Authors: Suki Kim
The Interpreter (3 page)
Suzy did not bother looking for a new roommate. There was still some money left over in the savings account that Damian had set up for her during the later stage of their escapade. It occurred to her that she should send it back to him, but she knew that he also expected her to. It was Damian’s way. It was his hook, his excuse to keep her in his tow, and she knew that he waited patiently for a day when she would throw the money back at him with a letter, a memo, a phone call, so Suzy would not do it. She kept it instead, and paid her landlord $966 each month with Damian’s money. She thought this ensured her as his kept woman, as everyone had believed, including Professor Tamiko and their mutual colleagues, including her parents and Grace, including Damian himself, although Suzy was the last one to find out.
Suzy spent the first year back in New York doing nothing. She lay around the apartment all day and called no one. Caleb dropped by once in a while, after his day shift at the restaurant. They would walk around the neighborhood on sticky evenings and sit on a bench at Tompkins Square Park munching on crème brûlée wrapped in tinfoil. Caleb would buy her a Starbucks Frappuccino, which he said was her Jappiest habit and that if she ever met a decent boy, she should keep it a secret from him until he was well hooked on her Asian charm, and she would laugh, realizing that her own laughter sounded almost foreign to her. Caleb would tell her all about his new boyfriend and the incredible sex they were having: “Three courses a night, darling. I tell you, you ain’t seen nothing yet until you fucked someone your dad’s age.”
But everything comes with a price,
Suzy thought. She was twenty-five then, unemployed, goal-less, an orphan.
Suzy thought. She was twenty-five then, unemployed, goal-less, an orphan.
At the funeral, Grace avoided Suzy. They sat next to each other and did not exchange a word. No one spoke to Suzy, not her parents’ acquaintances, not the man with gold-rimmed
glasses who had helped Grace out of a car, not Mr. and Mrs. Lim, whom Suzy grew up next door to when they lived in Flushing years ago. It was as if they considered her also dead, as if respecting the wishes of her parents, who had disowned her the minute she ran off with Damian in her senior year. Quite a crowd had gathered at the Korean church in Fort Lee, New Jersey, where Grace now lived. There were no relatives, because they did not have any except for a few aunts back in Korea whom neither Suzy nor Grace had ever met. Her parents barely had any friends, never liked people much, but their death had been shocking, scandalous, tragic, and people, especially churchgoing immigrants, loved tragedies. The only thing Grace said when Suzy went up to her to say goodbye was,
Don’t bother showing up for the ashes, they are with God now. Do me a favor, Suzy; leave us alone.
glasses who had helped Grace out of a car, not Mr. and Mrs. Lim, whom Suzy grew up next door to when they lived in Flushing years ago. It was as if they considered her also dead, as if respecting the wishes of her parents, who had disowned her the minute she ran off with Damian in her senior year. Quite a crowd had gathered at the Korean church in Fort Lee, New Jersey, where Grace now lived. There were no relatives, because they did not have any except for a few aunts back in Korea whom neither Suzy nor Grace had ever met. Her parents barely had any friends, never liked people much, but their death had been shocking, scandalous, tragic, and people, especially churchgoing immigrants, loved tragedies. The only thing Grace said when Suzy went up to her to say goodbye was,
Don’t bother showing up for the ashes, they are with God now. Do me a favor, Suzy; leave us alone.
The phone starts ringing again. Whoever it is does not want to leave the evidence. Whoever it is is desperately looking for her. The Caller ID says “private.” But she knew that without even looking at it. Suzy finally takes off her coat, throwing it on a silk hanger from the pricey Madison Avenue shop. Took Sandy all afternoon to find it, Michael claimed. Michael wants Suzy in the latest fashion. He wants the latest of anything. Often she stands in front a mirror, clad in what strikes her as carefully sewn and stitched money, lots of it. She hardly recognizes herself. A bona fide mistress, whose clothing shields her from herself. Suzy brushes her fingers across the array of silk shirts and cashmere sweaters. They come in every shade of black. “To match your hair, Suzy,” Michael said. She imagines his wife in the most flamboyant pitch of red and green, a blonde surely, once-upon-a-sorority, maybe a book club or two, that would suit him. Michael never discusses his family. It is taboo, and
Suzy prefers it that way. She knows how to be a kept woman. She got her start early. She even sacrificed her own parents to be one, so she had better be damn good at it. The phone starts again, and Suzy stares at it without turning off the ringer. Then she walks to the end of the railroad and turns the hot water on to the fullest.
