Comfort Woman Read Online Free Page B
Author: Nora Okja Keller
death primarily through what others have told me. The villagers who took him in say he had a lung disease, coughing up blood as he died. They also said he called for my mother.
She was always a good wife; she went to him quickly in death, just as she did in life. One night after we had carried home the wash, she kept saying how tired she was, how tired. Come, Mother, I told her, lie down. I kept asking her, what could I do? Do you want soup, do you want massage? Till finally she put her hand over my mouth and guided my fingers to her forehead. I stroked her softly, loosening her hair from the bun she tied it in, rubbing her temples where I could feel the heat and the throb of her beating heart. Even when the erratic tempo slowed, then finally stopped, I continued to pet her. I wanted her to know that I loved her.
I touch my child in the same way now; this is the language she understands: the cool caresses of my fingers across her tiny eyelids, her smooth tummy, her fat toes. This, not the senseless murmurings of useless words, is what quiets her, tells her she is precious. She is like my mother in this way.
Because of this likeness, this link to the dead, my daughter is the only living thing I love. My husband, the missionaries who took me in after the camp, my sisters, if they are still alive, all are incidental. What are living people to ghosts, except ghosts themselves?
My oldest sister understood this. When my second and third sisters ran away together to look for work as secretaries or factory workers in Pyongyang, the oldest sister tried to keep our fatherâs business going by marrying our closest neighbor. The neighbors didnât have much money, but they had more than us and wouldnât take her without a dowry. How could they buy cattle without any capital, they reasoned.
I was her dowry, sold like one of the cows before and after me. You are just going to follow second and third sisters, she told me. The Japanese say there is enough work for anyone in the cities. Girls, even, can learn factory work or serve in restaurants. You will make lots of money.
Still, I cried. She hugged me, then pinched me. Grow up now, she said. No mother, no father. We all have to make our lives. She didnât look at my face when the soldiers came, didnât watch as they herded me onto their truck. I heard them asking her if she wanted to come along; your sister is still so young, not good for much, they said. But you. You are grown and pretty. You could do well.
I am not sure, but I think my sister laughed. I hope that she had at least a momentary fear that they would take her too.
I am already married, she said.
I imagine she shrugged then, as if to say, What can I do? Then she added, My sister will be even prettier. She didnât ask why that should matter in a factory line.
I knew I would not see the city. We had heard the rumors: girls bought or stolen from villages outside the city, sent to Japanese recreation centers. But still, we did not know what the centers were like. At worst, I thought, I would do what Iâve done all my life: clean, cook, wash clothes, work hard. How could I imagine anything else?
At first that is what I did do. Still young, I was kept to serve the women in the camps. Around women all my life, I felt almost like I was coming home when I first realized there were women at the camps, maybe a dozen. I didnât see them right away; they were kept in their stalls, behind mat curtains, most of the days and throughout the night. Only slowly were they revealed to me as I delivered and took away their meals, as I emptied their night pots. Hanako 38, her name given because her face was once pretty as a flower. Miyoko 52, frail and unlucky as the Miyokos before her. Kimi-ko 3, with hair the color of egg yellow, which made the officers laugh when they realized the pun of her name: Kimi the sovereign, Kimi the yolk. Akiko 40. Tamayo 29, who told the men she loved them and received gifts and
She was always a good wife; she went to him quickly in death, just as she did in life. One night after we had carried home the wash, she kept saying how tired she was, how tired. Come, Mother, I told her, lie down. I kept asking her, what could I do? Do you want soup, do you want massage? Till finally she put her hand over my mouth and guided my fingers to her forehead. I stroked her softly, loosening her hair from the bun she tied it in, rubbing her temples where I could feel the heat and the throb of her beating heart. Even when the erratic tempo slowed, then finally stopped, I continued to pet her. I wanted her to know that I loved her.
I touch my child in the same way now; this is the language she understands: the cool caresses of my fingers across her tiny eyelids, her smooth tummy, her fat toes. This, not the senseless murmurings of useless words, is what quiets her, tells her she is precious. She is like my mother in this way.
Because of this likeness, this link to the dead, my daughter is the only living thing I love. My husband, the missionaries who took me in after the camp, my sisters, if they are still alive, all are incidental. What are living people to ghosts, except ghosts themselves?
My oldest sister understood this. When my second and third sisters ran away together to look for work as secretaries or factory workers in Pyongyang, the oldest sister tried to keep our fatherâs business going by marrying our closest neighbor. The neighbors didnât have much money, but they had more than us and wouldnât take her without a dowry. How could they buy cattle without any capital, they reasoned.
I was her dowry, sold like one of the cows before and after me. You are just going to follow second and third sisters, she told me. The Japanese say there is enough work for anyone in the cities. Girls, even, can learn factory work or serve in restaurants. You will make lots of money.
Still, I cried. She hugged me, then pinched me. Grow up now, she said. No mother, no father. We all have to make our lives. She didnât look at my face when the soldiers came, didnât watch as they herded me onto their truck. I heard them asking her if she wanted to come along; your sister is still so young, not good for much, they said. But you. You are grown and pretty. You could do well.
I am not sure, but I think my sister laughed. I hope that she had at least a momentary fear that they would take her too.
I am already married, she said.
I imagine she shrugged then, as if to say, What can I do? Then she added, My sister will be even prettier. She didnât ask why that should matter in a factory line.
I knew I would not see the city. We had heard the rumors: girls bought or stolen from villages outside the city, sent to Japanese recreation centers. But still, we did not know what the centers were like. At worst, I thought, I would do what Iâve done all my life: clean, cook, wash clothes, work hard. How could I imagine anything else?
At first that is what I did do. Still young, I was kept to serve the women in the camps. Around women all my life, I felt almost like I was coming home when I first realized there were women at the camps, maybe a dozen. I didnât see them right away; they were kept in their stalls, behind mat curtains, most of the days and throughout the night. Only slowly were they revealed to me as I delivered and took away their meals, as I emptied their night pots. Hanako 38, her name given because her face was once pretty as a flower. Miyoko 52, frail and unlucky as the Miyokos before her. Kimi-ko 3, with hair the color of egg yellow, which made the officers laugh when they realized the pun of her name: Kimi the sovereign, Kimi the yolk. Akiko 40. Tamayo 29, who told the men she loved them and received gifts and
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