Page 8 of The Way Back Home

The playground comes into view past the last row of houses, empty and baking under the sun. The metal slide looks like it’s glowing, and I know that if you touch it right now you’ll burn your hand off. Nobody else is dumb enough to be out here in this kind of heat. Just us, I guess.

“Ryowoon!” I yell, cupping my hands around my mouth. “Yah, Cha Ryowoon!”

Nothing. Just the creak of the swings moving a little in the breeze, empty seats swaying like ghosts are sitting in them. I walk closer, kicking at a pebble, and walk closer to the tunnel underneath the slide, the plastic one shaped like a dome. It’s dark in there even with the sun so bright everywhere else.

I crouch down and peer inside, and my heart does a little jump when I see feet. Bare feet, dirty on the bottom, toes curled up.

“Ryowoon?”

The feet twitch. Then the rest of him shifts, he groans as he sits up too fast and smacks his head on the top of the tunnel, cursing the way his dad curses, using a word I know I’m not supposed to say even though I’ve heard it plenty of times when I’m around him.

“Ow, shit—” He blinks at me, squinting against the light. His hair’s sticking up in every direction, damp against his forehead. His shirt’s soaked through, stuck to his ribs, and I can count them a little too easily through the fabric. His face is red from the heat, and his eyes look glassy and unfocused for a second before they focus on me.

“What are you doing under there?” I ask. “It’s like two-hundred degrees.”

“Sleeping,” he mutters.

“In a tunnel?”

“S’dark. And cooler than my room.” He rubs at his eyes with the back of his hand.

I frown, looking at him harder now that he’s crawled out into the light. The skin around his eye looks all purple and swollen, and when he lifts his arm to rub at his face I see more dark purple splotches scattered down his skin like paint splatters.

“Yah, Cha Ryowoon.” I say, indignant. “Did Uncle beat you up again?”

“Shut up, Seyeon.” He doesn’t look at me as shoves himself toward the edge of the tunnel and slides out onto the sand, wincing a little when his feet push down. He blinks up at me, squinting against the sun. “What took you so long anyway?”

I shrug, kicking at the sand with the toe of my sneaker. “I was waiting to see if Mrs. Yoon was gonna set up her cart. Thought maybe I could get her to give me a fishcake if I promised my mom and dad would pay her back later.” I sigh. “But it’s probably too hot. She’s not coming out.”

Ryowoon looks at me for a second. “Are you hungry?”

I nod automatically, because I am, my stomach’s been squeezing tightly for the last hour.

He frowns, chewing on the inside of his cheek. “Maybe if we go down to the market, we can find something.”

He starts pushing himself up, wobbly on his feet, and I reach down without really thinking and grab his arm to help haul him upright. He doesn’t say thanks, but he doesn’t shake me off either, and that’s how I know it’s fine. We start off down the hill together, his steps a little uneven, leaning to one side, and I slow down so he can keep up.

We stick to the shade where we can find it, ducking along the sides of buildings, past Mr. Han’s gate with the mean dog that barks at everybody, past the laundry hanging limply in the heat. At the cross street Ryowoon stops walking all of a sudden and points.

“Look.”

He means the convenience store on the corner, the one with the striped awning that looks kind of old. The big freezer cooler sits right up near the front, right by the rolled-up metal doors, half tucked out of view if you’re standing at the register.

“Do you want a popsicle?” he asks.

I look at him in confusion. “But we don’t got any money.”

He shrugs. “If we’re quick maybe we can just take some.”

“That’s not nice,” I say, because it’s not. My mom would smack the back of my head if she heard me even thinking about it.

Ryowoon turns and glares at me. “Are you hungry or not?”

I don’t say anything else after that. I just follow him.

We creep along the side of the building together, Ryowoon in front like always, peeking around the corner first before he waves me forward. Through the front I can see Mrs. Nam sitting on her stool behind the counter, the little television bolted up near the ceiling flickering with a drama filled with shouting and crying, the sound crackling with static every few seconds. She has her chin propped in her hand, eyes locked on the screen.

Ryowoon motions for me to follow and ducks low, weaving between the outside shelves stacked with bags of shrimp chips and boxes of instant noodles until we reach the freezer tucked near the edge of the building. It’s one of those chest ones, the kind you have to push the sliding glass top open to reach inside, and it’s got a layer of frost built up along the seams that makes little crystal patterns.