Lost Dusk<단편소설, 잃어버린 황혼>, 역자 John Cha

[정소성]

Lost Dusk<단편소설, 잃어버린 황혼>, 역자 John Cha

LOST DUSK

I open my eyes...
The predawn darkness rushes at me all around like a thick substantive matter, and I shut my eyes. I hear raindrops tatter on the window, the quiet echoes in the room.
Downstairs, the clock ticks.
The ticking sound slices the silence in pieces and tosses the used ticks behind into the dreary space.
A chill runs down my body.
I hear Kilsu snoring. He groans now and then, and the noise in the dark pulls me into an abyss, a well filled with melancholy. A stench rises from where he sleeps. Sweat, trash, and spent soju wine are balled into one detestable stench, and I feel like throwing up.
I open my eyes again.
Predawn soaked in rain fills the window. I swallow against my dry throat. The stench in my mouth rolls down to my stomach, making me nauseous.
I hear soft rain, and my sense of hearing alone tells me that I am aware; my vision is blinded by darkness. My hearing seems sharper as time goes on. The ticking sound from the clock climb up the stairs and fill the room corner to corner, along with the snoring from other guests in the inn. The ticking sound fades away slowly, and the snoring sound ring my ears like the metallic drums and whistles. I'm thinking, the sounds that humans generate in sleep mimic other sounds the nature makes: bellows screaming, mosquitoes buzzing, thunder, water flowing down a ditch, and a cat crying, etc. etc.
Heavy darkness swarms in front of my eyes, making me dizzy. I feel nausea tickling in my throat. Is it because of the empty stomach, I wonder? Maybe because I drank soju wine on an empty stomach. Or, maybe the breathing sounds from the monsters next door.
I imagine briefly that every room is filled with animals that fed all day and now tired and sleeping. Immediately, I regret having lost myself to the silly imagination. I think maybe my helpless feeling has something to do with it, the helpless feeling from having to run around all over Seoul in the dark rain.
I turn my head toward the window. The dark dawn on the window is now little lighter. Nausea and hunger lingers, and I'm not sure if I'm awake or sleepy. I am caught in the blank space, between slumber and consciousness. I am not sure if I slept.
Breathing sounds from the next door persist.

I checked into this inn with Kilsu last night about midnight. We saw the bleary sign, "Seoul Inn" glowing in the alleyway under the white light and we made our way towards it.

I hear rain drops in between breathing sounds.
I wonder what time it is. I want to go outside. Now.
The bald innkeeper with a potbelly hasn't come to announce the end of curfew yet, so it must be still curfew, I'm thinking.
I put my left hand on my ear. The clock keeps ticking, and I know that time passes.

What should I do? Should I try to find Mr. Wu once again? Should I just get on the train? Actually, when Kilsu and I staggered into Seoul Inn last night, I had in mind to look for Mr. Wu in the morning after the curfew. But the persistent rain put a damper in my resolve to find Mr. Wu.
I thought that Kilsu would help me find Mr. Wu. But Kilsu told me clearly that he didn't know where Mr. Wu lived, didn't he? Now I can't think of anyone who could tell me where Mr. Wu lived, and I am hopeless. But I want to find Mr. Wu. I don't know why exactly, but I just want to. Is it because of Donshik's painting that I want to see Mr. Wu? Maybe.
That rascal Donshik...where did he disappear to?

Ding, ding, ding, dong…
The bell rings from downstairs. The metallic sound signals that the curfew is over. The bell stops ringing, and I can hear the rain beating against the window. More clearly now. At the same time, all the breathing sounds seem to subside. The four bells from the grandfather clock climb the steps one by one and pass through the corridor, shaking the stillness of the dark from the night before. My own sense of hearing sharpens, I can feel it, and I hear a car splashing through the rain. In the corner at the right side of the window, headlights shine briefly and disappear.
I scream inside, I must find Mr. Wu!
Should I turn on the light? I start to sit up, but I stop. I don't feel like turning on the light just yet. I want to stay in the dark a little longer. I am calm and comfortable there, the pensive state I'm in, and my mind is becoming clearer. With clarity comes loneliness, and maybe this is one of those times, I'm thinking, I must find Mr. Wu before I get on the train. I must make the six o'clock train if I'm going to get to school in time to teach my first class is at nine.
