The Girl Who Wrote Loneliness Read Online Free PDF

awake in the early hours of dawn. The sole of my foot hurts when I think of the silence of the pitchfork, sunken deep under the water, which makes me toss and turn and reach my hand out to touch Cousin’s forehead, her eyes. If she seems to be sleeping, I shake her awake.
    “What is it?”
    I almost bring up the pitchfork, then decide not to. But I do not want to lie awake alone, so I keep reaching for Cousin’s forehead and eyes, until she slaps my hand with her palm.
    Cousin is nineteen years old. She uses scented lotion on her hands. When I get back to the dorm room after washing my face, she uses cotton pads to dab skin toner around my skin, pressing gently. Then she speaks to me in a whisper.
    “One of our teachers, Mr. Kim, isn’t he dashing?”
    I nod. Mr. Kim teaches liberal arts. It is from him that I hear about the life of words, instead of industrial labor force, something I have not heard about sincearriving at the training center. He tells us life is beautiful. Did he also tell us what made it beautiful? I cannot remember. He simply said, “Life is a beautiful thing.” What its beauty will bring us, and what its beauty will take from us, he does not say. Simply beautiful, is all he says.

    Everything turns white inside my head. I think of the entrance of the industrial complex. I stand at the entrance of the industrial complex, with Cousin by my side. Where did everyone go, leaving only Cousin and me here? There were twenty of us sharing one dorm room, but I cannot recall a single face. Out of the blue, a pair of eyeglasses appears then disappears again. The only reason I remember this face is because it was the only one wearing glasses, not only among our roommates but in the entire dormitory. So it is the eyeglasses that I remember, not the face itself. A pair of black plastic-rimmed glasses placed on a pale face. And I only remember a single name: Kim Jeong-rye. In this case it is only the name I remember; the face has been erased. All I have left is a faint impression that her face was rather big compared to her body. Kim Jeong-rye. The name belonged to an orphan. Each Saturday, when we are given permission to spend the night outside the dorm, this name leaves the Job Training Center, saying she is going to visit her orphanage. On one of these Saturdays when Kim Jeong-rye has gone to the orphanage, a commotion breaks out in the dormitory.
    “The bread is gone.”
    “I lost my wallet.”
    “My clothes!”
    We open Kim Jeong-rye’s locker. It has been emptied out. Was Kim Jeong-rye really an orphan? Whichever the case, it turns out Kim Jeong-rye has also taken Cousin’s lotion and she does not return when roll call comes around Sunday night. She has deserted the training. Alsogone are seven of my new panties and three of my new handkerchiefs, which Mom bought in town and folded up for me into small squares to be packed with my other things.
    Even when the weekends come around, Cousin and I have nowhere to go. We do not even know which roads lead where on the other side of the center’s walls. Those who don’t have anywhere to go play volleyball on the athletic field. Cousin and I join them in chasing after the ball. When we get tired, Cousin and I take a shower at the shared washroom inside the center, scrubbing each other’s backs clean. On other days, we have to finish washing within a given time, but after the trainees leave for the weekend, we can take things slow and easy. After the shower, Cousin lies on her stomach on the hardwood floor of our dorm room, her face smothered with facial cream, and writes a letter to Aunt. I lie next to her and stare up at the ceiling while playing around with my feet. My foot keeps poking at Cousin. Irritated, Cousin suggests that I try writing a letter as well. I roll over on my stomach and whisper into Cousin’s ear.
    “I am going to write something other than a letter.”
    Cousin stares at me, the tip of her ballpoint pen still on the letter