Chapter 5: The Spit

Matt wasn’t always there when I found trouble.

One weekend, I lurched the Benzo into my building’s underground garage. It was after 3 a.m. Drunk. Tired. I didn’t want the lower levels, where there was always space. I wanted something close.

I passed an open space fronted by an orange pylon. I hit the brakes. You don’t save parking spaces. 

I rolled out, tossed the pylon aside, and backed into the space.

Metal scraped.

Then I saw her.

A woman sat inside the car I'd just hit, staring at me.

I barreled off—and hit another parked car. Then I drove down to a lower level and parked. I stumbled up to my apartment.

I woke to my phone ringing. Afternoon. I was on the living room floor—the same place the ambulance drivers had left me on Christmas Eve.

My Korean assistant was on the line. Her voice was flat.

“You know what you did.”

I’d hit two parked cars and fled. It was all on camera. This time, there was no Matt to call. He’d taken a night off from my chaos.

A few nights later, I met with the woman I’d hit in the apartment lobby. She wouldn’t look at me. I had to cover the damage, a rental car, and the trouble I’d caused. Or else she’d go to the police. She never involved the other car owner.

I paid. Lesson ignored.

*

Matt remembers the night we now call The Spit the way you remember a bad cut—not the blood, but the instant you know it will leave a mark.

We were at a bar in Itaewon meeting an American pastor who spirited defectors out of North Korea—through safe houses in China and Thailand. We wanted to join his next run, trying to convince a man who lived by caution that we wouldn't get him caught.

His hands moved as he talked, not fidgeting, just measuring. A man who has watched lives vanish keeps his voice low. The pastor said he’d think about it; that was the best we could do.

We walked down an alleyway and Matt stopped outside a bakery called Tartine Pie Shop. He wanted to bring something home. A small pie for Somi.

The shop was busy, the dessert display brightly lit. Matt grabbed a tray and reached for a cherry pie. A young worker in a black beret told him he needed a server. She was waiting on a young Korean couple. Matt apologized.

He waited at the register to pay for his pie. He heard a voice in his ear—a hiss.

“Next time, don’t cut in line.”

Matt turned. “Cut in line?” he said. “I didn’t cut.”

“Yes, you did,” the kid said.

He was Korean, but spoke decent English so Matt figured he’d lived abroad—maybe in America. He was in his early 20s, his hair styled hard, deliberate. His girlfriend stood a half-step behind him, like she’d seen this before.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“Derek,” the kid said.

“You shouldn’t speak to your elders like that,” Matt said in Korean.

It was then Matt’s turn at the register, but he paused and let Derek go ahead. A small courtesy. A little surrender.

The kid walked past. He leaned in again and said, low and sharp:

“Go fuck your head.”

Years of Taekwondo told Matt that you don’t fight when you know you can win. The kid wasn’t a threat. Not dangerous. Not worth it.

He thought of Somi. He exhaled, then he walked outside.

“Yo,” I said. “Where’s your pie?”

Matt told me that some kid was inside swearing at him. I asked if he wanted backup.

He nodded. I don’t know why. He was a martial artist—he could take care of himself. But I misread it. I thought he needed muscle.

We walked in together. I wore a heavy jacket and a furry trapper hat with flaps that hung down over the ears. More cartoon character than enforcer.

Matt pointed to Derek, then walked back to the counter to pay for his pie. The clerk apologized for the misunderstanding.

I walked up to Derek.

“You better watch who you’re jacking with, or you could get jacked.”

Matt wanted a diplomat. Instead he got me.

Derek shoved me in the chest. My mind went blank. I spat at him as he moved past me.

Frothy. Impulsive. Theatrical.

Then I heard it. The entire restaurant gasped in unison. I walked out fast.

Matt didn’t notice me leave. He paid for his pie and headed for the door. Derek stepped in front of him. Said he’d been assaulted. Pointed at the back of his head. Called Matt an accomplice.

Matt held the pie like a football, pushed the door with his shoulder. Derek wrapped his arms around Matt’s waist—an American tackle—and held on.

Matt kept walking. Derek fell away. Matt didn’t look back.

Later, we sat at a bar nearby replaying things, measuring what it meant. 

The kid might have started it, but no one would remember that now.

“Whatever happened,” I said, “we lost the moral high ground after the spit.”

WEDNESDAY: The Police—The Man Who Wouldn’t Give a Name.