15 #2
“My brother-in-law is now taking care of a dodgy mate’s child whose backstabbing mother is in jail.” Kenny looked worried. “Not sure why all the good people have to clean up the messes of the filthy sons of bitches—”
“Kenny.”
“It’s not like the kids don’t know these words. They’re adults.” His wife, Lily, was constantly telling him to clean up his language at home, even though their children swore better than he could when they wanted.
“When do you go back to school, Mido?” he asked.
Sonya looked up from the fish she was serving. Mido and DH put down their utensils. Everyone grew still.
“I want you to finish your degree,” he said.
“She will,” DH insisted.
“When?” Kenny asked. “How long will you be working at this hagwon? Your father’s doing well enough now. Korea doesn’t need another hagwon. You can come back to Sydney if you want to get your degree in education.”
Mido accepted the plate of fish from her aunt.
Kenny rubbed his sunbrowned neck and stretched his shoulders. He pulled up the sleeves of his blue dress shirt. The leather watchband on his left wrist was frayed.
“Your mother loved you kids more than anything in the world,” he said. “She wasn’t the sort of mother who bragged, but you’re all she thought of.”
Mido wanted him to keep talking about her mother. DH was also paying close attention. He picked up his spoon and cocked his head like a puppy in the direction of his uncle.
“One day you’ll have kids. I hope you do. Greatest part of my life. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to support them. And your mother worked like a mule. She did it because she wanted to take care of you.”
DH noticed that his uncle had the same nose as his mother, and the same gentle but firm way of speaking.
He thought about the letters she’d sent him at school.
Her handwriting sloped to the right, and when she wrote in English, her i’s were dotted high and to the right.
In each brief letter, she reminded him to go to bed on time because sleep was important, told him that she believed in him and that he could commit his plans to the Lord.
Always, there was a crisp $10 or $20 bill so he could buy pizza.
“Mommy is always praying for you, my beloved son.”
Kenny’s eyes were wet.
“Oh, she talked about you all the time, DH. You know why she talked about you?”
Mido wondered if it was because he had done so well in sports and school.
“She said you made her laugh. You always made her laugh.”
DH covered his mouth and began to sob.
Sonya patted his back. She almost never talked about Helen, but living alone in this apartment, she could not avoid her grief.
The only person she wanted to talk to was Helen.
She wanted to ask how she should live. Was this the right way?
How do you live a wise life? How do you make decisions when there are so many uncertain outcomes?
Helen might have understood why she had to move out.
She couldn’t divorce her husband or live with the Chairman like before.
Her sister wouldn’t have judged her or made her feel weak for continuing to love a man who wasn’t her husband. She might have just sat with her.
“Did she talk about me?” Mido could not help asking.
“Oh, I think you might have been her favorite.”
“No,” Mido said. “DH was her favorite. Everyone knows that.”
“I have four kids. The one I worry about the most, that one is my favorite. Doesn’t make any sense until you think about it.”
DH smiled. All his life, he had heard how much his mother loved him, and in that moment, he hoped his uncle was right.
“She worried about you the most. Especially when you were little. You were such a quiet little thing,” Kenny said. “And she worried about you because you always took care of other people and didn’t complain.”
Mido stared at her uncle, her eyes shining, not knowing what to say. All her life she had been trying to be good, never to trouble her mother, but even that had caused her mother anguish.
“When your family moved to California and you started working at the hagwon and supporting your brothers”—Kenny paused—“she was so proud of you. But I know she wanted you to finish school. For you to have your own wishes. I know that.” Kenny continued in spite of his tears.
“She told me to make sure that you finished school. She was so worried—”
“Why was Mommy worried?” DH asked.
“Because you were so quiet,” Sonya said to Mido. “But she wasn’t concerned about that later. You learned how to talk, and you figured out how to teach kids. Did you know that your mother wanted to be a schoolteacher?”
DH shook his head. “Really?”
Kenny looked puzzled. “How did you not know that? My older sister Sonya was going to be a doctor, and my middle sister Helen was going to be a high school English teacher.”
“You wanted to be a doctor?” Mido asked her aunt.
No one had touched their food. It was as if they were meeting each other for the first time.
“Yes, I wanted to be a doctor, but I couldn’t afford to keep studying.
So I got a job as a secretary, then married my husband and had the boys.
Your mother wanted to be a teacher, but after she got married, she followed your father to New Jersey.
The first job she got was at that department store in Paramus.
” Sonya remembered how excited Helen had been when she learned how much she’d earn.
Her salary would go toward the children’s educations, and her hours allowed her to be home when they returned from school.
“Did Mommy like her job?” DH asked, unloosening his necktie a little.
“She was good at her job. But it wasn’t what she’d always wanted to do. I remember once, years ago, when you kids were little, right around New Year’s Day, she called me crying from Paramus.”
“Why?” Mido asked.
“A customer had blamed her for something she didn’t do and wouldn’t apologize after realizing the mistake.
And that year, your mother didn’t get a Christmas bonus even though she’d been promised one.
She wanted to go back to school and get a degree to teach, but there was no time or money for that. ”
DH furrowed his brow, not knowing this story. He checked Mido’s face. She was listening intently. Kenny leaned in. “So what did you tell her?”
“That a mother is a child’s first teacher,” Sonya said.