I am completely calm now. Mr. Wu has a calming effect on me, and I don't know why. For some reason, when I recall Mr. Wu's face, I see his image with a fading sunset. Am I thinking of Mr. Wu because of Donshik's painting? Donshik's painting with the bright sunset?
No, Donshik's painting was not about the bright sunset. The sunset in Donshik's painting was a fading glow, about to disappear any moment, how should I say it, a lingering glow… That must be it, the lingering glow that invited people to stand in front of it, its calmness, clarity, and the sadness even
Yesterday, that is, Sunday morning, I left my office in Choong Chung Province along the coastal route to Seoul to see a national exhibit. I rarely came to Seoul ever since I left for the countryside ten years ago. But I am an art teacher after all, and I needed to take in an exhibit of national scale once. I asked my wife at breakfast yesterday, and she agreed.
When I left home a few raindrops were falling. The train sped along, and I felt lighthearted in anticipation of the exhibit. I turned my head to the window and in the frame I saw the dark horizon in between islands way out there beyond the ocean. The painting on the window held steady, the color of the ocean, the horizon, and the composition, and I let the impression settle in me. The gray sky over the horizon was oppressive, with a texture of cured cement, evoking sadness from somewhere deep inside. I didn't look for beauty in it.
Seoul had changed considerably. My eyes went to the Han River rippling melancholy and the high-rise apartment buildings that crowded the shore. I recalled vaguely my painter friends who had come to see my modern painting collection in the fall two years before.
I went to Duk Su Palace. Late autumn grass held its posture owing to the raindrops. A crowd of tourists were standing in queue, waiting to enter. I joined the long line and I waited for a good hour, soaking in rain. I heard someone call my name and I turned my head. A young man stood next to me. He wore wet and shabby work clothes, giving me a limp and soggy impression.
"Who are you?" I asked.
"Sunsaengnim, ah, aren't you Park sunsaengnim, teacher?"
"Yes, that's me, but I…"
"I'm Donshik, Donshiggi."
I presumed that he was one of my former students and I continued, "Ah, is that so, are you here to see the national exhibit?"
Donshik hesitated and swallowed his reply. Next to Donshik stood a young man in the similar work clothes. I felt a chill all over me and I shook my upper body a little. Turning to the right with a cigarette in my mouth, I watched the rainwater fall off the eave and splatter onto the ground. I exhaled and turned back to Donshik and his companion, but they were gone. The queue line moved up a little, and I followed the crowd, trying to recall where and when I had taught Donshik. I couldn't think of where and when. Wherever I taught, I was usually the only art teacher in the whole school, and it wasn't easy to pick out a particular student out of the entire student body.
I promptly forgot about Donshik. Raindrops splattered in the middle of the pond ahead. Further ahead, I saw the high-rise buildings beyond the edge of my vinyl umbrella. Wet cement faces of the high-rise buildings reminded me of the bleak gray sky over the horizon at the end of the ocean. Far to the north, the Bugak Mountain appeared as though it was sliding in the rain. A balloon carrying an advertisement floated in the air despite the wet gray sky, and I didn't know why the balloon filled me with sorrow. I shook my body. In between the roofs of the ancient palaces, the Inwang Mountain peered its dark head through the lead-colored sky over the Seoul skyline.
I walked through the exhibit slowly with rest of the crowd. I looked at the sculptures and the oriental painting halfheartedly. Naturally, I was more interested in oil paintings, a subject of my former undying devotion from many years ago. I was just an art teacher in a small town now, far away from the creative world itself, but the oil painting still drew my eyes. I studied the paintings one by one. The beauty of color gave me solace and lifted my soul, although the majority of the pieces were of realism variety with some romantic, melancholy pieces. Some nude paintings reminded me of post-Renaissance genre, and they didn't draw my interest.
Then I came upon a painting that gave me a peculiar sensation. It had no discernable structure but a combination of several colors over a large canvass. My eyes were drawn to it completely, the bold red splayed side to side almost afire, surrounded by dark strokes that seemed to dampen the red. The heavy dark strokes appeared to suffocate the red glow. I swallowed once. The red's weak brilliance spun in my head over and over.
