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Chapter 18: The Child Who Sees Light
TL: Enuma ID
Tuesday, 10 a.m.
The graduate student Yoon Ji-su stood in front of an officetel in Mapo-gu.
'Unit 508. Han So-young. Lee Jun's aunt.'
She checked the address. This was it.
Wе́ b_ṅ_ov̊ êl̄ Еn u m̊ à
It was the address Professor Kim Yo-han had texted her.
"What am I even supposed to do to keep a five-year-old entertained?"
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
She was already at a loss.
She pressed the doorbell.
No answer.
She pressed it again.
Е n̆ um a . ї d̄
After a long while, a voice came through the intercom.
"...Yeees?"
It was the voice of someone just woken up.
"Hello. I'm Yoon Ji-su, from the Hongik University Painting Department. Professor Kim Yo-han..."
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
"Ah!"
A rustling sound. The clatter of something falling over.
Еn u m̄ a
A moment later, the front door opened.
Han So-young came out.
Her hair was mashed flat on one side. There was a pillow crease pressed into her lip, and her eyes were puffy.
She'd thrown a cardigan on over her pajamas in a hurry.
"I, I'm so sorry. I just woke up. I had a deadline last night..."
"No, it's fine."
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Ji-su smiled and waved it off.
So this was the aunt the professor had mentioned. The webtoon artist.
It seemed she'd worked through the night and collapsed into sleep.
"Come in. I'll get ready right away. Jun's, um, probably drawing right now."
So-young went inside and opened the bedroom door.
Ji-su followed her in.
Е ń u m̄ӑ . id̀
The bedroom was cramped.
One bed. Beside it, a canvas stood propped up.
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Not just one.
Canvases stood lined up along the wall.
Seven? Eight?
Ji-su stopped in her tracks.
Е̇ńu m̆a . і d̆
The Starry Night. Water Lilies. An alley. An aquarium. A mountain with negative space.
And the sky. A still sky with glowing clouds. A small black silhouette near the bottom.
All of them oil paintings.
In this cramped room, the wall was covered with oil paintings done by a five-year-old.
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And in front of those canvases sat Lee Jun.
On the floor. A sketchbook on his knees, drawing something with a pencil.
Ѐ n u m̊_а̌
He didn't so much as look up when someone came in.
"Jun."
So-young called.
"The older girl from the university's here. Remember, I told you yesterday? You promised your teacher you'd go out and play."
Lee Jun shook his head.
Without taking his eyes off the sketchbook.
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"I'm doing my homework."
"But that homework's the kind you do outside. You can go out and do it with her."
"...In a minute."
So-young knew that 'in a minute' could easily turn into an hour.
Ji-su stood behind Lee Jun.
Over the child's shoulder, she could see the sketchbook.
W̌ ĕbnо v e l̂ Е ǹǔ_m̀ а̇
He was drawing a tree branch.
In pencil. Branches stretching upward from below.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
A pattern of the trunk splitting and splitting again spread across the paper.
There was no hesitation in the lines.
Not a single eraser mark.
Ji-su looked again at the canvases on the wall.
W̄е̇b̀n оv ѐ l̀ E ṅüm а
The aquarium painting. Fish in blue water. Bright at the top, dark at the bottom.
The thickness of the paint created the depth of the water.
The mountain with negative space. A mountain on the left, the right side empty.
An oil painting, yet it had negative space.
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The sky painting. The bright parts of the clouds rose up in thick paint.
Catching the light in the room, they were actually glittering.
Ěn̊_um̆ а̀
"Did this little boy... paint all of these?"
she asked So-young.
"Yes. He painted them after coming to Seoul."
Ji-su looked at the canvases again.
Five years old.
The child the professor had called 'my student'.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
She thought she understood why the professor had insisted on teaching the boy himself.
No, she still didn't get it. It made no sense. That a five-year-old had drawn these.
A hidden-camera prank?
Something impossible in reality was unfolding right in front of her.
"Jun."
Ji-su crouched down in front of Lee Jun.
Ĕ nu mа̄.і d
"Hi. I'm Yoon Ji-su. You can just call me Ji-su."
Lee Jun looked up.
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He looked at Ji-su for a moment, then dropped his eyes back to the sketchbook.
No interest. That much was clear.
[She's a pretty one. Aren't you going to say hi?]
the Shadow said. Lee Jun ignored it.
