Lost 4

Brian's Father cried for a long time. His tears were hot and filled with repressed feelings. He wondered what had happened to filial piety. He wondered what had happened to the commandment, "Obey your mother and father." Then, his ego dissolved almost completely. He cried more and more and more and then wondered who he was. He remembered his Father. He had hardly seen his face. He was always gone, somewhere. He had never known him, and before he knew it, his Father was dead. He cried some more and wondered what it meant to know someone. His son, he was someone else. He was gone to him, gone into the wind somewhere, past the mountains, and past the souls of women who flighted near the seas. His tears began almost to erase his face. He had failed his parents too. He had not passed the examination to enter Seoul National University. He could see the disappointment in his Father's face and then all those times that he did something that was disapproved by his Mother and Father, he could see their disappointment, their eyes almost closing. Now his son, but his son was really something else, a demon almost. What was he to do with him. Tears could not tell him. They could only drop below or release all these words or things he had seen or heard, faint echoes of something half-forgotten or vainly hidden. What could he do with Brian? Did Brian not understand that he was working with as few employees as possible so that Brian could go to the best colleges and become economically secure? Did Brian not understand that this was his way of showing his love toward Brian? Then he wondered, "Why could he not show it to Brian in a more direct way?" Why was he crying alone, showing his feelings to no one but himself and God? How Brian hurt him. How cruel he was. But did he know anything about Brian? Was Brian (nothing) nothingness to be filled by him. Was he an absolute and Brian a nothing? Father, he thought then he thought of all Fathers that he knew and his Father became all Fathers. Was he responsible for what Brian had become? Why? Teardrops roaded down his face and curved into the shadow over his upper neck. Impersonal love... was that all he was capable of feeling? He really wondered and then his thoughts popped, disappeared into holes of mind. He couldn't be anything else than what he was. It was time to work.