깡패

"Jeong-ssi, where are you going?"

I quickly buttoned my slacks and turned away to finish dressing, all grogginess gone from my head. She sat up in bed, clutching the sheets to her chest as if ashamed of showing herself to me despite what we'd done the night before. I could think of nothing except that I would be late and that it would be a golden opportunity wasted because of a woman. She continued to call my name to get my attention, but I wasn't listening anymore. I started to walk out when she threw something at me. Whatever it was missed me by almost a whole arm's length and clattered to the floor. I turned around just long enough to glare at her.

The angry expression froze on her face and gave way to fear, which I had anticipated. I briefly considered striking her outright, but it would take effort and time, and I was already late. I could not afford to miss this, even if it meant letting her insolence slide. I turned away and slammed shut the door behind me.

It was faintly humid, as if summer stubbornly clung to the air despite that it should have been waning by then. The summer sun had lost the worst of its heat, but it was still quite hot outside. I quickened my step toward the marketplace and hoped that I wouldn't look like a peasant in my secondhand suit and scuffed-up shoes. I looked very out of place walking around like that, especially during the war time when everyone suffered its ill effects, but people were strangely energetic today, chattering in loud tones about varying topics. It was a side of my country that I hadn't seen in many years, and if I hadn't been in such a hurry, I probably would have been curious.

When I came to the gang's building, Min Jeong was waiting for me as we had planned. He was leaning against the building, watching people walk by, with an unreadable expression.

It had been a long time since I'd seen my brother. I was still too young to really understand what had happened when he was taken from the family and forced to work in Japan. He had been officially released with the other Koreans who had been forced into labor, but due to his poverty and the Japanese apathy, he hadn't been able to return to the city until only a few weeks ago. I had seen him a few times since then, but we hadn't really spoken in that time. He was a lot more withdrawn and less apt to speak idly. In fact, our mother complained to me that he hadn't said more than a few sentences in all those weeks he spent with her. I didn't know what happened to him. He never told me about it, and I didn't press it.

I bowed slightly to him and he returned my bow with a nod. After the formalities were over, I gauged his expression, but I could never quite read him, especially after his return.

"You're late," he observed unhappily.

"Out with it, hyeong," I said mildly, trying to keep the annoyance out of my voice.

"It's about the Japanese. I heard from some of the others that you're thinking of going with the next ferry. You don't really plan to go there, do you?"

"Of course I do, brother! Can't you see all the opportunities just ripe for the taking?" I indicated the building behind him. "Look, I know you're loyal to this gang and I was too, but we can do a lot better than this if we are in the right place at the right time, and do the right things. The gangs here don't have any sense of timing. Japan is a new place with different and possibly better opportunities. We can be leaders. We don't have to be followers forever."

"You can't promise that we'll live a better life there! You haven't been there before! Look at everything they've done to us. Look at what they do to Koreans who were born there." He narrowed his eyes at me, his cheeks flushing a bit with annoyance. "I can't believe that after everything those bastards have done to our people, you would want to live with them."

"It's not about living with them or enjoying their company. It's about what their country has that ours doesn't. They've been in the business longer than we have. They have more receptive markets, and the Americans have done us quite a favor by cornering the Yakuza. If we go there, we can take over. We won't need to worry about them anymore. You really don't see the profit we can make from this?"

"Profit is one thing, but what are you willing to give up for it? How much is dignity worth to you?"

I shook my head. "This has nothing to do with dignity. It has everything to do with possibility. I can be average here or I can be great there. That's all there is to it."

"Look, man, I'm not a saint. I'm far from it." My brother met my eyes and his gaze was intense, accusing. "But even I have standards about the people I work with. You go there, you will be working with that filth. You work with them, you become like them. A Japanese is not my brother."

I paused for a moment, too stunned at his sudden intensity to know what to say.

"You go there, you stay there," he said, holding my eyes. The muscle in his jaw twitched. "There will be no place for you here." Before I could say anything, he turned away and began to walk inside. It was then I noticed the fingers that were missing on his right hand. I watched my brother disappear into the building, and stood alone in the street for a long time, wondering what to do. Eventually, after warring with myself for a long time, I turned around and took a step away from the building and toward the life I believed would be best for me.

It was horrible... at first.