If I had any aesthetic sense left in me, I would have most likely have become possessed by the painting and its colors. But that was a long time ago before my youth suffocated away in between life's struggles. By the time I learned the title of the painting, "Dusk in Seoul," I was a few steps away from it. It had no sky, no cloud; it had only lines and color strokes on a flat surface with such intense image. It provoked impulse, that was all. I found out that the artist was Donshik by a fluke after I passed by several other pieces. Early yesterday, I had decided not to look at the artists' names as I viewed the exhibit and I had passed it by without seeing Donshik's name next to "Dusk in Seoul." I had turned my head by chance and spotted his name below the painting.
By the time I finished the exhibit and came outside, the dusk set in the ancient palace's courtyard. My neck and shoulders felt tight and tired from concentrating on the exhibition. I dragged my limp body out of the palace. The asphalt street was awash with rainwater. Automobile headlights danced wildly all around me, and I felt hungry.
Soggy metropolis in late autumn turned dark quickly, embracing a faraway silence. The lukewarm air steamed idly, looking for a place to settle for the night. I walked to a tearoom nearby to rest my weary legs a bit. Fading red glow from the canvass reflected in my mind, its sad lighting. Was Donshik one of my former students? I tried to recall the faces from the middle and high school I had worked in. Half of my pitiful life passed by in front of me like a panorama, but Donshik was nowhere.
I left the tearoom and walked, the wet trousers sticking to my legs. A long day at the exhibition made me feel calm yet stimulated, and I walked towards the Yongsan railroad station slowly. I could have taken the bus, but I wanted to quiet down my excitement. I held my vinyl umbrella limply and walked.
Whenever I was in Seoul, or even when I used to live in Seoul as an art student, I walked everywhere. Was it because I liked walking? Not really. But I didn't dislike walking. No matter what, I really hated riding buses. Besides, walking gave me a chance to examine the colors and the composition of the city, the labyrinth and all the strange things in it.
I would daydream endlessly as I walked, and I always took pleasure in such a state of mind. There were times when I would get lost in the corners of the shanty part of the city, or run into the ladies of the night in the shabby district.
I wasn't meant to ride in cars and speed through life. If I rode in cars around the city, I would be living in Seoul but not really. I would be living in Seoul only on the surface. The fact that I had moved more than twenty times in ten years in Seoul tells me that I had become attached to the life style of a wanderer, a wanderer in the labyrinth, and that I felt no urgency to push myself on a daily basis. Besides, I didn't have a chunk of money to put down for a respectable apartment. I had a few fine women who were interested in marrying me, but I always hesitated and lost my chances.
Yesterday I walked the rainy streets at night. People disappeared off the streets as the rain washed off the city's outer layer. I had time, plenty of time until the train left, and I walked and walked endlessly without a care.
Where was I? To my left, the headlights from cars were lined up on the wet asphalt road. The recollection process that began with my effort to place Donshik in my past--one empty moment to another--evoked familiar landscapes in my mind. Mostly, my memories were hazy and they tumbled on soggy streets in irregular cadence to my footsteps. Subconsciously and suddenly, it occurred to me that I was thinking about Mr. Wu. The recollection process took me back to the past and its desolate space holding scattered glimpses of life. And one of those moments took shape in my consciousness briefly.
One rainy evening about ten years ago, Mr. Wu and I walked under the dark and dreary overpass. I wondered why Mr. Wu's face appeared while I tried to place Donshik in my past. I thought maybe the rainy walk under the overpass triggered it. Then I thought that there was some connection between Mr. Wu and Donshik somehow and that I had associated them together for some inexplicable reason.
I had met Mr. Wu at a night school where I lectured on western painting. He was the principal there. The school was in the middle of shanty section on the hill behind Seoul Railroad Station. To get to the school, I walked passed the noisy marketplace and through the shantytown without fences and up the tiny winding alley. The art school would await me at the top of the hill as though it was asleep under the lone incandescent light. I held my classes in a strange building with three or four classrooms, while the new building was being built in the tiny schoolyard. The construction of the new building had stopped, and it reminded me of a ruin of some kind leering in the darkness, an infection gone bad.
Night school teachers try to finish the classroom work as quickly as possible and go home. Being just a lecturer, I didn't have a choice of time slots, nor did I have a reason to go home quickly. I lived alone and I didn't mind going home well after nine o'clock at night.
Mr. Wu always sat at his desk in the corner of the administration office with his slumped shoulders. Countless wrinkles on his face told of the years of fatigue. When he talked, his facial muscles crinkled, and I was afraid that his dried up skin might fall off. I learned that Mr. Wu had attended an art school in Japan. He lived alone in a room behind the semi-finished brick building. The room's exterior wall was nothing but a vinyl cover with a window in the middle of it. Mr. Wu had a habit of sitting by the window and staring out to the sunset blankly.
