#tgpy

tw: body image

He’s born to a girl who’s barely 20 and a man who’s more of a myth than an actual human being, a story to be told to Chihang to make him feel better about the swift abandonment he can’t remember.

Fat kids with poor eyesight and niche hobbies get picked last, get picked on. He doesn’t tell Ma about it, because it’s pointless in worrying her, and everyone knows the truth about it. There’s a boy who saves up his milk boxes throughout the week until they spoil and throws them at Chihang on his way home. There’s a girl who smiles and laughs at him as if teasing the ugly fat kid is some sort of fun game. Ma says he shouldn’t worry about them, her words fall on deaf ears.

Ma meets a guy on a plane when she’s flying somewhere over the South China Sea, serving overpriced wine to business men who don’t look twice at people like her. Only Jihoon looks twice, and a third time. She calls it a whirlwind love affair, one that sees her pregnant within three months and married within six and Chihang gets packaged off to a place called Daegu to fit like a puzzle piece jammed into the wrong spot into their new family narrative.

Kids in Korea are like kids in Hong Kong. No one likes the new boy. The fat boy, the boy who can’t speak Korean, the foreigner. He learns slang before he learns proper words, learns that the girl he likes calls him a “fat fuck” behind his back and even his only friend just feels sorry for him. He doesn’t tell Ma about the disgust he feels with himself, the way self-hatred clings like a second skin and he can’t shake it off, the way he wishes he was just someone else.

Jihoon tells him this: the problem is Chihang with he’s too soft, a residual effect of a boy growing up without a father trying to make sense of himself with no one to look up to. A man is supposed to be tough, to be strong, to be confident. Chihang can’t check off a single box, pathetic. “Don’t you have a rolemodel to look up to?” Chihang doesn’t bother to answer, they both know the answer is no.

He runs two kilometers a day but can’t seem to lose himself. The weight goes, features go from soft to sharp, people call him handsome but it doesn’t make a difference. He’s still Tsui Chihang the same fat little fuck from the shitty part of New Kowloon. Cosmetic changes don’t make a difference.

Adult life is a disappointment by his own design. He fails the college exam twice, gets fired from the halfway decent job Jihoon gets him, and takes the rest of his savings, and some money Ma has to sneak to him to land in Seoul on his ass with nothing to show for but a shit job and a shittier apartment.

I.

“Jaesuk oppa.”

“Mhmm… Yeah?”

“Let’s break up.”

Her statement jolts her boyfriend awake immediately. His head whips around to face her, sleepy eyes widened in such a bewildered expression Eunsol finds it cute. It’s almost comical how her first thought is to tell him it’s a joke, that she’s not serious about it. She would want nothing more than to jump back into the bed with him and feel safe in his arms, under the blankets. Swallowing down the lump in her throat, she forces herself to follow through with it. If you love something, let it go, right?

“I’m serious.”

Good, her voice isn’t trembling.

“Why?” he finally voices the question he’s been asking with his eyes. Hearing it with such raw emotion breaks her heart even more. Was it selfish of her to leave him as she wanted? Or was it more selfish of her to stay with him even when she knew she was weighing him down?

She’s been through numerous breakups before and initiated most of them. None of them was as difficult as this. They’d met through a mutual friend when she was still working. Han Jaesuk: young, bright-eyed, and beautiful. Their friends would joke that he was too good for her, way out of her league, how she would never have snagged such a great catch if not for Jisoo introducing them. Eunsol had laughed along with them then, slapping on their backs and telling them not to spout such bullshit.

At first, when the production company she worked for filed for bankruptcy and she was left without a job, having him there for her was comforting. But as the weeks passed and she remained unemployed, it began to feel a little upsetting. They no longer celebrated his small achievements at work. He always came home late at night, drunk as a skunk, smelling of alcohol. Having so much time to herself allowed her to reflect, to dissect and pick apart meaningless conversations. His encouraging words falling on ears which would eventually hear them as condescending.

It’s always the little things piling up to amount to a force powerful enough to tear open a rift.

Except Eunsol’s the only one drifting away. And God, how much it fucking kills her.

“I started seeing someone else.” Better lie than truth, it would be easier to deal with his hate and indifference than receiving his pity. “You knew about my reputation during university, right? It was only a matter of time before I started my shit again.”

