The last thing we ate was a Jaws Bar popsicle. It was actually on the bus to our field trip at Seorak Mountain. As each of our classmates starting from the front began singing, Thumbtack kept spitting about how horrible it was more than ten times. Why Thumbtack? Her head is huge. "I better pretend I'm sleeping." Radio who was sitting in front of Thumbtack said while hitting the seat adjuster button. That made Thumbtack's chair bend backwards. "Radio, this is my chair. You need to press that one over there." "Alright. You should just sleep, too." Radio pulled out her jacket and covered Thumbtack's knees for her. Radio listens to the radio every night. It's a hand-me-down from her mother and she says the frequency adjuster is broken. That radio is over 60-years old. One that's been passed down from daughter to daughter. Does the thing work? According to Radio it still plays fine. It's just that the listener can't adjust the frequency. "My radio chooses stations on its own." That's what Radio said. "Yesterday an Italian station came on. It played all operas for three whole hours." When she got to school Radio would talk about what stations she listened to the night before. Whenever she did, Thumbtack would take Radio's hand and hit Radio on the head. "You broken Radio!" We eat together. At the beginning of the semester, we somehow ended up sitting together during mealtime. And after that day we stuck together. That's to say what us four have in common is that we don't put any special effort into the task of making friends. It's not as if other kids would be much different. If we had sat in different seats during mealtime we probably would've made different friends. I mean cooler friends. In no time, more than half of our classmates had sung. As the mic got passed to the back Mirror's face started growing pale. "Be honest. You have to pee, huh?" I asked. Mirror answered, Yeah. When Mirror gets nervous, she can't hold her pee. On music exam days, she would say she might have to pee in the middle of singing and sometimes even wore her nephew's diaper to school. Mirror's probably the worst singer in our class. Oh yeah, us calling her Mirror, everyone seems to think it's because she looks in the mirror too much. It's the opposite. Does that girl ever look in a mirror. One time she even came out with a dead mosquito stuck to her forehead. You might have guessed, but yeah, Mirror's actually pretty dumb. "Don't sing. I'm not going to sing either." I said to Mirror, who had stuffed her hands in her pits and didn't know what to do. Suddenly Radio, who'd been pretending to sleep, shot up and yelled. "Teacher, she says she needs to pee. I think she's gonna go soon." Our homeroom teacher held up an empty plastic bottle and said. "Go for it." "Teacher, we're girls." The kids on the bus shouted at the same time. As the bus pulled into a rest stop Mirror unbuckled her belt. And as soon as the bus door opened she started sprinting. "Buy us a popsicle." Radio shouted at the back of Mirror's head as she ran. Even during all that, Mirror replied, Okay in a loud voice.
Mirror brought us a Jaws Bar. "I want to have Screw Bar." "I want Bravo Cone." "I want Pig Bar." We each wanted to have something different. "I'm going to have all of it." Mirror tore open the Jaws Bar wrapper and started licking it all over. "Question 1: How many square meters is Mirror's heart?" Thumbtack asked, and me and Radio quickly raised our hands. "Beep. It's 30,000 square meters." With that, Mirror finally held out the Jaws Bar which was dripping with her saliva. After eating the Jaws Bar I showed Thumbtack my tongue. Thumbtack showed Radio her tongue, too. "You guys think yourselves pretty swell don't you? I don't think so." Mirror looked at the rest of us giggling with disdain. Our classmates started singing again, and I quickly closed my eyes to pretend I was sleeping. In my dream I met my youngest Aunt. She's the Aunt that bought me a toy drummer monkey, and my relatives say I resemble that Aunt the most. I was wearing a red Cape that my mom knit for me. It was my favorite piece of clothing when I was ten. "Where have you been all this time, Aunt?" My Aunt went to an amusement park with her friends and fell in love with a Magician from a land with no snow. To win his mother-in-law's heart the Magician would call all of their neighbors and hold magic shows. When he transformed a 1,000 won bill into a 10,000 won bill, my great grandfather muttered. Guess they won't starve to death. The only relative who didn't oppose the marriage is none other than my great grandfather. My Aunt ran away with the Magician to that land where they say there's no snow. Each time the Magician guessed a card right the kids would clap. But I didn't clap. "That's all rigged." The Magican took off his hat and placed it over my head. "We will meet soon." The Magician said. The hat was too big, so, it quickly covered up my face. "You should wash your hair sometimes. It smells." My words didn't escape the hat. Suddenly, someone whispered this in my ear. "Wake up, come on." As the Magician's hat came off, Radio and Thumbtack and Mirror were looking down at me. "What?" I wanted to ask more but I couldn't talk anymore. Radio suddenly covered my mouth you see. Thumbtack and Mirror linked arms on either side of me and lifted me up. "We have to go now." Mirror said. When I tried to turn my head and look back, this time Radio covered my eyes. Between her fingers I saw someone wearing an oxygen mask. That face looks really familiar, I thought. "Don't be shocked. That's you." Mirror said. "Why're you telling