When I went up to see him he would say, "It's you, Mr. Park, welcome, welcome. So, what brings you here?" Mr. Wu always mumbled these words and shook my hand. No, he didn't just shake my hand but he pulled my hand to him. One day, I went up to see him and found him sitting on the same chair by the window. He greeted me as usual. Then I heard a crashing sound from the kitchen. I didn't ask who was in the kitchen. As far as I knew, he had only one daughter and his Japanese wife had taken the daughter back to Japan. Mr. Wu's attention was directed at the western sky, painted with fading brilliance of a sunset.

Under the overpass, rainwater gushed out of the gutter suddenly. The dark night and the rain had chased people indoors and there was no one on the street, only the pouring rain. I looked at my watch under the street light. It was past seven in the evening. Mr. Wu was with me on that distant night, cold and wet.
He stood close to me and looked into my eyes for a long time, and I saw his worn and weary face in between passing headlights.
"Mr. Wu, do you like walking, too?" I asked the question but I didn't know why I asked him.
"Walking?" Mr. Wu replied with a question, not sure what I had in mind. "Do I like walking? I haven't walked for such a long time."
"I guess you don't need to walk anywhere since you live at the school."
"Mm, I don't have anywhere to go."
"Then, just a short walk maybe..."
"A short walk…" Mr. Wu trailed off.
We walked quite a while when he said, "I just don't have the confidence."
"About what?"
"Confidence to take a walk."
I can't remember the exact conversation, it's such a long time ago. I recall that we passed under the overpass and I looked towards an alley by the railroad tracks. We walked to a liquor house in the alley and lifted soju cups together. I think I asked him why he didn't feel confident about walking. I think he said that he was worried about getting lost. Mr. Wu appeared serious as he offered me his cup and poured soju for me. We talked as we drank. We talked about painting mostly. When I asked him why he didn't paint any more, he muttered hesitantly, "I…I don't…look at me…I…really…" without giving me an intelligible reply.
As I waded through his grunts, I visualized a drowning man, a man lost in a forest, or a man caught in a maze. I felt depressed. He was drunk, but I thought he was trying to explain himself truthfully. I thought about my own inability to paint and the words to explain it. I didn't ask him any more; I felt that there was an inexplicable reason why he can't paint.
In my own case, I would finish a painting and look at it several months later only to see that it was not really a painting. On my canvass I saw no theme of any kind, just a series of colors put together haphazardly. I didn't know what to call it, an abstract painting or otherwise. It could be called a painting just by the fact that there were lines and colors, but I couldn't bring myself to call it a painting because it lacked any artistic value. I didn't see a need for a grand explanation and I made a judgement that I didn't have any talent. Yet I had studied art, and I do have a keen sense of appreciation for great artwork even though I had not produced any outstanding painting. That was the extent of my talent.

I came out of the alley and walked towards Yongsan Station. I had to catch the nine o'clock train. The rain seemed to die down a little.

One evening, I saw a student carry things out of Mr. Wu's room. I found out later that Mr. Wu had been let go by the Board of Directors, and that the student was helping Mr. Wu move. That student was Donshik. Mr. Wu and Donshik were gone by the time I finished my class and went to Mr. Wu's room. I didn't see them, and I turned around and went home. Rumors went around that a young, able principal was on the way. But the young principal never came. The principal's position stayed open for a half a year when Mr. Wu came back unexpectedly. Mr. Wu saw me and gave me a bitter smile. I replied with my own smile without much thought. I felt as if I had to say something and I said, "Have you done painting much since I saw you last?"
Mr. Wu shook his head a few times slowly and stared without saying anything. As I watched him on his chair pointed towards the west I thought his jaw sagged more than before, and his shoulders slumped more.
An artist's eyes see aesthetics and sense creative impulses captured in a painting. They do more than just the optical function. They see shapes, lines and colors. Mr. Wu and I weren't artists, yet we were, and our eyes could see aesthetically, but not creatively. With Mr. Wu, his creative spirit had dried up, yet he couldn't discard it all together. Whatever lingered in him, it was but a vague stir in him, sufficient only to appreciate the sunset. Watching him made me feel depressed, suffocating me like a curtain of despair all around me.
