Snowy Day and Other Stories by Chang-dong Lee

Author:Chang-dong,Lee [Chang-dong, Lee]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: no data
Publisher: Penguin Press
Published: 2025-02-18T00:00:00+00:00

5

The next day, as soon as Junshik came home, Minu came to apologize.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier,” he said.

Junshik assumed that his wife must have told Minu about the visit from the police detective. He admitted to Minu that he’d been upset, that his lack of frankness was tantamount to a lack of trust. But Minu said that wasn’t the case. He’d only wanted to spare Junshik any unnecessary worry.

“But I’m your brother,” Junshik said. “You should have told me if it was something like this.”

“I’m sorry,” Minu said. “But I thought just keeping quiet and leaving would make things less complicated for you and your wife.”

“What are you gonna do now?”

“I have to leave soon. I thought about it, and I realized I might be getting you in trouble. . . . ”

“What are you talking about?” Junshik’s wife interrupted. “What kind of trouble could it be, anyway? We’ll be fine, so feel free to stay as long as you like.”

“Junshik’s a teacher. If things go wrong for me, he could end up being reprimanded. And since the police already paid him a visit, I don’t think it’s going to be safe for me to stay here.”

“But if they knew you were here, they’d already have come after you. You’re safe here,” Minu’s wife said, her face flushing as she looked at Minu. “So stay a little longer if you need to.”

Junshik thought she might be dreading Minu’s departure. No, he was certain of it. He said to Minu, in a cooler voice:

“How long can you live on the run like this? You’re past thirty now—it’s not like you’re still a college student. You can’t just keep running until the world changes. . . . You don’t actually believe the world is going to change, do you?”

“Whether the world changes or not isn’t the important thing,” Minu said. “I’m just doing what I believe is right.”

“And if you believe it’s right, you have to do it?”

“There has to be someone in the world who speaks up for what’s right.”

“You mean like when we were little and Mom lied about our age when she took us on the bus?”

Minu just stared at him as if he didn’t understand. He had already forgotten. But Junshik would always remember it.

Their mother had taken the two of them on a bus that day. Junshik was in third grade then, so he was nine and Minu was seven. School-aged children were entitled to a reduced fare, but their mother wanted them to ride for free to save money. So she lied and told the ticket taker that Junshik was six and Minu was five. But she’d subtracted so much from their real ages that there was no way the man was going to be fooled.

“Ajumma, stop lying and just pay the fare,” he said.

“Lying? What are you saying? They look older because they’re tall, but they’re only six and five.”

“Look, if you’re gonna lie, make it believable at least. Who’s gonna believe

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.