meryoon / yoonmin

Afterword

There was nervous anticipation in the mass of water around a pretty temptress who was staring at the seven eggs in the carefully carved out soft-sponge warmer. Her palms kept unfolding and fisting, as if she wanted to reach out and nudge the eggs but resisted doing so.

The crevice she was in was rather unwelcoming, with no one around other than her but sharp rocks and narrow pathways in both ways. To add to the eerie aura of the place, the sun refused to surface that day, turning the waters greyish and murky.

“Come on,” she mumbled, biting on her lips. “It is supposed to be today. I didn’t make a mistake in the calculation.”    

No answer came to that; no opposition or reassurance. The temptress swatted a stray strand of hair out of her face rather angrily, her roundish cheeks puffed out in obvious distress. She couldn’t chase away the feeling of a looming foreboding in the waters, and it got her skittish to be alone out there with a brood of eggs that were about to hatch.

The eggs in front of her looked healthy and full of life. If she concentrated hard enough she could see movements behind the thick membrane. At this her deep eyes filled with a sense of pride, despite the heartache she was carrying around with herself.  

“You little ones, don’t make me wait any longer. Come on out.”

But none of the eggs’ movements indicated they were ready to hatch so the temptress leaned in close and cradled the sponge bed to her chest. She settled against a smooth patch of cold rock and started talking. “You little ones must know your mother loves you very much and cannot wait to see your cute little cheeks and small fins. Even if- even if she birthed you out of duty, your mother loves you.”

Her voice was scratchy like she has cried prior to coming there. “You little ones will carry on the bloodline of priestesses and will be generous and fierce protectors of your sisters and brothers across the big blue. So come on out and meet your mother. She wants to see you - see you before she must do her final duty.”

And just as if the fingerlings have heard her plead, the first egg started to move about, more insistent and forceful than before. The temptress’ face lit up in wonder and excitement as she watched her first baby tearing at the wall of the egg and slid free.

But her marvel and happiness turned into cold dread, as she was forced to watch her newborn fingerling wildly trash about and letting out gut-clenching thin screams. She panicked, cupping the little body in her hands.

“Wait- what is wrong? Little one, what’s happening?” her yells of fright resounded in the crevice.

The fingerling’s screams ceased shortly thereafter, its trashing body also going lax. The temptress watched with wide terror-filled eyes as her baby’s entire body got covered in blisters, and the more time passed the deeper the bruises became until the tiny corpse melted away in a mix of blood and other fluids.   

“It can’t be,” she whispered hoarsely. “It can’t be.”

She had distantly heard of this phenomenon. Once an unlucky temptress’ fingerlings due to a genetic mutation could not stand the salt water and the entire brood died before they could allocate them into freshwater.   

“That’s it!” she frenziedly exclaimed. “Freshwater!”

The temptress’ entire body jerked into motion, grabbing the sponge bed and started swimming like a madman. She knew of a small island not too far from the crevice where she played a few times when she was young. She remembered the island had a freshwater spring in its center. She must place her fingerlings in there!

But fate was cruel and merciless. Even though the temptress swam at her top speed, risking overdrive and heart failure, she still lost four more of her babies by the time the island’s silhouette - like the arms of an angel - appeared on the horizon.

“Come on, come on. Please wait…”

The leftover two eggs were starting to stir too, however. The temptress let out a broken cry, at this point purely going on by her sheer will. The two babies thankfully barely got a feeling of scalding as she jumped out of the water and onto the sandy beach. Holding her crying fingerlings to her bosom, the temptress jerked her legs free and started sprinting.  

Her tears wet her cheeks, but they got wiped away by the wind just as fast. “Please, please, please …”   

Even though the two fingerlings didn’t get burn badly they didn’t take dryness any better either. Their pained little cries stabbed at her heart. She didn’t feel the cuts across her soles, didn’t feel the bruises on her shin and arms as the branches hit her - she ran even faster.

When she finally stumbled upon the glade with the spring, the small cries have already ceased. It scared her to death. The temptress dived down into the water, gently cradling her two fingerlings and gasped for breath.

She heaved in relief when she confirmed them both alive. Hurt and entirely too tiny but alive. She didn’t dare to take her eyes off them for even a second. She didn’t dare to jostle them around either in fear of inflicting further pain on them. She just kept holding them in her embrace and murmuring calming words to them.

“Shh, it’s okay. Mother has you. You’re safe now. You’re okay, little ones.”

One of them was a little girl and the other a little boy. Both beautiful, twinkling with the colors of a priestess, yet so pitiful with the red patches of burn on their skin. The temptress didn’t dare name them, in fear they won’t make it through and then it would hurt even more.

The temptress didn’t even have time to grieve her lost ones. All her attention was on the two, jumping at even the smallest of movement or sound. Yet by the next morning, the weaker one still perished, its little body going rigid and cold in her hold.

She did cry then. It lasted for a long while afterward.   

Out of seven, she was left with one. The little boy. But oh, the little boy was a fighter clinging to his mother just like the mother was clinging to him. With each passing day, he grew stronger, the burnt marks faded away from his skin and on the fifth day when his eyes opened for the first time, the temptress cried again sorrowful and repenting.

“Nilasha, forgive me,” she begged amidst her tears. “I cannot come to save you right away. I cannot leave this little one alone. Nilasha… please don’t hate me.”

When she ran out of tears to cry, she just rocked the little fingerling in her arms staring up at the starry sky through the crystal clear water. When she found that the baby wasn’t sleepy whatsoever, instead it was moving about in her hold quite energetically, the temptress began to talk to him.

“You strong little one. You didn’t give in. You lived for me. Hence I promise you this, right here right now, that I will do my best to live for you too. You must become kind but strong, gentle but firm. And you must always know that your mother loves you.” The temptress smiled down at her son like he was the most precious, most beloved thing. Her heart filled with warmth when her baby opened his mouth and gave a few gurgling sounds.  

“And your name shall be Jimin.”