Chapter 66 - Closure

"You sure were persistent," Jade commented.

"He was being abused, Jade," KJ rolled his eyes. They were observing young Jiwon taking an early walk out of the village. "I had to do something!"

"It's weird to see you actually caring for a person," Jade replied. "You're usually so cold towards people. It's weird to see you helping someone."

KJ ignored his jibe and concentrated on his younger self. Jiwon was walking up the path towards the main city.

"Let's follow him," KJ ordered. Jade shrugged and tagged along, his tail swaying behind him.

Jiwon had a piece of paper in his hand with an address written on it. The place was not far from the village he was staying at; it was only twenty minutes away on a bus. He took the first bus which was en route towards the city.

As the bus sped to its destination, Jiwon could not help but feel nervous. Was the house still there? He wondered. What if someone had it demolished? Or what if there were people living in it? He did not want to intrude. 

But curiosity got the better of him. It was the main reason why he came to Busan. He wanted to see where his mother had once lived. The twenty minute bus journey seemed to have stretched on for hours for Jiwon. Once the bus stopped, he got off. 

He was in the midst of a busy market town. The people around him were busy haggling with shopkeepers to reduce the prices. Many shops displayed freshly caught fish, some of which were kept inside tanks to attract customers. Farmers were showing off their chickens to the customers and butchers hung rows of meat carcasses on their shops.

Jiwon looked at it all in awe. Since, he was sheltered inside a mansion and later in his school for most of his life, the lively marketplace was a marvel for him. He checked out some of the fresh meat and vegetables on display, carefully scrutinizing the quality of the produced goods. 

Moreover, being an aspiring musician, he also listened to the different sounds of the marketplace. He noted the angst in some voices, happiness in some people's tones and even hints of sadness in a few. His keen observing skills were put to use, as he basked in the different tunes of the crowd.

I want to make music which will resonate with the common people, he realized. It was not an epiphany for him, but rather something he knew all along only to realize it now. Renewed with a sense of belonging, Jiwon made his way towards his mother's old house. 

After asking some of the local people and navigating his way through the crowded market, he finally managed to locate the small house. It was grouped with other houses on the street. Jiwon had to climb a long stairway to reach the houses before finally tracking down the unit he was looking for.

It was not a very large house; it was probably as big as his bathroom back home. It looked deserted as there were no signs of life in it. Jiwon peered through the door before knocking it. No one answered.

"Hey you!" a voice called him from behind. He spun around to see a hunchbacked old lady, glaring at him. "Who are you?" she demanded.

"Ma'am, my name is Kwon Jiwon," he bowed down in greeting. "My mother, Song Sia, used to live here."

The old woman's mouth fell in shock. 

"Song Sia?" she gaped at him. "You are Song Sia's son?"

"Yes," Jiwon replied. The old woman's expression softened.

"Yes, I do see some resemblance," she noted. "You have her amber eyes. She and her father lived there."

She pointed at the house behind Jiwon. "But after her father passed away, she left for Seoul, in the hopes of getting a job. Then I heard she got married and had a son. That was the last time I heard from her until news came that she passed away in an accident."

Her tone held heavy sorrow. Jiwon did not say anything, but let the old woman continue talking.

"I wanted to go to Seoul and meet you," she said. "But my hip got dislocated and I could not travel long distances anymore."

"That is alright, grandma," Jiwon assured her. "I simply wanted to see where my mother lived. May I go inside the house?"

"By all means, go ahead my child," she laughed. "And call me Grandma Shin. That's what everyone knows me as."

"Thank you, Grandma Shin," Jiwon bowed once again. Grandma Shin unlocked the door for him.

"The place is quite dusty," she said. "No one lived here since your mother left. I did not have the heart to rent it out to someone else. Please go in."

She ushered him to enter. Jiwon stepped into the dingy house.

It only had three rooms: one bedroom, one living room and a bathroom. There were no furniture in it; no doubt his mother must have sold them off before leaving. He wandered into the bedroom. It was almost empty except for a small desk at a corner.

Jiwon strode towards the desk and tried to pull open a drawer. It was locked but the rust had loosened it over the years. It took him a few tries before he finally managed to break the lock open. Inside, were some pictures of his mother and maternal grandfather.

She had the same eyes as him. Her smile was lopsided just like Jiwon's but that was where the similarities ended. Her face was round and small. Her brunette hair reached till her shoulder. In the picture, she was hugging her father, happily smiling for the camera on her school graduation day. 

He sat there, observing the picture in his hand. This was proof that Song Sia was once a living being. She too laughed, cried and faced her fair share of ups and downs in her life. The picture was proof of what was taken from Jiwon: a family. 

It was hard to determine what to feel. Should he be happy? Or sad? Or a bit of both. Jiwon had no idea. He simply wanted to see the place which proved Song Sia once existed. He came to terms with his parents' death a long time ago. This was just a closure.

Jiwon smiled and put the picture in his bag. There was nothing else in the drawer nor did he find anything of value in the other parts of the house. Taking a last glance at the place, he thanked Grandma Shin and bid her adieu.

As he walked away from the house, he did not feel sad nor was he weepy. Instead, he felt content and strangely peaceful. He did not know his parents enough to feel much for them but he knew that they loved him a lot. Even if they were almost like strangers to him, he came to honor the love they had for each other. 

Love. It was an alien feeling to him. Maybe he would never fall in love. But he was content with the love his parents felt. Sometimes, he wondered whether how did those two get the strength to defy all the obstacles in their way. Was it really possible to love a person like that? Jiwon would probably never know. 

What he did know was that reality is a bitch. Now that he was done visiting his mother's home, it was time for him to rescue Hyun Jung's mother from the clutches of that monster.

With renewed determination, Jiwon boarded another bus to the village, this time deciding to stop by at that abusive household.