Every minute of the day in a Kentucky summer feels like an entire hour passing by. The cicadas and the bees hum lazily, drunk on the sweet perfume of the blooming honeysuckle. The air itself sweats, leaving skin glistening and warm. It's a place of unspoken desires, of sultry glances from behind lace fans and stolen kisses in the shade of a willow's long branches. Men and women go to church to praise god on Sundays, and then spend every other day by the river doing anything but praying. It's wild and untamed, and this is the place that I was born into. It was only second to Heaven, and it was all mine. This was my home.

 

Just like the beginning of every June since as long as I can remember, Mama and I had bought tickets to take the train from Hodgenville and on into Bardstown. The livestock auctions were in town, and she always liked to go and look at all the cattle options that were on offer there. Oftentimes a lot of the locals would come out as well, setting up stalls around the grand courthouse in the town square to sell handmade quilts and soaps and the like. The Rowan family that lived in the grand mansion that they called Federal Hill would open their doors and their lawns, serving cold lemonades and delicious tomato and bacon sandwiches to travelers. My personal favorite was going to see what the farmers had to sell from their harvests, and although Mama would chastise me for it to no end I would always buy myself a jar of clover honey and a few slices of watermelon to snack on throughout the day. She would tell me over and over that I was going to make my teeth rot black and fall out of my head, all the while handing me a handful of pennies to go and buy it anyway. Usually immediately after she would try to force feed me a slice of cucumber, using my utter disgust of them for her own amusement. "Minhyukkie, they're good for you! Grandmother used to grow them and they will make you grow tall and strong!" she'd call as I dodged her attempts, laughter pouring from both of us all the while.

 

Bardstown holds so many fond memories for me, even as I sit in this cell now. I guess it's not the worst place for the ending chapter of my life to be set.

 

It was the summer before I turned 18 that everything turned sour. Mama had gone to visit with Mrs. Rowan at Federal Hill, bringing with her a strawberry pie that she was known statewide for. Mrs. Rowan had lost her husband John the year before I was born when he'd fallen out the window of their mansion, and since John had been such a loyal customer in Mama and Daddy's laundry Mama immediately offered Mrs. Rowan whatever help she could offer. John had left her widowed with 10 children and a farm that she had no idea how to manage, and so Mama become close friends with her while teaching her how to go about day to day life in her newly widowed state. With Mama being from Korea and Mrs. Rowan being from Baltimore, I think they bonded over the fact that they were both somewhat of outsiders among the native Kentuckians. I don't think I can ever recall a time in my life when I saw Mrs. Rowan wearing a color other than black, but Mama assures me that prior to John's death she wore almost exclusively yellow and pink.

 

As for me, I had gone to eat my newly acquired watermelon on the steps of the stocks in front of the jail. The hustle and bustle of Federal Hill and its many guests had never held much interest for me, especially since I was the only boy there, and so this year Mama had told me to go off on my own and explore what I wished; after all, I was 17. I was a man now, so I didn't need to keep one hand fastened to her skirts at all times. I have to say, this breath of new freedom elated me and left me feeling rather giddy that day. Luckily there was no one locked into the stocks today, so I was able to have this little square of wood all to myself for the time being. Behind me sat the jail, and back beyond that the gallows and the criminal's cemetery. To my right was Talbott Tavern, a lively inn and pub that offered hours of endless entertainment from watching the drunkards stumble their way out and try to find their ways home. Rumors flew that Jesse James himself frequented the place, but I had yet to see his infamous white cowboy hat there in all the times I'd visited here. I'd also heard tell that he and his brother Frank both had been held in the jail at Brandenburg along the Ohio River, but somehow they'd managed to pull a daring escape and disappear as they always inevitably would do.

 

Secretly I looked up to Jesse, and I wanted to be just like him when I was growing up. It was strange to think that someone so legendary was only 9 years older than me. Mama like to have never approved of this, but luckily for me she couldn't read the newspaper articles I kept since they were in English. You would think that with having two immigrated parents they would've taught me their language, but I didn't speak a of Korean. Mama had this notion that because they'd come to America they must leave everything behind and become Americans themselves, and so she remained stubborn in her mission to keep me as much a true American as she possibly could.

 

I let my eyes wander over the crowd gathered in the square as I ate, ignoring the little tug of disappointment in my gut when the white hat was once again not there. There were still plenty of other people to watch, so it wasn't the end of the world. People watching is probably my favorite hobby; I like to take in as much detail as I can, and I like to make up stories in my head about where they might be from or what their lives may be like outside of this small bubble of time that we were sharing currently. It was a curious thought, that every single person we meet in the streets or elsewhere lives their own complicated life full of friends and relatives and problems that we will never know about. It can baffle one's brain if you sit and try to think too hard on it. I believe the most interesting one so far today was the lady in the heavy bear fur coat, wearing a hat with an entire stuffed peacock perched on it. Did she not feel that the heat was close to a hundred degrees and rising?

