Beyond Claire

I keep on saying stuff to myself as to know that I am here. I'm in
front of this mirror and the mirror proves that I am. I can't touch
myself, but when daddy or mommy appear in front of the mirror, I know
that they are there. I can touch their bodies then. It's very simple,
nothing complex at all.


I have friends. I'm not just all alone. One friend calls me
the shadow since I have black hair. I don't like being her shadow, but
it's the game she likes to play. So I play the shadow. I am the shadow,
I say. She is amused. She likes to amuse me in a funny way. She
freezes, pretending to be stuck. I am a shadow, stuck also. I really
don't know where to go. She starts giggling maniacally: "You are a very
frozen shadow. You are so very good at being a shadow." That's what she
says, like it's something I ought to be proud of. I like to soak in her
laughter and feel the laughter too, like I am too laughing, not just
imitating another person who is laughing. Sometimes, I think I'm the
only one who exists. Other times, it is only the others, everyone
outside of myself who exists. I feel like a ghost, yes, a ghost at
times, and yet I am never sure why. It's strange. DO I HAVE MY OWN
LAUGHTER or do I steal it from those who do laughter?


I grow up this way, as a shadow, as a ghost, not really
anything with a body, but someone lost, even a dead person you may say,
trying to find her grave or some place she can call a home. It's just
so tough, not really knowing whether I am not just a shadow of that
girl who made me imitate everything that she did. Later in life, when
my Korean mother locked me up in my room for hours so that I could
study, bringing in fruits (chopped apples, nude pillowy pieces of
oranges, crisp pears), I would often play the game called the shadow. I
would talk to my shadow, never even look at my shadow, but simply talk:



"How are you today, shadow?"


"Very sad."


"Why so sad?"


"I don't have a home."


"My heart is your home, is it not?"


"It's so dark in here. There is no love in here, only
confusion."


I would walk to school in the mornings. Naturally, I did
pretty well in school. After all, I would spend all my time either
studying or talking to my shadow. I had only one terrible problem. It
really started in drawing class one day. I drew myself as a
Caucasian.


"That is not you," my shadow said.


All the other kids also seemed confused:


"Well, it doesn't really look like you."


"It is me. It's as much me as it is you. You're a whole bunch
of idiots anyway. What WOULD you know?"


I felt free after that. I knew that it was a very offensive
thing to say, but I felt completely free afterward. I didn't have any
desire to be anything like any one of my classmates.


When I turned 12, I learned that there were other people who
felt the way I did. They all appeared so lonely and tired. Somehow we
all found ourselves together at the same lunch table, the table that no
one wanted. We wanted it though. It was our home, even. That was the
charm of it.


One girl ventured to strike up a conversation, "It's obvious
that none of us like other people, so that must mean we have at least
one thing in common."


That was true. That is true, I then thought. I wanted to say
something clever in response too, but I really didn't know what to say.
It was really very difficult to sit there, trying to appear as
indifferent and cold as a thing. That's how I often felt at times, a
THING, not even something living. I had become so hard inside. I even
imagined that there was a rock living inside of me. That's how I knew I
was alive. When people looked at me the wrong way or pissed me off, I
would imagine grabbing that rock and throwing it at them. THAT always
made me smile. I liked to smile.


It's not really a ROCK that is stuck inside of me although I
would like to throw a ROCK at the outside world. I don't really need a
ROCK now anyway. I'm just a bit inebriated, you see. In my drunken
state, the rock becomes a marvelous star. OF COURSE, you should realize
that I am staring out at the stars now, those cold and distant
creatures. They are so preciously and prettily, glowingly white. In my
drunken state, I can accept anything. Nothing really hurts me. I'm a
bit numb even or as Pink Floyd so elegantly put it, I am very
comfortably numb. I enjoy living in this high-rise building, looking
either up at the stars or below at the comically-colored vehicles. Why
am I thinking about all those lonely friends I once
had?


