Flowers Where the Fire Should Be
The next day, with my brother Park Yugeon's spirits properly tended, it was time to deal with the work I'd been putting off—if you could even call it work. I hurried off toward Seoul National University. One of the staff who saw me to and from school came along, so the trip itself was no trouble at all.
I've already seen the painting. If I meant to ask about buying it, the assistants' office in Western Painting ought to be the place.
A murmur went up around me. An elementary-school kid wandering a university building was bound to draw eyes, and the students passing in the corridor all turned to look. I hate to say it myself, but I was reasonably cute, and suspender pants with a checked shirt only doubled the effect. Cuteness past any reasonable limit has its consequences.
"Oh my. What are you doing here?"
More than a few of the girls stopped to talk to me. The truth was that I was thirty-five. Anyway.
"Where's the assistants' office?"
"The assistants' office?"
"Western Painting. I came to buy a painting."
"You did?"
I nodded.
"A birthday present for your mom? Something like that?"
"Something like that."
She looked me up and down. Nothing about the clothes suggested a chaebol house. The one exception was the shoes. Feet ought to be comfortable, so those, at least, were a proper luxury pair—but she didn't seem to recognize them.
"The office is straight down this hall, all right?"
"Thank you."
"Hold on."
"...?"
"When you hear the prices, don't get too shocked. Got it?"
Sorry. If she heard the balance in my account, she'd be the one who was shocked. Ahem.
"Thank you."
I bobbed a bow and hurried on toward the office.
Knock, knock.
"Yes, come in."
The door creaked open on an eleven-year-old. The woman assistant, halfway out of her chair, froze in an awkward half-rise.
"What brings you here?"
"There's a painting I already had my eye on."
"You had your eye on a painting? You're not here looking for your big brother or sister?"
"My brother's in sixth grade."
She stared at me, blank. The look of someone encountering this for the first time.
"So you saw a painting, you want to see it again, and you'd like the gallery unlocked. Is that what you mean?"
"No. I'd like to buy the piece."
"What?"
I'd expected exactly that.
"Buy a painting? You?"
"Aren't children allowed to?"
"No, it's not that..."
She scratched her head, plainly searching for the right words to soothe me and send me on my way.
"Do you like paintings?"
"Yes."
"And that's why you want to buy one? To hang it at home and keep looking at it?"
I nodded.
"The thought is admirable, but how do I put this so our little friend will understand..."
"You don't have to worry."
"Hm?"
"I have a lot of money."
"Right. That's how you got this far. But no matter how much money you have..."
That was when someone knocked, and the office door clicked open at the same time. A voice came in without preamble.
"Assistant Kim, the phone in my office is acting strange."
A middle-aged man past fifty: the chair of Western Painting. A few days ago, when I'd come with Song Suhee, we'd exchanged greetings in his studio.
"Get someone over here. It needs to be fixed before I leave for the—"
He broke off.
"...?"
He ran a puzzled eye over me. What business did a child have here? That, clearly, was the question—but only for a moment.
"Well, well!"
He'd recognized me. The stiff expression vanished, and he bent at the waist until his eyes were level with mine.
"Jihoon, wasn't it?"
"Hello, Professor."
"Aigoo, and such nice manners. What a darling boy."
Unlike the bewildered assistant, the chair's response was remarkably quick.
"Assistant Kim, when a guest arrives you offer juice first, at the very least. Are you just going to stand there?"
"Sir?"
"I told you then. Important people had come."
"Ah—yes."
"When I say something, you're meant to take it to heart. Hm? Do you think I dropped that hint for nothing?"
"What do you—"
"When important people visit, you look after them smartly. That's what I meant."
Perhaps he decided that any more scolding would make me uncomfortable. He turned his attention back to me.
"And where is your mother?"
"I came alone today."
"Alone?"
"Yes. I wanted to buy a painting."
"Aigoo, and you're only in fourth grade... already such a refined hobby?"
"..."
"Then again, with Chairman Park's blood in you, of course your taste would be exceptional. And your mother was a promising artist herself, after all."
Left to himself, the man would have been four verses deep in a hymn of praise to Hyeon-gang. The special treatment I'd never once received in my previous life was novel enough, but watch someone whose motives show straight through and you tire of it soon enough.
"I have to be home before my grandfather leaves the office."
I cut him off, lightly. The effect was excellent.
"Aigoo! The grandson has to be back before the Chairman arrives. Of course, of course. Assistant Kim."
"...Sir?"
"What are you doing, off in your own head?"
"I—I'm sorry. It was all so sudden, I was flustered..."
