What threw her backwards, she didn’t know. It was nearing pitch black. All she could manage was a forfeiting groan before the peat-colored sky disappeared altogether.

The seasickness woke her up.

At least that’s what she thought it was from the sound of splashing water nearby. She bent off the side of her bed and threw up on the floor; eyes watering, throat burning, nails digging into the mattress. And when she was done she wept at the vacancy inside her. Flopped onto her back and clutched her head while it throbbed as loud as a…

As loud as a…

Kibum used to struggle with the lawnmower every weekend. The sun would be in his hair, wet mud would be smeared on a cheek and… and then he’d look up at her to shrug. She remembered standing in the balcony with a steaming cup of cocoa, smiling down as he cursed at the machinery when it malfunctioned and spluttered to a halt. She remembered those days now, when her head throbbed as loud as a broken lawnmower.

They lived by the railway tracks and a few meters away was the sea. Then one day Kibum disappeared and it was only her. All alone. She sobbed at the ceiling, covering and leaking her eyes onto the pillow under her quaking head. Helplessness settled into the pit of her stomach now that it was emptied of all else. She wept till it got too painful and then she rolled herself in a cocoon of blankets, hiding from the lights.

The shapeless blackness in her dreams was a respite.

“You have to eat,” a voice shook her shoulder. Some hours later, she guessed languidly. Grousing and rubbing the lethargy out of her eyes, she sat up to look around herself. A woman with long, straight, jet black hair sat crouched beside her with a bowl in her hands. Her gaze was sharp, her expression stern. But her voice had been unbearably kind.

“I am Eonsook,” she introduced herself flatly. “You are on my yacht. I took you from the beach.”

“T-took…?”

“The man following you,” there was a pause filled with frowns and deep breaths. “Had to punch his jaw off so I could carry you here safely, I did. Won’t ask who that was but I hope it wasn’t someone you hold dear to you. Looked like a seasoned criminal, that one.”

“It wasn’t… someone I knew, I mean.”

“That’s good,” a nod was granted. Then there a was a short beat of awkwardness until Eonsook stirred and placed the bowl on a nearby table. “Alright. If you can feed yourself it’d be great, I can’t leave us to drift for too long.”

“I… I’m sorry for burdening you with—”

“It’s no burden,” the woman shook her head curtly. “You need to eat and keep your strength up. Only natural. Then rest till you can get back on your feet. Need a second pair of hands to help out around here if you want to stay. I know you have questions, but now is no time for that. We can talk later.”

There was nothing else exchanged between them after that. The bowl of soup was finished silently and swiftly, with unbounded care that steel didn’t clink against china too often. And then Eonsook took her leave, suddenly moving out of the room like a bat with no warning or no parting word. It raised pressing doubts about whether this place was safe enough to stay in.

She looked around the room, taking in its relative luxury. She’d never been on a yacht before. Never been on the open sea before, really. For one vacation, Kibum had booked them a helicopter ride to the mountains where they’d have crossed over the thrashing waters. But they’d cancelled at the last minute. He was too afraid of heights, and she wasn’t ready to leave him behind.

The memory of his face brought on a sad graft of recollections—a nonsensical fight they’d had the afternoon of his disappearance, a blank message she’d assumed was sent from his phone by accident, the cynical police officer who’d filed the missing person’s report. These reminiscences pained her immensely, because she wanted to remember Kibum for his brightness and compassion. She wanted to keep him preserved in her mind as untainted, unsullied happiness.

“Where did you go…?” she wondered aloud to the empty room.

Once the drowsy rocking of the yacht folded over her, she shrugged her unease off and lay down from exhaustion.

“So you do this every year?”

Eonsook looked up from a large map she’d been studying. It was spread open neatly, spanning the length of a work desk and then some. She removed a pencil from behind the helix of her ear, drawing a rough circle somewhere in a large patch of blue. “That wasn’t the first question I expected from you. You know,” she shrugged. “Given the circumstances.”

“You… saved my life,” was the most precautious response thinkable at the time. “I don’t think I need to ask you anything much except conversationally.”