Suzy prefers it that way. She knows how to be a kept woman. She got her start early. She even sacrificed her own parents to be one, so she had better be damn good at it. The phone starts again, and Suzy stares at it without turning off the ringer. Then she walks to the end of the railroad and turns the hot water on to the fullest.
THE VOICE ON THE OTHER END shouts, “Delivery.” Suzy presses the intercom button, standing at the door in her bathrobe with her hair wrapped in a towel. The deliveryman smiles, as if her wetness suggests a private promise. In his arms is a bouquet of white irises. “Sign the receipt, please,” he says, and she asks, “From whom?” although she already knows the answer. No sender’s name, nothing. No note, no miniature card with a happy smile, no heart-shaped balloon with a double I-love-you’s. A bunch of white irises, a rarity in November, but only in November, always in November. Almost exactly four years ago, a man first appeared at her doorstep with a bunch of white irises much like these. It occurred to her that they might be from Damian, but this was not Damian’s style, and delicate white irises definitely not his thing. Then who? Not Michael, because she did not even know him then, and not a secret admirer, Caleb said he hoped, because the joke was too old and she was not so young anymore. They were always delivered right around
the anniversary of her parents’ death. She wonders if they were sent to Grace also. But why irises, why such insistence? Mom had liked them, Suzy vaguely recalls. Her parents used to sell them at their store. Mom said that, among all garden flowers, irises needed the most care, because they withered quickly and had virtually no smell. Her mother was not one of those softies whose hearts melt at the sight of long-stemmed roses or tulips, and neither was Suzy. They were pleasing to look at, she thought, but why not leave them wherever they came from, either the perennial fields of the Netherlands or the sloping valleys of northern California, anywhere at all but primped like a poodle and squeezed into a glass vase on a now-satisfied girlfriend’s mantel in order to reassure her that somebody loved her on this Valentine’s Day or birthday or anniversary? A bouquet reminded Suzy of a Hallmark card from a corner stationery store, whose price was preprinted and whose purpose was long prescribed. Only once she thought that flowers served a purpose, and that was at the funeral. Grace must have arranged it, which surprised Suzy, but one could never tell how a sibling might react to one’s parents’ death, which sort of coffin, open casket or not, a chorus of hymns even if they had never believed in Christ. There were white flowers everywhere around both coffins, either lilies or chrysanthemums, although Suzy cannot recall if she saw irises among them. Dad would have thrown a fit, she thought then. “Frivolous!” he would’ve screamed. “What a waste! In Korea, no one would dare to throw away so much for nothing!” And that must be exactly why Grace chose to do it. Everyone thought that the flowers were appropriate. But Suzy knew that they were the last things her parents would have wanted at their final moment.
