"No tienes un llave?" he asked the clerk; but the man just scoffed at this Asian attempt at Spanish. "No key, hombre." Sang Huin stayed in his room for fifteen minutes but he felt a loneliness suffocate him worse than the musty air. He needed out; and so he picked up his bag and drifted into the night. Instead of providing him with space and movement to shed his morbid thoughts, the night just impaled him with a vast darkness that seemed like endless meat hooks in the cold meat locker of the universe. A sun, he told himself, was a temporary thing and all temporary things gave off the illusion of animation and illumination. Only the darkness was real and he decided to lose himself within it.
It only took an hour more and he was lost in the rains that set dry dirt roads on hills into mud streams sweeping down into the center of the city and could quickly cook a brain into a fever with cold inundations. The rains drenched him and he began to cough deeply. He found the city park that earlier had couples courting each other under the eyes of chirping and squawking birds that fastened onto each limb as thick as leaves; but now no one was there but a man who collected cans from the garbage. Still this Sang Huin, this Sean, strolled around as if it were a sunny day. He examined each corner of the park as of someone in daylight enjoying the fauna for he was hoping that some queers would not care about the rain and like him would be obsessed with the possibility of being impaled in promiscuous activity. An hour passed this way and yet no one came.
Finally he managed to find his way back to his room. He lay there making a puddle upon the mattress until what appeared to be the night manager came into his room.
"You can speak the Spanish a little," said the man,
"Prefiero Ingles porque mi sabio de Espanol esta limitado y despues de viviendo en Korea mis vocabulario esta una mezcla del lenguas."
"Where you from?"
It was such a simple question and yet he did not know the exact answer. "I'm
Korean but I've lived most of my life in the states."
"A gringo?"
"Mas or menos."
"Want a towel, amigo?" Sang Huin sat up in the bed and looked toward the man that was animation and illumination in his doorway.