A blasé look received the answer. “I assume that’s because you expect the same courtesy?” Eonsook asked, and then fleetingly smirked at the alarm her words caused. “Don’t worry. I am no one to pry about in your business. Whoever you are and whatever you’re running from—it doesn’t matter on this ship.”

She tentatively walked up to take a look at the map and Eonsook stepped aside to allow it. Quick messy loops of lead marked the world in different places—a roughly linear path almost circling the globe from Pusan through Fukuoka, Ningbo, Fozhou, Taipei,  a few indecipherable islands in the Philippines; crossing the equator through  something called the Makassar Strait, then sliding off the west coast of Australia to end up on a blank piece of Antarctica. “Is this the route we’re on?”

“Yes. And… yes. I do this every year.”

“I’ve seen you docked on the beach ever since we moved there,” she said. “It was something Kibum and I always wondered about, whenever we went for a run. Once he suggested we should act like neighbours. That we come around to say hello. But the one day we finally decided to, you were already gone.”

“Kibum?”

She felt her skin prickle, realizing how she’d been speaking about him so normally. So easily. Like a narration from someone else’s life. “M-my husband…” she muttered in reply, offering nothing more. “So… Antarctica,” she changed the subject. “That’s an interesting choice for tourism. Any particular reason?”

There was no answer for a long time and then Eonsook bent her head low as if to study the floor. “I thought you said you don’t need to ask me anything.”

She shuffled from foot to foot, looking everywhere else but at each other. “A-again, you’re very kind. I’m so sorry for the trouble…” the other started.

“And again, you are no trouble,” Eonsook readily cut off the apology, pointing behind her with a thumb as her eyes returned to survey the map. “Anyway, you were ill last night. So, I assume you’re hungry. If you’re willing to join me, breakfast awaits us.”

They sat down at a large dining table fixed in the center of the saloon, laden with enough food for a large family to finish in three meals. She blinked at the display like it was a deliberate attempt to entice her into scarfing it down. It is poisoned? she thought with newly aroused suspicion. Is it drugged?

And so she decided to play it safe at first. From an array of fruits, a large orange persimmon was picked up and placed onto an empty plate.

Eonsook followed the action penetratingly. Like a hawk, one would say. “You… like persimmons?” she inquired in a tone that had clearly been forced into casualness.

The other nodded with a faint smile. “They’re my favorite.”

A mysterious silence settled between them at that: one still contemplating her safety, the other swallowed by deep thought, and neither woman making to continue their meal. So she tried to ease into conversation again.

“I… I can’t help feel guilty forcing you to cook like this for me,” she bowed her head as Eonsook shook out of her reverie and served her rice. “If it’s alright with you, I’d like to cook us our meals from today. I’m not the best cook, but. As… as a sort of payment.”

“If you must,” Eonsook shrugged. “But we’ll be having dinner on land five days from now. Change is good once in a while, it is.”

“Where are we going?”

“Does it matter? Land is land and sea is sea.”

It felt like the sort of thing one would say to end an exchange. So they ate the rest of their breakfast quietly.

She lived by the railway tracks and a few meters away was the sea.

Yet she’d never noticed how massive that sea was. She’d often played cards with Kibum in their balcony that looked out to the water. But neither of them had ever halted their game a moment to take in what sat so vastly right in their sights. Now as she stared into its frothy grey depths, it looked too big and too lonely. It looked too heavy, too sad, too corpulent with grief. Like a collection of all the tears this world has ever wept.

She turned away from it and squinted at the looming coast while a mad gust whipped her hair around.

Eonsook emerged from the engine room, hefting a large metal box with white stenciled lettering on its side. When offered help, she shook her head and waved it away. The large box was dragged across the aft deck to be arranged in line with three others like it. Eonsook groaned with effort, then let the box slip from her grasp. It made a resounding clang against the floorboards. She straightened and let out a tired sigh, stretching her back and wincing a little.

“What are these?” the other asked.

“Bread,” Eonsook replied.

“Real bread…?”

“Bread to be earned,” the woman informed. “The yacht is an inheritance but it’s also my home. Need to make a living if I want to keep my home. Just like everybody else.”

