Chapter 30
Unless it was a proper box seat, balcony seats were usually unpopular and uncomfortable seats. You had to twist your body to see the performance, and in severe cases, some theaters had the ends of the stage completely cut off from view.
“I haven’t been to every theater, but… I think the National Theater’s Dalooreum Theater is the only theater in Korea I’ve seen with balcony seating arranged like this.”
“It would require more funding to do construction like this.”
Except for musicals or operas, theater was a performance that didn’t make much money anywhere in the world, excluding special minority cases. Theater performances that could fill 500 seats were rare in themselves.
From when audience entry began until the seats filled up, he and I had conversations of that sort. Despite being a relationship formed through sex, I was completely absorbed in conversation, forgetting that we were spending time together doing activities completely unrelated to sex.
“I was grateful that you agreed to come with me… but I’m relieved that Jung Jiin-ssi seems to like theater.”
Only upon hearing that did I realize I’d been chattering too excitedly. It was as embarrassing as having a foolish one-sided love discovered by the very object of that crush.
“When Jung Jiin-ssi talks about theater, your eyes are different.”
“……”
“More passionate than when talking about sex…”
Without realizing it, I gripped his hand tightly on the armrest. Surprised by my sudden action, he couldn’t continue speaking. His eyes, wide with puzzlement, looked down at our overlapped hands. Only then did I quickly let go as if I’d touched a boiling kettle.
Just then, the owner of the seat next to him appeared. We exchanged brief eye greetings and silent bows with two elegantly dressed elderly ladies.
He leaned over the armrest, bringing his lips close to my ear and whispering low.
“I can’t tell if you’re liberal or conservative.”
I got annoyed for no reason at that amused-sounding voice. I stared at his kind profile as he picked up a scarf dropped by the elderly lady in the adjacent seat. While I was pondering what decisive thing to say to him, all the lights in the theater simultaneously went out. The play was about to begin. The various noises that had been wandering around the theater also subsided and disappeared.
He rested his elbow on the armrest at our boundary and propped his chin. Then, smiling faintly in the darkness, he lightly gripped my chin and turned it toward the stage.
“Don’t look at me, you should watch the stage.”
The approximately 50-minute performance was filled in the form of a one-person play. It was a method where she reenacted scenes from several representative works among her 40 years of performances, and between scenes, she directly delivered episodes related to those works or her life at the time to the audience through monologues.
In that multiple roles were performed by one person, the performance could be called a monodrama. The actor also played piano and sang directly, and performed comical dances. Though it was a one-person play, it wasn’t shoddy at all, and was colorfully captivating even without elaborate stage devices.
As the performance headed toward the latter half, the script was exquisitely weaving her theater and her life into one solid piece, to the point where you couldn’t tell whether each role she had played was fiction or actually her own story.
The climax of the play. All lights went out, and only one narrow spotlight illuminated her at center stage.
‘People often ask me. How could you stand on stage for 40 years without resting even one year? Didn’t you ever want to quit theater, which doesn’t earn much money? If I had entered theater because of some great ambition or sense of mission, I probably couldn’t have endured it. But I just… just did it. Like eating three meals a day. Like sleeping when night comes and opening my eyes after sleeping well. Just as there are no birds that don’t flap their wings, no fish that don’t move their fins. Because I can’t be Park Nami without acting, I just did it to live. Nothing else.’
The actor who calmly finished her final monologue began singing a song that her longtime friend, a film composer, had composed for her 40th anniversary debut commemoration.
Theater, acting and I cannot be spoken of separately. We are already one.
That’s what she wanted to say. She was conveying those words through theater, through acting. A realm where I and the object cannot be distinguished from each other.
My earlobes burned with envy and shame. Sometimes, the sight of dazzling people became thunderbolt-like scolding in itself.
My gaze moved from the actor on stage to the first-floor audience, to the railing in front of me, to my knees, and then to the man beside me. I hadn’t intended to look at him, but he was there when I turned my head to look away from the stage.
“……”
His face was turned toward me, faintly reflecting the light from the stage illumination. He wouldn’t know anything, yet even the gaze of him who knew nothing seemed to scold and reproach me. Is the place where you are now really where you want to be?
“Are you bored?”
He leaned his face close toward me and whispered worriedly. I shook my head. He had guessed wrong. I wanted a kiss. I wanted more radical sex than last time. I wanted to escape that way. Though today was only our third meeting, I now knew that sex with him could be an excellent aid for forgetting. And exquisitely, he was by my side whenever I wanted sex.
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Bending my waist and resting my arms on the railing, I looked down at the floor below.
People greeting acquaintances they’d discovered belatedly, people capturing the empty stage on their phones, people hurriedly leaving the theater… I watched various audience members while waiting for him to return.
Saying he’d briefly show his face in the waiting room, he went downstairs as soon as the play ended. He was like a manager, thoughtfully considering even the detail that it would be better for me to wait here since it would be troublesome if someone recognized me and spoke to me.
Either someone naturally considerate, or… someone accustomed to meeting people with known faces. Probably one of the two?
“Weren’t there people who recognized you?”
At the sound of someone slumping into a seat behind me, I looked back. As he’d said it wouldn’t take long, he returned in less than 5 minutes. He ran his fingers through his hair to tousle it while exhaling a long breath. It seemed to announce that today’s official schedule was completed.
“I’m not that big a celebrity. But you came to give congratulations without even a bouquet?”
“I had it delivered in advance.”
“Ah…”
“Jung Jiin-ssi is a celebrity though. Your standards for evaluating yourself must be quite high.”
In that most people in their 20s and 30s know my face, I might be considered somewhat of a celebrity. But recognition and popularity weren’t always proportional. It was bothersome to explain in detail, and he didn’t seem very interested, so I just smiled appropriately as if brushing it off.
He leaned his upper body forward and rested his elbows on his knees. With his hands loosely clasped, his face looking up at me asked carefully.
“How was the play? You seemed unable to concentrate at the end. Did I drag you here for nothing?”
Only we two remained on the second-floor balcony. He was sitting in his seat, and I was standing with my back to the railing, looking down at him. Having returned from the waiting room, his bare face was without glasses.
“No, it was nice seeing a play after a long time? Even though it was a one-person play, it wasn’t boring at all. For someone to carry a play alone for 50 minutes isn’t easy even for young actors… I thought what an amazing actor.”
“Her energy is incredible, right? She’s amazing in private too.”
“You’re acquainted with the actor?”
“To be precise, she’s close with my mother, so I’ve met her a few times.”
He seemed to have studied in America and started his social life at Knox in America too… but his family was in Korea? That much seemed okay to ask, but I decided not to.
“Your schedule after this is free too, right?”
I nodded to him who was confirming what we’d discussed on the phone.
“Then, let’s go. I’ll treat you to dinner.”
“Dinner?”
He who had been about to get up stopped his movement at my question. A mischievous smile gradually spread across his face as he looked back. While picking up my jacket that had been draped over the seat back, he glanced sideways at me.
“Did you think I’d say let’s go to sleep?”
“……”
Since ours was a relationship formed for the purpose of sex, it was natural that suggesting going to have sex would be more natural than suggesting going to eat.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