Old goat, why doesn’t he just kick the bucket! I would find myself spit out these words to no one in particular as I walked down the hill. Then Donshik. I saw him whip his brush on the canvass now and then.

I came up to the alley that led to Yongsan Railroad Station. I headed for the plaza in front of the station. In the dark plaza a lone white lamp illuminated the streaking rain, reminding me of the empty space, the state of desolation. The waiting room was sparse. I bought a ticket for the nine o'clock train. I sat down, and my soaked body seemed to sink into the hard bench like a sack of soggy cotton. The light from the waiting room spilled on to the sidewalk and the splattering rain. I looked at the watch. One hour left. I wanted to stand in front of the plaza again. I stood up. The wet clothes stuck to me all over. Standing outside the waiting room, the plaza looked different from the opposite vantage point. The train whistled just then, a long and piercing whistle over the splashing rain. A gloomy city lay beyond the plaza, a city that held ten years of memories that seemed to be buried deep in the valley somewhere and fade away into the horizon. The light appeared to turn the rain into countless bits of bright needles, scattering into the wet and soggy space in my conscience and tingling the bits and pieces of memories from my youth. The bits of memories pricked me inside, and I lit a cigarette, an antidote perhaps.
Suddenly I wanted to see Mr. Wu. Beyond the rain, beyond the space filled with rain, Mr. Wu appeared from somewhere forgotten, motioning his hand for me. I decided to see him. I could catch the early train in morning, I told myself, and make the morning meeting in time. I didn't know when I would be back in Seoul to see Mr. Wu, nor did I know if I would ever recover this moment of clarity.
I opened the vinyl umbrella and stepped out onto the plaza, recalling Mr. Wu's distant voice, "Welcome, welcome, Mr. Park!" The rain fell on the umbrella prrrrrt. I walked and walked. I walked inside my memory, I walked in the rain. I was lost in a maze of my own conscience, but my weary legs kept moving with a notion that my consciousness would return to the past.
An overpass appeared out of the dark mist. Briefly, the overpass appeared to coincide with the one in my memory but the two images separated. The buildings by the entrance to the overpass disrupted the image from my memory. But the bridge, its shape and the obliqueness revived my hazy memory.
There was no pedestrian on the street, only the speeding cars, more speeding cars dashing ahead. Half of the stores were closed. I stepped under the bridge and lowered my umbrella. Water drops fell from the ceiling onto the back of my neck, and I knew that it was the same bridge. The water on the back of my neck made me recall the familiar sensation I had felt before.
A few people came towards me from the other side. They held their trousers up with one hand and an umbrella with the other, reminding me that there was another sea of water from another time waiting for me the other side of the bridge.
Is Mr. Wu still alive, I asked myself. Is he still the principal at the art school? The new school must have been completed by now. Mr. Wu's residence must have been fixed up, too.
As I came out from under the bridge I questioned whether the overpass bridge was the same one from my memory. The shanty town by the bridge was not the same. I didn't recall that the shanty town was this depressing. The shanty town in my memory was a busy place crowded with people, people yelling, groaning, children, men, women, drunks, old women, old men, little mice, pop songs, liquor houses, electric wires, stench, crying noise, and laughing noise all around. What I saw was a 30-watt light bulb dozing over the pitiful alley, empty and quiet.
I used to walk past the shanty town, the marketplace, and up the winding alley to the school. The winding alley wasn't there any more. I was staring at an unfamiliar street, open and wide, and a huge building ahead. The shanty town was gone, and cars sped through the rain where the shanty town used to be. I looked back at the overpass to make sure that it was the same bridge, and I was sure it was the same. I recognized the same dark cement columns.
I turned around and crossed the wide street towards the big, square, cement building. I raised the front end of the vinyl umbrella and saw a sign that said "Seoul Apartment" some distance away. The rainy night seemed darker now. The hilly street was familiar. Water flowed down the asphalt roadway. Grocery store, pharmacy, liquor house, clothing store, watch store lined both sides of the hilly street with people walking by. The old scenery was completely gone. The only familiar scenery was the overpass bridge and the inclining hill. I didn't recognize the endless stores and the lights. I was surprised to see so many inns everywhere with their acrylic signs blazing away into the night.
I kept walking up the hill, thinking that the art school would be at the top. The rain intensified to a torrential pour, beating on the poor vinyl umbrella mercilessly. I gasped for breath. I felt hot. A large building came into view. This must be the school. But it looked too strange to be an art school, standing tall and lonely in the rain. Someone came out of the entrance. The darkness and the rain streaks hid his face, and I asked the man, "Hello, where is this?"
