MARCH 1954

 

“Why do you care so much about what he thinks?” Jongdae asked him over a beer. It was early March now, the freeze of winter was fully gone. Spring was approaching, and with it came the frenzy to prepare for the coming planting season. It was a time of change and renewal, in more ways than one. All over town the reconstruction was making progress, the renewal coming both in the fields and in the city simultaneously.

Chanyeol shrugged. He had just finished telling Jongdae about how Kyungsoo had yet to really acknowledge anything he was doing, or say more than two words to him in any given day. Not to mention that the more blunt that Chanyeol got, the more honest he was becoming, the less Kyungsoo talked to him.

“For claiming to dislike this guy so much you seem awfully fixated on gaining his approval.” Jongdae took a sip of beer, smacking his lips as he swallowed. “I think you want to be his friend.”

Chanyeol’s eyes widened, almost comically. “No, never!”

Jongdae rolled his eyes. The subject changed to Jongdae’s hunt for a wife (thus far unsuccessful).

After they finished a small afternoon meal and another round Chanyeol headed back to the farm. On the long walk he thought about what Jongdae had said. He knew it wasn’t the case, he didn't want to be Kyungsoo’s friend. But yet he cared about him in some odd way. He wanted to see the man smile again. He wanted to see him heal. He wanted…what did he want?

He sighed, trudging up the muddy road. He really wished he could control his thoughts sometimes.

 

 

 

The world can be a mind blowingly small place sometimes, Chanyeol thought. He could scarcely believe his eyes when he returned to the farm one evening only to see a car parked out in front of the white building. It was a strange site, the nicest car Chanyeol had encountered in his entire time in Namwon was parked at the side of a muddy farm road.

When he entered the house his confusion only grew. A very familiar man was seated around the little dining table, his suit coat folded on the floor next to him. One look at Kyungsoo’s grim expression told Chanyeol that this was not a friendly visit.

“Jongin?” Chanyeol asked, still shocked at the familiar silhouette sitting across from Kyungsoo.

The man turned to see who had entered the house, smiling broadly when he spotted his old friend. “Chanyeol! What are the odds?” He was up in a second, clapping Chanyeol’s back as he pulled him in for a friendly hug.

“What are you doing here?”

“Business,” Jongin answered cryptically. “What are you doing here?”

“I rent a room.” Chanyeol had a bad feeling about Jongin being at this farm for business, considering what he had told him back in Seoul.

Jongin laughed. “What a strange coincidence! To think I would run into you. Sit,” he gestured towards the table, “Help me convince Mr. Do.”

Chanyeol took off his jacket, making eye contact with Kyungsoo in the process. He could see the barely contained anger in the man, in the way his shoulders were tense, his posture stick straight. He sat down at the table, feeling extremely awkward.

“I don’t think my boarder should have anything to do with this discussion,” Kyungsoo stated, glaring at Jongin as he spoke.

Jongin ignored him. “Mr. Do here refuses to let me help him. He has a half a dozen loans and his farm won’t turn a profit, I can guarantee it. Yet, despite facing certain failure and destitution, he doesn’t want to sell. Chanyeol, old friend, tell your landlord why selling is a good idea.”

Chanyeol shifted, feeling intensely uncomfortable. “I–” he looked at Kyungsoo, and for some reason what Ji Won had told him replayed in his mind. Pride. This was his pride. Jongin was asking Kyungsoo to sell his pride. Kyungsoo, who had been through hell and back, was being bullied into selling his home. Kyungsoo, who was as different from Jongin and Chanyeol as could be– was being asked to give up the only thing he had left. Chanyeol wasn’t going to ask him that, he couldn’t. “I don’t think selling the farm is a good idea.”

“What?!” Jongin looked at Chanyeol with wide eyes. “You must be joking. Do you realize–”

“I realize that Mr. Do and his family have worked this land for generations. I realize that if he has loans it is only to keep his farm going. I realize that you’re a lot like my father, taking advantage of those who are in a tight spot.” Chanyeol felt his heart beating in his chest - thud, thud thud. He had never stood up to anyone of his class before, not like this. It was both exhilarating and scary at the same time.

Jongin snorted. “You have to be kidding me. Has your time here made you stupid?”

“No, my time here has started to cure the stupidity I suffered from my entire life,” Chanyeol answered resolutely. He felt this wholly and completely. That Namwon, in its own way, had started to cure him of the degenerative mindset that had been instilled in him. This place, this farm, and this family had begun to push out the fog of selfish perception.

“What if I bought the neighbor's farm? Or perhaps the farm beyond that? Would you care?” Jongin’s tone was biting, there was venom there that made Chanyeol nervous. What was he getting at?

With someone like Jongin he couldn’t be sure where the conversation would go, especially since this was a business conversation. Jongin reminded Chanyeol so much of his father, and he had heard his father bargain once or twice in his life. It was like a chess game, the way his father pushed the other person until he won, leaving his opponent to be amazed any of it had happened at all.