"The young master is busy, so save the fluster for later. For now, Assistant Kim will see him from the gallery tour all the way through the purchase."
"But I... I haven't finished preparing for the afternoon lecture..."
"Are you the only assistant in the College of Fine Arts?"
"Sir?"
"There are plenty in Eastern Painting and Printmaking. Ask one of them to cover."
"Ah."
"What are you waiting for? The young master is waiting. I'll make the call. Go on, quickly."
"Th-thank you."
The gallery. She still looked dazed, but what could she do? A professor had given the order, so she followed it.
"You said you'd already picked one out?"
"Yes."
"Do you remember where it's hanging?"
"Of course."
I walked straight over and pointed at Yoo Seonho's Spiral. Her brow drew tight.
"That's a freshman's painting."
"..."
"There are much better ones. Why this, of all things?"
Because to my eye it was the best. Lee Yoonki's piece, the one Song Suhee had chosen, might surpass it in finish, but this painting held the particular possibility of something still raw and unpolished. The forceful touch had caught me, you might say. The assistant seemed to see it differently.
"Some of the students about to graduate are already being scouted on quite good terms. Want to take a look?"
"Sure."
Looking cost nothing, so I followed her without a word.
"From this wall to the far end, these are the ones we'd call professional. They've done group shows several times over. Stack up a few more pieces and any of them could open a solo exhibition tomorrow without it seeming strange."
Mm. Sorry, but I'd seen these before. She wasn't wrong that you could call them professional. Still, if the question was whether I wanted to spend money and hang them in my room...
Not these.
Yoo Seonho's work, short as it fell, had something that pulled at a person. A force that made you want to keep looking.
"They haven't debuted as artists yet, so even these aren't that expensive."
"I'll take the one I saw earlier."
"If it's the budget, I can speak to—"
"No."
"...?"
"To my eye, that painting is better."
She'd meant it as a kindness. The professor had told her to look after me, so she was trying. But if the person in question was satisfied, there was no reason to press.
"All right. The one from earlier, then."
"Thank you."
"Thing is, the student—Yoo Seonho—said he was quitting school. I heard he was preparing to study abroad, but I don't know if he actually went."
"Then... I can't buy the painting?"
"If he's really gone, there's no way to reach him."
"..."
A turn I hadn't expected at all.
"I'll check the studio. Will you wait here?"
"The studio?"
"The freshmen share one. He said he'd clear his things out before he left, so a look should tell us roughly where things stand."
"Can I come too?"
"Hm?"
"I just wondered how the university students work. I'm curious."
The studio was ordinary. Canvases stood at generous intervals, and that was about all. There weren't many people, either.
"They're in a major class."
So that was why she'd agreed so readily. She headed for a room at the back of the studio, where tall lockers stood in a long row.
"Yoo Seonho..."
She checked the name and opened the locker with a key she'd brought.
"His things are still here. He hasn't left after all."
"He hasn't?"
"As you can see, there are quite a lot of drawings. Too many to throw away without a pang. He wouldn't have left them like this if he'd gone."
She was right. Sketches were stacked thick inside the locker.
"Were you thinking of buying drawings too?"
"If there's one I like."
"Want to look?"
"Is that all right?"
"If he doesn't come for them in time, they're things we'd have to throw out anyway."
"...?"
"We're already being generous. He took a leave after the first semester and still hasn't collected them, even though the second semester is over."
Mm. He was late, all right.
"We could toss them this minute and he'd have nothing to say. And here I am pulling the drawings out because a buyer showed up. He ought to be bowing to me in thanks, and it still wouldn't be enough."
"May I take my time, then?"
"Sure. Sit over there and look as long as you like. I'll call Seonho's house in the meantime."
"Thank you."
After she left, I sat and went through the drawings.
As I thought. This isn't ordinary skill.
But the further I turned the pages, the more admiration gave way to something I hadn't expected. A sense of familiarity. I'd felt something similar looking at Spiral.
How much time had passed? The piled drawings were nearly down to the bottom when footsteps drew closer.
"What am I supposed to do? He's not picking up."
It was the assistant.
"I need to reach him if we're going to sell the painting."
I'd meant to thank her for going to the trouble. But when my eyes landed on the last drawing—
"...!"
I froze where I sat. I couldn't even part my lips. My gaze locked on the picture and would not move.
At the center of the faded paper was a man in a mask. One of a protest, perhaps. He was poised to hurl a Molotov at any moment. And yet, astonishingly, the hand that ought to have held the bottle clutched a slender bouquet instead.
A bouquet... instead of a Molotov?
A name rose at once.
Banksy?
The faceless painter. Banksy. This was unmistakably a Banksy.