She cleared the table, washed her dishes, and wiped down all the surfaces, trying to keep the kitchen as clean and tidy as possible. The landlady wasn’t neat herself, often leaving food out accidentally or forgetting to clean up spills on the stove. But Mina wanted everything to be as clean as this old kitchen, with the grease on the walls and the broken cabinet doors, could possibly be.

She reached her arms above her head to stretch before lying down in bed, where she stared at the ceiling. She remembered when she had gotten the news that her husband and daughter had been killed in a terrible accident, when the police officers had arrived at her apartment door. All she could imagine was the horror of their excruciating pain. The red blood seeping from their bodies onto the street.

What had she been doing that day at home? She must’ve been cooking or cleaning. Or had she been watching television? Was it Sunday or Saturday? She didn’t know. Wearing an apron, she had opened the door, and seeing the men in uniform, her heart fell to the floor. She wanted to scream but couldn’t. Instead, crying, she had fallen, knees and palms on the ground, begging this life for mercy.

Margot

Fall 2014

DOWN RESIDENTIAL ROADS, MOSTLY FREE OF PEDESTRIANS at night with an occasional family walking or children playing on the sidewalk, Margot and Miguel drove to Hanok House. Mrs. Baek had said, Your mother used to bring you to the restaurant that I worked at, Hanok House. Do you remember? It looked like an old traditional house, lots of wood everywhere.

There was no reason not to believe what Mrs. Baek had claimed about her mother—connecting her mother’s recent grief to the death of a lover, the man in the obituary. But Margot still wanted to scope the place out, where she and her mother spent time, a place that both her mother and Mrs. Baek had left behind. And besides, after all she and Miguel had been through these past several days, they needed a feast to reward themselves.

Koreatown, like many ethnic enclaves in major cities, had been changing slowly. White people who had once fled now edged their way back—particularly youth hungry for cheaper rent with access to supermarkets, bars, and restaurants. Yet when areas “improved,” did the lives within them get better also, or were they pushed away to somewhere cheaper to make room for the droves, the new blood? Soon developers would follow to demolish and build over the place, rebranding the symbols and the signs of the people who lived there (the “kitschy” culture and the “foreign” architecture, the novelty of foods once deemed disgusting). Would her mom have been one of those priced-out people, too? Or would she have clung stubbornly, maybe even found a second job so that she could stay in Koreatown? With her limited English and inability to drive on the freeway, the choices would be slim.

In a brave mood, Margot had once asked her mother in the best Korean she could over the phone, “Why don’t you go back to Korea? Why do you live here?” She had always wondered why her mother had chosen this life, which couldn’t be easier than living in Korea where she would at least speak the same language, possess the same cultural understanding and history as everyone else. Even though Margot knew very little about her mother’s Korean life—that she was an orphan who mostly worked in clothing factories from her teens through her twenties, eventually learning to design clothes—she couldn’t understand why she would rather be in a country where she had so little power, such few rights.

Her mother had paused for a long while.

“I would be too far away from you,” her mother had said.

Margot pulled into the narrow, one-way parking lot of Hanok House, a stand-alone restaurant in the style of a traditional Korean residence with rustic wood shutters and a sloped, gray-tiled roof. She had never been to Korea herself, and although she knew its cities were full of skyscrapers and electronic screens, she often imagined the homes to still look this way—charming, earthy, and functional.

“Did you ever hear back from Officer Choi?” Miguel asked.

“No, not yet.” Margot sighed, pulling the key out of the ignition. “Mind if I give him another try now before dinner? Maybe he’s still at work.”

“No worries. I’ll be managing my prolific Grindr.”

Margot laughed while pressing the police officer’s number.

“Hey, Margot,” he answered. “Sorry I didn’t return your call today. Mondays are the worst.”

“No problem. Any thoughts on the landlord? The yelling from my mom’s apartment?”

