Indelible Memories
There are memories that refuse to fade, no matter how much time passes.
Things like the cool breeze that stirs on a stifling midsummer night, the damp air at dawn, or the sour bite of a lemon candy that makes your mouth ache.
Young Yeo-won was certain today would become one of those memories.
“I should have gone with you, old man. How am I supposed to live now that you’ve left me like this…”
The sound of her weeping echoed through the empty funeral hall like a dirge.
“How am I supposed to live…”
Beside her grandmother, who beat her chest violently and poured out endless tears, Yeo-won stared blankly ahead.
In the portrait photo nestled among white chrysanthemums, her grandfather wore a gentle smile.
Despite her grandmother’s wailing, Yeo-won only blinked her large eyes slowly, her gaze fixed on the photograph.
The sight of a child silently watching a portrait—when she should have been crying—struck the mourners as somehow unsettling.
Villagers who had come to pay their respects began to whisper among themselves.
“Look at her, just look…. Her grandfather adored her more than anything, yet she doesn’t shed a single tear. Tsk.”
“Exactly. She ought to be grateful they took in an orphan with nowhere else to go.”
The adults who had always disapproved of Yeo-won clicked their tongues and added biting remarks.
The cautious murmurs gained strength from agreement and gradually grew louder.
“Ugh. Seeing her like that makes that rumor feel all too true.”
“What rumor?”
Mrs. Park put on a grave expression, covered her mouth with one hand, and whispered.
Her deadly serious face made the people around her tense up and strain their ears.
“Oh, that one. Ghosts. The rumor that the girl can see ghosts is everywhere. It’s not just once or twice she’s muttered to thin air and then screamed herself hoarse.”
At Mrs. Park’s words, the village head—who sat in the middle—snorted in disbelief.
“Aigoo. Has the old woman lost her mind? We were having a normal conversation and now you’re spouting nonsense! Who would believe that? She’s not a child.”
“It’s not nonsense! The whole village is talking about it!”
Mrs. Park huffed indignantly and launched into the story.
It had happened not long after Yeo-won came to Inwol with her grandfather.
The villagers, pitying the little girl who had lost her parents so young, had welcomed her with rough kindness.
Adults who felt sorry for her would occasionally offer her candy or snacks and pat her head with sympathetic faces.
Yet instead of showing gratitude, Yeo-won would flinch and pull away from their hands more than once or twice.
Each time, her grandmother would apologize profusely to the villagers and scold Yeo-won harshly, as if putting on a show.
Still, the villagers were generous enough. They would even restrain the grandmother, saying the child must be heartbroken after losing her parents.
A few days passed like that, and then the incident occurred.
Mr. Yoon, who had been gathering wild greens on the mountain and only descended after sunset, spotted a child walking alone along the embankment in the distance.
He narrowed his dim eyes and peered at the child. Darkness had fallen quickly, making it hard to tell who it was.
Whoever the child was, the countryside at night was no safe place for one so young to wander.
Especially in the deep mountains of Inwol, where night fell so thick you could barely see a foot ahead, and wild boars frequently came down from the slopes. Worry was only natural.
But the direction the child was heading seemed wrong.
Village children usually headed toward the small clearing at the entrance or toward town, yet this child was going in the exact opposite direction.
The child was walking straight toward Mount Inwol.
Alarmed, Mr. Yoon quickened his pace.
If the child entered the mountain at this hour, it would be a disaster.
Yet the closer he drew, the clearer the soft muttering became.
Mr. Yoon’s face hardened at the child’s voice.
He assumed there must be another child hidden in the shadows whom he simply hadn’t seen yet.
Since they had apparently slipped out without their elders’ knowledge at this late hour, he intended to give them a good scolding and take them home.
Then the child suddenly stopped in front of Mount Inwol.
By the time Mr. Yoon caught up directly behind, his eyes widened in shock.
It was Yeo-won—someone he had never seen outside the house before. He blinked rapidly in surprise.
Yeo-won was shedding large tears and speaking into empty air. The sight made Mr. Yoon hold his breath.
‘If you come… hic… all the way here, you promised… you’d let me meet Mom and Dad… sob…’
Her tiny hands trembled as she muttered words that made no sense.
‘I don’t know. I don’t know anything. I don’t have anything like that.’
