Tarim sat at the table with a proud expression.
“The doenjang was fermented last year. This is when it tastes best.”
“You make your own doenjang?”
“Making and drying the meju is kind of fun, actually.”
The idea that a towering photographer like her made her own doenjang was unbelievable. It’s rare even for ninety-year-old grandmas to do that nowadays.
And it wasn’t just the stew. The individual rolled omelets were so perfectly smooth they looked cut with a knife. The spring cabbage kimchi was flavorful enough to devour two bowls of rice with just that. Hoshik crunched on the spring cabbage and asked:
“Aunt grew this herself, right?”
“Yep. Tastes good, doesn’t it?”
“The spring cabbage is alive! If she went pro in farming, she’d hit it big.”
Apparently, there was someone who regularly grew and shared vegetables. Just then—knock knock knock!—a sharp knock rang out from the front door. Tarim jumped up and ran toward it. Lee Gyeom muttered, “Aunt’s like a psychic,” and made eye contact with Muru.
“She lives next door. She often brings us vegetables or side dishes.”
“A lot, often, and generously,” Hoshik added.
Tarim’s cheerful voice greeted the visitor: “Auntie~!”
Muru turned toward the living room to see Tarim walking in with a middle-aged woman.
“Come eat with us, Auntie.”
Tarim clung to the woman’s arm affectionately. The short, round woman entered the kitchen with a stiff expression. Muru quickly swallowed her food, stood up, and bowed politely.
“Hello. I’m new here…”
The woman didn’t change her expression and instead focused her gaze on Tarim’s back as she went to fetch utensils.
“I’m Joo Muru… nice to meet you…”
Something about her felt… blunt and different.
That was Muru’s impression of her. Lee Gyeom stepped in to smooth over the awkward first greeting.
“She’s just really shy. Don’t worry, Aunt’s like that. Go ahead and eat.”
The way he said it implied “Please understand.” Muru, a bit flustered, picked up her chopsticks again.
Lee Gyeom casually pulled out the chair for her, and Hoshik brought over another bowl of rice. Everyone acted like it was normal to have the neighbor woman join them for a meal. Hoshik gave her a thumbs up.
“Auntie, this spring cabbage is amazing! As expected!”
The woman finally opened her mouth after entering the house, chopsticks in hand.
“…Gave it fertilizer, bought seedlings from the seed shop…”
She pronounced “seed shop” a bit off as “jongmosa,” and her speech wasn’t clear overall—like someone who didn’t use their facial muscles much to speak.
Tarim placed the stainless-steel tray she’d been carrying, still wrapped in cloth, onto the table.
“Whoa!”
All three of them gasped at once. The tray was piled high with glass noodles stir-fried with fish cakes and vegetables—enough for three people.
“Ooh, fish cake japchae! My absolute favorite!”
Lee Gyeom casually took a big bite, and Muru also picked up a few strands. Tarim introduced Muru.
“Auntie, she’s the new person who moved into our house. From now on, you can just say, ‘Muru-ya.’ Got it?”
Auntie responded not with “yes” but more like an abbreviated “mm,” picking out only the fish cakes and piling them on a small plate.
“This is Aunt Kang-shin, who lives next door. She often brings us these delicious things.”
“…Mmm.”
Somehow, Muru felt like she understood the reason behind the aunt’s blunt speech and actions. Someone whose thoughts and actions didn’t come easily. Tarim, Lee Gyeom, and Hoshik’s extra kindness toward her made sense now.
Aunt Kang-shin awkwardly pushed the plate of fish cakes toward Tarim’s rice bowl. Tarim grinned, and Hoshik rolled his eyes.
“Ugh, again! Auntie only likes Tarim!”
“She gives all the fish cakes to Tarim with japchae and all the meat to Tarim with jangjorim!”
Aunt Kang-shin didn’t make eye contact with anyone. She just intensely watched Tarim eat, focused entirely on the food she had given her.
