A written creative work submitted to the faculty of San Francisco

THE SNOW BLANKET AND OTHER STORIES
36
A written creative work submitted to the faculty of
San Francisco State University
In partial fulfillment of
the requirements for
the Degree
'T U 5
Master of Fine Arts
In
Creative Writing: Fiction
by
Yukiko Tominaga
San Francisco, California
Spring 2015
THE SNOW BLANKET AND OTHER STORIES
Yukiko Tominaga
San Francisco, California
2015
A short story collection with the theme of ‘death’. Some stories will be about death as a
cultural phenomenon while others will deal directly with the death of loved ones. One
component will be about the effects of the Tsunami disaster in Japan. Second component
will be broader, more of a cultural overview. The third will be about the experience of the
death of a loved one.
I certify that the Annotation is a correct representation of the content of this written
creative work.
Chair, Written Work Committee
Date
CERTIFICATION OF APPROVAL
I certify that I have read The Snow Blanket and Other Stories by Yukiko Tominaga, and
that in my opinion this work meets the criteria for approving a thesis submitted in partial
fulfillment of the requirement for the degree: Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing:
Fiction at San Francisco State University.
A xM / I
Peter Omer
Professor of Creative Writing
Maxine Chemoff
Professor of Creative
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Nukegara.................................................................................................................1
Would You Tell Me What I want?........................................................................ 6
Mr. Suicide........................................................................................................... 12
Autumn Rain.......................................................................................................31
In Winter, I Smile Under the Cold Rain........................................................... 35
Scar Tissue............................................................................................................43
The Pain of Losing You.......................................................................................56
The Boy from Over the Sea.............................................................................. 69
The Death of a Fish............................................................................................ 78
Zaydeh’s Dream Home..........................................................................
84
Saying Good-Bye in Another Language.......................................................... 93
The Snow Blanket................................................................................................ 99
My Father............................................................................................................. 107
Failure.............................
112
The Umpire’s Call................................................................................................120
The Myth of the Serpent..................................................................................... 126
Kobushi............. ..................................................................................................134
The Elephant in the Room.................................................................................. 139
The Book Cases...................................................................................................161
1
Nukegara
We go through the forest by bicycle, among the Cicada’s full chorus.
“I’ll bet we can find them easily in this place.”
I speak to my son who is riding behind me, on my bicycle seat.
“Yeah, but they are also brown.”
He met Cicadas for the first time in this place. We live in a town where the
summer is too cool for the Cicada to grow and winter too warm for sleeping. When was
the last time I came home?
“Don’t you worry. I used to be good at this,” I said.
I probably would not have come home if not for this.
I remember when my grandmother was still energetic. She loved talking to
people. Other than that, she had no hobby. As soon as she finished her breakfast, she
visited her friend’s house. When the noon siren echoed in the town, the front door opened
and before I knew it, my grandmother was in the kitchen preparing lunch for her husband
and herself. They ate lunch together; only the sound of biting into pickled cucumbers kept
them company. Each dish they emptied she immediately took to the sink, washed it, still
chewing her food, then sat back next to her husband. She repeated this over and over.
2
When all the dishes were clean, she said only, “I am going.” Then she left for her friend’s
house to chat until the five o’clock siren rang once again.
My grandfather, who was blind, often walking along the wall the whole afternoon,
calling my grandmother’s name. In a Haiku, he wrote:
Fine autumn day
Where is my gun bullet wife
This Haiku was written down by my mother with a Fude. It is still on the wall in
front of my old desk, next to a faded Audrey Hepburn poster.
I heard about his death three months after he’d died. My mother telephoned one
night and told me the news, speaking, as if she was telling me about my childhood
friend’s wedding.
“When did he die?”
“Three months ago. I didn’t tell you because I thought you were too busy
studying. I didn’t want you to feel guilty for not being able to come home.”
I never witnessed my grandfather growing weak. In my memory he still walked
along the wall, calling my grandmother - bright and healthy. I was glad that I had his
Haiku.
My grandmother grew weaker, moved in with my parents and was now living her
life as a sick old woman. According to her doctor she was very healthy, though she lived
each day full of enthusiasm only to die.
3
“It might be the last time for you to see her. Come home to show your grandma
her great grandson.”
“That might be true, it’s his summer vacation anyway. He might enjoy it,” I said.