She even shook her head, insisting she didn’t know.
It should have been simple to just take the child away, but his body refused to move.
It felt as if something were pressing down on him, like sleep paralysis. The eerie sensation left him unable to lift even a finger.
Mr. Yoon swallowed hard and turned his gaze in the direction Yeo-won was facing.
There was only a single willow tree marking the entrance to Mount Inwol.
Just then the wind blew, making the tree’s slender branches sway.
A sight that would normally mean nothing felt unnervingly ominous today.
The thin branches seemed almost to be beckoning, inviting them closer.
It was the moment Mr. Yoon stood transfixed by the tree.
The instant the wind died, Yeo-won’s crying stopped as well.
When Mr. Yoon turned to look at her, the child had gone deathly pale—blue-white to the point that it would have been better if she were still crying.
‘No… No, no, no!!’
She shook her head slowly, then collapsed to the ground and screamed.
‘Aaaah! Aaaaaaaaah! Let go! Let me go! I don’t want this! Mommyyyy!’
Yeo-won wailed hysterically, scooting backward on the ground. She pushed against the dirt with her palms, legs kicking wildly.
There was clearly nothing there, yet she was being dragged little by little toward the mountain as if someone were physically pulling her in.
‘Help me! Please help me! Aaaah!!’
At that moment, had Mr. Yoon not snapped out of it and seized her hand, she truly would have been dragged into the mountain.
‘Hey! Yeo-won! Come back to your senses! Hey!’
Yeo-won, gasping in Mr. Yoon’s arms, soon went completely limp. Pale as death, he hoisted her onto his back and ran for home.
The wind blew again. On the path home, his legs felt strangely heavy.
Mr. Yoon tried to ignore the chilling sensation on his back and tightened his grip on the child he carried.
When Mrs. Park finished the story, she rubbed her arms as though covered in goosebumps.
After that incident, the rumor that Yeo-won could see ghosts spread rapidly among the villagers.
As if to lend the tale credibility, she would sometimes burst into terrified tears at the sight of passing residents.
After several such episodes, even those who had dismissed the rumor began to avoid her, one by one.
The village head laughed awkwardly and glanced at Yeo-won.
“No way…”
By then Yeo-won was no longer looking at the portrait, but at her grandmother prostrated on the floor in tears.
Or rather, she seemed to be looking slightly above her grandmother.
“Who knows… Maybe the ghost took her grandfather in her place…”
At that moment, Yeo-won shot to her feet. The villagers who had been watching her furtively all flinched in unison.
While they wondered whether she had overheard, Yeo-won brushed past them and hurried outside.
Once she was gone, the village head let out a small sigh and barked.
“Enough with the ridiculous talk! Eat your food! Finish up and go home!”
At his shout the villagers exchanged glances and lifted their cups.
The head emptied his glass in one gulp, then took a spoonful of the spicy beef soup.
The yukgaejang that had gone cold while listening to Mrs. Park’s tale tasted unusually heavy on the tongue.
*
Outside, Yeo-won looked around, eyes darting. Her large eyes moved restlessly, searching for something.
A small light flickered in the distance. It was unmistakably the blue flame visible only to her.
“W-wait.”
The light drifted slowly behind the funeral hall, moving with lazy invitation, as if urging her to follow.
Yeo-won glanced anxiously between the spot where the light had vanished and the funeral hall. She thought of her grandmother crying alone inside.
But if she didn’t follow now…
After a brief hesitation, Yeo-won made up her mind and began to walk.
Behind the funeral hall lay a deserted mountain path. At its entrance, the light she had been chasing hovered alone.
Yeo-won stared at it blankly and whispered.
“……Grandfather.”
“As expected, you can see me. My sweetheart.”
The grandfather wore the same gentle smile he always had.
“But why did you pretend not to notice me earlier?”
“It’s all right. Tell me.”
“Yes… your grandmother always hated that sort of thing.”
“What are you saying? Why would I hate you? Grandfather is happy I can talk with my sweetheart like this.”
“Yeo-won. Everyone dies someday. No one can choose the day they go. For Grandfather, today was simply that day.”
“My sweetheart. Shall we make one promise, just between us?”
