“As long as you need me.”
“Then you can leave tomorrow.”
His curt response surprised her even though she had expected it. Pouting, she said, “I’m sorry. I wanted to come home. I really did.”
Examining the inky legs of Merlot after swirling it in a glass, he said, “I always defended you to Umma. I always said that you would change, that this running around that you did was just a phase. She never believed me.” He paused to take a sip but stopped and said, “She never stopped worrying about you. She wanted you to come home.”
“I couldn’t.”
He swished the wine in his mouth while closing his eyes as the singer stretched the final note of the song into a tremulous crescendo before the music abruptly ended. Then he said coldly, “Well she’s dead now. Your room is ready for you. You can stay as long as you like.”
“I’m here for good now, Daddy.”
“Good. Then take a bath.”
V.
For most of her life, Grace took comfort in structured divisions of time. In Portugal, it was divided into two distinct phases, sobriety and inebriation, and sleep comprised much of the former. When she traveled, time was neatly separated between periods of movement—planes, buses, tourist sights—and periods of rest—hostels, campgrounds, restaurants, airports, and bus stations. But at the winery, time had sprouted into infecund vines of indolence. Except for meals, she rarely saw her father, who remained aloof to her presence. A distant relative from Korea performed all housework. Being several years Grace’s minor and unable to speak English, she avoided Grace, whose Korean had become rudimentary. There wasn’t much work necessary in the field as well. Because of a drought, the grapes were harvested and crushed prior to Grace’s arrival, and any other manual labor was accomplished by a few hired hands. There wasn’t even any alcohol to drink except for wine, which Grace hated, so she drank Mountain Dew from a can through a straw—wedging it in the gap in her teeth from habit—and gobbled Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups by the handful to curb her newly insatiable sweet tooth.
But in the periods of inactivity, when books and movies and TV programs lost her attention, the fact of her mother’s death resurfaced like a cold sore in Grace’s mind. Everything about home reminded Grace of her: the couches, which still remained pristine because she had forbade anyone to sit on them except for guests; the curtains, which Grace would hide behind as a child when her mother was mad; the dishware, which she remembered packing countless times; even the dust: although her mother meticulously cleaned the house every week, she always missed a spot behind the mirror on Grace’s dresser, and Grace would cherish this spot as if it were a holy shrine.
Anchoring these memories was the realization that Grace should have returned sooner. She was after all her mother—the one who patiently braided her waist length hair everyday before school when she was twelve; the one who bought her every book she wanted to read; the one who encouraged a degree in English; and the one who sent her care packages filled with candies and cakes every month while at Yale.
Lying in bed one afternoon, Grace tried to reconstruct her reasons for not returning as if they were Lego pieces to be snapped together again into a building or a car. But the pieces were missing. Despondent, she studied a banner hanging on the wall. It had her Korean name, Hye-Jung, written in calligraphy. The first grouping of characters for “Hye,” which meant Grace—the moniker she would adopt despite her mother’s lifelong dismissal—had two letters in it. The first was a circle connected to a horizontal line with a smaller parallel line above that, and the second consisted of two vertical slashes with two smaller cross strokes pointing to the left almost like an inverted “f.” Both letters were drawn to fit neatly inside an imaginary box, a rule that dictated all syllables written in Korean, no matter how many letters.
Grace thought about how it was emblematic of her relationship with her mother, and recalled when she was a child helping her arrange her father’s clothes on their bed in an outline of a human body: a maroon tie with blue stripes; an azure shirt starched and pressed; creased khaki pants looped with a belt; and navy blue socks pristine as if new. That servitude, that lack of individuality, that was why she didn’t return. To escape her Korean American cave and experience the life. “Yes, that was the reason,” she said to herself emphatically and pictured her apartment, the missing door, rickety table, and longed for its comfort.
VI.
Paul was coming for Christmas. For his annual winter trip, he had decided to drive across America in a used van he had bought. His plan was to stay at the winery until the New Year; then he would begin his trek across the continent, finally ending in Vancouver to stay with relatives until the summer, when Grace would meet him to return to Portugal. Paul arrived on Christmas Eve in a maroon Chrysler Minivan, freckled with dirt on the exterior’s faux-wood paneling, and emblazoned with a bumper sticker that announced: “My son made honor roll at Grover Cleveland Middle School.” Having smoked a joint an hour earlier, Paul was jovial when he met Grace’s father, complimenting him on his estate and asking questions about his grapes and the wine making process. A half hour later when Grace wandered down to the winery looking for Paul, she found them in the tasting room, cradling glasses of wine.