"What?" the man said haughtily.
"Where is this, I asked."
"Here? This is Seoul, Seoul."
"No, I mean, where in Seoul?"
"In the middle of Seoul."
"This building?"
"This one? South Seoul Apartment building," the man said and flipped his umbrella open to leave.
"By the way, do you know where the art school is? The art school?"
"What art school are you talking about?"
"There used to be an art school around here."
"I don't know of any school. If you go over this street, there is an elementary school on the right-hand side."
"Do you happen to know Mr. Wu, the principal?"
"I don't know if the elementary school principal is Mr. Wu."
I looked up at the hill. I thought I was at the top of the hill but it didn't feel as though I was. The huge building stood in rain, stifling me inexplicably. I turned around and walked away. My legs felt weak. Taxicabs sped up the hill one after the other. The cars splashed water on my legs. I almost staggered as I walked. Mr. Wu is probably still alive, I muttered, hanging on to the principal's job. For some reason, I felt certain that Mr. Wu was alive, struggling alone, nearing the end.
If a painter can't paint any more, do his legs become weak? That's why he gets lost. I have to find Mr. Wu.
How long did I walk? I don't remember but I looked up and saw a hug building beyond the endless hotel signs in red and blue.
"That can't be Mr. Wu's school," I muttered and approached the building entrance, feeling tense and urgent. I wanted to see him and hear him say, 'Welcome, welcome.' I wanted him to follow me under the umbrella and walk. To the right side of the entrance, I saw the city lights twinkling in the mist in the distance.
"Is this Seoul Art School?" I yelled towards where a watchman might be on duty.
There was no answer, and I called out "Hello" through the rain noise.
The watchman's window opened and a voice sounded. The entrance was lit under a faint light. I was going to ask again 'Is this Seoul Art School?' but I changed my mind because the building wasn't anything like a school. I asked instead, "Where is this?"
"Here? This is an apartment building."
"What apartment?"
"New Seoul Apartment, for chrissake. Who are you looking for?"
"No, never mind."
I ran out of there. The rain beat down on the vinyl umbrella, no sign of letting up. I felt desperate. I felt as though it was impossible to find Mr. Wu or the school. I stood helplessly under the vinyl umbrella in the dark. I stood outside the building for a long while. Standing still without moving, the rain seemed to beat on the umbrella harder, its noise reverberating in me. My ears felt numb. I couldn't stand there forever. Headlights from cars shined momentarily and went away. I began walking.
Where was the school? Where was Mr. Wu? I kept asking myself. New Seoul Apartment? That had to be the location where the school was. Did the school sink into the ground under the new building? Then I thought that it was possible for the watchman to know about the school. I had to turn back.
I saw a man standing in front of the entrance under a light. The shabby watchman looked at my direction. I said, "Hello, I'd like to ask one more thing…" as I folded the umbrella.
He looked at me blankly, holding his hands together behind him.
I asked, "Do you know about the art school that used to be at this location?"
He brought his hand to his front and took a pull on the cigarette, peering into my face carefully. He said, "You're Mr. Park."
Flabbergasted, I returned the stare. He looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't place him. I looked at the man more carefully, searching quickly through the dark corners of my memory.
"That's me, but I don't know who you are."
"Aigo, how long has it been, over ten years? I thought maybe you were dead. I'm Kilsu, Kilsu." The man said and offered his hand.
We shook hands. It was good to see someone I knew in the dark rainy night. The name Kilsu didn't mean anything to me, although I didn't want to let it on. I gathered that he was someone I had known from many years ago. I smiled and said, "Ah, yes, Kilsu, it's really been a long time. What are you doing these days?" I asked him how he was, hoping to extract some hints as to what he was in my past.
"Still the watchman. What else is there for me? For a while I tried my hand at business in Dong Dae Mun market, but it went nowhere. I was like a flea running a marathon, so I just came back to being a watchman." Kilsu said and laughed heartily.
Then I figured out who Kilsu was. He was the watchman at Seoul Art School. Also, he was the first one who told me that Mr. Wu's salary was cut in half when he took his job back as the principal.
"Good to see you. Good to see you, Kilsu." I said as I took his hand and shook it heartily.