“Yes. When you become an adult, you must leave Inwol. Even if you return, do not stay long…”
“And never, under any circumstances, enter Mount Inwol.”
“Yeo-won, please…”
Yeo-won had been watching him the entire time he sat above the portrait, patting her grandmother’s heaving back, answering her desperate question of how she was supposed to live by telling her to stay healthy for many years. She had simply watched in silence.
“Just…”
When Yeo-won trailed off and lowered her head, he patted her back encouragingly.
At a voice smaller than a mosquito’s buzz, her grandfather gave a bittersweet smile.
Every time Yeo-won flinched at the sight of villagers, her grandmother would fly into a terrifying rage.
To that furious woman, Yeo-won had once summoned the courage to say that ever since her parents died, she kept seeing strange things.
That day had been an unlucky one—her grandfather had been away at the five-day market.
She hadn’t expected much. She had only wanted a little warmth and comfort.
Instead she received only her grandmother’s look of utter contempt.
‘You… never speak of such things to anyone. It’s already humiliating enough in front of the villagers. I don’t want to hear them say the child has gone mad on top of everything!’
Her grandmother’s wrinkled eyes had been clouded with fury and disgust.
After that day, Yeo-won held her tears back at least in front of her grandmother.
She had learned that crying solved nothing.
But it was all right. She still had her grandfather.
“……Do you hate it too, Grandfather?”
Tears pooled in the eyes of the girl who asked so carefully.
Unlike her grandmother, her grandfather had always taken her side.
On nights when she saw those things, she would have nightmares, and he would stay up reading books to her until dawn.
Because of him, she had endured countless terrifying nights.
Yet she had never been able to tell him the full truth.
She was afraid he would look at her with the same eyes her grandmother did.
That was the one thing she could not bear. She did not want to be hated by her grandfather of all people.
That was why she had endured it. Acknowledging him at the funeral would have exposed all her lies.
But that was over now.
The moment she saw him leaving the funeral hall, her body had moved before her mind could stop it.
Yeo-won’s whole body trembled.
Just as she feared he might dislike her for lying, a hearty laugh rang out above her head.
Yeo-won looked up at him with a dazed face. Through his transparent form she could see the clear sky.
Seeing her grandfather’s fading body, she finally released the tears she had been holding back.
“Is it… sob… because of me that you died, Grandfather…?”
At her question his laughter ceased.
Everyone she loved had left her.
It was always the same. Her mother, her father, even the bird Pipi she had raised.
“People said the ghost took Grandfather instead of me…”
Tears spilled heavily down her pale cheeks.
If that was true, why hadn’t it taken her instead? It would have been better if it had taken her.
Those left behind suffered more than those who departed.
Living on with memories of love was not an easy burden for a child to carry.
Yeo-won had learned this cruel truth far too young.
That was why she prayed every night. If there was a god, please do not take Grandfather.
She prayed to every religion she knew, yet reality remained brutally merciless.
As the months passed, her grandfather’s coughing grew worse and his body weaker.
“I’m… sob… I’m sorry. It’s because of me.”
Yeo-won had eventually concluded that anyone she loved would die.
Her grandfather looked down at the girl sobbing bitterly, his face filled with sorrow.
He pitied her deeply for having shouldered too much at such a tender age.
He bent down and wrapped her in his arms.
No warmth came from the grandfather who held her. At that realization, Yeo-won cried with all her heart.
Knowing time was short, she still could not stop weeping. An indescribable loneliness and desolation surged over her like a tide.
If even Grandfather left, she would truly be alone.
Regardless of her tears, her grandfather’s form grew more and more transparent.
His transparent hand brushed her cheek.
Her grandfather wore a stern expression she had never seen while he lived.
Mixed within that strictness were pity and lament, leaving Yeo-won no choice but to nod.
When she did, a warm smile returned to his lips.
With a voice that sounded as though it might crumble to dust, her grandfather vanished at last.
Left behind, Yeo-won heard voices calling her name from far away.
Rain began to fall from a sky that had been clear and cloudless.
“Sob… hic… Waaaah…!”
The droplets that began as one or two soon poured down in torrents.
The sound of rain mingled with the sound of crying.
The scent of wet earth she had smelled that day, the incense from the funeral hall, and her grandfather’s final words lingered in her mind for a long, long time.