Incomplete
Let's hide him by the name Half.
Half is part Korean and part American. But that's not why I call him Half.
Half was a social worker. Devoted to share the graces that the creatures of the Earth are scarfing down to satisfy their limitless hunger, Half left home and flew to nearby countries to extend a foreign hand. Manila, Tokyo, Beijing, Phuket, and some other places he didn't tell me about--he conquered them all with his will to embrace the less fortunate with as much warmth as his large-framed body can emit. Little by little, Half paved his way into a contentment that he could only find in a sea of strange but familiar smiles.
I asked Half why he didn't stay in his hometown. "Seoul is a big bustle itself," I said. "Yes," he replied, "But I had to look at the bigger picture." "And what did you see?" "Fog," he told me, "And I'm not going back until I've cleared it up. Or, at least, the parts that I can reach."
Half met her in the Philippines. She was a missionary, travelling the same path that he was. To save humankind, I was told. But mostly to see the world. She was an only child. A papa's girl who got what she didn't need and got twice more of what she demanded. And one day, under the burning mid-afternoon sun in Manila, her eyes caught something she didn't have to ask for.
She and Half went back to Seoul. "Did the fog clear up already?" I asked. "Not really," he answered, "But she was another part of the picture. One that didn't have any fog." They pronounced their vows to forever and to happily-ever-after with a flower tucked behind her ear and a smile frozen on his face. "When?" "I...," his lip quivered, "I don't remember."
Half thought that life spun around repacking and trekking, but as months turned into years, he discovered a new orbit. She gave him two gifts, one after the other. One was named after him, the other was named after her. Not only did he find the sun, but Half also found the planets in his orbit. "Were you happy?" "Very."
A street full of people rushing in different directions. Half was among the crowd, excusing his way towards work. A few hundred and sixty people crammed within a main street that morning, but the knife was pressed up behind his back. "Weren't you afraid?" "Maybe." "What did you do then?" "I jumped into a ravine." Half staggered back home, lips in a permanent purse.
A dozen bruises climbed up his flesh and his feet trembled from a continuous stroll. Half's legs gave way and he stumbled farther from where he had already fell. Up and down. Half tried to keep up, but he kept falling. "Did you know where you were?" "Busan." "What were you doing in Busan?" "I don't remember." His body limped one last time and then--darkness.
"Why did you cry?" Half asked. I looked up from my notepad and found him staring straight into my eyes for the first time since I met him. "Did I?" I questioned back. "Yes," he insisted, "When I sang that song." "That song for your wife?" "Yes." Half looked away. He wasn't to blame.
"Where is she?" I moved my seat closer. "Back to where she's supposed to be." "Where do you think that is?" "Home." Half lifted one scrawny hand and ruffled his once burgundy-shaded hair that was reduced to a crew cut. "Where is home?" "Away from me."
"Why did you cry?" Half asked. "I just remembered something," I lied. He nodded in agreement, lapsing once more into the blunted state I took forever to get him out of. His eyes turned dull, and his lips folded into its signature purse. Panicked, I blurted out, "Will you sing it again for me?"
And he did. Word for word from beginning to finish, all dripped with all that's left in his heart that not even his memory could recall.
I looked back down at my notepad, pretending to act useful. Though he could, but still he shouldn't see, tears fell one after the other.
Tears for someone left incomplete.