Redemption

We were done with chess. I won, barely. The room was filled with happy people, drinking, lounging, eating, some even settling into their beds laid out on the wooden floor. Charles and I went to the front door and put on our shoes and stepped out on the porch for a cigarette. We were up near the Northern border outside a beach town for our company weekend retreat. It had rained all day. The wooden deck was covered in beads of water. We lit our smokes and exhaled. We stood in silence for a minute. I was listening to the wind through the trees, breathing in the clean air, face red with drink. The Crickets chirped. I can't remember ever being as content.

"mmm, You like, ah...wait, wait," He took his cellphone out of his pocket and with one hand typed a Korean word into his English dictionary. I watched the screen in anticipation. The word popped up. Romantic. "Ah romance," I said. Yes very much. He was smiling. He told me he likes to be romantic with his girlfriend, how he can't wait to marry her. "Where is your girlfriend? Why is she not here?" I asked. "No come. Work." "Ahh." "I come, I drive in car four hours to see you, and Bryan and Ben. You good friends. Your mind, my mind, same." I smiled, same minds. "Thanks Charles. I'm glad you came."

"You want to walk?" So we walked down the dirt road that winds through small rice fields and eventually climbs over a little hill covered in pines and slopes down into the Pacific. "You know what is awesome Charles, that I can come from over the sea and meet people like you, people with like minds. We don't even speak the same language but we communicate through games like chess or through music." I drew the word communicate with my fingers on the air. "I'm glad you made it tonight." "Ah, mmm hmm," he said.

"You have tattoos?" He asked.

"No tattoos. You?" He told me he had one on his back. It meant something, peace I think he said. "Are you going to get more tattoos?"

"Yes. I want more."

"What is it about tattoos that you like? mmm, Why do you like tattoos?"

Ah, he said. "I don't like my life. Tattoos, mmm like, mmm, ah..." he was frustrated. "You don't like your life?" I asked slowly, perplexed.

His brow creased at the center and he looked up and searched right and left in his brain for the right word. "I get tattoos, because I don't like my life. I get tattoos for..." and he brought out his cellphone again and typed out a word. The light on the phone monitor was bright in the country night. There was a word on the screen that made my stomach twist and my eyes nearly fill with water. Redemption. "Ahh, redemption," I whispered.

"You know word?"

"Yes. I know that word."

You get tattooed for redemption. I understand. Yes, I understand."

I patted him on the shoulder, and smiled. Come on, let's get back to the house."

Charles, my new friend and I walked back to the house, like minds, like hearts.