It is a real thing that I am, a person. I enjoy being with
myself tremendously. I KNOW, I'm lying. I'm not very interesting, I do
know that. I suppose I am trying to make myself more interesting than I
am. What's the point! What am I trying to say? YES, now I do remember.
I was trying to tell you why I am the way I am. It's just difficult.
Give me a moment to warm up a bit. You know, whoever wants to hear an
entire autobiography so quickly anway. It's only my third glass. On my
fourth, I'll really start to let loose. *tears falling* I just don't
know why I am so melodramatic. What is it that is making me so damned
sad. Sometimes I just can't explain myself. That's not a sin, is it?
Let me just begin trying to tell you how I felt so left out, how
everyone tried to make me feel so left out so that I just became
obsessed with the attention that my parents and teachers gave me when I
did something well, when I made the grade or when I finally,
successfully showed other people what I was fully capable of. I wanted
people to see what a wonderful person I was. That's not what I inspired
though. Kids are at war with the adult world and whoever receives too
much favorable attention from them is seen as the enemy. I don't know.
I don't know why I am saying this. I even wish I could retract what I
had already said. Is that possible? Can I just erase what I said a few
moments ago?


"How are you, Miss _______?"


Can you imagine that my life would be life this? I thought
life would be fabulous, even fantastic once I attained a certain amount
of wealth. Instead, all I find is that I spend all my time trying to
keep it! I manage about 60 employees in groceries. I visit one of my
groceries everyday, trying to keep track of what is going on in each
location, checking orders, inventory, and paperwork. It's not all that
easy, you know. I wanted the glamourous life, the kind of life I read
about in books, with parties and with people saying scintillating
things. That's not what I got though. Instead, unable to trust anyone
but myself, I keep my eyes on all the others, making sure everything
adds up. Childhood is surely a precious thing. It's even a divine
thing.
While taking the train from one location to another, looking at all
these strange faces, I really wonder who I am and who all these other
people are. One face in the train keeps on intriguing me. It's such a
familiar face, it's his face, someone whom I knew or whom I vaguely
recognize. Who is this man? Oh yes, it's him, I think. Yes, it's
him.


Was it for this face in the train that I became such a
financial success and a recluse. Look at him! He does not even seem to
know who he is. He is dirty and grimy, a homeless man. Behind that dirt
and alcohol, I can still sense him. Was it for him that I became such a
success. These are the strange thoughts running through my head. I
wonder, I wonder why i even think about such things and whether
thinking about such things are worthwhile. All I know is that through
all my distrust, all my longing for financial wealth which I achieved,
I've lost the ability to experience pleasure unless it is a pleasure of
reward. Was this homeless man my reward? It's such a letdown after all.
One would think that my life would end as firecrackers end, flowers
maturing quickly in the air -- a grand display of something superficial
perhaps but celebratory, a champagne display of a naive and enduring
joy. NO, my life could not end like that but like this?


"It's rather disappointing, isn't it?" the shadow asks, "You
didn't really expect to meet him."


"Yes, it is rather disappointing," I admit. I pour him a
glass of merlot.


"It is strange, how a skeleton like me can drink merlot. It's
very strange. Somehow it makes my bones stronger."


"Should I still call you the shadow?"


"It's like hood that I wear. I don't have much of a choice
though. If I didn't wear the hood, they'd either scream at me or return
me to the science class or something. You are very lucky to have flesh
and bone."


"I still live like a ghost or a lost spirit." Claire sits
herself down, grabs his cold, skeletal fingers.


"Would you like me to warm your fingers?"


"No, it's sweet of you though. How long have we been together
for? Years and years and yet, I never grow tired of you. All these
nights, we spend, discussing things. Why... we really do understand
each other, don't we?"

"It's because of these things that we can't say to anyone outside of
ourselves. It makes life so lonely... I remember when I was once a
prince in Korea, back in the 14th or 15th century. People used to bow
down to me... it was so very nice *yawning* and now, look at me,
nothing much to look at. People have really changed, haven't
they?"

"They have indeed," Claire comments, "And who would have guessed that I
would have become such a successful businesswoman only to find myself
so alone, so alone as to have only a hooded figure like you as my
companion. How is it that a "clatter of noises" like you understands me
better than anyone else. It's positively creepy, if you ask me."

"No one asked you though," he answers, smiling strangely.