Fox Girl by Nora Okja Keller Page B

the back of the train. “Shillye hamnida,” we repeated over and over again as we shouldered past other passengers and stepped on toes in our quest to find a handhold.
    â€œOver here,” said Lobetto. Tired of following behind us, ducking and weaving between bodies, he bulldozed a space near the windows. Sprawling in the foot space between two seats, Lobetto stretched his legs—stained by mud and sun and birth—into the aisle, ignoring the dirty looks of the passengers at whose feet he sat.
    â€œUnjo.” Lobetto pulled in his legs and motioned for us to sit next to him. “You might as well be comfortable.” Sookie and I squatted by his toes. While Sookie looked out the window toward the hills shielding the Monkey House, Lobetto pulled a packet of colored papers from his bag.
    â€œHomework?” I asked, surprised. I had thought all the ainokos did was listen to stories about America and wait for their fathers to remember them.
    â€œWork.” Lobetto handed me a yellow sheet.
    As I struggled to sound out the English: “See the Club Angel! Show. Pussy Pingpongball. Pussy smokecigarettes. Pussy writeletter,” Lobetto explained. “I’m a bringer,” he said. “The clubs pay me to bring in GIs. That’s for Club Angel. Pink paper is for Club Rose, blue for Club Foxa. I make good money when the GIs come in with my programs.” He tapped at his name scrawled in the upper corner of the paper.
    â€œPussy Openbeer bot-tle.” I continued to wrestle with the words. “And ‘dr-dr-I-ink-u’—”
    Lobetto jerked the paper from my grasp. “You’re pathetic,” he snarled. “If you want to have a future, you have to learn better English. I’ll read it to you.” He puffed out his chest and cleared his throat, just as he used to do when preparing to read to us from his father’s letters.
    â€œSee Fish Pushin sideher. Banana pushinto her. Egg pushin toher cunt—”
    Before he finished reading the flyer, Sookie interrupted. “I’m hungry,” she announced.
    And suddenly we all were; that’s all we could think about.
    At the next stop, Lobetto stood up, leaned over the people in the seats and stuck his head out the window. “Yogi-e, yogi!” Lobetto waved at the grandmas selling food in the station. “Here, we’ll buy something here,” he called out. Women with backs bowed from food baskets crowded beneath our window, waving their specialties under the tips of Lobetto’s fingers.
    â€œWhat do you want?” Lobetto asked us. “ Kimbap, sweet potato, eggs, persimmon, hodu, cidah? ”
    â€œEverything,” I growled, suddenly hungry.
    Sookie fumbled with the knot on her money pouch.
    â€œHurry, hurry.” He motioned to the vendors with one hand and held his other hand out to us. We dropped money into his palm, and Lobetto passed it out the window. Reaching down, he grabbed up what was offered—rolls of kimbap, strings of yam, small woven baskets of eggs and orange persimmons, newspaper cups of walnuts, a six-pack of cidah —and hastily handed them off to us. Lobetto shoved his share into his canvas bag, while Sookie and I scooped the food into our shirts.
    As the train began its slow roll out of the station, the three of us picnicked on the floor, stuffing rice balls into our mouths whole, washing down the bits of sticky grains clinging to our teeth with long gulps of bubbling cidah. We cracked open the eggs and nuts, devouring the meat and sweeping the shells underneath the seats. The koguma and persimmon we ate for dessert, smearing the fleshy fruits against our lips and tongues until the juices scented our faces and hair with their perfume.
    When the passengers seated above Lobetto got off at the Pusan train station, Sookie and I scrambled into their seats. Relaxing into the cushions, we propped our feet against Lobetto’s back. The sky outside