her now? We said we'd tell her later." Thumbtack yelled at Mirror. "It can't be helped." Radio took away the hand that had covered my eyes. Then she told me the following story. It was right when the kid sitting in front of me was about to sing. Our bus hit the guardrail and plunged down the hill. Mirror who had been at the window died of a concussion. She was killed on the spot. The good thing is that Mirror was sleeping so she supposedly doesn't remember a thing. Radio fell toward the kid who was singing. Too bad for her her neck got caught in the mic cord. Thumbtack was crushed under the vehicle but our uninjured classmates worked together and lifted the thing. According to Mirror they lifted it up about 20 centimeters. But then the kids ran out of strength and dropped the bus. Thumbtack died from that impact. "This is all because of those tramps that don't just shove down their food and keep dieting." Apparently Thumbtack was screaming that all the way until the rescue aids took me away. "At least you lived a whole week longer than us. We were waiting for you in the hospital emergency room but, really, it was awful." Radio finished her story like this. Mirror and Thumbtack wouldn't unlink arms with me for three days and two nights. "Be honest. Did you want me to die?" No one answered my question. After three days and two nights, as she let me go, Thumbtack said. "Honestly it would be unfair if only we died. And the person who said we should sit way in the back was you." You guys were unlucky to begin with, I replied. "Don't, ever, even think of going home." "You should thank us for not letting you see your own funeral." "We went through all of that." I spat toward Thumbtack's and Mirror's and Radio's faces. Of course, the spit, it didn't come out. When the spit didn't come out, it seemed like I could just about understand what my friends were trying to say. Even if I'd wanted to cry no tears would have come out you know. As I looked at my friends' faces I asked. "But what's wrong with your lips?" "You're like that too. We all ate a Jaws Bar before we died remember." This is how we came to forever have purple lips and purple tongues.
We had nowhere to go. It wasn't even like we could fly freely through the sky like in the movies. We went to a recently built apartment complex. There was a pavilion there that Radio called the Magic Carpet. Radio muttered as she peered at the cigarette butts littered around the pavilion. "Wonder which ones I dropped here?" Hearing that, Thumbtack yelled, You smoke? Radio would go absent from school every so often and she says whenever she did she'd come here to hang out. I finally realized then the reason that girl talks to herself so much. Every time the moving truck pulled in Radio would say she had to watch and disappeared. "There's no television. Don't you think it's a weird house?" "There's a house with no bowls. Do you think maybe they don't eat?" "Do you know how big their dining table is? I'm telling you there were twelve chairs. I wonder just how many family members they have?" I went with Radio to go look at a human-faced clock. Its tongue was the clock's pendulum, and every time the tongue moved left to right the pupils moved with it. I got back to the pavilion and tried imitating the clock all day long. Thumbtack discovered a house with one room completely filled with handbags. Turns out that kid knows all the bag brands. The more surprising thing is that she could tell between the real ones and the fakes. "When you reach your 20s you're probably going to become a snob." I said. Suddenly Mirror who had been sitting in the corner said, Please. "Somebody please hammer in this nail." Mirror got up from her seat and we could see a nail sticking out. "Even though I've been sitting on this for days my butt, doesn't, hurt." At that moment, I thought it such a relief that Mirror's lips are purple. Thumbtack took one deep breath and thenstruck down on the nail with that big head of hers. "I don't get it. My fate is to live a long life." Mirror said while she continued staring at the protruding nail. "What about my palm lines? Look at this." Radio opened her hand and showed it to us. The life line was very long. The person with the best fortune reading is Thumbtack. According to the fortune-teller Thumbtack will become famous in her 50s. "I'll eat breakfast in Korea, dinner in New York, that's the kind of life they said I'll have." Thumbtack did the best in her studies out of all of us you see. "I'm supposed to have three kids, all daughters. My second daughter will be a headache but she'll still grow up without trouble." I hated my fortune. Three kids! An old man with a cane was coming toward the pavilion. "I gave a whole 30,000 won to have mine told. Supposed to be a famous fortune-teller." "You only need 5,000 won on the Internet." "Is there really no way to hammer in this nail?" As the old man sat at the pavilion and lit up a cigarette Radio quickly moved to the old man's side. The old man spewed cigarette smoke toward Radio. "I guess it's automatic no smoking." Saying nothing could be smelt, Radio fell disappointed. I put both hands together and prayed. Then I tried touching the cane which the old man had leaned upright. My hand passed right through the cane. "Looks like you still lack training." Thumbtack took up the lotus position and began abdominal breathing. "You seriously expect that to work?" Radio shook her head. "Watch close." The moment Thumbtack tried to touch the cane the cane fell over by itself. "See that?" Thumbtack wiggled her butt. "It's the wind." Mirror said.