the anniversary of her parents’ death. She wonders if they were sent to Grace also. But why irises, why such insistence? Mom had liked them, Suzy vaguely recalls. Her parents used to sell them at their store. Mom said that, among all garden flowers, irises needed the most care, because they withered quickly and had virtually no smell. Her mother was not one of those softies whose hearts melt at the sight of long-stemmed roses or tulips, and neither was Suzy. They were pleasing to look at, she thought, but why not leave them wherever they came from, either the perennial fields of the Netherlands or the sloping valleys of northern California, anywhere at all but primped like a poodle and squeezed into a glass vase on a now-satisfied girlfriend’s mantel in order to reassure her that somebody loved her on this Valentine’s Day or birthday or anniversary? A bouquet reminded Suzy of a Hallmark card from a corner stationery store, whose price was preprinted and whose purpose was long prescribed. Only once she thought that flowers served a purpose, and that was at the funeral. Grace must have arranged it, which surprised Suzy, but one could never tell how a sibling might react to one’s parents’ death, which sort of coffin, open casket or not, a chorus of hymns even if they had never believed in Christ. There were white flowers everywhere around both coffins, either lilies or chrysanthemums, although Suzy cannot recall if she saw irises among them. Dad would have thrown a fit, she thought then. “Frivolous!” he would’ve screamed. “What a waste! In Korea, no one would dare to throw away so much for nothing!” And that must be exactly why Grace chose to do it. Everyone thought that the flowers were appropriate. But Suzy knew that they were the last things her parents would have wanted at their final moment.
Grabbing the nearly empty Evian bottle from the refrigerator, Suzy cuts open the top part and sticks the flowers in it. She is not sure where to put it, although she must have found a spot
for it each year. On the dining table, there, she places the bottle on the corner as if putting it away. Irises are sad flowers, she thinks, neither as glamorous as roses nor as graceful as lilies, just a run-of-the-mill sort. Each flower stalk stands perfectly straight, with slivers of drooping falls. White ones are the worst. Such petals, signaling perpetual mourning. Mom was right. It is eerie how they carry no scent, no trace.
for it each year. On the dining table, there, she places the bottle on the corner as if putting it away. Irises are sad flowers, she thinks, neither as glamorous as roses nor as graceful as lilies, just a run-of-the-mill sort. Each flower stalk stands perfectly straight, with slivers of drooping falls. White ones are the worst. Such petals, signaling perpetual mourning. Mom was right. It is eerie how they carry no scent, no trace.
Suzy told no one about the flowers. Somehow she thought that she was not supposed to, that it was meant to be a secret between her and whoever sent them, and that if she were to break this code something bad was bound to happen. Caleb was the only one who knew, because the first delivery came while he was over. “An acquaintance of your parents, probably,” he said. “Maybe he owed them money, maybe he cheated your parents a little and feels sorry, who knows, but whoever it is sure isn’t very original!”
November is a strange month anyway, not quite the winter, not quite the end of a year, and Suzy not quite thirty. She is happy to be almost done with her twenties. The whole youth thing escaped her. While other girls fretted about noncommittal boyfriends, maniacal bosses, or aimless Friday nights, Suzy was always looking to see who might be lashing at her from behind. It is impossible to insist on youth when your own parents call you a whore. But one cannot blame the dead. Whatever meanness is forgotten, washed away, gone with the ashes. It is their privilege. And here’s Suzy, five years since the funeral, still looking over her shoulder, or looking at the screeching phone, which will not leave her alone.
Perhaps it is the last echo of Dad’s anger, the way he muttered “
yang-gal-bo
” under his breath, or perhaps the faraway look on Mom, who would not meet Suzy’s eyes, but Suzy continues to stare at the phone without turning off the ringer. Each ring is a slash, a slap, a shot or two.
yang-gal-bo
” under his breath, or perhaps the faraway look on Mom, who would not meet Suzy’s eyes, but Suzy continues to stare at the phone without turning off the ringer. Each ring is a slash, a slap, a shot or two.
Two shots only; the gun had fired exactly twice and pierced their hearts.
Too precise for a random shooting, too perfectly executed, too clean. There wasn’t much bleeding, she was told. The bullets stopped their hearts.
A cold murder, a professional’s job, miss, your parents died instantly.