 

It was while I was watching this eccentric lady strut about that I felt a heavy hand clap down on my shoulder. The fingers were like fat sausages, and I found myself suddenly surrounded by the smell of ale and unwashed man. Who the hell?

 

I turned my head to tell off this newcomer when his face swam into view; Nelson County sheriff Buford Skaggs, known far and wide for his abilities to drink heavily before either ing or shooting whatever was in sight. From the smell of him he'd gotten a head start on quenching his thirst for the day. I wore my hair long in those days and I wasn't able to grow much in the way of facial hair, so I could understand if he'd mistaken me for some poor woman without a chaperone to protect her from his advances. "Sheriff, you're kind of hurting me there--"

 

"Everyone likes a little pain now and then, darlin'," he drawls, leaning closer to my face with a leering grin. It was hard to mistake his intentions, but luckily for me we were in broad daylight and there would be witnesses abound if he tried to get fresh with me.

 

I shrugged my shoulder kind of harshly, trying to throw him off. “Back off , Sheriff.”

 

The sheriff didn’t seem much to mind my warning tone, not that I had expected him to. Since John Rowan had died, he had become the most powerful man in all of Nelson County. In fact, my protests only seemed to make him more and more interested. Surely he couldn’t still be mistaking me for a woman, could he? My voice should’ve been a dead giveaway. He leaned in closer, so close I could smell the whiskey on his breath, and pressed a sloppy kiss to my cheek that sent shivers of disgust racing down my spine. “You’re the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen in this town. Are you sure you don’t want to give me s little kiss? Just one won’t hurt nothin’.”

 

I knew full well that I shouldn’t exactly deck the sheriff in front of nearly half the town, but by this point there wasn’t much else I could do. His crusty lips came nearer and nearer to me, expecting to be met by lips of my own.

 

Instead, Sheriff Skaggs made a loud grunt of pain when my knuckles met his teeth. It stung a little, but judging from the way he went reeling back it had to have hurt him a hell of a lot more than it did me. Once he’d gotten his wits about him again he turned to stare at me, eyes as wide as Mama’s fancy china plates. “You’re gonna pay for that, son.”

 

“You threatnin’ me?” I shot back, although my heart was hammering away in my chest. By this point we were starting to draw attention to ourselves. Trust everyone not to see the actual quarrel and only notice the punch itself. That definitely couldn’t work out well in my favor.

 

Sheriff Skaggs slowly stumbled to his feet, and I hastily jumped to mine to let him know that he wasn’t going to intimidate me that easily. I was a good head taller than him, but I was also fairly certain that he outweighed me by a solid 200 pounds. “I am the law, don’t you dareaccuse me of that nonsense,” he snaps, making like he was reaching forward to grab me again.

 

“I might have a little more respect if the law weren’t a fat, stinking drunkard!”

 

I’m not entirely sure what defiant spirit had possessed my immortal soul in that moment; Mama surely hadn’t raised me to backtalk to my elders, and everyone from here to the Mississippi knew full well that Buford Skaggs would hang you soon as look at you when he was in a mood like this.

 

By now a crowd had formed around us, and I had no choice but to lay down in the hole I'd just dug myself in to. With a shaking hand I pointed at him. "The sheriff tried to kiss me!"

 

The crowd tittered with shock and slight amusement, but Sheriff Skaggs wasn't about to let me get away with saying that that easily—especially not when I'd just accused him of molestation so boldly. "He's lying to all of you to save his own skin! I caught him trying to pickpocket me! You know how those filthy Chinese monkeys are—always greedy and grabbing for more with their sticky fingers!"

 

A flash of hot red rage flooded my vision then, and before I had a chance to reason with myself over this my feet were carrying me forward at an alarming rate of their own volition. Several of the spectators screamed while others cheered. Fights always made for a cheap source of entertainment for everyone watching.

 

You have to give that old pig some credit; he moves much faster than his looks would have you believe. I almost had him within arm's reach when suddenly all I saw was the dark blur of his whiskey bottle flying towards me. The details of of what followed have always been a bit fuzzy to me—I remember feeling a dull thunk against my skull before a sharp pain presented itself in my temple, accompanied by the tumultuous sound of glass shattering.

 

The amused laughter of the crowd surrounding us slipped further and further into the distance as everything fell dark.                                           

 

Notes:

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