6. Monroe
“Moni!”
I hear her voice before I even spot her.
Mom barrels toward me like she’s coming in for a tackle. Her floral carry-on bag swings wildly from her shoulder, and her matching suitcase lurches behind her, the wheels trying to keep up.
I’m pulled into a deep embrace that knocks the air out of me and can only be described as a mama bear hug.
“Moni baby,” she breathes, kissing my temple. Her hands sweep up and down my back and sides as if checking I’m okay. “You’ve lost a few pounds! Don’t tell me you’re not eating right!”
“I’m fine, Mom,” I murmur into her shoulder, smiling despite myself. “I do a lot of walking here. That’s why.”
She makes a hmph noise as though my story doesn’t pass her smell test, and then she pulls back just far enough to kiss my cheek and fuss with my curls. Her fingers tug at a loose little coil on my brow before she busies herself fixing the collar of my shirt.
“Did you not iron this?” she asks in her usual blunt manner. “It’s got a wrinkle, baby. I can see it right there.”
I laugh and gently grab at her wrists to pry her hands away.
And change the topic.
“Mom, how was your flight?”
She lets out a long and dramatic sigh as I disentangle myself and reach down to grab her suitcase.
“It was a hot mess, Moni. I swear these airlines are going downhill. Charge an arm and a leg, and for what? Some soda pop and cheese crackers? My plane landed late in Shanghai, and I almost didn’t make the connection to Busan.
Can you believe that? After flying halfway around the world?
I said, ‘You’re not about to leave me stranded in China.
I’ve got my baby to see!’ And the gate attendant had the nerve to look at me like I was crazy?—”
“There are cabs outside,” I interrupt, guiding her toward the exit. “Let’s get your luggage loaded. Then you can tell me all about the evil gate attendant on the ride to my apartment.”
Outside, the air is moist and hot. The typical summer day in South Korea, frizzing my coily hair as the bright sun casts everything in a warm, golden glow.
It would almost feel like the perfect day, if not for the gnawing tightness that’s been living inside me for a week now.
I tried my best to focus on preparing for Mom’s visit, scrubbing the apartment squeaky clean and planning day trips and activities for us to do. But no matter how hard I tried, the dread and paranoia remained, driving me to even change the code for my front door.
Just in case. Just to be as safe as possible while Mom’s here.
As soon as we’ve hailed a cab and are sliding into the backseat, Mom’s back to her chattiness.
“So tell me, baby. How’s school? You still liking it?”
“I do. The kids are sweet.”
“Made any friends yet?”
I glance sideways at her and laugh. “Mom, what am I? Ten years old? You used to ask me these questions when I was in elementary school.”
She grins, pinching my cheek like she used to. “Some things never change, Moni. Like the fact that you’ll always be my baby.”
We’re in motion now, crossing through Busan’s busiest streets to make it to my neighborhood.
“So? Speaking of friends, found any special guy friends out here in Korea? Anyone tall, handsome, and good with chopsticks?”
My whole face flushes hot. “Mom.”
“What?” she giggles. “You know I taught you love is color blind. I don’t care what complexion the man you bring home is, Moni. Just so long as he treats my baby well. If you find yourself a Korean man, I’m okay with that.”
“Mom, seriously?” I shake my head, the expression on my face half incredulous smile, half horrified grimace.
“You’re a beautiful, smart young woman who deserves the best,” she recites like she always does. My biggest cheerleader in life. “I want you to marry a man who treats you like gold. Don’t roll your eyes at me.”
“I know, Mom,” I groan. “But I’m not interested in dating right now, okay? I’m not ready.”
She quiets at that, knowing what I mean.
Though neither of us dare mention his name.
A stretch of silence falls over the taxicab.
I stare out the window as we pass through a cluster of neighborhoods and force my mind elsewhere. It’s been two years, and I still have trouble not thinking about him.
Eli was such a part of my life for so long that it’s still surreal to believe he’s gone.
My right hand subconsciously drifts to my left wrist and adjusts the bangle bracelets I wore on purpose today.
They’ve become a staple since the night in the alley. The night I was marked .
The thick black Baekho Pa symbol is still as deeply etched onto the inside of my wrist as ever.
I’ve tried everything.
Soaps. Ointments. Bleaching creams. Fading gels. Spot-correcting treatments that burned like acid. I’ve rubbed my skin so raw it almost has a permanent red tint to it that’s suffused with my natural medium brown complexion.
I even visited a local calligrapher—an old man who blinked at me like I was crazy when I showed him the mark and asked him how to remove it. He said the muk was unfamiliar, not like the traditional kind. He claimed he’d never seen anything like the one I was marked with.
Then there was the old woman in the local marketplace who sold herbal balms and healing salves. She gave me something that smelled like fermented mint and told me to apply it twice a day with prayer.
It only made my skin more tender. More swollen and irritated.
The mark remained.
So now I just hide it behind a stack of bangles and hope no one notices it.
Every day it’s still on me feels like a countdown. As if I’m close to the kind of trouble Jin seemed to believe I couldn’t outrun.
“Moni baby, what’s that place there?” my mom asks, pointing at the window.
I blink out of my thoughts and look up. She’s pointing at a stretch of ancient towers in the distance.
“That’s the Haedong Yonggungsa Temple,” I explain. “It’s one of South Korea’s famous Buddhist temples.”
“Ohhhh,” she says, leaning even closer to the window. “It’s beautiful. Look at all those colors. We have to go there!”
I smile despite the dread coiling in my stomach.
She hasn’t noticed the way my voice wavers or how my smile fades. I’ve been staring distractedly out the window, lost in thought.
“Look at those little market stands!” she gasps next, tapping my arm. “We’re hitting those up too, you hear me? You know I love me a good sale!”
