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I don’t know how far I walk but my feet grow sore and my calves ache and there’s a low pain in the middle of my back and all of that is good because I’ve been able to successfully distract myself for a few hours. The traffic is starting to pick up and the quietness of the streets is being erased by the sounds of cars, buses, and people. The sun is baking my dress to my back.
Near one of the city gates, I discover the remnants of an old fortress wall. The stone stairs leading up disappear into a cove of trees. I find a burst of energy and clamber up the wooden steps. A woven burlap mat covers the dirt trail, providing cushion and grip. My thighs and calves appreciate it. Under one dense collection of trees, a bench appears. I collapse on it. I’m not fit enough for all this walking. Back home, I drive everywhere.
Around five minutes later, an older man, in his seventies, dressed in a sports coat and loafers, strolls by with his hands clasped behind his back. He barely gives me a nod of acknowledgment. A little while later, two ladies dressed in exercise gear huff up the hill. The two eye me with a frown, likely wondering why I’m not at work.
I pull out my cell phone and duck my head, pretending to be preoccupied, which is a mistake because the last text I have is the one I sent to Yujun. I scan my messages and am shocked to see my mom so low. I haven’t talked to her in a couple of days. I’m a little surprised she hasn’t texted me, though. I tap her name and then stop. Maybe it’s best that I don’t contact her. She might ask questions that I don’t feel comfortable answering, and I don’t want to lie to her. Plus, if she hasn’t contacted me, it means she’s occupied, which is good. Better not to wake the sleeping dog.
As for Yujun—or even Kim Jihye—I don’t know what to do about either of them. The one brings me anxiety and the other brings me joy, and it gets mixed up in my head and my heart until the dampness on my skin isn’t from the sun but from something inside me.
I turn my phone off and get to my feet. Doing something is better than sitting here and turning into a roasted potato in the shade. I follow the meandering trail up the hill, focusing on the immense skyline of Seoul below. It’s an intimidating sight. I laugh a little at thinking that Seoul was small. Up here, it feels like even the mountains are dwarfed by the massive number of buildings squished together. In this great big city with its ten million people, do I even have a chance of finding my family?
A lump develops in my throat—the small, wiry kind that scratches whenever I try to swallow. I rub a hand across my forehead. What exactly am I trying to prove here? Was I trying to find my mother or something else? I hate this uncertainty. I hate having all these emotions. It is messy and unsettling and I wish for a hot minute I was back in Iowa where there is nothing but flat land, cornfields, and serenity.
“Ha!” The bark of laughter escapes me. As if. If my Iowa self was so happy, why’d I come here?
That thought tumbles through my head as I walk, taking a turn here, branching off there. The sun beats down on my head, my legs grow tired, and my mind empties out as I navigate the trail. I walk by a driving range, through a large parking lot filled with more luxury cars than the country club back home, past giant rocks with etchings on them set in a garden of sand. The path leads me down, down, down until I emerge at an intersection eight lanes wide. My eyes skip from the asphalt roadway to the lights hanging over the center of the crosswalks to the large banner arching over the entrance to yet another steep incline.
Namsan Park.
I pluck the dress away from my chest, read the letters again, and shake my head.
If your plans fall through, the view of Seoul from Namsan Tower is amazing.
If I believed in signs, this would be a big one.
* * *
• • •
I REMEMBER WATCHING The Hunt for Red October with my dad. Pat loved spy movies—the Bond movies, Jason Bourne, John le Carré adaptations. The plots of the movies all sort of run together for me. Men with guns chasing more men with guns. Sometimes there are airplanes involved. Most of the time there are explosions. I don’t have any specific recollection of exactly what The Hunt was about, but I remember a bearded actor with a low-pitched voice spending the whole movie looking for someone inside the submarine. That’s all these spy movies were about—the search for someone.