Kilsu laughed again. He kept on looking at me, studying my face. I looked at him carefully as well.
I said, "You look tired, Kilsu."
He replied, "Mr. Park, you look terrible," and he continued, "You are too pale. Were you seriously ill…" He trailed off and stepped into the vinyl umbrella. He continued to smoke while we walked. The wind drove the rain across the city down below. The rain whipped under the umbrella.
We sat in a soju house and lifted soju cups. He repeated his concern for me, "An illness, perhaps…" as he studied my face in detail. My clothes were soaked like a bundle of wet cotton bail, with patches of dirt splattered all over and wrinkled. We offered soju cups to each other and thawed out the awkwardness that came from the ten years of separation.
There were many people talking and drinking heartily in the soju house, and we drank and talked loudly as well. The ceiling was low and kept the smoke in the room, and the rain pounded the tin roof above. We smoked.
"I wasn't sick at all."
"Then why is your face like that? You look like you've had a serious illness."
"I wandered all over the place today."
"Why?"
"Through rain and darkness." I muttered and emptied the cup.
"Looking for Seoul Art School?"
"No."
"Then what?"
The wind made raucous over the tin roof. A car horn blared through the rain from down below. A reflection shined white on Kilsu's soju cup as he emptied it.
He said, "As you can see, the art school turned into the apartment building…"
"I know, Kilsu. Let's have another drink."
"Jeez, damn rain in autumn."
Words came to me easily now. "I don't think I was wandering to find the school."
"Then why did you wander all over?"
"At first, I was looking for my travel companion."
"And so? Mr. Park, you changed a lot. You can't express your thoughts clearly."
"Ha, is that right? I wanted to know about Mr. Wu, whether he was dead or alive."
I gulped down my cup. It was a tense moment. I closed my eyes and downed another cup. Soju was taking its effect on me.
"I knew that you were looking for Mr. Wu. He was living in the room in the back of the school until the day the bulldozer came and leveled the building. A student came and packed up everything and left and I…"
"Kilsu, why aren't you drinking?"
"Ah, yes, yes."
Kimchi stew boiled on the stove made out of a used oil drum. Rainwater that have been on top of my head dislodged and flowed down my face. Kilsu's face turned hard suddenly.
I wiped my face and said, "I'm not crying, Kilsu."
Kilsu didn't say anything.
"But I don't think I was only looking for Mr. Wu."
We opened the second bottle. Soju house was warm and crowded, quite different from the asphalt street with rain and cars.
The front door opened, and many men followed in, complaining, "Damn lousy rain." As they warmed up they got down to the business of drinking. "Liquor tastes the best on days like these." "Ajumma, bring us more raw fish." "Do you have bean sprout soup? It's the best thing on a day like today." "Can't stand days like these without a few drinks."
I said to Kilsu, "But it's true, I was out to look for Mr. Wu."
"Blast the old man, so pitiful he was."
We were both getting drunk. Kilsu became more belligerent as time went on. "He's deep in the ground by now, I reckon. Surely, he can't be alive and kicking around still. Do you think?"
"Probably not." I replied as I shook my head once as if to shake off my drunken state. But alcohol had the best of me, and I felt wobbly.
"Ah, yes," Kilsu acknowledged my reply.
I wiped off the moisture on my forehead with my hand.
"Steam is coming off your head."
"You should wipe the rain off your head."
"Ah, yes," I said absent-mindedly. I felt myself becoming more serious for some reason.
"Mr. Park, then, why did you wander around in the rain?"
"To find Mr. Wu."
"Stop repeating yourself."
"No, I don't repeat myself."
"Do you know how many times you said it?"
"Really? That's true, isn't it? Well, that's because I didn't know exactly what I was doing…"
"What didn't you know?"
"Why I roamed the streets."
We offered cups to each other.
"Kilsu, I thought that I had lost something on the streets, something very important."
"What did you lose?"
"Well, something important, something that drives me crazy."
"And so…"
"Now that I think about it, I wasn't wandering around to look for it."
The rain beat the tin roof hard.
Donshik's painting ran across my mind quickly. Its splendid colors made me thirsty. The bold, dark stroke at the top rendered me helpless, giving me a sinking sensation into the world of gray.
I almost asked Kilsu if he knew where Donshik was, but I changed my mind.
I told myself not to drink too much. I had already lost something important without my knowing, and I wasn't about to pass out and make a fool out of myself. I was thirsty, however, and I kept drinking and offered Kilsu more drinks.
