Purple Hyacinth Exchange

When your loved one leaves to war and never comes back...

[Year 1913]

"Ah-Jin, what is wrong with your head?" Hui-Won asked, so casually that I wanted to puke. Insulting me without pausing to think for even a second--he really was the worst sometimes. "Don't worry about it! I'm going to be perfectly fine, understand?"

On the balcony, Hui-Won and I hugged each other and immediately started to cry. We hugged because both of our first loves had been granted. We cried because, just days after our love for eachother had been noticed by the other, our peace had been shattered. There was a chance that I would never see him--and he would never see me--ever again.

"I must go, Ah-Jin," Hui-Won stated coldly. Mechanically, like an automaton that had been drained of its movement, I let go. While making hand-motions for Hui-won to leave I forced on a smile. It was an obvious fake, even I knew that. But somehow, with shaking hands, I couldn't force on a more realistic one. 

"You have to come back!" I cried. Hui-Won was aiming to rebel or something like that in Japan. Three years ago, Japan had taken over Korea. Bombings had already occurred a couple times, most men were forced to go work in Hiroshima and Nagasaki to make the same bombs that had destroyed us. Hui-Won had been faking death to avoid being a slave to the Japanese and making killing tools. Because of that, we hadn't been able to marry.

If he were to come out of this mess alive, that would mean marriage. An actual one with a minister and a church, instead of a mental one where Hui-Won had simply given me a ring of grass and a hug.

After straightening out his back, Hui-Won turned around for just a second to tell me in a loud, enthusiastic voice- "I'll be back soon!"

+~+~+~+~+

[Year 1914]

Azaleas. They represent first love, something anyone with experience in flowers would know. My mother had been the owner to a flower shop before she died two years ago and passed it onto me, but I'd never been interested until I realized that Hui-Won had a mania for flowers. He had been the one to teach me the meanings to so many flowers, something that had come in handy when I was trying to sell the sniff-able little things.

Today is Hui-Won's birthday, December fourteenth. Today's also our first anniversary, something he's not here to celebrate with me. I don't know when I'll ever see him again. I'm willing to wait long, even forever, but I don't know if I'll be able to say the same in thirty years. Did I mention? I turned fourteen about a month ago. Father beat me for still not being married,and was about to engage me to a poor man living in the south.

Again, if he were here I'd have slaved him around in the shop. There was one customer today--a rare occurrence, seeing as there is little money for us Koreans after what Japan did to us--yet I did not know what a flower for blossoming hope was. When I finally figured it out hours later, the customer had already left. I tried to lift the plant up, but it was way too heavy and I almost broke my wrist. Wait... did I say I would have slaved him around? I meant hug him and ask him for advice. Yeah. That's it.

Waiting for him... Stop thinking about it. Why's he not coming back? Don't! My daily thoughts are always interrupted by my worries about Hui-Won. I don't even think it's love anymore, I think it's obsession. Worry has made me into a stalker, and I need Hui-Won to help me stop feeling in such a way. Another reason for my need for him, except he's probably lying dead in Japan... Quit it!

The Japanese are taking land, and they don't even have official ownership to take them. What do they think they are. Just because they took over us. And to think they- four years ago- assassinated the emperor Lee (Yi) and his family! Unforgivable!

Ayumi is now what everyone calls me. When the Japanese people told us that it would be nice of us to change our names to something Japanese, some of us didn't have a choice. Others did, but our family didn't. I am now officially Ayumi Park. Ayumi because that was one of the "common" names from Japan closest to Ah-Jin, and we didn't have to change our last name.

He said he'd come back. I should have asked him when. But I didn't. More than the fact I miss him, I'm worried that each and every day I'm turning into a stalker, and it's making me into an over crazed psycho. The rate at which I think of him daily increases,and that scares me. So. Much.

~+~+~+~+~+~

[Year 1916]

I found a package in my mailbox. There was no sender on the package, only a recipient (me). I vigorously opened it for sign of life in Japan, only to find a dead flower. The flower had a small trace of life, a tiny tint of purple. Instantly I knew what the flower was called. It was a purple hyacinth. A flower that represented apologies, sorrow, and a craving for forgiveness.

It's from Hui-Won. I know it is... or maybe I'm just thinking too much.

+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+

[Year 1920]

I am now twenty years old and married to a Japanese man. His name is Yoshi Tachibana, and he's fairly nice except for when he treats me like s**t just because I'm Korean. The way he treats me becomes worse when he's with his friends, but a man gotta keep his power, right? I never would have married him, except my father forced me. Besides, I was hugely lacking in money.

I know little Japanese, and he knows no Korean. We manage to communicate through Japanese however, and he beats me--compared to his, my father's beatings are like flies tickling me--when I mess up a slight word. I must study Japanese, and study, and study...

Now that I am married, it is stupid and pointless for me to keep thinking about Hui-Won. I do it anyway. It scares me, my stalkerish dedication is very terrifying. I can't help myself, to my disappointment, as I keep thinking about him.

~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~

[Year 1921]

"Ayumi," Yoshi calls for me. "There are guests coming over. If you don't get your butt up here and cook I'm going to report you to court for bad behavior."