Before the sun was up, we went to catch an elephant beetle. On the weekend we
went to the amusement park with a giant pool attached to it. Everyday was a new
discovery for my son.
However, this was not so for my grandmother. She no longer cared if someone
came to visit her. As we spoke to her, her gaze passed us as if there was something better
waiting for up ahead. The only change brought to her life by our visit was that she now
had to wait for the bathroom.
I don’t recall her speaking, not even once during our visit. Her voice only existed
in my memory. For what reason does she stay so healthy?
“Let’s find a cicada.” I parked the bicycle by the sidewalk.
“But I don’t see them.”
“Mom can find them,” I said.
Even though the Cicadas were screaming, they were invisible. I could not even
find one.
They have only one week to live: What kind of cicada would be suicidal enough
to scream in the lowest part of a tree? If 1 do not find one my son might grow up to be a
4
man who becomes frustrated, giving up easily. I looked for a Cicada for my pride and for
his bright future.
“Look, there is a nukegara.” I grabbed it and showed it to him.
“Is this a cicada?”
“No, this is a shell which the Cicada stayed in before he became a Cicada, like the
cocoon of a butterfly. It was a house for him to grow up. Hold it.”
He touched it with his index finger nail. The shell rolled in my palm.
“No, I don’t want.”
“Why, are you scared?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s okay. It’s not going to move.”
“I know.”
“It’s rarer to find it than it is to find a Cicada.” This was a lie of course.
“It’s empty. It’s creepy.”
I let it fall. The brown shell settled slowly and blended in with the ground. The
Cicada chorus grew louder.
“Should we go?”
“Yeah.”
We continued our bicycle ride among the trees.
5
“Cicada lives underground for five years like a baby in a tummy. Then they come
out and live in the shell then become a Cicada before flying away, so it was not a dead
Cicada,” I said.
“They never go back there again?”
“Never.”
“Why?”
“Because, they can’t fit there anymore.”
“Where is their home?”
“They don’t have one.”
“No home?”
“Not anymore.”
6
Would You Tell Me What I Want?
I dropped on my bed, bounced once, then landed. My dress slowly fell over my thighs
and I felt a chill from the silk material. The chill continued to creep up on my tail bone,
my spine, and up the back of my neck. Goose bumps chased the chill over my arms, and
at the same time, the air conditioner expelled cold air, so I wrapped myself in the brand
new bed cover that my brother in law had bought me. The bed and the bedding set were
gifts from him to make me feel that I was a part of this family. My brother-in-law had
moved his dead weight vintage oak desk, white leather reading chaise, and his civil war
coin collection, out the room and replaced them with a brand new bed for me and a
Winnie the Pooh crib set for my son, Alex. The sofa and desk were stacked haphazardly
in the hallway, and the coin collection lay in a plastic grocery bag tossed under the desk.
He had not found the time to move them into the basement. I wanted to cry and I wanted
to be moved by his thoughtful gesture, but my body was too honest to produce any tears.
Although this was how I felt and I couldn’t change, I still felt shame, so I thought about
how I could punish myself. To stop eating his food could be one way to show my
appreciation for his generosity. I could become his maid, scrubbing his toilets, taking his
kids to violin lessons, or cooking for them, or I could stop eating. But for now I didn’t
even have the strength to get up, so I bit my tongue, pinched my inner thigh hard and
inhaled the toxic smell of the brand new bed cover. But when I felt too much pain on my
thigh, I let my bite go. I failed to even make myself bleed.
I glanced at the clock. In twenty minutes, my mother-in-law would come with Alex
to get us. And when she came, I would have to show up in front of hundreds of people.
My mother was standing in the bathroom putting on her make up.
“You are lucky,” she said, “everyone loves you.”
I saw her naked face in the reflection of the mirror. She touched her face to take a
closer look at her age spots. She tried rubbing them off, then picking at them.
“No matter what you do, they won’t go away. They’re stained,” I told her.
She said she knew that as she opened her facial cream.