“We’ll definitely get plenty of shopping in,” I say softly, and I mean it.
I really do.
As we pull up outside my apartment building, I lean forward and thank the cab driver in Hangugeo.
Mom carries her carry-on bag while I take her larger suitcase, and we make our way toward the front gate.
“This is your place, baby?” she asks with pride. “You’re right in the city! I like that.”
I smile faintly. “It does the job.”
But as we step through the gate and into the building, the calm I’ve been putting on for her feels like it’s slipping.
My mother’s still chatting beside me, animated and blissfully unaware.
She’s got zero clue about anything I’m feeling. She doesn’t understand the deep grief I still feel, and she would never understand the intense dread and anxiety about the mark on the inside of my wrist.
I adjust the bangles again, letting the metal rings clink against each other.
I just have to focus on making this next week enjoyable for her.
Just because my life is a hot mess doesn’t mean I shouldn’t show Mom a good time. She’s traveled across the world to see me, and I love and appreciate her so much.
For the next week, I’ll have to bury everything else and hope it doesn’t come up.
We keep things simple for the rest of the day.
Mom is jet-lagged the second we step through the door of my apartment. I help her unpack, clearing a drawer and space in my wardrobe for her. She’ll only be here a week, but I want my apartment to feel like home.
She showers and changes into soft cotton pajamas with her hair up in a scarf, then makes herself comfortable like I hoped she would.
We order takeout from a local Korean barbecue restaurant I thought she might like—tender pork belly, beef bulgogi, grilled kimchi, seasoned rice, and these little pickled radish discs that she loves and keeps popping into her mouth like candy.
We sit around the tiny table I have in my kitchenette, knees touching, plates cluttered, our laughter filling up the apartment.
We talk about the family, trading memories. We’re currently on Uncle Devon, her brother back home in Philly—the one who thinks he’s God’s gift to women.
“Remember how he used to strut around in that cheap polyester suit?” I say with a mouthful of rice. “The one with the wide lapels and shiny buttons?”
Mom nearly chokes on her beef bulgogi. “Lord don’t remind me! I used to beg him not to wear that out of the house. I told him he looked like a walking sofa cushion.
“It’s still not as bad as that awful cologne he used to bathe in.”
Her laugh blossoms, coming from deep in her belly. “Yes! Oh chile—what was that stuff called? He’d douse himself in it before going to the salon around the block and flirting with the ladies getting their hair and nails done.”
“He thought he was real fly,” I say, smirking. “A regular Mac Daddy.”
We lose track of our laughter as we eat ’til we can’t consume another bite.
After dinner, we curl up on the couch and I put on Train to Busan , trying to introduce her to Korean cinema through one of the few movies I know will actually hold her attention. She watches with wide eyes and mutters prayers under her breath every time a zombie pops up on screen.
And, as usual, she has whole conversations with the characters.
“Now, why would you get on that train knowing something’s wrong?” she huffs, shaking her head. “Do you know how fast I would’ve been out of there? Could never be me!”
By the time the credits roll, she’s yawning and rolling her neck on her shoulders.
“Get some sleep, Mom,” I say softly. “You’ve had a long day.”
“You sure you don’t want the bed? This is your apartment, baby.”
“You’re my guest. And my mom. You get the bed. I’ll be fine on the couch.”
She hugs me tight, taking her time like she used to when I was a kid and she’d read me bedtime stories before lights-out. Her fingers gently stroke at my curls.
“Moni…”
I feel it coming before she says it.
“I know you loved him, baby,” she murmurs. “You were good together. But it’s been two years. My wish for you is that you honor Eli by moving on and finding happiness again.”
My stomach clenches. I pull away from her, unable to censor my irritation that she’d bring this up now. Right before bed.
“How many times do I have to tell you I don’t want to talk about that, Mom? Please don’t bring it up.”
She sighs and cups my cheek, pinching it lightly. “I don’t like to see my baby hurting. And Moni… that’s all I see in your eyes these days.”
They’re her parting words for the night. She pads into my bedroom and closes the door with a soft click that echoes much louder than it should.
I exhale the breath I’ve been holding all day long and sink down onto my couch. My head falls back against the cushions as I stare up at the popcorn ceiling.
I love having her here. I’ve missed so much about her—the sound of her voice in person, her hugs, even some of her lighter nagging and fussing.
But I hate how she talks about Eli like he’s a chapter of a book and I should’ve turned the page by now. She acts as if grief is something you can schedule.
Mom’s suffered her own losses when Dad passed away while I was in college—we both did—but it’s like she still doesn’t get how I feel.
Imagine if she knew about the mark.
She’d probably lose her mind and demand I go to the local police. She wouldn’t get that the Baekho Pa laughs in the face of the law.
I lift my arm slowly and check out the mark inked on the inside of my wrist. If the Baekho Pa were going to truly end me, I wish they would’ve done so that night.
At least then I wouldn’t have to deal with the unknown. All this endless torture waiting for them to return.
A sudden thump outside my apartment door makes the breath catch in my lungs.
I bolt upright on the couch and listen for the sound again.
It wasn’t loud. It was so subtle I probably would’ve missed it if I had the TV on or was watching videos on TikTok.
But it was definitely there.
I pop to my feet and hurry to the door. My insides twist into knots as I press my eye to the peephole and scope out the hall.
No one is around. Not a single soul.
The hallway is empty like it usually is.
I’m no less relieved.
Because I did hear something. I sensed something outside my door.
I’ve stopped believing in coincidences. Deep down, I know the truth.
He’s coming for me. He’s lurking somewhere, waiting to strike at the most opportune moment. It may not be tonight or tomorrow or even next week, but the time will come when I can’t outrun the mark inked onto my skin.
Someday, Jin will be back.