After that, Mirror continued sitting on the protruding nail. Radio probably looked at all 205 buildings' worth of apartment houses. It was when me and Thumbtack were pretending to fight by grabbing each other's hair. There wasn't really anything else we knew how to do. Mirror shook her butt from left to right then slowly rose from her seat. "Why? Does your butt finally hurt?" Thumbtack scoffed. "Maybe she developed hemorrhoids?" I quipped too. "I feel weird." Mirror pushed her right leg out in front of us. "No way!" Radio covered her mouth with two hands. We couldn't see Mirror's right foot. It disappeared. Yeah, I said it disappeared. I quickly looked down at my foot. Of course Thumbtack and Radio did too. "I guess I'm okay." We felt sorry to Mirror, but the other three breathed a sigh of relief. "Do you think at this rate the rest will disappear too? And I think I have to pee." Mirror's voice trembled. Radio put forward this opinion. We have to go find people who died before us. Saying Wouldn't there be some answer if we asked them. "It seems like dying made you smarter." Thumbtack stroked Radio's head. "That's an insult, huh?" We replied, Yeah. We were surprised there were a lot of ghosts that looked more normal than we expected. And surprised once more by the number of people that look amazingly like ghosts. A ghost we met in front of the crosswalk swore up a storm then disappeared. We still don't know why we got sworn at. We met a young kid ghost that was playing pranks on a blind beggar. When the number of coins went down each time he counted them the blind man yelled, Is someone there at the empty air. We showed the kid Mirror's ankle. "Would you happen to know why it's like this?" The kid didn't seem to know. "Alright then, how do you move objects, kid?" Thumbtack asked. "You talked down to me so I don't want to tell you." The kid said. It was Radio who discovered the grandpa and granny coming out the theater entrance. The two were working their way free of the surging crowd by stepping across on people's shoulders. "You haven't done anything for a few days, hm?" The grandpa who saw Mirror's leg said. "Are you a fortune teller? Then could you tell us our fortunes please." I said that and my friends scolded me really hard. "This is what happens when you don't do anything. You slowly disappear. When that happens you go way up there." The grandpa pointed to the sky. At that moment the granny at his side planted a kiss on the grandpa's cheek. "That's why we're dating. This person is my fourth lover." I briefly imagined the grandpa's wife becoming a ghost and coming after him. "You have to do something. Try going to the theatre. And go to the library too. There are even some ghosts who run." Saying that, the grandpa and granny flew across the crosswalk at the red light. As soon as the light turned green, Mirror start racing in the direction the grandpa had disappeared to. "What's up with her?" "Why does she wait until the light turns green?" "Does she think she's still a person?" After a long while Mirror came back. Of course only after waiting for the light to turn green. "I asked them how to fly." Mirror said. Thanks to Mirror we learned that no matter how much we ran we wouldn't run out of breath. "They won't tell me I guess. Anyway, what do we do from now on. I mean I'll die if we stay put." Thumbtack held her hand up to Mirror's forehead. "Look here. Is this a temperature. You're already dead." I clapped. Of course there was no clapping sound. "Anyway, we have to do something." We decided to hold a meeting. We could have just done it by putting our heads together on the street, but, it was an official meeting, you know. We looked around for an empty office. And we sat around a round table and started presenting our opinions one by one.