Suzy knows nothing further, and Grace will not speak to her. The Bronx Homicide Unit did the usual investigation, but there was no witness, no evidence, no suspect. There had been several similar shootings around the neighborhood, all unsolved. The case was quite typical, Detective Lester told Suzy: a useless killing by useless thugs. The victims were almost always immigrants, but there were no outstanding conflicts between specific immigrant groups, just the usual squabble. “Don’t worry,” he said. “We’ll get them; these thugs end up in jail anyway, if not for this, then something equally horrendous sooner or later.” And that was that. Grace took care of the store, the funeral, and their Queens brownstone. She contacted Suzy only once, through the accountant, about a small sum of money Suzy was entitled to from the sale of her parents’ possessions, but Suzy quietly declined. What right did she have? When Dad called her a whore, she stood up and said,
I wish I wasn’t your daughter!
That was her farewell to him.
I wish I wasn’t your daughter!
That was her farewell to him.
Nine years now, almost ten. She had just turned twenty when she ran off with Damian. Four years later, her parents were shot at their store. Five years have passed since their death. Once you start counting years, the numbers drive you crazy. A decade since she’s seen her parents alive, which should make her a credible orphan, and yet one never gets used to being alone. A bouquet of flowers arrives, and she cannot imagine who could’ve sent it, who would know that irises were her mother’s favorite flowers, who would mark each November to commemorate her
parents’ death, who would care whom she loves, who would cry because she will never marry him because he is already married, who would call her a whore, hoping it would stop her from plunging onto the wrong track, who would lose sleep at night because she is all alone in her railroad apartment afraid to answer the phone.
parents’ death, who would care whom she loves, who would cry because she will never marry him because he is already married, who would call her a whore, hoping it would stop her from plunging onto the wrong track, who would lose sleep at night because she is all alone in her railroad apartment afraid to answer the phone.
I wish I wasn’t your daughter.
She had meant it, and they knew it. There are words one cannot take back, intentions that are permanent.
It is useless going back to bathe now. The moment is gone, the shock of hot water running over her body has had its fill. She stands in her towel and lights a cigarette instead. She barely inhales before putting it out. The ashtray is filled with half-smoked cigarettes. Lately, cigarettes have begun to taste bitter. She has heard that it happens when one stops longing. Each time one of those righteous ladies comes up to her on the street and clicks her tongue with the cigarettes-are-so-bad-for-you speech, she wants to spit back something equally rude, like “So is your corduroy dress for your sex life.” But instead, she throws them the coldest stare, which usually wipes the benevolent smile right off their faces. Damian used to tease her for it. He used to say that Philip Morris should give her a medal for being one of the last true militants. He himself never touched them. He said that cigarettes were for the young, and it would be embarrassing for him at forty-nine to be sucking on something so obviously seductive. But he liked watching her smoke. “Take off your bra.” He would surprise her with an order so abrupt, and she would hold on to the cigarette between her lips while unhooking the strap with both her hands. “Take off your stockings,” he’d say. And before the end of the cigarette, she would be ready, and Damian would finally reach over and take the cigarette from her lips and stub it out.
Still she refuses to quit, although she can no longer smoke a
whole cigarette. Still it is the one thing she recognizes in herself. It’s like a line from a Leonard Cohen song, a girl who’s been left with nothing but a pack of cigarettes. Nothing is familiar any longer, nothing sinks. Since Caleb left, the apartment became bare. Hardly any furniture except for a futon and a mahogany dining table with two chairs. No posters lighten up the walls, no pretty fabrics cover the cracks in the corner. The only obvious electronic items are the Sony boom box and a fourteen-inch television set. The table and the TV belong to Caleb. “Turns out that a married life needs something more than Ikea,” he sighed when she asked him if he wanted his stuff back.
whole cigarette. Still it is the one thing she recognizes in herself. It’s like a line from a Leonard Cohen song, a girl who’s been left with nothing but a pack of cigarettes. Nothing is familiar any longer, nothing sinks. Since Caleb left, the apartment became bare. Hardly any furniture except for a futon and a mahogany dining table with two chairs. No posters lighten up the walls, no pretty fabrics cover the cracks in the corner. The only obvious electronic items are the Sony boom box and a fourteen-inch television set. The table and the TV belong to Caleb. “Turns out that a married life needs something more than Ikea,” he sighed when she asked him if he wanted his stuff back.
