A Wonderful Life (10 page)

I remember when I was a little girl. I was playing in the fields of my village when all of the children were gathered to listen to the town elder.  He told them about the history of Korea, how we once ruled the lands that were now our prison, and how our language was once the language of all the people. He told us to be proud of our heritage.  Even our language,
Hanguk Mal
, means language of the chosen people. We were told to never forget this.

So, when you came to my village, enlisted my brothers in your war, put my father to work in your factories and made my mother disappear never to be seen again, I never forgot. When you took away my language and made it illegal for me to speak or write it, I never forgot. Even when you forced us into slavery and made us prostitutes for your soldiers, I never forgot. I may be an old woman, but I remembered, no matter how hard you tried to make me forget.

When I was 14, I was walking to my uncle’s house to visit him. I had Nam-mi, my teddy bear in my hands like I always did; he went everywhere with me, even though I was probably a little too old for a teddy bear. I will never forget that the first time I saw you was when your soldiers arrived during my walk and stopped me.

I never made it to my uncle’s house. And I never saw him alive again.

My village was a proud village. We never bothered anyone, and we raised the famous Son Kijung who you would one day remember as the fastest man alive. I remember when I was maybe 12; he used to run at the local school, and he ran faster than the wind itself. I knew then, watching him, that he would show the world how wonderful our village was because there would be no one who could ever catch him.

But when your soldiers came, the school was closed down, and it was used as one of your…comfort stations, as you liked to call them. Women from all over the valley were brought into this place.

I was 14 years old when you, Yoshida Tanaka, the lieutenant in charge of us comfort women, raped me in front of your soldiers because I was the new girl. You took away my innocence and left me with nothing but years of this kind of life. I am sorry. I can never forgive you.

This was before you started to take away more than just our innocence. You told me that I was no longer allowed to speak my own language, that from this day forward I would speak only Japanese. You told me that to read, write or speak Korean would be a crime that could only bring death.

I stood there silently as you went through my things, destroying everything that had Korean writing on it, confiscating anything that showed allegiance to the Korean flag or country, including my teddy bear because it had a Korean name, and then turning to face me as you spoke only in Japanese from that moment forward.

So, my friends and I spoke only Japanese, and we told each other we would no longer speak in Korean. On threat of death, we did what you told us.

I remember standing in the bathroom one morning with a soldier’s straight razor in my hands, rubbing it across my wrist, thinking that I could end it all right here and now, and I would never have to go through another day of this again.  I poked my arm with the blade, and I drew a tiny bit of blood, staring at it as if this would not be hard to do, and then everything would be all right.

And then the Olympics started.

The only comfort you ever gave us was to listen to the radio about Japan’s preparations for the 1936 Olympics.  When the games started, the two favorites from Japan in the Marathon were our Son Kijung and the younger Nam Sung-Yung. Of course, they were forced to wear Japanese colors and compete for the Japanese team, but we knew who they were because they were from Korea.

At the end, Son was the champion, setting a new world record at two hours, twenty-nine minutes and nineteen point two seconds, a time forever ingrained in my memories, and Nam came
in third. All of the women cheered for as long as you can possibly imagine.

And then there was the award ceremony. When we saw Son and Nam bow their heads when the Japanese anthem was played, we felt their shame with them. I will never forget the interview Son gave to the western television people. He told them of our struggle, of how the Japanese were enslaving a once proud country. I was so proud of him. He was able to say things that none of us would ever be able to say. And then I heard the newsman change the subject and want to talk about the race, about how he ran very fast, and that was the last we heard of his protest.

But this changed us forever. Our Japanese captors continued to use us for sex, but we no longer allowed ourselves to give up our heritage. We had seen what Son had done for us by his silent victory, and we started to speak our language again, always out of earshot of the Japanese. We passed notes in Korean, so that only we could read them. Then we would destroy the evidence so no one could blame us.

It wasn’t like grabbing a rifle and killing Japanese soldiers, but we were young women. There was only so much we could do.

It was as if his victory gave me a new reason for living. I thought to myself that if he could stand up to the Japanese and show them how he really felt, he was doing this for me; he was doing this for all of us, and if I was to surrender, if I was to quit now, he would be doing it for nothing. And that was the last I ever thought of killing myself.

One day, however, I remember you, Lieutenant Tanaka, as you discovered one of these notes being passed by Miss Ko, a 13 year old girl who was possibly my only friend at the time. I saw you take one look at the note and then hit her. I thought that was the punishment you were going to give her before you dragged her out to the street and then gathered the rest of the women to line up in formation like you used to like to have us do. You told us that she was in violation of Japanese law, and that she would have to pay. In front of three dozen women, you took your revolver, and you killed her. You killed a 13-year-old girl for passing a note in Korean. And then you had the nerve to warn us that we would be next if we did the same.

