Looking back now, all I could think of was the blurry yet sharpened images, fragments of dialogues and the faces of the past. Specifically, my past. I couldn’t begin to remember all those that have been forgotten, nor could I start to think of the many possibilities that made my past great. Simply said, strapped to my seat as the 747 plunged through the clouds, I began to ponder about life itself and all its meaning.

I was leaving for Germany, sitting quietly as my seatmate next to me began flipping out the sides of his headphones and jabbing the jack into the appropriate hole. He was German, I have learnt, but was of Korean descent. We enjoyed some small talk about the weather in Germany, the dropping currency recently and all things that would have made us adults. If I were to be talking about how short the stewardess’s skirts were, he would have probably looked past in me disgust and clamp his headphones over his ears, uninterested at how many moles I could find on her honey thighs from where I was. The temperature had dipped to a negative in Germany, but it didn’t come to me as a surprise. After all, I had spent a few years without a heater back in Korea. The dorm was lacking and so I requested for an apartment instead. It was easily granted.

Though small and dim, it was homey and for a while, it became my home. Friends would come and leave, relatives would stop by for a cup of coffee and if I was lucky enough, an invitation for a party held by the dorm Head. The parties were usually held at dodgy bars, without the knowledge of any professors, and kept in secret. The music was a little too loud and the girls were a little too open for my taste, but the alcohol wasn’t bad. After a while, I began to get bored of living alone, and so I rented out a room for the students at the dorm, spreading the word around that I wanted a roommate who would be willing to pay a small fee for a larger bedroom and a faster access to the washroom. After a few months, I finally found an interested applicant. His name was Yuri. He moved in after a while, and made the room his. We got along well, with similar interests of music and books. He would put up interesting shots of girls on his wall and I would walk past without a worry or care. Things worked like that for a while until he returned back to the apartment with a bottle of whiskey in his hand and his phone. He grabbed his keys and turned to me, eyes stoned and stoic.

“I’m leaving. Don’t expect me to be back till late,” he said and left.

I never asked. I assumed that he had troubles with his relationship, which I heard was with a girl at another university. When I checked, he would be there in the morning, sleeping off a bad hangover. As long as he was there, I left him alone.

“Sir?” a gentle shake of my shoulder snapped me from my wake.

I looked up, only to see the German stewardess. She asked me if I was sick in English, to which I replied that I wasn’t. Nodding, she strode off, her hands reaching out for nearby seats to balance herself. Glancing to my right, I saw that my seatmate was fast asleep, the music still blaring in his ears. Nestling back into my seat, I began to drift again.

I was born in Jeonju, the capital city of Jeollabuk-do, or the North Jeolla Province. My parents were happily married and I grew up with big dreams to be an astronomer, which was crushed when I learnt how difficult it was to remember all nine planets (it was nine back then), until my father was diagnosed with skin cancer when I was nineteen. My parents were never that rich, nor were they that poor. Even then, with my mother as the only sole breadwinner and the significant amount of funds that had been spent for treatment, there was only so much left for me. I began to work for my school funds and tuition fees. After my father’s death not too long ago, things became easier for me. My mother began to send me some allowance on a regular, monthly basis and the financial burden was more or less lifted off my shoulders. Though, things weren’t all that easy. My mother suffered depression a few months after my father’s death, in which I had to take leave to stabilise her condition. Gradually, she improved, and began working again, though her mind was always enclosed without her affectionate husband. I never questioned her. I didn’t feel like I had the right to, but life went on like that.

As I drifted, my mind began to retreat into a world of subconscious and surrealism. Sleep captured me and soon, I was dreaming.

Jessica always talked about a field. She would always ask me if there were fields, grassy plains or anything of that sort back in Incheon, where I had been studying in. Of course, being an industrialised city with international links, I had to answer no and even if there was, they were scarce. She loved meadows, more than she loved life. Probably because her life was almost like a field, seemingly open, yet full of secrets hidden beneath every blade of grass. It was like a mystery. Then, at the end of the question, she would add, ‘Are there any wells?’

To that, my answer would be, “I’m sure there is, somewhere out there.”

Jessica grabbed my hand, leading me through the meadow, which was bright with green and the blue of the sky. The gentle rain fell down on us, and the October breeze set the grass swaying in kind. We saw no other people. We heard no other sounds. We only saw the yellow canaries taking flight somewhere on the high branches of the lone tree that stood by the corner of the meadow. Strange, I thought, I never knew there were canaries in Korea, especially when it was nearing winter.

“There’s a well by the tree,” she pointed to the circle of blackened bricks near the tree.

The birds seemed to be avoiding it and when the leaves fell, it fell nowhere near the well. Jessica peered over it, her whistle echoing into the endless well.

“It’s very deep,” I noted.

“Very,” she agreed, head nodding slightly.

When Jessica spoke, she did so with infinite levels of calm and indifference. One would never think that she was a nervous wreck on the inside that was unstable and fragile. Jessica slowed her words down, choosing her words carefully.

“It’s endless. You throw something in there and you’ll never get it out.”

“Really?”

“Everything lost down there is forgotten. No one dares to venture in the dark to find something that was probably not worth its value. That’s why everyone avoid this bottomless pit. It’s impossible to see the end.”

“Auf Wiedersehen.”

My eyes opened to soft, jazzy music from the intercom. My seatmate was busy tucking his headphones away into his briefcase, glancing around for anything he might have left behind. Unbuckling my seatbelt, I stood up, limbs sore from sitting for too long. Grabbing my haversack from the overhead compartment, I was greeted by the pretty stewardess.

“Have a nice stay. Auf Wiedersehen,” she smiled.

“Thank you. Auf Wiedersehen.”