After Lee Gyeom and Hoshik left for work, only Tarim and Muru remained in the house. Aunt Kang-shin had lingered around the sink offering to do the dishes, but Tarim insisted she go home. Quietly, silently, she slipped out amid the morning hustle and bustle.
“…Aunt Kang-shin is… a special person.”
Tarim brought coffee to the freshly cleared table as she spoke. Muru simply replied, “Mm…” and didn’t pry further.
“She has level 3 intellectual disability. There are too many bad people in the world, you know? After her grandmother passed away and she was left alone, my mom took extra care of her. Aunt doesn’t have other family. My mom treated her like a real sister. She used to always say you never know how people behave when alone with someone vulnerable. That someone had to keep watching. It’s safer when people know someone is watching.”
“She was right. Your mom sounds like an incredibly wise woman.”
“This house originally had an attached cottage. My mom split the land and registered it under Aunt’s name.”
It was the first time Tarim had mentioned her mother. Muru knew she inherited this house but hadn’t heard anything about her parents until now.
“She was known for being kind even when she ran her pharmacy.”
So Tarim’s mother was a pharmacist. Maybe that’s why Tarim was such a kind person—he was raised by someone warm-hearted. Thinking about his mother seemed to make Tarim’s voice misty, like he was recalling something distant. Muru noticed the brief emotion.
“What about your mom…?”
“She passed away. Three years ago… four, if you count by year.”
“…Then your father’s alone?”
Tarim paused, confused for a moment, and then said:
“Ah, right. I forgot.”
He’d forgotten how little she knew about him. It hadn’t even been a full day since Tarim confessed everything to her.
“I don’t have a father, Muru.”
“Ah… I’m sorry.”
“No, I don’t mean it like that.”
He took a moment to gather his thoughts.
What Muru knew and didn’t know. What she had known, and what she had forgotten.
“You knew before too—I was adopted.”
“Huh?”
Adopted?
“My mom had lost a child—when the kid was five. I grew up in an orphanage since birth, but she adopted me when I was ten and brought me to Junsan. I transferred schools at the end of 3rd grade and joined your class in 2nd semester. You, Hoshik, and Lee Gyeom were all born and raised here. I’m a bit different. My mom wasn’t originally from Junsan either. She graduated pharmacy school, became a single mom, and moved here with her daughter when she was a baby. She bought this house and opened her pharmacy then.”
Ah…
That’s why losing her memory always felt so guilt-inducing. Because it meant hearing someone’s life story twice.
Especially a personal story like Tarim’s—that must’ve been hard to share even once.
“…I’m sorry, Tarim.”
“Nah, it’s fine. Everyone in town knows. Mom worried a bit before we moved here, about how people would react to her adopting an older kid. What if they looked down on me for being from an orphanage? Even the nuns were worried. But Mom had a big heart, and the church members helped me adjust.”
“So she was Catholic.”
“Yep. The orphanage was Catholic too. All the teachers were nuns. I don’t know for sure, but I think that’s how we connected. She used to go to Bongnim Cathedral.”
“Are you Catholic too?”
“I try to go to Mass if I don’t have a shoot on Sundays. I’m not the most faithful, though.”
Muru could picture it now. A woman arriving in Junsan with her baby, with no ties to the area. How she gradually connected with people through the church, creating a community for herself and her child. A woman who didn’t give up on parenting even after losing her daughter. A woman who raised someone so kind. The woman who once owned this beautiful house.
“I… must’ve met your mom often, huh?”
“…Yeah.”
“I wish I could remember at least that.”
“…She really liked you, Muru.”
“……?”
“She said you had stars in your eyes.”
“Huh?”
“That the baby’s eyes sparkled like stars. You were quiet but full of curiosity. If she saw you passing by while she was in the pharmacy… She used to call you something. I can’t remember what. I think it wasn’t in Korean… Maybe English.”
Maybe it was a nickname or a pet name. The fragments Tarim passed down about the forgotten Muru felt like a fairytale born in Bongnim-dong.