During her first year back in New York, Suzy watched TV all day. It was a new thing for her. Her parents never had time to sit around, because they were always working, and when they did watch, for an hour or two on rare weekends, they would put on Channel 47, which was the East Coast’s only Korean programming, whose jokes were lost on her. Grace had no tolerance for it either. It bored the hell out of her, she said, turning back to the book in her hands; the only thing she did with any enthusiasm was read. And when Suzy lived with Damian, of course there was no TV. Despicable, he grunted. American culture is the gutter, worse than drugs, definitely worse than cigarettes! Damian would have turned away in disgust if he saw how Suzy started the day now with
Good Morning America
and continued with
Regis and Kathy Lee
until midday, when the wildly convoluted sagas of daytime soaps unfolded. They had fabulous titles like
All My Children and Days of Our Lives.
There was one called
The Bold and the Beautiful
, which she thought was a more appropriate name for a body shampoo or a cologne. She welcomed the whole ritual, to lean back in her futon with a bowl of microwaved popcorn and lose herself in the entangled lives of Yasmina or Desiree or Katharina, who all seemed to have popped out of the Ms. Clairol box, and the occasional black or Asian
ones, who looked even more Ms. Clairol—like with their perfectly coifed hair, which, even though they were definitely not blonde, still carried the just-walked-out-of-a-salon essence as they bobbed along with the saccharine smile of the golden girl’s best friend. Her favorite was
One Life to Live
. She tried not to miss it, only because she found out while watching
Regis and Kathy Lee
one morning that it was the least popular among the soaps. She thought this was unfair, since they were basically interchangeable. In fact, even the actors seemed to skip around. She was sure that she had seen one particular actor in the two o‘clock soap as a handsome but evil doctor, and then, a week later, she would find him at three o’clock on another channel as a self-made millionaire. Then, of course, she would quickly discover that he had been killed in a plane crash in one soap but smoothly popped into another with a newer and nicer character. She envied their resurrecting lives. They never died, not completely. There seemed to be always a way out, a second, even a third chance. People did not just disappear without proper explanation. Tragedies came with namable causes and retribution. Their fate was a puzzle but an easy one, and days, months would fly by as she watched and toyed with the missing bits.
Good Morning America
and continued with
Regis and Kathy Lee
until midday, when the wildly convoluted sagas of daytime soaps unfolded. They had fabulous titles like
All My Children and Days of Our Lives.
There was one called
The Bold and the Beautiful
, which she thought was a more appropriate name for a body shampoo or a cologne. She welcomed the whole ritual, to lean back in her futon with a bowl of microwaved popcorn and lose herself in the entangled lives of Yasmina or Desiree or Katharina, who all seemed to have popped out of the Ms. Clairol box, and the occasional black or Asian
ones, who looked even more Ms. Clairol—like with their perfectly coifed hair, which, even though they were definitely not blonde, still carried the just-walked-out-of-a-salon essence as they bobbed along with the saccharine smile of the golden girl’s best friend. Her favorite was
One Life to Live
. She tried not to miss it, only because she found out while watching
Regis and Kathy Lee
one morning that it was the least popular among the soaps. She thought this was unfair, since they were basically interchangeable. In fact, even the actors seemed to skip around. She was sure that she had seen one particular actor in the two o‘clock soap as a handsome but evil doctor, and then, a week later, she would find him at three o’clock on another channel as a self-made millionaire. Then, of course, she would quickly discover that he had been killed in a plane crash in one soap but smoothly popped into another with a newer and nicer character. She envied their resurrecting lives. They never died, not completely. There seemed to be always a way out, a second, even a third chance. People did not just disappear without proper explanation. Tragedies came with namable causes and retribution. Their fate was a puzzle but an easy one, and days, months would fly by as she watched and toyed with the missing bits.