Watching for car accidents at frequent crash sites on a rainy day.(Radio said she knew a spot that sees over 20 car accidents every monsoon season. "A whole fifteen people died there last year. I'm serious, I saw it in the news." At that Thumbtack said. 'It's fall right now. It's too long till monsoon season.") Confirming if the scandal between movie star K and singer L is true.(Mirror suggested this one. 'Cause she's a mad K fan.) Observing the car assembly process at a car factory.("Ooh. Sounds super boring." They shook their heads so hard I started feeling uncomfortable for even bringing it up.) Going to the police station and choosing one scary-looking police officer. And following that police officer around for one week.("Even to the bathroom?" Even dead, Mirror still asked only dumb questions.) Searching out a veteran ghost and learning how to float in midair.(It's tough walking the streets alongside people. I still get a scare every time people spit toward my feet. And we can't fly much longer than a few seconds.) Going back to school and studying with the kids.(It's times like this that Thumbtack is lame. Can you believe she put that out there as a suggestion. Seeing our reactions, Thumbtack quickly launched into damage control. "Just wanted to have a laugh.") Meeting foreign ghosts.(We were wondering if we could talk with them, you see. How sad would it be if we can't understand them even in death.) Finding a restaurant that people will line up to eat at and uncovering its secret to success.(Mirror's parents ran a restaurant. It was really bad. That and they had three children to send to school. Radio consoled Mirror like this. "They probably received compensation from the bus company. They should be able to use that money to educate your younger siblings.") Going to the amusement park and riding the roller coaster all day.('Cause we won't get sick anymore. On top of that everything's free for us now, you know.)
Finding K was easy. K was making regular appearances, every Wednesday, on some radio program. We transferred subway trains twice then went to the broadcasting station. K was taking a call from a girl who said her boyfriend would hit her whenever he drank. K replied like this to the girl. "Dump him." At that the girl said in a shaking voice. "But, I still, love him." We all know what K will say next. Then keep getting hit, he'll reply. We liked K's phone consultation hour. K always talks like this. Break up. Call the police. What are you, stupid? Go to her place immediately. And tell her you love her. Do what you want. One time he told a kid who said he wanted to commit suicide to Just die, and almost got fired from the station. When the broadcasting session ended K ate hot noodles in front of the broadcasting station. We rode K's huge van and spent a whole week with him. We took turns sitting on K's lap, and afterwards, we were ashamed. The fact that we'd have to stay in our teens forever was terrifying. Anyway, so, the truth! Don't be too shocked. K and L aren't dating. But K and L purposefully made a scandal. Honest. We heard everything when K called L. The truth is L is pregnant right now. I don't know who the baby's father is. No matter how much K asked L stayed silent only about that. Probably sooner or later there'll be a rumor that K is the baby's father. Mirror declared there had to be more to the story and said she would investigate. "Then let's meet later at the amusement park." Leaving Mirror, the rest of us, we went to the police station. The elite first division squad chief's spelling is a mess. He types up reports using just his index fingers. The elite first division detectives were investigating some strange and unusual cases. When the squad chief pulled out the case files, I quickly moved behind him, and looked at the pictures of corpses. Each of the corpses was biting down on its right index finger. Radio came back from eavesdropping on some detectives talking in the bathroom, and bragged to us about having found out an important fact. "You think I'm just going to tell you? Apologize for going to the beach without me last summer vacation." Suddenly a really big guy flew toward us and swooped down on Radio. "Talk. You found something out, didn't you?" Radio took one look at the man's face and immediately got scared. "They say the killer's footprint is just about 40 centimeters. He's got to be an alien." The man spread his hands apart and approximated 40 centimeters. "Couldn't the criminal have worn a clown costume?" The man says he was a police officer before he died. The man solved more cases after he died than before he died. "You get out of here. 'Cause this police station is my territory." Radio pointed at a red stain over the man's heart as she asked. "We'll go. But, did you get stabbed to death? Or shot to death?" The man put his index finger to his lips as he spoke. "This is red pepper paste. I died of a heart attack while eating sashimi." Me and Radio and Thumbtack answered at the same time. "Us, a Jaws Bar." Before we went to the amusement park, we dropped by the car factory. That's the first place I've ever seen so many ghosts. "Why are ghosts gathering in a boring factory like this?" Thumbtack wore an expression of absolute incomprehension. One man said this. "We're men that did nothing but work until we died. So we don't have anywhere to go besides here." We quickly left the factory that was overflowing with men in their 40s. As we arrived at the amusement park, Mirror was waiting for us at the entrance to the rollercoaster. "When did you get here?" "I've ridden that thing more than thirty times. I'm not riding ever again." "Now come on, tell us." We pretended to massage Mirror's shoulders. "K and L are half siblings. K's father abandoned L when she was three. K wants to protect his father's honor. But he also wants to take care of his younger sister in his father's place. Done, that's all there is to it." She talked so fast it took a while to figure out what it all meant. "My aunt's a reporter, how nice would it be if I could just let her know the truth?" I said. "Shameless girl." My friends scowled at me. We entered a haunted house. When a maiden ghost wearing white mourning clothes dropped from the ceiling Mirror and Thumbtack screamed. A couple who had been holding hands grabbed the puppet ghost's hair and laughed as they shook it around. We were a bit embarrassed. Can't believe we're real ghosts that were scared by a fake ghost. We even carefully looked around in case someone would notice.