“You don’t drink alcohol,” she said, standing in the doorway.
“I do too,” replied Paul and guzzled his Merlot, swishing the velvety liquid in his mouth before jettisoning it into a spittoon. “I just don’t swallow.”
When Grace’s father poured some Cabernet Sauvignon, the two men began conversing about the brambleberry fruit flavors tethered to the tobacco finish as Grace stood in the doorway fuming. She finally took a seat when her father presented Paul with a cheddar cheese ball and crackers. It would be another hour—and another cheese ball—before they left.
“I don’t see what the big fuss is about your dad. He’s a nice enough guy,” Paul said.
“I said the same thing about your mom,” replied Grace, “and I wasn’t stoned.”
Grace led Paul to a guest bedroom where she locked the door, and they proceeded to have sex. Terse conversation followed, this despite months of separation. Since Paul never called, only corresponding by email, Grace had wanted nothing more than to hear his cluttered Australian voice mumble as only he could about his family, home, his friends, even his less-than-masculine minivan. And she had longed to tell him everything that had been fermenting inside her about living here, about her relationship with her father, and about the memories of her dead mother. But for some reason she grew agitated at his garbled pronunciation and inaudible tone, drowned by the wind outside.
After they had sex again, Grace craved a Peanut Butter Cup. She ate it in the kitchen, breaking the cup in half and licking the gritty peanut butter from its shell before nibbling on the ridged perimeter. Finally lapping the chocolate prints on her fingers, Grace felt satisfied as only a Peanut Butter Cup could induce in her and returned to Paul’s room when a memory of their first sexual encounter splashed through her mind: on the stairs, both drunk, her spine in pain from the wooden steps while her left hand gripped the railing. There was such passion, such animalistic desire their first time. She wanted that desire, that sensation now. But when she opened the door, she found Paul curled on her bed with the head of a yellow teddy bears lodged in his mouth. Quickly removing it, he said, “Sorry, love. I was just bored,” and smiled, accentuating the silver stud shining in his lower lip.
VII.
Grace and Paul exchanged gifts when they awoke. She gave him a pearl white cashmere sweater, elegantly wrapped in green paper with a magenta ribbon tied in the corner, which Paul tore apart with one swipe.
Holding it aloft, he said, “Why did you buy me this?”
Grace replied, “It’s cashmere. I figured you’d be cold here. Feel how soft it is.” Grace stroked the sleeve.
“No, why’d you buy me a turtle neck?”
Staring at the extra six inches of flaccid fabric, Grace repeated that it was cold and thought he would need it.
For Grace’s present, Paul gave her a CD of various punk songs, which he had burned. He didn’t even have a case for the CD, having removed it from a sleeve of disks.
“You know I hate punk,” she said.
“Don’t be so ignorant,” he replied. “This is way better than that Tori Amos crap you listen to.”
Christmas dinner was equally unpleasant for Grace. With all of her nearby relatives in attendance, they ate a roast leg of lamb in a cabernet sauce with rosemary potatoes, a green been casserole, and various other side dishes. Everyone ate ravenously, including Paul, who happily devoured the lamb.
“You don’t eat meat,” Grace cried out when her father passed him a slice.
“I love lamb. Besides, you have to bend a little for holidays.”
“But I’ve never known you to bend for anything,” she thought while biting the end of her straw.
Grace sat quietly through the rest of dinner, finally excusing herself when her father turned on the karaoke machine in the living room. Paul followed her, though pausing briefly to watch her father croon a rendition of “Silver Bells” in Korean, and found Grace in tears, sitting on the floor. He asked what was wrong and she told him she didn’t know.
“Well, love, I told you it was a stupid idea to come back here for all this time.” “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Lots. You know, the whole dead mother thing.”
“The dead mother thing? God, you’re as tactful as a brick sometimes.”