On their port side stood the dazzling outline of a sprawling cityscape. One she didn’t recognize from any of the postcards she’d been collecting since college. They were about to drop anchor at a major international dock, but she had no idea which one. And Eonsook would yield no real answers.

“So you trade… whatever’s in those containers at every port you go?” she guessed.

“Hmm.”

Loud yells and louder horns sounded in the distance as other, larger vessels arrived or departed. A squabble was heard nearby—a group of men fighting amongst one another over who got to unload the large containers off the yacht. Two of them started to brawl in earnest when a police officer arrived on his bicycle, blowing his whistle and yelling at the men in a foreign tongue. As she leaned against the railing to watch the scene unfold with interest, Eonsook joined her side. Their hair tangled together when the wind played around with it.

“Will you need to go?” she asked of her host.

“Hmm.”

“Can I come with?”

Eonsook shook her head, a soft motion that mirrored the placidity of her voice. “Not unless you want to get deported back. No immigration papers on you, are there?”

The other cowered at that, sliding her palms off the rusty railing and crackling away chips of paint. She stepped back in dread with a vigilant eye on the policeman. He was just a few feet away, and he hadn’t seen her yet. But what if he smelt her from the short distance? What if he somehow sensed there was something wrong about her being here, and took her in custody for them to send her back? Force her back to that house where the goons lay in wait for her…

“I’ll—be in my room.”

“And I will call you when business is done,” she was bowed away. “There will be some noise from the underside, but do not be alarmed. Just the fuel boys. Rest now, why don’t you. We’ll eat when I’m returned.” The loose locks on Eonsook’s head roiled like a halo of ink. She tucked them into a clip and hummed once more in response.

She devoted hours in the bathroom after that. Grated her skin raw in trying to wash off the odor of salt, tugged her hair into a bigger mess to free it from the knots it’d gotten itself in; dunked her clothes repeatedly in soapy water so they wouldn’t look like the color of the sea. But no matter how much she scrubbed or yanked or lathered, the stench wouldn’t leave her alone, the kinks still itched her scalp, the clothes still dripped of sadness.

And then she understood what she was—a stowaway. A smuggled drug, an illegal refugee, contraband. She shivered in the bathroom stall, utterly disgusted. gurgled curses, her nails ground tiles. She felt for the towel through all the steam in the space, and wrapped it around herself like a shield. It did nothing to stop the leak of shame.

Eonsook knocked on her door to call for dinner, but she stayed on the floor of the bath. The knocks gained intensity at first, growing more and more urgent and panicky every rap. “Open the door…” a scared voice came. “Open the door, please open the door!” Then she was left all alone.

“I’m sorry,” was the first thing she said. She made sure of it.

“It’s OK,” Eonsook responded oddly fast. No questions or demands came from her about the odd behavior last night. She displayed no telling signs of her earlier panic or fright, simply kept her eyes lowered to the dining table where she served an additional plate. “Come, eat. You must be hungry.” This meal was supposed to be cooked by her guest, yet here she was not in the least bit bitter over the fact.

The other dawdled a little at the entrance to the saloon. Beneath her feet the engine whirred too hard, as if it had chanced upon a mass of seaweed that got tangled in the propellers. But her hostess seemed unconcerned with the noise and so she decided to let her anxiety go.

“I…” she started before continuing with less hesitancy. Her feet carried her the short distance to the perpetually full dining table, where she took care to have a seat as noiselessly as possible. “I need to explain myself. It’s only right,” she nodded decisively.

“No,” Eonsook shook her head, letting their glances meet for a belated moment. “I need no explanations from you. You have the right to do whatever you must. To feel safe, to feel sane. To be as you want to be. I’m only a captain of this yacht, not your life,” she offered a short-lived smile. “You don’t owe me anything.”

“Then,” the other considered with pursed lips. “Then it’ll be OK if you let me go on your next stop. We’re far away from home. Almost at the equator, isn’t it? I’ll be fine. By myself. And so will you, right?”

