The Target(111)
Chung-Cha’s hand moved involuntarily. She was gripping not a knife but a teaspoon. Min watched as the spoon made thrusts in the air. Then Min gripped her hand and said, “Are you okay, Chung-Cha?” Her voice was fearful.
Chung-Cha looked down at her and put aside the spoon. She readily interpreted the fear Min held: Is my savior, the one person who stands between me and “back there,” going mad?
“Memories are sometimes as painful as wounds on the skin, Min. Do you see that?”
The girl nodded, the fear slowly receding from her eyes.
Chung-Cha said, “We cannot live without memories, but we cannot live within them either. Do you understand that?”
“I think that I do.”
“Good. Now finish with that tomato. When the rice is done we will have our meal.”
An hour later they set aside their bowls and utensils.
“Can I work on my writing now?” asked Min, and Chung-Cha nodded.
The girl rushed to get the tablet and the pen.
But before she returned there was a knock at the door.
They never summoned Chung-Cha by phone. They came and got her. She knew why this was. Just to show that they could do so at any time they wanted. And she would have to drop whatever it was she was doing and obey.
Min’s face scrunched up as Chung-Cha rose to answer the knock.
The men there were not in military uniforms. They were in sleek slacks and jackets with white shirts buttoned up to the neck. They were young, nearly as young as she was, and their angular features were smug.
“Yes?” she said.
One of the men said, “You will come with us, Comrade Yie. Your presence is required.”
She nodded and motioned to Min. “I will leave her with my landlord.”
“You do what you must, but you will hurry,” said the same one.
Chung-Cha put a jacket on Min and walked her down to her landlord’s apartment. She spoke a few words, apologizing for the lack of notice, but the landlord observed the two men behind her and issued no protest. He simply took Min by the hand.
Min still held her tablet and pen. She looked up at Chung-Cha with wide, sad eyes.
Chung-Cha said to the landlord, “Can you work with her on her writing, please?”
The landlord looked down at Min and nodded. “My wife. She is good with that.”
Chung-Cha nodded, took Min by the hand, and squeezed it. “I will be back for you, Min.”
When the door closed behind Min the other man said sneeringly, “Your little bitch from Yodok, right? How can you stand the smell?”
Chung-Cha turned to the man and stared up at him. The look in her eyes caused the sneer to drain from his features. She could kill this man. She could kill them both with a teaspoon.
“Do you know what I am?” she said quietly.
“You are Yie Chung-Cha.”
“I did not ask if you knew my name. I asked if you know what I am.”
The man took a step back. “You…you are assigned—”
“I kill people who are enemies of this country, Comrade. That little bitch will one day do what I do now, for our country. For our Supreme Leader. Anyone who speaks ill of her I will treat as an enemy of this country.” She took a quick step forward, closing the distance between them by half. “Does that include you, Comrade? I need to know. So you will tell me. Now.”
These men were important, Chung-Cha knew. And what she was doing right now was very dangerous. But still, she had to do it. It was either that or her fury would cause her to kill them both.
“I am…not your enemy, Yie Chung-Cha,” the man said, his voice quavering.
She turned away from him, her disgust ill-concealed. “Then let us go to our meeting.”
She walked down the hall and the men hurried after her.
Chapter
60
IT WAS A DILAPIDATED GOVERNMENT building. The paint was cheap, the furnishings cheaper still. The bulbs overhead dimmed and brightened as the shaky electricity made its way through the corroded lines like blood through clogged arteries. The smell was sweat mixed with cigarettes. The packs of cigarettes available here carried the typical skulls and crossbones on them, but apparently no one in North Korea cared. They smoked. They died. What did it matter?
Chung-Cha stopped at the door indicated to her by one of the men who had come for her. The door was opened and she was ushered in. Then the two young men left her. She could hear their polished shoes tapping down the faded linoleum.
She turned to face the people in the room. There were three of them. Two men and one woman. The black tunic was one of the men. The general who had been Pak’s good friend was the other man. The woman looked familiar to Chung-Cha. She blinked rapidly when she remembered her.
“It has been a long time, Yie Chung-Cha,” she said, rising from her seat. Her hair was white now instead of black. And her face was creased with age and worry. But it had been many years. Time did that to all. There was no escaping it.