “I thought we were safe here.”

  “It isn’t safe anywhere if you’re a defector,” the man admonished.

  Dash lowered his head.

  The man shook his head and placed his hand on Dash’s shoulder. “Do you have a place to go?” he asked, somewhat sympathetically.

  Dash shook his head. The man gestured to the end of the alley, where an old but well maintained Toyota was waiting. “Get
in, then. You’ll be able to avoid the SPSD if you do as I say.”

  We drove through a busy red-light district. It was still early in the evening but the streets were raucous, neon lights flashing and drunks weaving around. Bare skin flared in garish lights, heels clacked on the pavement, and laughter rang out. We entered a building with a flashing neon sign, bigger and larger than any other: it cycled through Changbaishan, and . We were led down a long corridor before going downstairs. Our guardian opened the steel door at the end of the hallway to a room filled with big men in suits. The men bowed.

  Dash looked around warily.

  “You’ll work here,” our savior told us, then turned and disappeared upstairs.

  The men in suits glared at us.

  Dash smiled ingratiatingly. “Who is that?”

  “What’s the date today?” asked one man.

  “September 18, clear then overcast,” I mumbled.

  The man ignored me. “Remember this date,” he said haughtily. “Meeting Zheng Hanmo was the luckiest thing that could ever happen to you.” He explained that Zheng was the owner of Changbaishan, the leading entertainment house in all of Yanji. “He operates four upscale entertainment complexes here, and has the liquor distribution rights for the area. Not even the simplest task can be done without his involvement. His influence reaches not only our bureau of public security but also the SPSD along the border.”

  A larger man cut him off. “Put your belongings in that cabinet over there and change into your uniforms.”