“If this is you feeling like a burden, I assure you—”

“No, it’s…” she cut in. “It’s not that. I am—I’m grateful for everything you’ve done for me. I’m in your debt. You saved my life. You’ve protected me and let me share your roof for months. I… really, I thank you for all this but.” Her spoon paused mid-scoop in the bowl. She stared at its contents, wondering how to go on.

“But?” Eonsook raised an eyebrow. “But you don’t trust me.”

“I don’t know you very well…”

“This is true,” she was allowed. “But do you know anyone at the next stop?" Eonsook reasoned. "Even if you make it past security and get into the city. Do you know the language? Do you know the people? Do you know anyone who will help you into a new life? Who will let you move on so you can forget about that absent husband of yours?”

“Please don’t talk about Kibum,” the other shook her head, and Eonsook only scoffed. “You don’t know anything about him.”

“I don’t but I can guess,” the challenge came. “How long has he been gone? Months? Years? Has he written to you? Has he tried to contact you? Has he sent messages with someone? And what about those goons?” Eonsook attacked. “Could it be they were there because of what he did? Because of his mistakes? Huh, all men are the same, they say they’ll take care of you for the rest of your life and then they do whatever strikes their fancy.”

The other only shrunk back in her chair, covered her ears and denied everything with her mumbled no-no-nos.

“It’s it true? Didn’t your worthless Kibum or whatever do the same to you? Didn’t he trick you into marrying him and acted like he loved you until you found out about his secrets?” the accusations slipped out one by one. “What was it? Drugs? Alcohol? Cheating? Did he beat you? Did he get wasted and threaten to kill you for not doing as he said? What else? Did he force himself on you? Did he treat you like trash? Did he make you feel like dying? What else did he do?!” Eonsook’s voice had risen to a scream that resonated through the space.

The other flipped her plate and pushed her chair back, running out into the open. Wind slapped her hair around, the lights of only a few distant bulk carriers guiding her footsteps along the upper deck. She fumbled to get to the railings, to get as far away from the other woman as possible.

The words had been too toxic, too venomous to swallow. Their acrid flavor still coiled around in a tight unbreakable knot. She sobbed for it to go away, to disappear so she could be at peace. But it wasn't as simple as that. Salt sprayed in her eyes, the water being rough with her instead of trying to soothe her tumultous thoughts. She cursed its black depths then cursed herself for hoping she'd find solace up here. Or anywhere for that matter...

Footsteps behind her spread alarm through her body. She started to run; run for the prow so she could jump to her escape. The yacht would probably crush her, the propellers would slice her into ribbons. She didn’t care. As long as she heard nothing more from anyone ever again, she was ready to do whatever it took.

“Stop!” Eonsook shrieked, probably realizing her intentions. “Stop! Please, no, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean any of it! I’m sorry! Please, please, don’t jump!”

Her right leg made it over the metal rails but she was yanked off it and thrown onto her back.

They lived by the railway tracks and a few meters away was the sea.

When Kibum had brought her to the house for the first time, with a blindfold over her eyes, he’d taken her straight to the backyard and then left her to stand against the fence. As she’d waited with an expectant grin on her face and the crash of waves in her ears, a faraway horn signaled an incoming train.

The rattle of carriages, the squeak of tracks, the slight tinge of fear that it was running too close and would probably carry her away… all of it dissipated when Kibum rolled his arms around her to kiss her neck. She slipped the blindfold off herself and giggled at him. The house before her was perfect. The sea at her back was perfect. The sunlight dipping into his dimple was perfect. “I love it,” she’d said. “I love you.”

They’d been married for just a little over a year. It’d been rushed, but the families were good friends, and very soon they became good friends too. He was a good husband, in his soft caresses and his loud laughter and his indulgent smiles. He was a good husband because there was love in every thing he did for her, every bouquet or every gift he brought home some days from work. He was a good husband, so she’d tried to be an equally good wife.

She supported him, respected him and his work, didn’t nag too much if he came home too late or brought his lunchbox back half-empty. She tried to understand him, to believe him, to love him, to care about his big dreams and even his stupid ideas. She really tried her best. And in return he never let her down, he never kept secrets to himself and he never fought with her over stupid things he didn’t like. He was a good husband.

But he was a gambler.