Еǹum̆ а . i d
"Your teacher told you to go out and play. Come out with me."
"No."
Firm.
"But you have to do your homework outside, right?"
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
"I can do it here too."
"This homework, you got it because you didn't go out last time, right? So this time you have to go out and look."
Е̇n̆ um̄ a
Lee Jun's pencil stopped.
Logically, it was a fair point.
[She's right. Let's go. Let's go see the world.]
the Shadow chimed in.
Lee Jun got up reluctantly.
He put the sketchbook in his bag. The pencil too.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Then he hesitated, took out a Conté crayon, and slipped it in with the rest.
[Good. Always keep your Conté on you.]
"Where do you want to go, Jun?"
asked Ji-su, slipping on her shoes in the entryway.
Lee Jun didn't answer.
He put on his shoes and went out the door.
W е b ǹоv́ е̂l̃ Ê ňu m a
They came out of the officetel building.
The outside air at the tail end of November was chilly.
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Lee Jun took three steps.
Then he stopped.
The edge of the flower bed in front of the officetel.
Something was moving on the cement edging stone.
W е b́ nо̌ v е̄l̇ Е̌ nu m̀а
Ants.
They were walking along in a single line.
One of them was hauling a scrap of leaf.
Lee Jun crouched down right there.
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He took the sketchbook out of his bag. Picked up the Conté.
"...Already?"
Wëb̊_n ov еl̄ Е n̄ ū m̄ ã
Ji-su muttered, dumbfounded.
Not even ten seconds since they'd stepped out.
Lee Jun was watching the ants. So close his nose nearly touched the ground.
[An ant's body has three parts.
Head, thorax, abdomen. Six joints. Six legs.
But you can't draw all of that at this size.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
You capture the form in simple shapes.]
Lee Jun's Conté moved.
A small dot. A dot joined to it. Six thin lines for the legs.
He drew one.
Then another.
A line of marching ants.
Е̂ ǹ ŭ m̆ ӓ .id̀
But they weren't all the same.
He drew the ants in front large, the ones behind small.
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"Why are they different sizes?"
Ji-su asked.
"Because the close ones are big and the far ones are small."
He was putting perspective into the line of ants.
Е n u m̄ а
He drew the texture of the cement edging stone too. He laid the Conté on its side and scrubbed it rough.
The bumpy, uneven feel of the stone's surface came through.
The ants were walking across the cement. Inside the sketchbook.
"There's one carrying a leaf."
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Lee Jun said.
"That one's hauling something bigger than its body. So its body has to tilt."
W̆ e̊ b nо v̂ еl Е ňu m̃а
With the Conté he drew the scrap of leaf.
The body of the ant carrying it leaned slightly forward. He'd given the drawing weight.
Ji-su stood beside him, watching.
Observation.
How an ant's legs move, how its body tilts when it carries something heavy.
A five-year-old kid was studying that, right there by the flower bed.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Five minutes passed. One sketch was finished.
A line of ants. Cement texture. An ant carrying a leaf.
The black, soft lines of the Conté held a tiny world.
Lee Jun gazed quietly at the sketchbook.
"I can't see the legs well. They move too fast."
[When that happens, imagine the movement and draw it. Not a frozen frame, but one moment of the motion.]
W е̌b n̄ o v̌ еl Е̊ nu m̌ а̃
"Imagine the movement? One moment of it moving."
Lee Jun nods, absorbing the Shadow's words.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Beside him, Ji-su blinked.
This little kid was drawing all by himself, and analyzing his own drawing all by himself.
"Aren't you going to draw?"
Lee Jun looked up at Ji-su.
Еn̊ u̇ m̊ а̇ . і̃ d
It was the first time his eyes really looked at her.
"Me?"
"You draw too, don't you."
Ji-su faltered. She hadn't said a word about drawing herself.
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"How did you know?"
Lee Jun pointed at Ji-su's right hand.
W̌e ḃ ń о v̀ ĕ l̂ Е̂ ṅ u ma
"Your middle finger. Here."
Ji-su looked at her own hand.
On her right middle finger, beside the first knuckle.
A callus had formed there, raised and round.
The kind you get from holding a pencil too long. Every art-college student has one.
"My aunt has one too. My teacher has one too. Everyone who draws has one."
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Ji-su touched her own callus.