And maybe that is why he knew he wasn’t going to stay quiet, even if Jongin’s response to anything he said was beyond his power of prediction. Because Jongin was like his father and a thousand other faceless businessmen who thought they could bully the poor and take from them what they wanted. Jongin was another man who chased profits, forgetting that with each deal there was a human cost as well.

“I think you should allow people to make up their own minds, not bully them into selling because you have money and they don’t.” Chanyeol had opened the door to voice his opinion, he had allowed himself to finally say what had been building inside him since he left Busan. Now there was no stopping him, there was no more pleasantries, no more going back. “You’re like my father, treating people like in the name of business. You shouldn’t do this Jongin, this isn’t just a business deal. This is a family. This is more than you can comprehend.”

Jongin frowned. “You have quite the interesting opinions, Park. Now think sensibly for a moment and stop being an idiot.”

Chanyeol had a desire to toss Jongin out of the house physically, to remove him from the premises of this time and place. He settled on harsher words. “Stop being a soulless greedy son of a , Jongin.”

“Ah, I see.” Jongin crossed his arms. “You come down to Namwon and turn into a mouthpiece for the poor. What changed your mind? What made you act like this? Mr. Do perhaps?”

Chanyeol swallowed. No, there was no way he was going there, was he? It was just a hint of something, something that made Chanyeol exceedingly nervous. A truth that if spilled would change things, would bring hate and revulsion.

“Or is it his pretty sister in law. Aw, but no – that isn’t up your alley, now is it Park? You never did like pretty girls.” Jongin had hit the nail on the head, found the weakest spot in Chanyeol’s being. His deepest, darkest secret.

Chanyeol felt sick. How had Jongin found out? He had only ever told his sister. Sure some people insinuated, but was it that well known? He couldn't look at Kyungsoo, couldn’t look over to see the hatred in his face that he was certain would be there.

“Get out of this house. Get out of Namwon, and go back to your pathetic excuse for a life,” Kyungsoo growled, standing up quickly he teetered on his leg due to his injury.

Chanyeol reached to steady him, a further mistake.

“And you end up playing house with a cripple.” Jongin laughed. “Wait until the others back in Seoul get word of this.”

“Out, now!” Kyungsoo roared.

Jongin grabbed his suit coat and stood, throwing out “If you change your mind, or should I say when, you have my number.”

Jongin stalked out of the house. Chanyeol was quiet, wanting to disappear. His secret had just been shouted in a place where he had found comfort. Perhaps the first place he had ever felt comfortable in his life. He felt utter despair, depression, a sadness that came on so suddenly he wasn’t certain how to move, how to speak, how to go on.

“Ignore him, he’s scum.” Kyungsoo said before limping off towards the door. Chanyeol watched him leave, a veil of depression and fear overcoming him.

 

 

 

Chanyeol skipped dinner, going for a walk instead. When he returned to the farmhouse he sat on the porch, somehow not finding the courage to go inside. Ji Hyo came out of the house and set down a plate of food and a beer. She didn't say anything, only offered a small smile. Chanyeol thanked her.

The evening was still warm, a sure sign that spring was on its way. Chanyeol sat on the porch, the cheap beer that Ji Hyo had brought him in hand. He wasn’t sure he would be able to sleep that night, not after what had happened that day.

The front door opened, the limp indicating it was Kyungsoo.

He sat down on the porch, when Chanyeol looked over he saw that he had a beer in his hand. It was silent for a few minutes before Kyungsoo spoke.

“Thank you.”

They were two words that Chanyeol never expected to hear from Kyungsoo, and more shockingly they were followed by the words he never in a million years would have expected to hear.

“I’m sorry, for treating you like that.” It was gruff, the way the farmer said it. Like he had never said the words before. Chanyeol imagined he probably hadn’t.

“I think I misjudged you.” Kyungsoo took a sip of his beer. Chanyeol mimicked the action. More silence.

“You didn’t.” Chanyeol stared out towards the muddy rice paddies. “Misjudge me I mean. I’m a coward.”

“And I’m an .”

Chanyeol looked at Kyungsoo, shocked. Was he joking? Was Kyungsoo, the angriest, most depressing person that he had ever met trying to be funny? The small smile on Kyungsoo’s face would suggest as much.

“Is it that bad? With money.” Chanyeol hoped it wasn’t, hoped Jongin was misinformed.

“Yes. It is probably worse than that man even knew.” Kyungsoo kept his eyes fixated on the ground, not looking over at Chanyeol. “I needed loans to keep buying supplies, loans to feed us, loans…” he trailed off.

Chanyeol felt a pang of sorrow at the knowledge that the Do’s farm was over leveraged. He was so focused on this revelation he forgot his nervousness over what Jongin had insinuated.

Kyungsoo laughed, a low and sad laugh. “Before the war I wanted to be a singer, if you can believe that.” He snorted, finding his own hopes and dreams amusing in the most depressing of ways. “I was going to go to Seoul someday.”

Chanyeol shared in the anguish of lost dreams. He let himself assume that pain that he could tell was simmering below the surface. “Perhaps you still could.” But that would entail selling the farm, giving it up.

