Jia: A Novel of North Korea Read Online Free Page B

the room restlessly before sitting down right in front of the
door. My sister stepped behind her and stuck to the wall,
dragging me next to her. She held my hand tightly.
    Grandfather said to Grandmother, "Bring some food he
can eat." She looked at him with suspicious eyes and slid
into the kitchen without a word.
    "Thank you," the man said. I remember thinking he
had a funny way of speaking. I tried to get a closer look at
him, but my sister warned me, giving me sharp pinches.
    "I've become lost." He took off his hat and pointed a
finger at us. "I followed those kids all day. Otherwise, I
would have wandered around the mountains for one more
night."
    My sister opened her eyes wide and looked at me to let
me know that she had been right about hearing noises during the day.
    The man gave us a smile, and I smiled back at him. He
didn't look like a bad guy.

    Grandfather told us to offer our seats. That was the
warmest place in the room, where my sister and I always
sit. We moved next to Grandfather, and I finally got out of
my sister's grip. Grandmother opened the kitchen door and
asked Grandfather, "Do you want me to heat up the fireplace?"
    The stranger shook both his hands to stop my grandmother. "No. It's warm enough. You don't have to...I
mean it. This is already heaven to me. Sorry to give you
such trouble."
    A little later, Grandmother set the table. I stood up nimbly and took the dishes from her hands, asking the soldier
with a smile, "Do you want some plain water or scorched
rice water? I recommend my grandmother's scorched rice
water-it's really good." I didn't care about my sister anymore, and I dodged her gaze.
    "Thank you. Either one is fine," he said, smiling, showing his white and well-arranged teeth.
    I brought him some fairly hot scorched rice water.
Grandmother always made it, boiling the leftover cooked
rice, stuck in the pot, in water for a long time over a low
fire. We sipped it before or after our actual meal because it
made our stomachs warm and full. It was too hot to drink in
one stretch, and sometimes I burned my tongue. I couldn't
understand how my grandparents could drink something so
hot and then say, in a satisfied voice, "Hu! How cool it is!"
    When I asked them how they could refer to such a hot
drink as cool, they tried to explain. "Even though it's hot,
when it goes down along your throat and arrives at your
stomach, you can feel it make your insides so clean and
cool." Seeing my dissatisfaction, they would grin and say,
"You'll understand when you grow up."

    The soldier sat at the table and wolfed down his food
as we all looked on quietly. He said, "I'm taking a guerilla
training course that is supposed to last for three months.
It's my first time in these mountains-we just arrived here
five days ago. When I was doing an individual exercise, I
got lost."
    While the man spoke, Grandfather rolled a cigarette
with thin paper he brought from the mines. "There is an
army training camp," Grandfather replied. "I know where
it is. Crossing the mine is a shortcut to get there. I'll take
you over there." He put the cigarette on the table for the
stranger and made another for himself.
    "Thanks. It was lucky to run into those kids. I was
thinking of asking for help as soon as I saw them, but I was
afraid they might be scared. So I followed them and was
hesitating at the door."
    Grandfather looked at him closely. "Are you a professional soldier? You look a little old to be going through
guerilla training for the first time."
    Putting the spoon and chopsticks down on the table, he
nodded slightly to my grandmother as a token of gratitude.
He watched all of us and cautiously answered, "No. I'm
not. I was a fisherman. Actually, I'm from South Korea."
    I could feel my grandfather's and grandmother's faces
suddenly go stiff. And my sister grabbed my hand with such
force that I yelped with pain. I didn't know why his answer
provoked such a reaction; I knew my