Each word that comes out of her mouth is a blade, sharp and cutting, but who were they meant for exactly? If his face was an open book, then hers would be a canvas. Painted over and hidden. Her suffering shelved away for someone else to deal with. His is in plain sight, still having trouble processing her words, yet there’s nothing she could do to help him ease the pain even if she wanted to. Eunsol blinks back the tears that were starting to well up in her eyes, smoothing out the wrinkles in her pants as she abruptly stands up amidst the heavy tension in the room.

“I’ll start packing my things.”

(Was this really the right thing to do?)

II.

INT. AN APARTMENT IN MAPO-GU – LIVING ROOM – NIGHT

EUNSOL is drinking with her third sister, EUNHA, in the latter’s apartment. Beer cans and soju bottles are strewn on the coffee table and on the floor. There’s a plastic container, containing half-devoured jokbal, on one end of the table.

EUNSOL: You know, when I was younger, I thought… I thought that once I turned 20, once I became an adult, I would finally understand.

EUNHA has a look of concern on her face although it goes largely unnoticed by EUNSOL, who is busy taking her nth shot of the night.

EUNHA: Understand what?

EUNSOL: I don’t know. The world, I guess. How things work. How people work, why they do stupid things… [sighs contemplatively, tracing the outline of her now-empty shot glass with her index finger] I don’t really know.

EUNHA: [snorting incredulously] You thought the knowledge of the world would magically transfer to you once you turned 20?

EUNSOL: With all due respect, unnie; die in a fucking ditch. I’m being serious here, pouring my heart out to you. Don’t laugh.

EUNHA: Ugh, fine. Continue.

EUNSOL knocks back a couple of drinks, wiping her lips with the back of her palm once she’s finished. EUNHA pours more soju in her shot glass.

EUNSOL: So, it’s like… Why can’t reality be kinder to me? Like my childhood imagination was. Why do we have to suffer? Haven’t I done well enough? What more do I have to do? Can’t life be as easy as it was 20 years ago? I should have just done what I wanted to do back then.

EUNSOL rests her head on the coffee table.

EUNHA: I thought you did? The four of us always fought because of you, you spoiled brat.

SILENCE hangs in the room after EUNHA’s half-joking interjection; the older sister taking her time to pick out her next words carefully. When she’s about to speak, she realises EUNSOL has fallen asleep across the table, clutching the shot glass tight. Carefully, she pries it out of EUNSOL’s grasp and throws on a blanket on her sister’s back. With her spare hand, she strokes EUNSOL’s hair.

Choi Iris, the one with the honeyed gaze and the plump cigarettes loves her cigarettes menthol and her coffee sweet and doused in cream. It’s a shame she isn’t any sweeter for it; a tragedy many refuse to swallow without the spoonful of sugar. She’s all misplaced arpeggios of laughter when a fatuous comment catches her attention, scorn veiled by apathy etched across her countenance, that condescending smirk that one would dismiss as an involuntary muscle spasm. As if anyone could love her, a statement she grew accustomed to hearing and subsequently, believing in.

Iris had been moody ever since she was a child, irreverent and often choleric, most would steer clear of her unless she went through the daunting task of patching up the cracks in her personality, like plaster on filamentary lines. The problem didn’t lie in her abhorrence for the world but she loathed trying, deeming nobody worthy to try for. Her father had taught her very young that those closest to you are impermanent and his revolving door approach to paternity were early lessons on distrust.

Iris’ mother taught her that her beauty could be weaponised and monetised simultaneously and at the age of seven, she was entered into the modelling world, her penchant for masks fostered at such a tender age. Her mother’s greed saw for her daughter that she would be the cynosure of all eyes and control was a tricky conundrum in the Choi household. Food, clothing, makeup, lovers; all had to be approved by mother dearest and soon Iris was toying with tiny rebellions. Growing up, she would indulge in reckless behaviour to spite her mother staying out late when she had shoots the next day, smoking, alcohol, wanton nights out on the town. Exasperated, her mother packed up all their stuff and hauled off to South Korea, hoping that she would build a flourishing modelling career and avoid the free lifestyle Iris was living in New Zealand. Iris succumbed and for a while her behaviour was quelled by the fascination for her motherland and her demanding career. She managed to finish school and by twenty-two she had ceased counting all the places she had been to and the landscapes she had seen due to her occupation. Her mother had relaxed some, granting her a loosening up of the reigns.