“I thought it was interesting. I mean, he wasn’t certain where the yelling was coming from and on what day, right?”

“He thought it was my mother. There aren’t a lot of Koreans left in the building. He wasn’t certain, but it seemed odd to me since my mother wasn’t particularly noisy—especially after I moved out for college. Anyway, it seemed suspicious enough for him to bring it up, don’t you think?”

“Hmm. I can stop by. I’ll try to talk to him this week, see if I can get any more details.”

“That would be great,” she said, heart quickening. “Also, before you hang up—I know this might sound weird, but last night, I was going through my mother’s apartment and found this obituary she had saved. It was from the Korean news paper back in October. So today I went to the swap meet where my mom worked to see if any of the other store owners had seen anything suspicious around the weekend she died. One of my mother’s friends, a woman named Mrs. Baek, said that the man in the obituary was . . . a man that my mom was seeing over the summer. They were dating and . . . he was married, so she didn’t tell anyone.”

“And you didn’t know about this guy?”

“No.”

“But he’s dead now, right? Since October, almost two months ago?”

“Correct,” she said. “I don’t know if you could do this or if it’s related to my mom’s death, but is there any way you could find out some more information on him? His name was Chang-hee Kim. I think he lived in Calabasas.”

“I could look into it . . . but let me first talk to the landlord, okay? I’ll try to get over there this week.” He paused. “But if her boyfriend died back in October, I’m not sure what that would have to do with your mother’s death.”

“What about his wife? He was having an affair with my mom.”

“Hmm, that’s a good point. I can look into it.”

“Great, thanks. I would . . . almost want to talk to her myself? Is there a way to get her phone number or address? I tried googling his name, but—”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“What do you mean?”

“To be honest . . . your mother’s death was an accident. There’s not much we can do unless something substantial happens, some revelation, or we find out for whatever reason that your mother’s death is connected to some other activity.”

“What?”

“And what if Mr. Kim’s wife doesn’t know about the affair? What if you revealed the affair to his widow by contacting her? You have no proof that she was involved in your mother’s death, so how would we get any information from her without revealing that her husband was cheating on her? There’s a chance she doesn’t know, right?”

“I suppose so, but—”

“How would you find out whether or not she knows? You couldn’t. You’d have to ask her outright, and there would be no reason to ask her about your mom if her husband wasn’t cheating in her mind. There’s no real other connection. She’s a widow. It’d be—”

“I still think we should—”

“I know this is a lot, Margot. You’re . . . finding out a lot of things about your mother, things that she kept from you for a reason, right? Sometimes those things are hard to accept, and you want them to be connected to the hardest fact of all—that she’s gone. I get that.”

“You can believe whatever you want, Officer Choi.” Her voice rose. She could feel Miguel’s eyes on her. “But I absolutely refuse to settle for anything but the truth. I need to know what happened that night and why—”

“Margot—”

“You might think we’re some kind of burden on your workload, but my mother worked her ass off, and she paid taxes like everyone else. She was an honest person. She was kind.” Her voice cracked. “Maybe she wasn’t a perfect mother or person, but she tried her best to do what was right for me and for everyone else—except herself. People like my mother hold up this sham as much as you.”

“Yikes,” Miguel whispered.

“That’s not it, Margot. That’s not what—”

“She deserved to live like everyone else. You of all people should know better. ‘To protect and to serve’?”

Margot’s ears pulsed. Tears filled her eyes. She could hear both Officer Choi and Miguel breathing, startled by her voice. Now was the last chance to stand up for her mother, whom she had been ashamed of for so long. She tried to muffle her crying.

“I’ll try to get you some more information, Margot,” Officer Choi said, resigned. “I’ll talk to the landlord. I’ll see what I can find out about Mr. Kim.” He paused. “I know you don’t think I do, but I understand more than you would know. I get it. I’m just trying to be realistic here. I am sorry about your loss.”

“Lord,” Miguel said after she hung up the phone.