His threats are perfectly serious, and I'm not going to be let go without beating and a death penalty. These days, men are better than women and only what the Japanese say are right. What chance of surviving do I have? I get up and cook sleepily. I don't even think about what I'm cooking, and instinctively I set to chef up Korean recipes.

"B***h, what the f**k do you think you're doing?" Yoshi screams at the top of his lungs after I have cooked for an hour. "You're cooking Korean food. We want Japanese food! What country are you in? Korea doesn't even exist anymore!"

I am sweating pain, not grasping why he didn't correct me earlier. Memory check! According to my memories, the place we're in is still Korea and he's being extremely rude to me. I cook again for another hour, and hide the Korean food to eat in private later in the day. Yoshi's clearly nicer to me than most Japanese are to Koreans, but I still can't stand him at all.

Ring, ring, periodically the house bell rings and guests come in. I speak in Japanese greeting and they frown and complain to Yoshi about the fact that his wife is Korean. And then they all spit out a greeting back to me, glare at me, and sit down to chat and eat. 

The doorbell rings for the seventh guests. I open the door to see a black haired man kissing a short brown-haired girl. What a nice thing to do in front of somebody else's door, but I suck my anger back in and greet them. I lose my energy and collapse as soon as I notice the guy's face. I know that man.

"Hui-Won?" I mutter. The two stop kissing and start speaking to each other. The girl looks irritated while Hui-Won has an awkward look to him.

I can barely make out what the two are speaking to eachother, they are speaking way too fast. But I can make out the just of things, and the girl is complaining about whether or not Hui-Won knows me. Hui-Won is denying it, and he seems to now have a Japanese name. Ikkane.

Angrily, I seek revenge on Hui-Won. Hui-Won who dumped me, Hui-Won who betrayed me. Yoshi's one of the high rankers, nobody knows why and how he married a Korean like me. Is this why? To show me ultimate dispair? The others pay no attention to me as they chat on and on, eating so fast they're almost choking on their food. Yoshi, however, has seen my reaction and is suppressing a smirk. But I could use the fact that he's of high rank. I could use it to punish Hui-Won. I was waiting for him so long, and I see him with another girl. The utmost betrayal.

"Hui-Won, Hui-Won~!" I laugh. The girl glares at him then at me. She opens her mouth to speak.

"This isn't Hui-Won he's Ikkane Tsukumoshi." she states in a cold voice. I shake my head and start speaking using all the Japanese I can muster up.

"Has he ever shown you I.D.?" I ask in poor Japanese, but I can say quite a few things fluently after all the studying I've done. That's when I realize, he would have forged an I.D. by now. "It fake. Forged. He an illegal Japanese, a Korean turned Japan. Real name is Hui-Won Joon. Realize how while he speaks fast he has same accent I do. We grew up here both, you should be able to see the way he has hair up. Like the average, modern, Korean.."

The girl seems to believe me as she screams the exact words I said to the others--just more fluently. The others don't believe the two of us at first, but they double check his I.D. and see the flaw the all missed years ago. I can't see the flaw, they do. And most importantly, they notice the accent that he has been trying to disguise as something else for years.

I fake up tears and ask Yoshi, "may I talk to him first?"

He, along with his comrades, coldly states that I may not. Everyone believes that I will make up a dark plan to escape with him. That I will discuss Japanese army secrets with him. I decide to use sign language to communicate with him.

Purple hyacinth means an apology and a desire for forgiveness. You mailed me it to dump me. I'll give it to you just before you die. Take it as a blessing- no, as a curse. 

Hui-Won makes a slight nod, and then I faint. When I wake up again, nobody's there. I make a run for the nearest police area. As I'd thought, everyone's gathered there. They're watching the men prepare for beatings of the guy who forged up a Japanese identity.

"The object we'll hit him to his death with are metal poles, and they're covered by towels. No marks on his dead body, but it'll hurt twice as much and kill him twice as fast!"

It's Yoshi speaking. I raise my hand.

"May I be the one to give him a beating?" I ask, my left hand behind me and holding onto twenty five flowers. One's a purple hyacinth. The others...

"Yes you may," Yoshi says, raising his brow.

I go up until I am behind the blindfolded Hui-Won. He's lying down. I drop the purple hyacinth where I stand. I am still hiding the other twenty four flowers. Then I take off the felt around Hui-Won's eyes.

"See that? It's a purple hyacinth. I'm sorry, sorrow, all that stuff."

And then I drop the remaining flowers. They're all roses, all twenty four of them. The others in front of me are looking up in confusion while Hui-Won starts counting with his eyes puzzled.

"You told me once what twenty four roses meant. It's something you give as a replacement for saying, 'I'm forever yours'. Maybe I should have gotten fifty, for unconditional love." I only now realize I am crying.

"Bye-bye." I smile the smile I gave him when he first left me. That one day eight years ago that changed our lives forever. And then I start beating him up with all strength I can muster up. Remembering the pain he gave me, yet remembering the love we once shared. Remembering the friendship we shared even before that. Remembering....

Remembering.

Reviews

[Narnie]

Excellent Anime style here. Although I am not very knowledgable on this genre, I sat down in front of the exhibition in Tate Modern of some Anime art and was completely enthralled by it. Your enthusiasm and your use of language is extremely good and I wish you lots of luck in developing your style. I think you will do very well. :)