They lived by the railway tracks and a few meters away was the sea. Then one day some men came with guns and took him away. They let him hold her trembling hands for a full minute. When he walked out the front door with them he looked back exactly six times to reassure her. “Everything will be fine!” he’d called out. “Don’t you worry! I’ll be back before you even start to miss me!”

He’d been gone two years.

There was nothing to tie her to the house. They had no kids and hardly anything valuable. She could’ve walked away whenever she wanted. She could’ve found another man. Another place. Another life. She could’ve left. But she hoped against hope that Kibum would really come back. He would come back and say, “I’m sorry. I should’ve known better. I’ll never leave you like that again. I promise.” She hoped for a long time.

Then the goons started to press her for information. “Where is he? Where are you hiding him?! What did he do with all that money?!” She couldn’t give them any answers. She had none to give. She couldn’t even lie. Alone and left to her devices she fared as well as she could’ve in the circumstances, even as she started to accept that Kibum was now gone forever. Soon her purpose of staying became to preserve every memory of him in the house.

They lived by the railway tracks and a few meters away was the sea. One day they became she and she became nothing.

That night, when they prowled in for her and not the money, she’d run knowing full well that she’d never be allowed to return. Those had been her last thoughts as she’d lain in some unknown samaritan’s hold with rapidly spiraling consciousness.

Now as the two women sat in the narrow confines of the yacht’s lower lobby, a drink passed from one hand to the other, she didn’t know where to begin or where to end her tale. Eonsook didn’t push her. She had her own stories to tell, so she knew what it was like to let everything spill out for the first time. It burned, and unbearably so.

“I had a husband, and he was good. Until he left. Now… I'm all alone. That’s it.”

Eonsook never nudged for more. They drank quietly as the rolling of the ship intensified then died down in a series, one after the other. When one bottle was emptied, another was broken into. They kept at it till they could coherently move around in the little space, then the alcohol took them.

The first thing she saw when she opened her eyes was Eonsook smoothing cream over her thighs. She wasn’t completely , but her s hung loose and her skin glistened from external light. There was no real memory connected to this odd sight—did they have last night? Did they just share a bed? Did the hostess happen to be in the room with no knowledge of being watched as she was?

A blinding pain in the back swiped all other questions aside.

“A-ah!”

“I’ll get you something for that,” Eonsook turned and spoke with a morose expression. “That, and the hangover… you had far too much last night.” That explained a lot to the other. It explained the meandering ceiling, the splotchy recollections, the terrifyingly loud pounding in her head. It even answered the pungent taste sitting heavily on her tongue. She felt the strong urge to spit it out of herself, but that would have to wait.

“I have to throw up…”

“I’d rather you did it in the washroom,” Eonsook said in a mildly pleading voice. “Come,” she approached, still half- and stretching her arms out like a mother would her child. With gentle urging she led the two of them to the nearest bath where one emptied the contents of her stomach and the other held her hair out of the way. As odd as it was to feel it, the experience was soothing. For both of them, she imagined. The press of a supple chest on her back, the of careful fingers along her scalp, the weight of last night’s confessions falling out in a steady flow… it was calming.

It wasn’t until they were back at the breakfast table that she opened again. “You don’t want to let me go.”

Eonsook took her time to answer. “No.”

The other leaned her elbows on the beveled edge of the table. “No one’s so good they do something without a reason.”

“Hmm,” she was informed. “You’re right. I do have a reason.”

Later in the day, they walked downstairs to the lobby they’d spent the night in. This part of the boat was new to her, since she remembered hardly any details from last night. For one, she couldn’t figure out why her back was so sore. Surely she hadn't fallen off the rails so hard as to feel a burn in her muscles every time she took a step forward. For another, Eonsook was behaving too demurely all day. Her disposition had gotten softer, sweeter. She watched the woman's face for any trace of answers. Obviously, there were none.

“Come,” she was invited, the door to one of the bedrooms creaking a little on its hinges. This door, she remembered, was always locked. Any attempts she’d made to get through it before had been pointless. Now she cautiously peeked in and looked around.

