#065
The man’s head nodded up and down briefly upon hearing my answer. He stopped plucking off the leaves and opened the showcase to take out a handful of butterfly ranunculus. He cut the stems of the prepared flowers to an appropriate length. Since Yoon-u said he would carry it, not too long. I inserted white pompon chrysanthemums between the cornflowers and filled the empty spaces with matricaria and carnations. Since it was a flower I’d never used as the main one, and there were too many different colors, I worried it might look awkward…
“It’s pretty.”
The man who had been staring at me gathering and securing the stems muttered as if talking to himself. Finally, I inserted butterfly ranunculus between the flowers and finished by extending their necks a bit longer. I wrapped the stems with white tissue paper and cloth paper, then tied them with a white ribbon string, overlapping two loops to make a butterfly-shaped knot. The moment I handed the completed bouquet to the man, the wind chime rang.
My gaze and the man’s gaze reflexively turned toward the back.
“Hello.”
Yoon-u, wearing a black suit similar to the man’s, walked in rubbing his puffy eyes.
“Dad.”
“Yeah, Yoon-u, did you wake up?”
“Aunt said Dad went in here.”
Yoon-u, who had been yawning softly, looked at the bouquet in the man’s arms and showed a quite bright smile.
“It’s flowers for Mom. Right?”
“Yeah, flowers for Mom. So Mom can carry pretty flowers when she goes. Look here, the owner put in flowers that look like Yoon-u too.”
“Wow, really. This is a butterfly flower. Butterfly.”
Giggling with a ticklish sound, Yoon-u’s father crouched down in front of him to match his eye level. He held out the bouquet for Yoon-u to hold and smiled affectionately with curved eyes.
“Let’s say goodbye to Mom properly, okay?”
“Yeah.”
“You can cry when we send Mom off today, so don’t hold back.”
“Grandma said Mom gets sad when Yoon-u cries.”
“She won’t be sad. And kids don’t have to hold back things like that.”
The man who had been patting the round head stood up. Taking out his wallet from his jacket’s inner pocket, he pulled out a neatly inserted card and held it out to me.
“Please process the payment.”
“Ah… yes. It’s thirty thousand won.”
Before he could even ask if I was giving a discount, I added an explanation that the bouquet was small and the flowers used weren’t main flowers either. So it wasn’t expensive. Only after rattling off the explanation did I return the card along with the printed receipt. As soon as the extended hand received the card and receipt, Yoon-u pushed the man.
“Dad, go out first.”
“Huh? Suddenly?”
“Ah, just wait a moment. Dad, go first.”
Yoon-u’s expression was serious as he pushed his father’s legs with his fern-like hands. Instead of asking the child why he was doing this, the man silently let himself be pushed along. Saying he understood and not to push because it hurt, he affectionately stroked the round head and gave me a light bow.
“Have a safe trip.”
“Don’t bother hyung too much and come quickly. We have to go to Mom.”
“I know.”
With the father-son conversation concluded, the wind chime rang. Now only Yoon-u and I remained in the flower shop.
“Hyung.”
Yoon-u called me with a deliberately solemn expression. I too became solemn in response. His black eyes sparkled with moisture.
“Yeah?”
Yoon-u stared up at me with clear eyes, then put his small hand into his pants pocket and wriggled something out.
“Mom gave me this.”
The pink paper clutched in his small hand was quite familiar to me.
“Ah, this is a letter. The one Mom wrote back then, did you read it?”
The small hand card I was asked to put together with the bouquet. This time I knelt down in front of Yoon-u.
“I don’t know all the letters yet.”
“Hangul is a bit difficult.”
“So I couldn’t read all of this letter… I only read the easy letters, but after reading like that, I don’t know what Mom wrote.”
The end of his hesitant voice trailed off. The child said with a sigh that he should have studied harder.
“Then couldn’t you ask Dad to read it for you?”
Yoon-u, who had crouched down with his legs folded in front of me, let out a deep sigh.
“Dad is a bit of a crybaby.”
“……”
“He cries more than me, so Grandma told me not to cry. If Dad cries like that and I cry too, she asked how Mom could be happy going to heaven.”
“Ah…”
“I’m worried Dad might cry again if I ask him to read this. I get sad when he cries.”
Though he looked really childlike on the outside, Yoon-u was much more thoughtful than I expected. The more we talked, the more I saw aspects that weren’t childlike, and that made my heart ache for no reason. When I suppressed a bursting sigh and reached out my hand, the child held out the letter as if he’d been waiting.
“So please read it for me, hyung.”
“Alright, just a moment.”
The card that had been stiff showed countless fold marks from how much it had been looked at. When I unfolded the card that had completely lost its original texture and become tattered and soft, neat handwriting appeared on the wrinkled paper. Before reading it to Yoon-u, I quickly scanned the content with my eyes and checked the child crouched in front of me.
“Should I read it?”
“Yes, please read it.”