A five-year-old had observed the callus on her hand and worked it out. And he hadn't even seemed to be looking.
Ji-su hesitated for a moment.
She had a notebook and pencil in her bag. She always carried them.
"...Okay. Should I give it a try too?"
Ji-su crouched down next to Lee Jun.
Ѐ num̌ а̃ . i d̀
She took out her notebook and picked up her pencil.
She looked at the ants.
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The same ants.
She drew.
She blocked in the ant's form with her pencil.
Head, thorax, abdomen. Six legs.
Ẇ е b́.n̂ о̄ v е̂ĺ Е́ň ů m̄ã
She tried to get the proportions right.
Ji-su's ant was accurate.
Anatomically.
Lee Jun looked at Ji-su's notebook.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
"You're good at this."
"Yeah?"
Е ň uṁ а
"But."
Lee Jun laid his own sketch and Ji-su's notebook side by side.
"Your ant's just standing still."
Ji-su looked.
Her ant. It stood frozen. Like a specimen.
Lee Jun's ant. It was walking.
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The legs were pushing against the ground. It tilted under the weight of a heavy leaf.
They'd looked at the same ant, but Ji-su had drawn the form and Lee Jun had drawn the movement.
"...Jun, how did you draw the movement?"
Ji-su asked. She really wanted to know.
"You watch for a long time. Then you can see the pattern. Which order the legs move in."
Lee Jun pointed at the ant.
Е̃ n ùmа́ .і́ d
"Front leg, middle leg, back leg, the ones on the same side move together. When the three on the left go, then the three on the right go."
Ji-su watched the ant closely.
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It was true. There was a pattern like that.
She must have seen it before. But she'd never been conscious of it.
A five-year-old had seen it and figured it out.
"Let me try again."
W е̂ b̈ ǹо v̆ѐl̂ E ňu m̀а̄
Ji-su opened to a new page.
This time she tried to capture not the form but the movement.
She changed the position of the legs. The moment the three on the left stepped forward.
Lee Jun peered at the drawing.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
"Oh. That's good. But the belly needs to sag a little more. Since it's carrying something heavy."
[Right. When the center of gravity shifts forward, the belly drops down.]
Ẽ_nù m̈a.і́ d̊
the Shadow said. Lee Jun passed it on word for word.
"When the center of gravity goes forward, the belly drops down."
Ji-su faltered.
Center of gravity?
A five-year-old was talking about center of gravity.
But he was right. She lowered the belly a touch.
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The ant took on the look of bearing a heavy load.
"Oh, it really does."
Ji-su murmured.
Lee Jun nodded. It was a better drawing than the first.
"Your lines are clean. Accurate. But they're so clean it just looks like a drawing."
Ji-su's hand stopped.
W̌ ӗb ňо̆ v̈е̇ l̄ Е̌ n u ṁа̀
It just looks like a drawing.
For a drawing to look like a drawing was no compliment.
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It was a terrifying thing to hear. And the five-year-old was saying it without a trace of malice.
So honestly. Just as it was.
Right now, she is getting a critique (Critique: a critical evaluation of an artwork) from a five-year-old.
The kind of concrete critique she'd never even gotten properly from Professor Kim Yo-han himself.
Е n̄uma
And yet she couldn't argue back.
Because he was right.
Ji-su's lines were precise. Lines she'd polished through the art-college entrance exams.
Getting the proportions right, blocking in the form, finishing it cleanly. The sort of thing every art-college student does.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
But they weren't alive.
What was in Lee Jun's crooked, rough Conté lines was missing from Ji-su's precise pencil lines.
E n̂ u m ӓ
What was it?
What made them different?
"Try drawing the line in one stroke."
Lee Jun said.
It was the Shadow speaking through Lee Jun's mouth.
"Don't break it. Don't erase. All in one go."
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
[A line drawn in one stroke has power. Hesitate, and the power drains out.]
Ji-su opened to a new page.
She held her pencil and looked at the ant.
In one stroke.
Without breaking it.
A line came out.
Ẇе̌ bn ov́ е̄ l Еn̄ǔ m̂ӓ
Rougher than usual. Crooked.
But it had power. The feel of the pencil pushing into the paper was alive.
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"Oh. That's good."
Lee Jun said.
Getting praised by a five-year-old felt strange.
Strange in a good way.
Е̇ n̈û m а
The two of them sat side by side in front of the flower bed.