All was well until Iris stumbled across an enigma with a generous pocket. Her dalliances with relationships were always cut short by her mother and anything done in secret wasn’t long-lasting enough to become love but when a man came to her in a coffee shop promising her the world, she thought she found something close. He was in his forties, dwelled in the upper echelons of society but he was looking for a distraction from his withering marriage. Iris thought about how her mother’s whole being would shrivel up should she found out that she was a kept woman, her heart twinging ever so slightly at the chaos it would cause. It wasn’t enough to deter her, however, as when he offered to move her to her own luxury apartment in Mapo-Gu, she jumped at the chance. She couldn’t say she loved him, but she loved his affluence and the risk of driving her mother to the edge of no return. Surely that was enough?

no matter what he does, sejoon feels like he never quite gets the smell of sesame oil out of his hair. the most terrifying realization was when he buried his face in his pillow, the deafening concert of the cicadas blaring through the window as he recognized the same smell in his linen pillow case. from then on he stopped dropping his aching body onto his bed right after work, even though every  weary bone yearned for the comfort of the mattress. instead, he lets the burning hot shower stream perform a factory reset on him, his brain idle but somehow running at 100 miles per hour simultaneously.

roaring laughter is what he earns from his father whenever he claims soju to taste bitter. “it’s sweet! you’ll get used to the taste,“ is the standard answer and sejoon has learned better than to disagree. the fault does not lie in the clear liquor. the sweetest strawberries, the most sour gummies, the richest red wine, the spiciest chicken - they all leave a bitter taste on his tongue.

the same bitterness seethed in his gastric acid whenever he met his friends and he despised himself for it. there was no vocabulary poignant enough to convey his envy when they voiced their complaints over boring classes, strict teachers and the approaching exam season. he had stopped thinking of all the things he would do and give up to be in their place, for it was in vain. they would often blame time-consuming classes and the countless hours spent studying as the reasons for the amount of get-togethers growing thin, but secretly sejoon did not mind the scarce contact. the less he was reminded of what he had been denied, the more he could ignore it.

the times he could not ignore it was when his brother visited. dazzling star park sehun, seoul national university attendee, medicine student. there had only ever been enough money to pay for one son’s rent, to sponsor one son’s tuition, to finance one son’s hakwon. of course it had to be the eldest son, who else. the honor of helping at the family restaurant was bestowed onto sejoon instead, a process to give the establishment into his experienced hands eventually.

when his older brother and his posse of medicine, law and engineer student friends frequent the restaurant and threaten to empty out the entire soju stock in one evening, sejoon cooks with his lips tightly pressed shut. his brother does not smell like sesame oil, he smells like gucci’s memoire d’une odeur. “it doesn’t have to be snu,“ he had begged his parents. any university would have been fine, he would have moved to busan if necessary, the tuition at pukyong national university was affordable. his pleas fell on deaf ears, the answer was always a firm no. blood, sweat and tears had been poured into the restaurant, too much to give it into stranger’s hands once mother and father decided to retire. it had to stay within the family, someone who would not run it into the ground, someone who knows it inside out.

sejoon does not hate the place. the two moons is decently popular enough among locals to have regulars and interesting enough for tourists to frequent and take pictures for their instagram account. hell, perhaps he would have studied business and management and taken over the restaurant at one point anyway. but he cannot help but see a metaphor in the way he routinely pours leftover samgyetang from a guest who did not finish his meal down the drain. wasted efforts.

complaints are rare, that does not mean they are non-existent. a veil of friendly demeanor covers them nicely at all points, sometimes he scares himself when his customer service voice manages to win the upper hand even outside of work. sejoon was not born stoic, but every second spent not doing what he wanted turned the characteristic up a notch. laughter has become less frequent, he cannot remember the last time he laughed until he ran out of breath. some days he gives it his all at the restaurant, stays late till after closing to count the register and mop the floors, sometimes he is barely mentally present. he is unhappy with either.