She stopped watching TV when she got her first job. Or maybe she got the job in order to stop watching it. No matter how frequently and closely she watched, she was never sure what really went on, who had supposedly died only to return with amnesia, who was cheating on whom with whose husbands and wives, who was kidnapped on the day of the wedding by the priest who turned out to be a spy. She thought these dramas required specific minds that could keep up with all the details. Yet what made her finally turn the TV off had nothing to do with its mind-numbing spell, but the gunshot. At least one or two characters were killed on TV each day. Almost always in daytime soaps, the victims came back alive, and the actual shooting scene
was skipped over. But there were the odd ones that would show the entire gruesome sequence in detail—the index finger on the trigger, the horrified victim shuddering, the squinting of the killer’s vengeful eyes, the slow falling of the body as the final ray of blood spurts out. The first time she saw a scene like that, Suzy was fixated. She could not stop thinking about it and wanted to record it to watch again and again. But the second time it happened, she felt sick and lay still on the futon and did not move for hours. And the third time, she shut it off and moved the TV set to the farthest corner of the apartment. She never went near it again.
was skipped over. But there were the odd ones that would show the entire gruesome sequence in detail—the index finger on the trigger, the horrified victim shuddering, the squinting of the killer’s vengeful eyes, the slow falling of the body as the final ray of blood spurts out. The first time she saw a scene like that, Suzy was fixated. She could not stop thinking about it and wanted to record it to watch again and again. But the second time it happened, she felt sick and lay still on the futon and did not move for hours. And the third time, she shut it off and moved the TV set to the farthest corner of the apartment. She never went near it again.
“You’re waiting for a whistle to blow; it’d take you less than five minutes to grab your stuff and run,” said Jen when she stopped by a few months ago, which she rarely did. “Deadline,” she claimed. “Drop by the office, we’ll go to the Royalton for lunch on the company’s account.” But Suzy knew that Jen did not want to meet at home. When lounging at each other’s apartments, they naturally fell into the familiar ways of former roommates. One would get up to pour coffee before the other even asked for a refill, or bring the ashtray before the other took out a cigarette. Yet somehow, sitting on the futon with the coffee brewing, they could not help remembering the way Suzy had quit and left an irreparable hole in their college days. Jen was right, though. The apartment resembles a temporary shelter. There is no sweetness here, no flowery sheets, no matching duvet cover, no framed childhood photos. In fact, Suzy cannot say if she is attached to anything anymore. A jade ring that once belonged to her mother? An album filled with her childhood photos? A videotape of her seventh-birthday party? No such memorabilia in her apartment. Sure, Grace might have retrieved a few items from the Queens house where their parents had lived in their final years—their family having moved frequently through their growing up—but how important were such things
if she had rarely missed them all these years? In college, Suzy envied Jen, who went home every few months to her parents’ Connecticut mansion, where her childhood bedroom was intact with her Barbie and her tattered Cure poster and a bulletin board filled with the snapshots from her high-school excursion to St. Petersburg. The shrine of such a lovely American past, to Suzy, suggested an emblem, a reference to what Jen would become, what Jen could only become—a successful editor, the one-bedroom apartment on Central Park West, a summer share in the Hamptons, a boyfriend of her own age in his final year of residency at Johns Hopkins. They were all the right, correct things in life, which a smart, ambitious young woman such as Jen, upon finishing an Ivy League education, was expected to find in such a scintillatingly possible ground as New York City.
if she had rarely missed them all these years? In college, Suzy envied Jen, who went home every few months to her parents’ Connecticut mansion, where her childhood bedroom was intact with her Barbie and her tattered Cure poster and a bulletin board filled with the snapshots from her high-school excursion to St. Petersburg. The shrine of such a lovely American past, to Suzy, suggested an emblem, a reference to what Jen would become, what Jen could only become—a successful editor, the one-bedroom apartment on Central Park West, a summer share in the Hamptons, a boyfriend of her own age in his final year of residency at Johns Hopkins. They were all the right, correct things in life, which a smart, ambitious young woman such as Jen, upon finishing an Ivy League education, was expected to find in such a scintillatingly possible ground as New York City.
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