Page 21 of Perfect Happiness
Eun-ho silently listened to them talk.Not only was there no way to include himself in their conversation, but he was also too busy extracting information from everything she said or stealing glances at her between sips of vodka.
Every once in a while, they would make eye contact.Whenever this happened, she would show him a smile with those half-moon eyes.Instead of smiling back at her, Eun-ho would divert his attention to his shot glass.Eun-ho was a thirty-four-year-old divorced man, and yet he was behaving like a teenage boy with a crush on the girl next door.Robert Frost was right: “A mother takes twenty years to make a man of her boy, and another woman makes a fool of him in twenty minutes.”
Eun-ho noticed Jinu starting to become less talkative after just a few shots of vodka.He was probably tired from the long trek in the cold back from the Shaman Rock or famished from not having a proper meal all day.Eun-ho went to the bathroom, and when he came back, he found Jinu with his head resting on the table.Eun-ho shook Jinu’s shoulder, but he was fast asleep.Eun-ho looked at Yuna.She offered what was her attempt at an explanation:
“I swear it wasn’t me.”
Eun-ho slung Jinu’s arm over his shoulder and used Jinu’s belt to help hoist him up.Yuna collected their belongings.
It took less than five minutes to walk back to their room.Jinu felt lighter than usual, despite being fifty percent heavier than Eun-ho.Perhaps it was that Eun-ho was simply too preoccupied with Yuna to notice.
Eun-ho couldn’t tell if Jinu had intentionally given him this opportunity to be alone with Yuna, but either way, he wasn’t going to miss it.He couldn’t remember the last time a woman could make him feel this way just by laughing.
Eun-ho laid Jinu down on the bed.He took Jinu’s socks off and pulled the bedsheets over Jinu so that he would be warm.Yuna put the belongings she had brought from the pub on the sofa.Eun-ho took his padded jacket and put it on, then held his scarf and hat in his hand.
“Where are you staying?”
She smiled.“So, you do know how to talk.”
Come to think of it, this was the first time he had spoken that day.This wasn’t unusual nor was it intentional.Most of the time, he was happy to let Jinu do the talking.Eun-ho didn’t hate talking; it was just that he was more comfortable listening.The only exception to this was when he was talking to his mother.
“Nikita House,” she finally answered.
He took out his cell phone and opened Google Maps.It was a ten-minute walk.Too bad it wasn’t farther, he thought.
Google guided them through the main road in town.It was still early in the evening, but almost every store was closed and the only thing roaming the dark, empty streets was a pack of stray dogs.In the distance, Eun-ho could also hear what he thought was the howling of wolves in the forest.
The brightest lights were coming from the night sky.Shooting stars fell like rain from space, and the Milky Way looked like an archipelago of stars in a dark blue ocean.With every step they took, the sky sparkled with the vapor trails of falling meteors.The constellations were so bright that they looked close enough to bathe his face in blue starlight.
Eun-ho took slow steps so as not to walk ahead of Yuna.Silently, to savor the sound of snow crunching beneath their feet.Eun-ho hadn’t spoken a word since leaving the inn.And he kept looking at his watch anxiously.Six minutes had already passed in vain.Only when the main gate of Nikita House came into view did he find an excuse to spend more time with her.
“Can we stop there?”Eun-ho said as he pointed to one of the only stores remaining open on the street.Eun-ho didn’t have anything to buy, but that didn’t matter.
“Only if you buy me a Nuga Bar,” she replied.
A Nuga Bar?He’d buy her a hundred.Eun-ho desperately hoped that this quaint store located in a remote pocket of Siberia had the same ice cream they had in Korea.
Despite being a small shop attached to a guesthouse, the store sold everything from souvenirs to ice cream.Eun-ho examined the selection of snacks before picking out a bag of peanuts for himself.Despite being small, the bag was densely packed with nuts, making it as heavy as a brick.Yuna took an item out of an ice cream freezer and waved it in the air.
“Nuga Bar.”
Despite only being inside for less than ten minutes, the weather had changed for the worse.Eun-ho was attacked by a flurry of snow as soon as he set foot outside.And when he breathed in, a sharp pain shot up his sinuses, making it feel like his head was inside the mouth of a crocodile.The tears that formed in his eyes turned to icicles and hung from his eyelashes.
Eun-ho stopped walking and covered his eyes with his palms.
“Is there ice in your eyes?”Yuna’s voice asked from the darkness.It sounded like she was standing directly beneath his chin.“Don’t rub your eyes.That’ll make it worse.”
Eun-ho uncovered his eyes to find that Yuna’s face was just beneath his.She was looking up at him and studying him, her breath close enough to tickle his Adam’s apple.
“I think I’m okay now.”
Nodding, she stepped back.Half her face was covered in snow, and her long hair, which stuck out from her fur hat, was flowing in the wind like a lion’s mane.
“Shall we get going?”she asked.Her face looked like it was blue with frostbite, and yet the cold didn’t seem to bother her.She adjusted her scarf and marched into the blizzard.
As they walked, Yuna peeled back the wrapping on the Nuga Bar and started nibbling on it.Eun-ho took out his phone to check the temperature.-41°C.
“Isn’t it too cold to be eating ice cream?Your teeth must be freezing?”
