Jung Yun - Shelter

After the prayer, the reverend’s wife, Molly, walks into the room and asks everyone to form a line for dinner. The crowd surges toward the buffet as she presents two full plates to Jin and Mae and bows deeply from the waist. Kyung looks for Gillian, who’s nowhere to be found. This is why he always has to remind her how to behave around his parents. She says she knows what to do, and can recite the list as proof, but deference doesn’t come naturally to her. Molly removes two napkins from the pocket of her skirt and spreads them across Mae’s and Jin’s laps. Then she bows again and backs away.

Kyung always feels nervous when he runs into Molly, whom he’s known since junior high. She went by Mi Young back then, and he remembers her as not terribly pretty or smart, but loud and destructive and loose. Among certain types of boys, this latter quality seemed to make up for most of her failings. By the time they started high school, she’d earned an unfortunate nickname for herself. “The Car Wash.” Whenever fifth period approached, Kyung could overhear boys clad in letterman jackets discuss the impending lunch hour: “So who’s going through the Car Wash today?” During their senior year, Molly’s parents caught her in bed with a boy and shipped her off to a private Christian college after graduation. Through friends of friends, Kyung heard that she tried to run away on more than one occasion, so it surprised him when she returned home four years later, born-again and perfect wife material for a young reverend. All of this happened so long ago, but Kyung can’t help comparing the awkward, trampy-looking girl he remembers with the plain but pretty woman she is now.

“Hello, Kyung.” Molly takes both of his hands in hers. “How are you?”

He wonders if she noticed him staring, although it wouldn’t be the first time if she did. Molly, he assumes, is well aware that he admires her, and some part of her secretly enjoys it.

“All right, I guess.”

“I hope you don’t mind that I organized this.”

“You?”

“Yes, my husband said it might be too soon, but I thought your wife — I thought she might enjoy a night off from cooking.”

She glances at Jin, who’s leaning over his plate, shoveling food into his mouth without coming up for air. Kyung assumed he’d been picking at his meals all week because he wasn’t hungry, but he realizes that Jin probably didn’t like Gillian’s cooking. The blood rushes to his cheeks as he watches his father eat like some kind of wild animal. Slow down, he thinks. People will wonder if he and Gillian have been feeding him at all.

“I haven’t seen your son in a while. He’s getting so big,” Molly says. “I bet he’ll want a little brother or sister soon.”

She adds this wistfully, making no attempt to conceal what his parents have speculated about for years — that Molly and the reverend can’t have children of their own. Kyung assumes they’re right. People like the Sungs are all about God and family. They don’t wait to get pregnant. For them, there’s no good or bad time. He wonders what Molly would say if he told her he doesn’t want a second child, that there are days when having one seems like the hardest thing he’ll ever do.

“Ethan hasn’t said anything about siblings yet. A dog, maybe.”

Molly begins to laugh, but quickly cups a hand over her mouth. “I’m so sorry.”

“For laughing?”

“Now’s not the time for it.”

“Better to laugh than cry, right?”

He’s playing a part for her, badly, and the awkwardness of his attempt makes him overheat. He can feel the beads of sweat collecting above his lip, suspended in stubble that he wishes he’d shaved.

“Some of the ladies have offered to stop by and bring you food, or help around the house. Your wife shouldn’t have to take care of so many people on her own.”

She doesn’t, he thinks. That’s what’s so odd about the people from his parents’ church, especially the ones his own age. Most of them grew up in the States or came here from Korea when they were young. But the way they behave around each other — it’s as if they never left. The women are all subservient to their husbands and fathers and in-laws, which always seems so sad to him. Everywhere he looks, a woman is serving a plate of food to someone else. The daughters-in-law are the easiest to spot, the way they seem so eager to please. Kyung has been attracted to Korean girls before, but he never wanted to marry one, not even Molly. He didn’t want to subject someone he loved, or even vaguely liked, to the life of a foot servant like his mother. A few times a year, Gillian plays the part to keep his parents content, but a Korean wife would never be able to pick and choose when to be Korean.

The reverend returns from the kitchen and threads his arm around Molly’s thin waist. “Would you like my wife to make you a plate?”

He shakes his head. The reverend seems to understand, just as Molly does, that Kyung finds her attractive. On the rare occasions when they see each other, the reverend always inserts himself into their conversations, laying his hands on her in a gentle, chaste way that signals his ownership. Molly appears unfazed by it, but Kyung can’t stand to look at the mismatch of them. Despite the plainness of their clothes and the diamond-crusted crucifixes they wear — a pendant for her and a lapel pin for him — he still remembers the person she used to be. Sometimes he daydreams about converting her back to her former state, if only for an afternoon.

“I promise we won’t stay long,” the reverend says. “We just wanted to give everyone a chance to see your parents and get something to eat. Then we’ll be out of the way.”

“And the ladies and I will leave your house exactly as we found it.”

Every female in the church, young and old alike, is referred to as one of “the ladies.” Mae talks about them often, how the ladies are hosting a flower show, or the ladies are having a prayer meeting. Kyung has never seen a group of women spend so much time together and yet know so little about each other. He doesn’t like the idea of the ladies cleaning up his house, but there’s no use trying to resist.

“Excuse me.” He glances over at Ethan, who seems perfectly happy where he is. “I need to get some air.”

“Are you sure I can’t make you a plate?” Molly asks.

The reverend is about to encourage Kyung to stay and eat, but he seems to think better of it. “Let him go, Molly. We’ve bothered him long enough.”

In the backyard, Kyung drags a folding lawn chair under a tall window, hopeful that no one will notice him sitting outside. He leans his head against the hot metal frame and looks for the sun, which is almost hidden behind the house. The angle of it in the sky suggests that it’s only five or six, leaving so many hours before he can climb into bed and not be obligated to anyone. A gust of wind sweeps through the trees, scattering dead leaves and dried-out blossoms through the grass. He can’t remember the last time he raked or weeded, and it shows. The layer of mulch covering the flower beds is thin in some places and completely bare in others. Weeds are sprouting their green and yellow heads through every crevice, choking out the perennials that should be blooming by now.

Gillian rounds the corner, carrying a plate piled high with food. “I’ve been looking for you. I figured you were hiding somewhere.” She sits cross-legged on a shady patch of grass and kicks off her sandals, revealing the undersides of her feet, which are gray with dirt. “You ran away before I could ask how it went at the house. Was your mom okay there?”

He doesn’t consider telling her about the slap, not for a second. She’d never let Mae near Ethan again. “She was all business, actually. She just wanted to clean up and figure out what to send the insurance company.”