The war has been over for a long time, and we tried very hard to get your people to remember what you did to us. But none of you would ever listen. I approached your government, and it wouldn’t listen. I approached your Diet, and it wouldn’t listen. I tried to get your news stations to talk about it, and even they wouldn’t listen.

It is only now, after all of these years that I have found a place where someone will listen to me, a place where you cannot tell me to be quiet, where you can’t say that this old woman needs to step down and let someone else speak. Three years ago, I came here before the Japanese Diet, and I tried to speak to you, but you would not listen. However, as fate would guide us, I could not believe when I heard that you, former Lieutenant Yoshida Tanaka was being appointed to the Housing Committee by the Diet. According to Japanese law, you cannot forbid one from addressing the Diet to address an appointment. Well, I am addressing this appointment, and I want you to know what this man did those many years ago. Oh, he would like you to forget as you’ve been doing all along, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you intend to do just that.

But even though I am an old woman, I did not come here alone, but this time I did not bring my fellow victims with me to be turned away because you don’t want to listen. No, I brought people you might recognize. If you look there, you will see Kim Byong-Jin, an executive with Samsung Corporation. That is Mr. Pak of Goldstar. Over there is Mr. Yi from Korean Utilities. And there are probably a whole bunch of others you might recognize, some from your own country, executives who speak your own language. Well, they have all assured me that should Mr. Yoshida Tanaka be approved by this Diet without condemnation, they will act upon my personal boycott of all Japanese goods and services.

So, Esteemed Members of the Japanese Diet, shall we hear the pleas of an old woman?

And that was all I had to say.

Actually, that was not all I had to say. Mr. Tanaka was, of course, voted down, and he would never receive another position of esteem in the Japanese government again. However, as he
stepped down from his chair, I could not resist the opportunity to speak to him one last time.

“Mr. Tanaka, it has been sixty years since the time you first raped me and took away my life. Not once have you ever apologized to me or to any one of us. You killed an innocent woman for reading…for reading! Know that as long as you live, I will hound you to the ends of the Earth so that you should know that you will never receive a position of importance again. You will never receive respect again. You will pay for your silence with my voice everywhere you go. Get used to it, Mr. Tanaka, because this is one old woman who’s going to be around for a very…long…time.”

THE END

When I arrived at the apartment, the fingerprint team was completing its work.  The duster shut his case and his assistant stuffed their print sheets into a carry-bag.  As a beat officer checked my badge at the door, the two fingerprint men made their official good-byes to the officer in charge and then pushed by me and onto the street.

“What do we have?” I said to Lieutenant Sidney Boister who came over to me after seeing me dealing with one of his men at the door.

“Looks like the wife killed the husband?” he said.  “Open and shut case.”

I stared at him for a long time.  “I don’t usually get called over open and shut cases.”

He smiled the smile he usually saved for the political folk which was unusual because he and I went back a long time.  “We don’t have a motive.”

This was unusual.  A spouse killing her husband wasn’t unusual, but a spouse killing her partner usually had an obvious reason.  Sometimes it was a domestic situation going back years, sometimes a domestic disturbance erupting for the first time, but almost always something that could be spotted by a rookie out of the Academy.  Sid Boister was not a stupid cop; he could usually read through a hidden story.

“Where’s the wife?” I said.

“In the bedroom,” he replied.  “Our tape team is working the living room right now, so we’ll need to go through the kitchen to get there.”

The kitchen, simple for even this type of neighborhood, was still obviously the domain of the woman of this house.  The décor was feminine of an earlier period ranging from the dandelion-patterned wallpaper to the faded pink cabinets where chipped paint revealed its exterior had once been light blue.  There were trinkets of capture from wars fought in random garage sales and discounted merchandise malls.  The dining room was solid wood with a Navaho-designed tablecloth with four place settings around the four sides of the table.  I guess the table was bought on sale at a major department store, but it took a second glance for me to see that one of the table chairs was not part of the set, although it was the same color but just not as wide as the others.  I wondered how long and hard she searched for a chair that was that
close
.

“Through here,” said Sid as he motioned for me to follow him through the door on the other side of the kitchen.  He noticed that I had stopped to glare at a set of photographs on the top of the blackened, white refrigerator that had seen a number of years in this abode.  There were fingerprints across the fridge’s surface that probably represented every member of this family and those who may have frequented the family over the years.  Some of them were smudged, indicating that someone had tried to wipe them off long ago, but with years of continuous oil rubbed onto the surface from dirty fingers, not all could be eliminated.  Still, the refrigerator didn’t catch my attention as much as the photographs.