I needed fresh air. I went outside into the rain. My watch said eleven thirty. Under the umbrella we dodged the rain as we walked. Kilsu's legs were wobbly like an octopus, stepping into holes in the ground one minute and kicking my foot the next. We kept running our shoulders into each other. I didn't know how far we walked. After a while Kilsu muttered, "Now, how come you lost the important thing? Mr. Park!"
I didn't give him an answer. Instead, I grabbed his shoulder, skinnier than I had expected, and I told him to get under the umbrella. "Don't run out into the rain. Don't ask me those difficult questions. I can't answer. Really, I don't know. I am just saying that's what happened. If you ask a man why he is lost, he wouldn't know, would he?"
At that instant, I felt like an incredible urge to work on a canvass. I wanted to scream. I wanted to cry. I wanted to whip a brush on a canvass even though it was just a passing impulse. Donshik's painting and the coloring glimmered in front of my eyes. I was overcome with emotion, and I staggered. I couldn't respond to Kilsu. I just rolled my head left to right as if to shake off my drunken stupor. I thought I heard Kilsu say "You keep saying you don't know."


Ding.
The clock chimes once over the rain noise.
Four thirty in the morning. The earth turns its face towards the dawn; the darkness makes a hurried retreat.
The connecting door from the next room slides open suddenly. I hear a man smacking his lips trying to moisten dry mouth. I hear footsteps going down the stairs. It seems that Kilsu is exhaling repeatedly against the sound of rain.
I want to go and look for Mr. Wu before I leave for my village on the western seashore. Kilsu will help me, probably. But Kilsu told me that he didn't know.
I sit up in the dark.
Whatever happens, I want to see Mr. Wu. If I don't see him, I want to know what happened to him. Shall I wake up Kilsu? But what can he do? Shall I turn on the light? No. If I turn on the light Kilsu will wake up.
The clock chimes five times, but the innkeeper with a potbelly doesn't come to wake me. I told him to wake me up at four, didn't I? I shouldn't wait for him, I'm thinking, I'll sneak out of here before the innkeeper with a potbelly shows up. I should escape from Kilsu, this crummy room, and the window. I'll just leave them. And I should wander around the neighborhood. I'll ask the early risers around the neighborhood if they know where Mr. Wu is.
I put on my clothes quietly. They are still wet and heavy. I feel the chill on my legs. I look at Kilsu. He is out to the world. I navigate my way in the dark and go out to the corridor. I see a faint light coming from near the stairs. I am surrounded by snoring sounds. I walk to the stairs. I hear strange groans. I walk down the stairs. My legs wobble. The front entrance door is already open. Rain is pouring down outside the front door. I pick out a vinyl umbrella and open it into the rain. The rain beats on the umbrella prrrrt. I walk out into the sleepy street. I feel empty. Out on the street, the darkness is peeling away.
I want to find Mr. Wu. But I don't have the strength, or the courage. Above all, I am weary. I feel like collapsing. I turn my head and look up at the hill in the distance. The tall square buildings in the rain are expression‎less. They just take up space up there, and I don't feel any sort of connection to it. I can't do anything else but to run over to Yongsan Railroad Station and get on the train. The buildings on the hill seem to be laughing at me for trying to find Mr. Wu.
The railroad platform in the dark looks as lonely as an island in the middle of the ocean. I carry myself up to the passenger car. It's sparse, owing to the early hour and the rain. I take a chilly window seat. The back of the front seat is stained from rain. The window is steaming, and Mr. Wu's image lingers.
I see myself in the window, the image of a floundering man who had lost his life's dream, unable to discard the impulses that come from color and shape. Then Mr. Wu's image reflects on the window.
The whistle blows. The locomotive jerks, Clunk Clunk Clunk, and the dull sounds of steel colliding with steel shake the train. The train slides ahead. The whistle pierces through the rain.
Someone is running towards the train from the platform. He is running. The train speeds ahead.
Tuuu. The locomotive blows the whistle and the piercing sound reverberates up to the sky. I wipe the steam off the window and look outside. Kilsu is running. The tiny man is soaked from head to toe with his hair pasted on his forehead. Kilsu is running towards the train, shouting something. I can't hear him. He's probably shouting my name. Maybe he saw me maybe he didn't. He runs and paws at the gray sky filled with rainwater.