“No, I can’t.” Kyungsoo answered firmly. “Because singing doesn’t matter anymore. This place does. This place…” he looked around, staring out towards the rice paddies illuminated by the departing sun, “is what my parents loved. It is what they worked for. It was everything to my family for generations. Now, it is what I want. It is what I will do.”

“More than being a singer? You want this more?” Chanyeol asked, feeling a level of comfort with the man that was impossible to conceive hours ago.

“Yes, more than a singer. This place is my home, and I will never see it go to anyone else.”

Chanyeol marveled at the fact Kyungsoo had said more to him in the last ten minutes than he had in two months. He marveled at the fact it was Jongin who had caused this to happen. That standing up for Kyungsoo’s opinion had somehow earned him the respect he could never gain otherwise. How this change had happened so quickly he felt like it was on shaky foundation. That it could go away at any time.

And maybe he needed confirmation that it wouldn’t. “Why are you suddenly sorry? Because of what I said to Jongin? Was that it?” Of course it was it. Chanyeol knew it, but he needed to hear it.

Instead of answering his question, Kyungsoo spoke of other things. It was like he was a lawyer building a case, starting from the motivations, the actions that had brought them there.

“When I got back, from the war, she was like that,” Kyungsoo spoke softly as he stared off into the distance. “My brother had died early on, back in Ka-san. I didn’t know until I got home, same with my parents. How she managed to survive with a child no less I have no idea.”

“I took a bullet to the leg in Kumsong, tore clear through, but took some bone with it.” Kyungsoo took a swig from his beer. “I never thought I would take over this place, that was supposed to be my brother’s life.”

Silence. Then the farmer spoke again, continuing his tale. “You’re what I hate, or what I thought of you is what I hate. Opportunity, easy won safety. Not understanding what it is like to struggle, to lose, to reach the bottom with nowhere to go. I assumed you thought you were better than all of us, better than those who fought. Better than people who struggled. I thought you were self-serving, coming down here to feel better about yourself.” He looked over at Chanyeol. “But if that were true you would have told me to sell. You would never have thought this rickety farm means anything to me. But you did, you figured it out. You said it.”

Chanyeol stared at the man dumbly, drinking in the feeling of finally gaining his approval. Of finally breaking away some of the shell that he kept around him at all times. For once, for a few minutes, Kyungsoo let himself be human. He couldn’t find the words to respond, he didn’t know what to say. So he stared, in wonder, in awe, and in some strange twisted version of gratitude.

Kyungsoo sighed and looked away, breaking the spell. He struggled to his feet. “If you’re going to town tomorrow I can give you a ride.”

With that he was off, limping back into the house. Chanyeol took a swig of beer, feeling like he had just breached the most impenetrable fortress to ever exist. From there on out, he hoped, things would be different between them.

 

 

 

Chanyeol spotted the guitar lying near the curb on his way home from work. There weren’t any strings and the body was so roughed up he seriously doubted it would be playable. Yet he grabbed it, carrying it back to the farmhouse like he had just discovered the most precious of treasures.

Four days had passed since Jongin had visited. Four days of Kyungsoo talking to him. Four days of good mornings and good evenings. Four days of realizing that Kyungsoo was a man of few words even if he was on friendly terms with a person.

They weren’t friends, not yet. But they weren’t avoiding each other either. And for some reason this fact made Chanyeol ecstatically happy, probably unreasonably so. In fact, when he spotted the guitar his first thought was of Kyungsoo’s confession. He wanted to be a singer, Chanyeol thought. And I can play guitar. Perhaps I could play it for him while he sings.

 Chanyeol ignored how ludicrous it was. How he was pandering to Kyungsoo. How somewhere, deep down, getting closer to Kyungsoo was motivating him in a lot of ways.

 

 

 

 

“Can I play it?” Baekhyun wanted the guitar the moment he laid eyes on it. He was still begging for it a week later, as Chanyeol fiddled with the new strings he had picked up in town. The instrument wasn’t working yet, since he had only bought half the needed strings.

“Baekhyun, the guitar isn’t a toy,” Ji Hyo admonished the boy.

They were sitting on the porch, the sun sinking below the horizon. Dinner was done, signaling to the occupants of the house that it was time to go outside. Could a routine be formed in such a small amount of time? Chanyeol wasn’t sure, yet it felt like they had been doing this forever.

As the temperatures grew warmer they had gravitated to the porch, all four of them sitting outside until the sun was down. Baekhyun would run around playing in the fields while Ji Hyo shared the latest gossip garnered from the other farmer’s wives and sisters. Kyungsoo would listen carefully, barely saying a word. Chanyeol would thrive on the interactions, sharing funny anecdotes if he had them.

Chanyeol couldn’t recognize just how much this ritual meant to him until he was alone inside his room, trying to fall asleep. Remembering how different his own childhood had been. How distant his parents were. How they had never really enjoyed each other’s conversation, an hour spent sitting together. This was, he supposed, what a family should be.

And, in a way it was scary, he felt part of this family. It wasn’t his place. He was a guest, he would remind himself as he tossed and turned. He would build the school and teach there. Eventually he would move on, he wouldn’t be here forever.

As March turned to April he realized leaving here was not something he wanted. And that was frightening in many ways.