“Well I tried,” he said and picked up a stuffed animal. Tossing it into the air like a football, he added, “Why don’t you eat some more chocolate? That’ll calm you down.”
“I don’t want chocolate.”
“What do you mean? You always want chocolate. In fact you’ve eaten so much of it, I’m surprised you’re not fatter than you are.”
To that response, Grace bit his foot. It wasn’t the first time she had bitten someone although it was the first with Paul.
“What did you do that for?” he cried and inspected her teeth imprints.
They spoke no more that night, and the next few days passed without much fanfare. Paul left the vineyard three days before the New Year. Grace didn’t try to stop him and gave him a light kiss on the lips as a goodbye. He said he’d write her a postcard from Vancouver. Then he departed, forgetting to take his cashmere sweater. Grace didn’t remind him, having packed it back in its box with the return receipt on top.
VII.
By April Grace was ready to leave. She purchased her tickets immediately but waited to tell her father until the day she departed. She found him outside on the deck, eating blueberries and drinking Vidal Blanc while Carmen played, accompanied by the buzzing of bees and flies overhead. Vivid in the clear sky, the sun covered the deck with light when Grace eclipsed it. He looked up.
“I’m leaving now,” she announced. He glanced at her bags on the steps of the deck, then at Grace. Bracing his hands against his armrests, he tried to stand but Grace told him not to rise. There was no point.
“Very well then,” he said. “Visit again soon.” He squeezed her fingers, like when she was a child, surprising her. She wished to respond in some way, to return this subtle sign of affection, but all she could think to say was, “Why here? Why now?”
From the gravel driveway came a blue Super Shuttle van. Her father let go, and Grace glided to the edge of the deck where it overlooked the pond. A koi appeared near the surface, its vibrant orange scales shining through the muddy water, followed by a few smaller, grayer fish, rigid in their triangular formation. Grace felt suddenly awed by the koi’s phosphorescent beauty and followed it as it swam through cattails and lily pads. Then it paused, hovered, its dorsal fins flickering against its forward motion, before it sank back down into the murky depths, leaving the other, duller fish to peruse the surface.
Slouching over the rail, Grace grieved at first for the koi but then for her father, for the gesture he had given her and for the time she had wasted here, and then for her mother. She should have come home sooner, she thought, this time believing in the certainty of her sentiment unlike before. As tears streaked down her face, she clutched the rail and fought the urge to crumble from the pain. She could do it, she thought. Drop where she stood so that her father would get her, hold her, make her stay, make her forgive the past, like an old vine sprouting new fruit.
“If the koi reappears, I’ll do it,” she thought, and stared at the spot where it had descended, occupied now by the three gray fish. She waited—one minute, two minutes perhaps—when her ride honked. Pressing her tongue into the gap in her teeth, she thought, “Maybe my luck has run out.”
VIII.
After learning her flight to London would be delayed for several hours, Grace waited in the terminal, eating cinnamon buns and reading a romance novel she had purchased at a newsstand, finally finishing it as they taxied to the runway—the great whirl of the engines making it seem as if they were already in the night sky. An obese man eating fried chicken sat next to Grace. He tore pieces of skin and flesh from his grease-stained bag, and sucked biscuit crumbs from his palm between slurps from his over-sized soda. Nauseous, Grace huddled next to her window as they took off. The lights on the ground grew smaller and dimmer, reminding her of pictures on a Lite Brite board. But as the plane turned, its wing obstructed her sight, and Grace felt again the grief that had earlier consumed her. “If only the koi had come back,” she said to herself.
When the plane continued its ascent, peeling into a patch of clouds seen only from the lights of the plane, the air pressure forced Grace to swallow several times without success. She grew increasingly hot as well, for the breeze from the vent barely brushed her face. Fidgeting with her seat belt and longing to recline, Grace felt helpless as she gazed at the lights on wing of the plane. She wanted to get out, leave now, but where would she go? “There’s no place left for me,” she thought. Then she recalled how as a child she dreamed of walking on clouds, believing it was possible even after she learned of their true composition, and now wished to be out there, as a carefree child, suspended by the sparse wisps of precipitation that stretched for miles in the stygian sky, oblivious to all that was around her, both real and imaginary, and both present and waiting.