20. Short-hair Girl

Once again, I returned to grandma’s home. Father was ready to get rid of Gu Pa Bal home and move again. He could not stay in one place for long.

 

My aunt got separated from her husband and came home. The season was winter and it was during the winter vacation. In Korea, then, the kids would learn English when they move up to the middle school. A girl was getting English tutoring from aunt. It was very basic and entry level English. 

 

Let’s call her “J.” Aunt often went to a fortune teller and shaman. She was a niece of the shaman lady. J’s aunt read fortune, made religious charms, and performed shaman rituals. J lost her father when she was young and lived with her aunt.

 

She was the first female other than my sisters I encountered. Around her, my face turned red and heart beat faster. My aunt often went out and I ended up tutoring her. By the time I got comfortable with her, the winter vacation was over and she stopped coming.

 

Slowly, my thought about her was getting faded. One day, she came in her school uniform, white blouse and black skirt. And she visited me regularly after that. I don’t remember what we talked about. Probably she told me about her school life, and I told her about the books I read.

 

Students of all levels, elementary to high school, had a day trip twice, spring and fall, a year. She gave me bride and groom wooden dolls which she bought during one of these school trips. Looking back, maybe she tried to tell me something. I bought a book of poems and waited for her, but I went back home in Byoek Je and did not see her again. 

 

Once I wrote a letter to her and ask aunt to deliver it to her. She assured me she handed it to her. Nevertheless, I never got the reply. I assumed she forgot about me and moved on. A few years later, she returned. 

 

We had an intercom between the restaurant my parents ran and the house. The intercom rang and they told me there was someone asking for me. I thought they made a mistake. I could not think of anyone who would visit me. Then, there she was with her friends in her purple school uniform in front of the door to my room. 

 

We became friends. She was still living with her aunt. Her aunt lived with a man who had a business. J worked for him during the day and went to the school in the evening. Her school uniform was purple and I liked it. 

 

She had to take a bus and transfer to another to visit me. She had to walk approx. 1 km from the bus station. Buses to the suburb did not run often. Sometimes she had to wait for it for a long time. 

 

She came to see me, at least, once a month. I missed her so much and wrote letters to her. Looking back, I was very self-centered and narrow minded. The environment I was in made me so. I did not have any opportunity to make friends and did not know how to manage the relationship. She was in my mind all the time, and I expected the same from her. 

 

Once we moved to Byoek Je, it was hard for my siblings to go to school. We had a car. In the morning, parents would take them to the city on their route to the market. They had to pick up supplies for the restaurant. Then, the kids would take the buses to their schools. In the afternoon, they all had to take buses home. They wasted so much times on the road. 

 

Parents rented a house in the city for the kids. We lived there without the parents for a while. Once I relocated to the city, it was easy for J to come and see me. She bought me LP records and we listened to them eating ice cream together. How sweet those moments were!

 

After she finished the high school, she got a temporary job at the post office. She started to wear bright color clothes and showed up with permed hair. She was so cute and pretty with the permed short hair. I loved it.

 

I was envious and jealous. She was so excited about the new world opening up to her. She was buying new clothes and putting make-ups. I did not know how to deal with it. I should have given her some space and adjusted to it. I demanded her to just look and focus on me. She was getting tired of my demands. She probably got scared of my obsession. 

 

She said we needed a vacation from each other. I could not accept it. I did not understand what was happening to us. Nevertheless, we agreed not to see each other at the end. I stopped all form of communication with her. I stopped writing to her. That’s how I ended my first love. It hurt me so much. 

 

I was still young and did not know how to deal with the relationship. My self-esteem fell to the bottom. I thought she left me because of my disability. 

 

Many years later, I realized I made the biggest mistake of my life. It was too late to go back. I had moved so far away from her already. I did not know how to find her. I should have been more patient. I should have waited for her. If I contacted her in few months, things might have turned out to be different. Yes, I still miss her.