“Ahem, ahem. Um…”
Since I, who had no relation to them, was about to read a letter exchanged between mother and son, I felt a bit embarrassed and glanced at Yoon-u before awkwardly reading the first sentence aloud.
“To my world. Hello, son. How was your day today? Did you do well? Mom—”
Ah, wait a moment. Before I could even finish reading two lines, Yoon-u burst into tears. Sniffling, sniffling, Yoon-u rubbed around his eyes roughly with his clenched fists, bit his lips tightly, and made a “hueng—” sound that was unclear whether it was calling for hyung or crying, as if asking me to continue reading.
“Mom thought about you all day. And I also went to the flower shop Yoon-u talked about and bought flowers that look just like Yoon-u.”
Yoon-u had drawn circles with various colored pencils around every character he didn’t know. Lines with many consonant clusters were almost completely circled, as if he didn’t know any of them.
“I’m curious whether I remained as a good mom in Yoon-u’s memory. I hope it wasn’t just a mom who was always sick.”
“…sniff, sob, hueng, sniff—”
“As I always told you, Yoon-u was always the best son to Mom. Was Mom also the best to Yoon-u? I truly wish that was the case…”
“Wait a moment— sob, hueng, wait…”
Sniff, sniffle, sob— Yoon-u, whose eyes were already swollen from rubbing them hard, rubbed his eyes again and suddenly stood up and turned around. Ah, if he turns around…
“Sniff, hueng, sniff—”
Dad was watching. He had been crying since the moment Yoon-u took out the crumpled letter from his pocket and handed it to me. Watching the father and son’s wailing, my eyes also started to sting and heat up. Leaving the last two lines, Yoon-u caught his breath.
“Now, hiccup, it’s okay.”
Tears welled up in my eyes too. I had to struggle quite a bit to read the crying letters smoothly, as if paper had been put into water.
“Yoon-u. My treasure. My love. My baby. Mom was so happy to meet you. Live strong and well, and let’s meet again much later. Goodbye. I love you as much as the sky and the earth.”
Yoon-u’s crying grew louder. The tears he had tried so hard to hold back burst forth and flowed down his round, risen cheeks drop by drop. I grabbed his arm that was trying to rub roughly and pulled out a tissue to gently dab around his eyes to wipe away the moisture.
“Yoon-u. Here Mom added a short postscript.”
“Post-what? What’s that, hiccup, what, sob, is that?”
“It means she added something because she had more to say, and here it says to eat vegetables and spinach well.”
“Sob, hueng, sniff, what, what is that, sob, is spinach what she had to say?”
“I guess so. Mom says you have to eat vegetables and spinach well to become strong.”
Yoon-u, who was trembling as he tried to hold back tears, took the letter from my hand and carefully put it in his pocket.
“Thank you, hiccup. I’m glad I didn’t ask Dad to read it, sniff.”
“Should I give you a hug?”
“No. I want to go now.”
The child was as resolute as the first day I met him. Feeling awkward, I also straightened up and held out the chocolate Woo Dohwan had brought toward the somewhat calmed Yoon-u.
“I have chocolate, do you want some?”
“No. Thank you. But hyung.”
“Yeah?”
“What about a reply to Mom? I have to give it before Mom goes to heaven, hiccup.”
At the mention of a reply, I thought for a moment then reached out to point to one side of the table.
“Then do you want to write a letter to Mom?”
“Could hyung write it for me, sniff, instead, hiccup? I can’t write now. There are many letters I don’t know, sniff, and if I can’t write everything, hueng, and Mom doesn’t know what I wrote, sniff, what should I do?”
His small hand stretched out toward me. Seeing the trembling hand, I nodded to Yoon-u’s request and moved my body. When I took out a yellow card and picked up a pen, Yoon-u, who had been dripping tears, cried “huaang” and muttered the words to be written in the reply.
“Mom, does your head not hurt anymore? Does your stomach not hurt either? Sob, as long as Mom doesn’t hurt, hiccup, I’m okay. Hueng, sniff, to me Mom was always, sniff, sob, pretty, hueng, the best, sob, a pretty mom. I was happy too. I want to tell you that I want to be Mom’s son next time too, sniff, so please, sob, be my mom next time too. I love you farther than the universe.”
Writing the letter for Yoon-u, I too started to tear up. I suppressed the bursting sighs and turned my head to rub my eyes against my forearm to remove the moisture. When I looked at Yoon-u thinking it might be over, the child was also busy crying.
“Yoon-u, is there nothing more you want to say?”
“Please write a postscript. Since I’m bringing flowers, just a little, sob, just a little, don’t go yet, sniff, wait. And I’ll eat vegetables and spinach well too.”
Before writing the postscript, I indicated that I was writing on his behalf and asked for understanding, then wrote down what Yoon-u had said.
Postscript: This is Seo Ranho from Flower House whom you met before. I wrote this letter at Yoon-u’s request. Please understand. Yoon-u is bringing flowers, so please wait just a little. And as you instructed, he says he will eat vegetables and spinach well. Don’t worry.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