Twenty minutes since they'd left the officetel.
And they still hadn't made it past the flower bed in front of the building.
Passersby kept sneaking glances at them.
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A college girl and a little kid, crouched side by side, peering at the ground.
"...Ahem. Should we move somewhere? Want to go to the park?"
Е̂n ũ m̄ а̇ . ї d
Ji-su asked.
Lee Jun pointed at the flower bed on the other side.
"There's a cat over there."
A cat sat on top of the wall.
A stray. Striped. Its eyes are closed. It was dozing in the sun.
Lee Jun flipped the sketchbook to a new page.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
And picked up the Conté.
[A cat is curves. Almost no straight lines. The back is round, the tail is round, the head is round too.]
Lee Jun's Conté moved.
A round line. In one stroke, without breaking it.
A single curve running from back to tail.
The round outline of the head.
Е.n uḿ а̃. і̊d̈
Closed eyes. A single thin line.
Thirty seconds.
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A cat sat in the sketchbook.
A cat curled up and dozing.
Ji-su looked at the drawing.
A few lines. Not even ten of them.
Е̊ńū ma . ǐd̂
And yet a cat was there. A cat dozing in a warm spot.
[Add some shadow. Under the belly. The cat's up on the wall, so the light's coming from above. The underside of the belly has to be dark.]
Lee Jun laid the Conté flat and rubbed under the cat's belly.
A soft shadow appeared. It gave the sense of a cat resting up on the wall.
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Ji-su felt like she was looking down into a deep well.
She couldn't see the bottom.
Wе b̀ ǹо̊ v̆ еl Е n̈ úḿ.а
She didn't think she could draw it any better than this.
Ji-su drew in her notebook too. The same cat.
This time in one stroke. Without breaking it.
Better than before. The lines had flow.
But laid next to Lee Jun's cat, the difference showed.
Ji-su's cat was the form of a cat.
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Lee Jun's cat was a cat dozing.
The difference between a form and a state.
The difference between a still life and a living creature.
Looking at the two drawings side by side, Ji-su bit her lip.
'I've drawn for twenty years to get to a master's program... and this kid is five...'
She felt like she might cry.
W e b̂n̊ о vе́l Е n̆ û.m ã
[The tail in her drawing is good. The curve of the tail is natural.]
the Shadow said.
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Lee Jun passed it on.
"You did the tail well. The curve's natural."
Ji-su looked at Lee Jun.
"Really?"
Еn u m̊а́
"Yeah. The tail's better than the body. When you drew the tail, you eased off, didn't you?"
She had.
On the body she'd tensed up trying to get the form right, but the tail she'd just let run.
"You get better when you can tell when to ease off and when to bear down."
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Advice from a five-year-old to a twenty-five-year-old.
It was an insane situation.
E n̄ ŭm̆ӑ
But Ji-su nodded.
Know when to ease off and when to bear down.
Was this, maybe, the reason her graduation piece wasn't coming together?
Because she pressed too hard?
The two of them got up from the flower bed and walked down the street.
Lee Jun led the way. Slowly.
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He kept looking as he walked.
Leaves rolling in the wind. The shadow of a bus stop. Power lines on a utility pole cutting across the sky.
"Look at those wires."
Lee Jun pointed at the sky.
"They're straight lines. The cat before was curves, but those are straight. Pulled tight from this side to that side."
He took out the sketchbook right away and drew the wires.
Ẅ ē b̃ n̄ôv е́ l̄ Ӗnum̂а̄
One straight line in Conté.
Three sparrows on top of it. Three small dots.
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[Birds over negative space. We said one dot creates meaning in a space, right?]
Lee Jun nodded.
The sparrows on the wire were creating the sky.
Ji-su drew too.
Е nu m̊ӑ
The wire. Sparrows.
This time her own drawing wasn't bad either.
The two of them walked.
As far as a nearby park.
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They sat on a bench and opened their sketchbooks side by side.
They drew the things in the park.
Е ṅ uḿă
Trees. Pigeons. The swings on the playground.
Lee Jun drew the chains of the swing.
"The light's reflecting off the chains. Only one side is bright."
Ji-su drew the whole swing.
Lee Jun drew only the light on the chains.
Their points of view were different.
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Ji-su saw the whole; Lee Jun saw the light.
It was lunchtime.
"Let's eat. What do you want?"
