Adam Johnson - The Orphan Master's Son

He shook his head no. She was so vulnerable before him, so pure—how did she stay so in this harsh world?

“So what are you, one of my husband’s new flunkies? Sent to check on me while he goes on a secret mission? Oh, I know about his secret missions—he alone is brave enough to infiltrate a whorehouse in Minpo, only the great Commander Ga can survive a week in a Vladivostok card den.”

He crouched beside her. “Oh, no. You judge him too harshly. He’s changed. Sure, he’s a man who’s made some mistakes, he’s sorry for those, but all that matters now is you. He adores you, I’m sure of it. He’s completely devoted to you.”

“Tell him I can’t take much more of this. Please pass that along for me.”

“I’m him now,” he said. “So you can tell him yourself.”

She took a deep breath and shook her head. “So you want to be Commander Ga, huh?” she asked. “Do you know what he’d do to you if he heard you assume his name? His taekwondo ‘tests’ are for real, you know. They’ve made an enemy of everyone in this town. That’s why I can’t get a role anymore. Just make up with the Dear Leader, won’t you? Can’t you just bow to him at the opera? Will you give my husband that request from me? That’s all it would take, a single gesture, in front of everybody, and the Dear Leader would forgive all.”

He reached to wipe her cheek, but she pulled away.

“These tears in my eyes,” she said. “Do you see them? Can you tell my husband of these tears?” she asked. “Don’t go on any more missions, please. Tell him not to send another flunky to babysit me.”

“He already knows,” he said. “And he’s sorry. Will you do something for him, a favor? It would mean so much to him.”

Lying on the grass, she turned to her side, her breasts lolling under the house robe, snot running freely from her nose. “Go away,” she said.

“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” he said. “I told you it’s been a long journey, and I’ve only just arrived. The favor is a small one, really, it’s nothing to a great actress like yourself. You know that part from A True Daughter of the Country , where, to find your sister, you must cross the Inchon Strait, still aflame with the sinking battleship Koryo , and when you wade in, you’re just a fishing-village girl from Cheju, but after swimming through the corpses of patriots in blood-red waters, you emerge a different person, now you are a woman soldier, a half-burned flag in your hands, and the line you say, you know it, will you say it to me now?”

She didn’t say the words, but he thought he could see them pass through her eyes— There is a greater love , one that from the lowest places calls us high . Yes, they were there in her eyes, that’s the sign of a true actress—being able to speak with just her expressions.

“Can you sense how right everything feels?” he asked her. “How everything’s going to be different? When I was in prison—”

“Prison?” she asked. She sat up straight. “How exactly do you know my husband?”

“Your husband attacked me this morning,” he said. “We were in a tunnel, in Prison 33, and I killed him.”

She cocked her head. “What?”

“I mean, I believe I killed him. It was dark, so I can’t be sure, but my hands, they know what to do.”

“Is this one of my husband’s tests?” she asked. “If so, it’s his sickest one yet. Are you supposed to report back how I responded to that news, whether I danced for joy or hanged myself in grief? I can’t believe he’s stooped this low. He’s a child, really, a scared little boy. Only someone like that would loyalty-test an old woman in the park. Only Commander Ga would give his own son a masculinity test. And by the way, his sidekicks eventually get tested, too, and when they fail, you don’t see them anymore.”

“Your husband won’t be testing anyone ever again,” he said. “You’re all that matters in his life right now. Over time, you’ll come to understand that.”

“Stop it,” she said. “This isn’t funny anymore. It’s time for you to leave.”

He looked up to the doorway, and standing there silent were the children—a girl perhaps eleven, a boy a little younger. They held the collar of a dog with thick shoulders and a shiny coat. “Brando,” Commander Ga called, and the dog broke free. The Catahoula bounded to him, tail wagging. It kept leaping high to lick his face, then flattening low to nip his heels.

“You got him,” he said to her. “I can’t believe you got him.”

“Got him?” she asked. Her voice was suddenly serious. “How do you know its name?” she asked. “We’ve kept the dog a secret so he won’t be taken by the authorities.”

“How do I know his name? I named him,” he said. “Right before I sent him to you last year. ‘Brando’ is the word that Texans use to say something is yours forever.”

“Wait a minute,” she said, and all the theatrics were gone. “Just who exactly are you?”

“I’m the good husband. I’m the one who’s going to make everything up to you.”

There was a look on her face that Ga recognized, and it was not a happy one. It expressed an understanding that everything would be different now, that the person you’d been and the life you’d been living were over. It was a tough knowledge to suddenly gain, but it got better with tomorrows. And it would be easier since she’d probably worn that look once before, when the Dear Leader gave her, as a prize, to the winner of the Golden Belt, the man who’d beat Kimura.

In his dark room in Division 42, the smoldering cigarette in Commander Ga’s lips was nearly finished. It had been a long day, and the memory of Sun Moon had saved him yet again. But it was time to put her away in his mind—she’d always be there when he needed her. He smiled a last time at the thought of her, causing the cigarette to fall from his mouth into the well where his neck curved into collarbone. There it burned slowly against his skin, a tiny red glow in an otherwise black room.

Pain, what was pain?

CITIZENS ,we bring good news! In your kitchens, in your offices, on your factory floors—wherever you hear this broadcast, turn up the volume! The first success we have to report is that our Grass into Meat Campaign is a complete triumph. Still, much more soil needs to be hauled to the rooftops, so all housing-block managers are instructed to schedule extra motivation meetings.

Also, this month’s recipe contest is upon us, citizens. The winning recipe will be painted on the front wall of the central bus terminal for all to copy down. The winner will be the citizen who submits the best recipe for: Celery Root Noodles!

Now for world news. Naked aggression continues from America—currently, two nuclear attack groups are parked in the East Sea, while in the U.S. Mainland, homeless citizens lie urine-soaked in the streets. And in poor South Korea, our soiled little sister, there is more flooding and hunger. Don’t worry, help is on the way—Dear Leader Kim Jong Il has ordered that sandbags and food shipments be sent south right away.

Finally, the first installment of this year’s Best North Korean Story begins today. Close your eyes and picture for a moment our national actress Sun Moon. Banish from your minds the foolish stories and gossip that have lately swirled our city about her. Picture her the way she will live forever in our national consciousness. Remember her famous “With Fever” scene in Woman of a Nation , where, following her rape at the hands of the Japanese, the sweat ran from her brow to meet, with moonlight, the tears upon her cheek, only to tumble down to her patriotic breasts? How can one tear, tracing its brief journey, start as a drop of ruin, trail into a drip of resolution, and, finally, splash with national fervor? Certainly, citizens, fresh in your minds is the final image of Motherless Fatherland , in which Sun Moon, clad only in bloodied gauze, emerges from the battlefield having saved the national flag, while behind her, the American Army is in ruins, foundering and aflame.