It was about the end of one year when we met the master of floating in midair. During that time the serial killer was caught. It was after as many as eight women in their twenties and thirties died. The criminal was the president of a small events company. For store openings, he would dress up as a clown and blow balloons up for kids. It was as the former police officer had suspected. "If he hadn't died he probably could have made chief of police." When talk of the serial killer was just about dying down the chain-reaction car explosion took place. The cause was not discovered. And some high school student picketed City Hall calling for the installation of day care centers in schools. "I don't want to dump my child in a bathroom trash can." That was the message on the placard she was holding. Teenage single mothers took part in the demonstration. Of course, we demonstrated too. One girl even confessed she had once given birth to a child and dumped it in the Han River. "I was 16 at the time." So-called experts starred in broadcasted debates every day. Orange snow fell and broadcasting stations all over the world scrambled to report it. A few religious groups even seized the chance to declare the end of the world. A year went by like that. As she gazed at the view of Seoul at night, Mirror said she wanted to contemplate the last year and put it behind her. "Contemplate all you want. But all you're going to keep remembering is that you died." We dragged the lazy Radio to Namsan Tower. And we discovered her there. The Teacher to show us how to fly the skies. The granny was sitting in lotus position at the top of Namsan Tower. "How do we get like that?" We yelled. "Secret." No matter how hard we pleaded with her to come down the granny wouldn't come down. "There's a very tough police officer ghost and we'll introduce him to you." "We can become your foster daughters." "Say, if you need someone to vent your anger at, feel free." "Are you lonely? We are too." After three rounds of fervent pleading the granny floated down to the ground in two and a half spirals. "In exchange there's a condition. I'd like you to do me a favor later." We did a military salute as we answered. "Yes."
"Each of you think of a word you like." This was our task. "Human Pyramids," Thumbtack said. "It was the day my parents announced their divorce. I was watching television. Hundreds of people were building this pyramid together. My mom said, Sorry. I imagined myself standing at the top of the pyramid. Thinking about that made me feel more generous about everything. I put both hands on my mom's shoulders and said this. It's okay. It's no big deal." I could just about recall the country where they were building this human pyramid. 'Cause I saw it on some global village news channel or overseas topic program. "Ah, I miss Naver." At that the granny asked. "What's Naver?" "You don't even know that?" "Yeah, I don't. 'Cause I couldn't even go to elementary school. But if you look down on me I'll kill you." We decided to call the granny Teacher. Revealing what few teeth she had left the granny smiled. "Teacher huh, alright." Radio said "Radio." "Eh, that's unimaginative." "Don't you know anything except radios?" Mirror explained to Teacher about Radio's most precious treasure, her broken radio. Of course she included Radio's claim that the radio changes frequencies by itself. "I believe it. What is there in the world that you can't believe?" Radio wanted to tell us why the radio was cherished through the generations. "That radio killed my grandpa." Radio's grandpa must have been an awful drunkard. Says it was enough that as soon as her grandpa showed up at the drinking house the people drinking there would leave pretending to go to the bathroom. "Yeah, I guess whenever he drank he'd hit my grandma real bad. Listening to the radio was my grandma's only comfort." Apparently it was at the start of monsoon season one summer. Shoes dripping with mud, Radio's grandpa kicked open the door to the inner room. The moment he tried to kick his sleeping wife in the side, the radio suddenly turned on, and a song called