Page 62 of Perfect Happiness
Mother really meant it when she said she would arrive soon.
“Mother, what happened to Noah?”Jiyoo asked as soon as she was in the car.
Mother’s eyes looked at Jiyoo through the rearview mirror.She had been crying earlier, but now there were no traces of tears anywhere.Her eyes were so clear and white that Jiyoo wondered if she had been dreaming when she saw Mother crying earlier.
“He’s dead.”
Mother’s voice shocked Jiyoo.It was the same voice Mother used when she told Jiyoo that Father had left the countryside cabin.Jiyoo worked up her courage to ask another question.
“Mother, are you sad?”
Mother’s eyes disappeared from the rearview mirror.They were passing through an intersection, and she seemed like she was focused on the road.
“Mother doesn’t have time to be sad,” she said only after getting onto the freeway.“Noah’s grandma collapsed and is being treated in the ER.I need to go to the police station.Your father can’t do it.He’s too out of it.Mother is going to be busy for a while.”
“But Noah is your son, too.”
Jiyoo didn’t know where this courage was coming from.She wanted an answer, even if it meant asking more than once.Perhaps Jiyoo just wanted to know if Mother’s tears were for real.
“Noah isn’t my son.The only son I know is one I give birth to.”
After this, Mother didn’t say anything.She didn’t even glance at Jiyoo through the mirror.She focused only on her driving until they arrived at Jiyoo’s kindergarten.When she left, she only said one thing.
“Your Auntie Jane will come to pick you up later.”
Jiyoo thought of the dark skin around Noah’s eyes.Jiyoo had another question that she wanted to ask Mother but couldn’t.
Why did you go upstairs last night?
“Auntie has a question for you, Jiyoo.”
Auntie Jane’s voice pulled Jiyoo out of her memories.Jiyoo nodded as she spooned some more rice porridge into her mouth.
“Last week, you were at the cabin in Woohyeri with your father and mother, weren’t you?Not your stepfather, but your real father.”
Jiyoo almost bit her tongue in surprise.The porridge that she had just swallowed became stuck in the middle of her throat.
“When did your father leave?”
How did she know?Did Mother tell her?Jiyoo winced as she tried to force the porridge down her throat.Auntie’s eyes were carefully studying Jiyoo’s face.Her gaze was just like Mother’s.It told Jiyoo not to lie.But if Jiyoo couldn’t lie, she wouldn’t be able to say anything.It was a secret—that’s what Mother said.
Chapter 5
Wife parked the car in the driveway, and Eun-ho stepped out holding Noah’s altar picture.
“Eat something,” Mother said from the back seat.“If you keep starving yourself like this, you’ll be dead, too.”
“I’ll drive her home and be right back,” Wife said.
Eun-ho and the family had just gotten back from Yong-in Cemetery.It had been more than six days since Noah died.Because the police needed to perform an autopsy, they hadn’t gotten permission to bury his body until this morning.
Eun-ho needed to prove it was an accident, that he hadn’t murdered his son on purpose.No one said it out loud, but everyone doubted his innocence.In Korea, there were many stories of children from previous marriages dying under suspicious circumstances.
Eun-ho didn’t know when the results of the autopsy were going to be ready.And there was no guarantee that his situation would change once they did.Nor did he have the strength to do anything about it right now.Whether it was an accident or intentional, it wouldn’t change the basic fact: he had killed his own son.Eun-ho would never be able to forgive himself, even if the legal system did.
Eun-ho’s father, who got on a flight as soon as he heard the news, never said a word during the funeral—not to Eun-ho, not to Mother, not to Wife.All he did was man his post at the funeral home and take care of what needed to be taken care of.After they buried Noah, Father bid Eun-ho farewell at the entrance to the cemetery and said he was headed back to Jeju Island.As he hugged Eun-ho, he whispered something into Eun-ho’s ear:
“Trust no one.”