There were three of them in three separate frames.  The first was a photograph of a young man and woman in their graduation outfits from a high school of which the color was predominately green in clothing.  The man wore a yellow sash over his green graduation gown, indicating that he had been a scholar of some sorts, and the woman stood beside him beaming, wearing a green gown of her own sans sash, but obviously as proud of her graduation as she was of his.  The second photograph was of the same couple, a few years older.  They were dressed in wedding clothing for a posed photograph, and there were friends and family of the wedding party gathered at their sides.  Everyone was a smile, and everyone was straight and proper.  The third photograph was of a family: a husband, a son, two daughters and a woman to the side of and slightly behind the youngest daughter.  There were smiles on all of their faces, although the smiles of the original man and woman did not appear to be as spontaneous as they had in the first two photographs.

“Sometime today,” said Sid.

In the kitchen itself, I remarked that the stove was anally clean but of a brand and style of which I had never seen.  The stove was clunky and aged, and I had a strange desire to turn it on to see if such a contraption really worked.  For a brief moment, I felt like an archaeologist walking through the tomb of a race before my time, and it was that momentary thought that forced me back to reality.  I was investigating the motive of a possible homicide, so losing myself in someone else’s past was not an option.

In the bedroom, a well-worn woman sat on the bad with tears still streaming from her eyes.  A policewoman was sitting with her, but from the look of things the police officer was practically giving up on her task, as there didn’t seem to be any way of calming the poor woman down.  Of course, the fact that the woman had been found with the smoking gun kind of made it difficult to feel that sorry for her, but there was sense that even with the murder, this woman was most definitely out of her element.

Sid spoke to me at the door out of the woman’s hearing.  “I wanted you here before I questioned her.”

I nodded and then took a stance on the other side of the room as Sid pulled up a chair from a desk and sat on it across from the woman.  “Evelyn,” he said, “I’m going to have to ask you some difficult questions.”

She nodded her head as if she understood.  Then he told her about her rights, and she waived them, almost as if they weren’t something she was interested in.  Then he pulled out his notepad and pen and started.

“Did you and your husband ever fight?”

“Heavens, no,” she replied.  “He was a kind, simple man.  There was never any reason for us to fight.”

He ticked something off on his notepad.  “How about other women?  Did he ever fool around?”

She shook her head no.  “Adam would never do such a thing.  He was an honorable man.”

Sid shook his head in confusion.  “Were there any problem between you?”

“Of course not,” she said.  “He and I got along admirably.”

The questions continued on like this for awhile, and my mind began to drift.  I looked around the bedroom and I saw what was a room that housed two separate people who had become one.  On one dresser was a man’s tie hanging from its edge and various photographs showing a young man shaking hands with numerous political figures of an earlier day.  As the photos continued in a line across the dresser, the political figures became less prominent and
then led to photographs of the one young man alone, but a much older man in a simple business suit.

A dresser on the other side of the room showed a young woman in a very expensive dress being courted by a young man who was obviously the same man from the photos on the other dresser.  They were dancing together at a prom-like function in their early days, and then each photo across this dresser showed the two of them at different social functions together.  As the photos came near an end, the woman was shown at a social gathering alone, a strained expression on her face.  From that point on there were two more photographs, and they were both of that much older woman alone in places where there were a lot of people.

“Did you love him?” said Sid, breaking my concentration.

“More than the world itself,” she said.  “He promised me the world when we were married, and….”

Sid glared at her.  “And?”

“I loved him more than the world itself,” she completed, even though I suspected that was not what she was going to say.

My mind drifted again, and I started looking at the various framed documents on the bedroom walls.  Near the man’s dresser was a line of documents that started from “Most Likely To Succeed” from high school, went to several business training certificates and then tapered off to “Thanks for Hanging In There” types of awards from businesses that probably gave out random awards just to remind their once-great employees that they haven’t been forgotten.

The woman’s certificates were not as abundant, but she had several from high school, including one from the debate team, one from the prom committee honoring her as the alternate prom queen to her graduation certificate from college with a liberal arts degree.  And then the certificates stopped suddenly, as if the rest of them had been forgotten and the open space just waiting for the proper items to be added.

Sid was obviously upset by now.  “All right, Evelyn, why don’t you just tell me why you did it?”

“Please call me Eve,” she said.  “And there’s not much to say.  There’s really no reason.”

Sid turned to me.  “Any questions?”

I nodded my head and then turned to her.  “Eve, what would you have done with your life had you not married your husband?”

Her response was a tear, then another, and then more.  Words couldn’t say what she needed to say.

I turned back to Sid.  “I believe we have our motive.”

THE END