Chang-Rae Lee - Native Speaker

“Who says your work with us is in the realm of politics?” he says, throwing back his head. His face reddens slightly with the alcohol. “That’s not what you’ve been doing, Henry. That’s not what we’re doing. Everyone speaks of politics as if it’s some kind of sentence. This is a fundamental misunderstanding.”

He points out the window.

“Down there, all those people from the media, those people snooping around for the mayor, that’s what they believe we’re all doing. Politics! We’re ‘politicians.’ So we cut deals and make compromises and hope our constituents will look favorably on us. We act appropriately outraged and righteous. We are champions of causes. We are concessionists. We are public servants. This is how we are marketed and so this is how we end up marketing ourselves.”

“No one says those things cynically of you.”

“They all do,” he says, clicking his glass on the side table. “I have been every one of those politicians. But it makes no matter, finally. Not to us. That’s not why we’re here. That’s not why I’m here.”

He delicately brushes his hair with his hand, as if it were strands of ash. All over he looks fragile, the model of someone grieving. I am conscious of how right he appears to me, how perfect, every one of his tones and gestures dead on, not simply what I expect but what I want desperately to see.

He says low, “Eduardo’s family. You saw them?”

“Yes.”

“When is the funeral?”

“The day after tomorrow.”

“Will you go for me?”

“You’re not?” I say.

He is silent. “He was easy to be with,” John whispers. “He was so bright-eyed, ambitious in the good way, for his mother and father, for his family who had given him the chance. They sacrifice for him and he returns their gift as best he can. What else is there? When I see a boy like Eduardo, working so hard for those behind him, I want to weep. For me, there is nothing else, our life is made only of hope and melancholy. I asked him to watch the boys a few times so they could be with him and learn. Imagine, I wanted them to learn from him. He had a natural will, a genuine confidence you rarely see in anyone.”

“I thought it was the boxing,” I say.

“No way,” John cries, reminding me of how my father would say the words, he thought, like an American. “He could box because he had the confidence. I know. You can’t let someone pound on your bare skull unless you have a very clear and strong sense of self. Everything begins with that. Everything. No matter what happens, you crouch down, protect yourself as best you can, and you concentrate on what got you there.”

“Even with bombs?”

“I don’t give a damn about bombs! God Almighty! Do you really care about bombs, Park Byong-ho shih? ”

I stop. I always freeze for a second on hearing my Korean name.

He yells, “Do you really care about who did this to us? That’s what everyone out there wants to know.”

I say, “They want to know what you believe.”

“That’s right,” he answers. He rises and walks behind the desk, taking hold of the back of his chair. “They want me to make a statement. They want me to respond to their theories of who’s responsible, whether it’s blacks, whites, the Asian gang leaders I’ve been trying to negotiate with, they want me to shade my suspicion toward one party or another.”

I say, “What if evidence comes forth? What if you have to?”

“There is no good evidence. You were there with Sherrie, yes? And even if there is I won’t let myself be their fire. This should strictly be a criminal investigation. What they want from me is a statement about color. Whatever I say they’ll make into a matter of race. Yellow man speaks out.”

“Or yellow man stays quiet,” I say.

“Perhaps. But the more racial strife they can report, the more the public questions what good any of this diversity brings. The underlying sense of what’s presented these days is that this country has difference that ails rather than strengthens and enriches. You can see what can happen from this, how the public may begin viewing anything outside mainstream experience and culture to be threatening or dangerous. There is a closing going, Henry, slowly but steadily, a narrowing of who can rightfully live here and be counted.”

He moves to the window shaded by venetian blinds, pulls the cord to open the slats. Almost twilight. He looks out. I hear shouts rise from the street, peppering the house. White camera light jumps up through the slats. They are trained on us. More shouts, and the window brightens further. Now it is the media keeping a vigil. They will stay all night, drinking hot coffee in the street, joking bitterly, working the video and microphones in shifts. This is their kind of hope, a Kwang Watch.

John peers down into the lights, unflinching.

“What is the mood downstairs, Henry, I mean, of our people?”

“Nothing bad,” I tell him. “They’re expectant, too, like the whole city. Haven’t you talked with Sherrie?”

“Yes. But I want to know what you see. I believe I can trust you,” he says, smiling easily, the manner still casual. “You seem already to move well among us,” he tells me. “You’ve made everyone forget your reason for being here, the article, whatnot. At times I’ve forgotten, too, and I think you’re here because you believe in what we’re doing. I hope that’s a little true.”

I grunt in assent, sipping the liquor. I can’t offer anything more. It is in these moments that I wish for John Kwang to start speaking the other tongue we know; somehow our English can’t touch what I want to say. I want to call the simple Korean back to him the way I once could when I was Peter’s age, our comely language of distance and bows, by which real secrets may be slowly courted, slowly unveiled.

“Sherrie,” he says, sitting down now at his desk, “she’s the best at many things, but I know people tend to hold their tongues around her. She’s so intelligent and attractive. Most people don’t handle that package well. Even some reporters cower a little with her. They get awed and start asking questions they think she’d like to answer.”

“They do the same with you,” I say.

“I believe that ended as of last week.”

“Don’t worry about our people,” I offer. “We’re just wondering like everyone else why this happened. Everyone is devastated. We can’t see any good reasons.”

John laughs bitterly, his head in his hands. “What are the bad ones, my friend?”

After a moment of quiet he pulls the bottom drawer and retrieves a folded green-and-white computer printout markered in Eduardo’s hand. I take it in my hands. Somehow it’s been retrieved from the fire, though I notice that it doesn’t at all smell of smoke. He pushes it to me. It is a listing of names and addresses, names and ages of children, occupation, name and address of business or businesses, estimated yearly income, nationality, year-to-date dollar figures, percentage changes. Then, to the far right, double-underlined, the dollar amounts.

“What Eduardo was working on,” John says softly, his voice lower, honorific. “What I ask you to do for us now. Before you look too much you must say yes or no. Say yes, my friend. Say yes to me tonight.”

I tell them cash is acceptable. Please nothing else. Checks, lottery tickets, diamond stud earrings, cases of fruit, VSOP cognac, tubs of fresh tofu, and all other wares will be returned or donated or else thrown away. The money comes in weekly, some of them giving as much as $250 and $500, others as little as $10. Most give fifty. We welcome them all. Ten dollars a week is what it takes to start, ten dollars for the right of knowing a someone in the city for you who are yet nobody. But then no one, no matter the amount, has his ear over another. It matters only that you give what you can. You give with honor and indomitable spirit. You remain loyal. True. These are the simple rules of his house.