On Sundays at their mother’s, things no one wanted to keep ended up on the balcony.
The balcony was already full. Two unplugged fans, a bent drying rack, three boxes of dishes wrapped in newspaper, and their father’s armchair filled the space to the glass. No one had decided whether the chair belonged with the furniture to sell or with the objects moved from room to room because a dead man had sat in them.
Ji-won worked by category. On her left, albums to digitize. In front of her, photographs to distribute. On her right, a shoebox for duplicates. Their mother sat on the floor, peeling off adhesive corners with her thumbnail. Ji-eun passed behind them with a roll of packing tape around her wrist.
“What category did you put the armchair in?” Ji-eun asked.
“The one where you stop asking the same question every twenty minutes.”
“So you’re taking it.”
“No.”
“Mom isn’t taking it.”
“I didn’t say I was taking it.”
“Fascinating, this third way.”
The tape unrolled with a sharp snap. Their mother looked up.
“Don’t argue over the chair. Your father would have hated it.”
Ji-eun crouched beside the book box and said without looking at Ji-won:
“Dad argued about the temperature of rice. He’d have survived an armchair.”
Their mother gave a brief, surprised laugh that made her cough. Ji-won smiled despite herself. It was the kind of line Ji-eun found before anyone else, with a tiny cruelty that landed exactly where it should. Since childhood, Ji-won had always believed they shared that way of remembering: nothing solemn lasted long between two people who knew the same story.
End of excerpt. Discover the other stories in this universe.