"Anything."
"What kind of answer is 'anything'?"
"Something I can eat fast so I can draw fast."
Ё ṅ um̀ а̊ .і̆ d
It was the same thing he'd said to his aunt.
Ji-su gave a helpless laugh.
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"You like gimbap?"
"Yeah."
They went into a snack shop and ordered two rolls of gimbap.
Lee Jun looked at Ji-su's notebook while he ate.
Е̄ n ů mа̀.íd̂
"Your drawing's gotten a lot better than at the start."
"...Thanks."
A grad student being complimented by a five-year-old, of all things.
And still, her spirits were dancing.
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Chewing her gimbap, Ji-su recalled what the professor had said.
'See what that boy sees, alongside him. It'll do you good.'
Е n̊ū m̀ ӑ. і́ ḋ
He'd been right. It really was helping.
This child was seeing the world differently somehow.
The same ant, the same cat, the same wire, and yet he drew something different.
Not the form but the movement. Not the whole but the light.
"Jun."
"Yeah."
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
"When you draw, what do you look at first?"
Lee Jun swallowed his gimbap with a gulp and said,
"Light."
One word.
The single most important word.
"If you see where the light's coming from, you can see the rest.
W е̃b̌ n о̆ v̈ѐľ Ë ň u mа
You can see the bright parts and the dark parts.
And then you can see the form."
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[Perfect.]
said the Shadow, sounding pleased.
Ji-su turned the words over.
Look at the light first, he'd said.
Е̂ ñ u m а̇
She had looked at the form first.
She'd seen the form and then drawn the lines to match.
The order was backwards.
They finished the gimbap and went back out.
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3 p.m. The sun had begun to dip.
"Should we head home now?"
Е̇ńū m̀ӓ .i̇d̂
"A little longer."
He hadn't wanted to come out at first; now he didn't want to go back.
Lee Jun sat on a park bench, doing his last sketch.
It was the streetlamp at the park entrance.
A streetlamp not yet lit.
But as the sun sank, a long shadow stretched from the lamppost.
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Lee Jun was drawing not the streetlamp but its shadow.
"You're not drawing the lamp, just the shadow?"
"The shadow's more fun."
[......]
The Shadow had gone quiet.
With the Conté, Lee Jun drew the lamp's shadow out long.
Ẇ е́bń о v̌ё l Ě n̈ u m̀а
A long shadow stretched across the ground.
The sketch was done.
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He looked over everything he'd drawn that day.
The ant. The cat. The wire and sparrows. The streetlamp's shadow.
On its own, it was more than the three pages of homework.
Ji-su walked Lee Jun back to the officetel.
Еn ũ ḿ а̇
So-young opened the door. Her face looked better than before. She seemed to have gotten a bit more sleep.
"How did it go? Was Jun good with you?"
"Yes."
Ji-su answered, looking at Lee Jun.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Lee Jun had already kicked off his shoes and was heading into the bedroom.
He went straight for the canvases, without hesitation.
Ė n̆ũ m а̀
"I'll come back again, Jun."
Lee Jun turned around.
"Yeah. Let's draw together again."
Ji-su smiled.
It felt like in a single day she'd learned something her graduate program had never taught her.
*
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On the subway ride home, Ji-su took out her notebook.
She looks again at the things she drew today.
The ant.
The first one. Accurate, but dead.
The second one. Drawn in one stroke. Rough, but moving.
The cat. The tail came out best. The part where she let go.
Е n̂ ům̌_а̊
Next, the wire and sparrows.
The things she'd learned from a five-year-old.
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Draw in one stroke. Know when to bear down and when to ease off.
Capture the movement, not the form.
Look at the light first.
Things she hadn't heard from the professor in a year, she'd heard from a five-year-old in a single day.
Ė ñ um а.іd̄
Ji-su closed the notebook and looked out the window.
The sun was setting.
She looks at the light first.
Ji-su looked at the setting sun.
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The light caught the subway window.
Orange light was reaching the faces of the people seated inside. Only the left halves of their faces.
Е ñu.mа̂.і̃ ď
The light was coming from the left.
Oh.
So this is what it is.
Ji-su took out her notebook again.
She picked up her pencil.
She began drawing the face of the man sitting across from her.
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The side the light touched, first.
It felt as if the canvas that had stood empty was filling in, just a little.
Just a little.
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