In the middle of the room was a shrine. It was nothing special, nothing extravagant. A simple clay urn was placed next to a framed photo. Plates with prayer inscriptions and the stone statue of a deity weighed the flat slab of wood down. A pair of freshly-lit incense sticks burned orange at their tips, their stringy ash falling into a plate of offerings. Persimmons, she noted.

Eonsook entered the room ahead of her and languidly sat down before the Spartan memorial. With practiced actions, a pair of candles were set alight then left to melt inside a pot already coated with wax. The captain held her palms in prayer, muttered a few words under her breath, then slid aside to make room for her guest.

The other followed with some indecision at first. All of this was really strange and it made her a little uneasy. She opened to ask about it, to maybe even demand an explanation with whatever anger she could muster. But then her sight caught the picture in the polished frame.

And she finally understood.

“Her name was Minjung,” Eonsook narrated. “She was…” their eyes met momentarily before straying apart once more. “You wouldn’t have believed me unless you’d seen it for yourself. She was just like you.” It was the truth. The girl in the photo had the same big eyes, the same straight nose, those same circular lips, going as far as showing the same crooked teeth in a happy smile.

“Wh-who… who was she?” the other asked, doing a bad job of masking her disbelief.

“Someone I loved,” the answer was immediate. “Someone… who loved me in her own way.” Eonsook picked up the frame and wiped its glass clean with her sleeve. “When I was with her, I saw myself become complete every day in the mirror. She was my happiness; she filled in for every lack in my life. Her every word, her every action seemed like it was meant for me. Only me. Even the way she ate persimmons like they were the only edible thing on this planet,” a short laugh accompanied the recollection. Eonsook dabbed the corner of her eyes.

“What happened to her?”

“They married her away. To some ,” the shocking answer came through gritted teeth. “He beat her. He hurt her. He used her. Then he threw her away. She…” the woman choked on her words. “She couldn’t stand it…”

Pats on the back or soft hushes wouldn’t suffice. They kept a distance between themselves. “She punished me for allowing it. For not protecting her when someone was breaking her. She drank up all that torture, all that pain. She drank the entire bottle down. And when they found her it was too late. When they told me, I somehow expected it. She’d given me her pain to carry as a penalty because I couldn’t save her…” Eonsook held her head in her hands. “The love of my life, and I couldn’t save her.

“After she… after her, I set out looking for a faith. I sold everything I owned and bought this yacht. Decided I’d pass nautical mile after nautical mile until I reached an answer that would help, that I could accept. I traveled the earth searching for something to believe in,” a shake of the head and a derisive laugh split the words open “It… it took me years to realize I set out with the wrong map.

“Finding you had to have been fate. I want to desperately believe that it was fate. I want to believe that I couldn’t follow any roads or read any directions until then because I was meant to find you. I want you to be a sign that I’m finally forgiven, that I can finally be at peace. Because—because I can’t live like this anymore," she defeatedly confided. "I can’t live alone for another second, or I’ll go mad blaming myself. I can’t be left alone with myself. I can’t be alone again, please…”

The other nodded vigorously and pulled Eonsook to herself, hugging her, quieting her fanatical cries.

“So… why are you sailing to the Antarctic?”

Seagulls screeched overhead, their gliding shadows moving across the floor of the yacht in mesmerizing circles. “For her,” Eonsook answered, looking up at the birds with an odd fascination. “She always wanted to go to the Antarctic. It was… sort of her dream. So I want to leave her there. I tried every year but I just…” she smiled at herself. “I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Maybe this time?”

No consolations were given, no assurances presented. The hope that something good might come of this trip was enough to push them forward with their sails still furled tightly shut. Maybe one day they'd loosen the string and let the boat sail where it wanted. Maybe in a few years they'd have healed enough to not look where they were going. But not now, not so soon.

“You know…” Eonsook said to her as they neared another shore. They reeled out a length of thick rope from the lazarette, heaving it and ocassionally stopping to wipe their brows. “You never told me your name.”

“Minjung,” the other said, then looked up and smiled at her hostess. “Why don't you call me Minjung.”

hi im rum

i usually update on weekend but 2day is surprize holiday lolol

ladies r tuff to write lulz