Chapter 2

○ Joy ○
My name is Jennie Kim.
In this moment, I should be. As my
aunt –or should I say mother– is
serving me dinner together with
Uncle Suro.
My aunt, Jessie Kim, Kim Suro’s
wife, is suffering from a major
trauma. They lost their daughter
Jennie in a car accident a year
before they met me. She became a
mute after she lost her one and
only daughter. It was devastating
for her husband, losing both his
daughter and his wife in different
ways. But that was until I came
into their lives.
The day I met Aunt Jessie was
when I was begging for a work at
one of their sites, for a job as a
construction worker. I was
desperate at the time, knowing full
well that as a woman, being
accepted would be close to a
miracle.
I exited the small built-up office
they had at the site with dismay
when someone grabbed the wrist
of my almost malnourished body.
It was Aunt Jessie. She hugged me
tightly in an illusion that I was her
daughter. Continuously calling me
in a name that wasn’t mine, I told
her that she was mistaken. It was
also on that day when I first met
Uncle Suro. Uncle Suro, who saw
where his wife was, ran to where
we were, shock completely all over
his face. At the time I didn’t know
exactly why he had that face, but
now I knew. It was because it was
the first time after the accident
that Aunt Jessie spoke.
That day was the day when Aunt
Jessie has fully realized her
daughter’s death. I was the
trigger, as they said. It took a few
weeks before she finally accepted
it. The unexpected thing was, she
asked people to look for me,
telling people she wanted to see
me again.

Finding me was easy for them.

They had the ability to do that in a
city as big as Seoul. They had the
money. They had the people to
look for me. The day they found
me was also the day when my
uncle gave me a job –the job that
saved me from my impending
demise.
Aunt Jessie became fond of me,
always telling stories about her
daughter and how I reminded her
of Jennie. I didn’t know if that was
a good thing, but to Uncle Suro, he
was just happy to have her wife
back. Soon enough, even his
husband has grown fond of me as
well.
The next week after that, they took
me in. It was Uncle Suro’s order
after learning I was homeless,
sleeping at the office –where they
gave me work for a living– every
night. The only few clothes I had
in my backpack were my only
clothes, the restroom became my
bathroom, the free lunch at the
cafeteria, my only food. It was
enough for me but they were not
okay with it.
Aunt Jessie was elated when I
started living with them. They
made me Joy. And I will always be
more thankful than they say they
are to me.
Everything became fine and
normal, until after a few months,
when Aunt Jessie has suddenly
shown traumatic symptoms again,
mistaking me for her daughter,
Jennie. It would take a whole day,
and then the next day it will go
back to normal. In my first year of
living with them, instances like
that hardly ever happened. Then,
it occurred almost every month,
and then every week. It has
happened more frequently as time
went by, and the only solution the
doctor gave was for me to just
pretend to be what my Aunt wants.
My aunt’s sickness has become so
serious that every time she’ll see a
photo of her daughter, she’ll have
a panic attack. That was when
Uncle Suro made his decision and
asked me for a favor –a favor to
pretend to be their dead daughter
whenever it’s needed.
Every memory of Jennie was
removed, erased, and hidden to be
forgotten. Everything was
replaced by me –the undeserving
me.
It was sad. I felt very sad for them.
I was feeling guilty of taking a
place in a family I could never
deserve. But I would do anything
for them, even if I have to pretend
to be someone I wasn’t for a
lifetime.
Nowadays, Aunt Jessie still has
these frequent episodes, like
today. There are times she’ll call
me Joy, and times she’ll see me as
Jennie. But I was used to it by now.
So every week when I come to visit
them for dinner, I always prepare
myself to be the lost and innocent
daughter to the family I owe my
life to.