“You know why else you are lucky? Because you are still young,” she said as she
dabbed the facial cream on her cheeks, chin, the tip of her nose and forehead. She
scooped more cream leaned closer to the mirror, and with a circular motion, rubbed it
forcefully into her face. Then she pulled out a case of skin colored cream, and with a
small brush, painted it over her spots. And after that she applied her face powder, first on
her cheeks, the side of her nose, eye lids, then chin and forehead. Now her face was
flawless, just as it was twenty years ago when I used to watch her transformation in the
mirror at home. I wanted to see her putting on her eyeliner, eye shadow and lipstick, but
my vision began to blur with my tears. My tears ran and ran, creating a line from my eye
8
to my nose. When my nose couldn’t hold my tears any longer, they began to travel to my
lips. I licked the salty liquid, sniffled and almost choked. The tears from my other eye
stopped no where -they just ran straight down and wet my bed cover.
“Did you already put your make up on?” She asked me as she was coming out of
the bathroom.
I shook my head.
“Hurry up, your mother-in-law will come to get us soon.”
I shook my head again.
“Everyone will come to say something to you, so you must put your make up on.”
“No, I don’t want to mother.”
“Alright then just draw your eyebrows. You look like a ghost with your thin eye
brows.”
“He’s dead. He can’t see me, mother.”
I stood up to pass her. Then my mother, a tiny Japanese woman, pushed me back
onto the bed. I fell backward and bounced on my brand new bed. I saw the chandelier
sparkling on the ceiling. She pulled my arms, forcing me to sit up, then she sat on my lap.
“It’s not for Michael. This is not for him. Okay, not for him!” she said and began
smearing cream on my face. The cream dissolved into my tears. My mother wiped them
off with tissues and put the cream back on, and when it dissolved again, she wiped my
face and applied it again. I just sat there. I didn’t move except for blinking my eyes
9
because she was on top of me. She wiped my cheeks and applied the cream again. She
wouldn’t give up. “I told you a long time ago, men like to see a woman naked. This is not
for him,” she said as she pressed powder onto my face. “Trust me, you’ll feel better once
you have make up on. I know it.”
***
My mother, my mother-in-law and I were sitting on the red couch, the couch Michael’s
friend was going to take in two days. The house was packed and ready to sell. In two
days, I would be leaving this house, saying goodbye to my mother at the airport, who
would be returning to Japan while I would be going in the opposite direction, to Boston,
with my mother in law and Alex.
“We did it. Zaydeh came and Zaydeh left. The house is packed and empty. We
deserve something for ourselves,” My mother in law said. “Tell me Kyoko, what do you
want to do? What would make you happy?”
“I want to move to Maui,” I said.
“Well, not that, but anything else. Anything. What do you really want?”
“Nothing,” I said.
“Well, I'll tell you what I want. I want to go to see a fortune teller,” my mother-inlaw said. “I want to see how happy we all will be because you know we will. We just
10
don’t know how.” I told her I knew there was one on Ocean Avenue. This made her
happy.
“How about you? what do you want, Masako?” My mother-in-law asked my
mother who was sitting on the edge of the sofa. I translated what my mother-in-law
asked. My mother, who always giggled with her hand her mouth whenever my mother-inlaw asked her something, was quiet. Suddenly, in one motion, my mother stood in front
of me, screaming in Japanese, “All I wanted was for you to put on make up. You never
put on any make up, even when Michael was alive! At least draw your eyebrows!” Then
she began to sob, her body shaking uncontrollably.
My mother in law, who had rarely even seen my mother speak, just sat there, her
eyes bouncing back and forth between my mother and me. She rose slowly and walked
over my mother, reached for her hand and said, “Yes, I know, we all miss Michael, don’t
we?” then embraced my mother for a very long time.
***
“Tell me the truth. Do you like classic cars?” Michael once asked.
I answered, “Not really.”
“Then let’s do something you like. What do you want to do?”
“This is what I want to do, sit next you in this car,” I said.
He looked at me like I'd said something funny. I couldn’t see his eyes because of
his sunglasses, but his eyebrows got close together, his mouth opened, forming a small O,
and his head tilted to the side like a puppy. I rubbed his knee and smiled tenderly at him.
He turned on the ignition and started singing to a song on the radio. I laughed and began
beating the dashboard like a drum. I loved the way he arched his back when he tried to hit
a high note. Alex was sleeping in the back seat. Noise never bothered him. He was still a
baby and I was twenty-four, and newly wed.
12
Mr. Suicide
At ten minutes before nine A.M., clenching his perspiring right hand while holding a
white cake box in the other, Taka stood in front of the door at the top floor of the old
three-story building. He raised his right hand and thought once more what to say before
he turned the door knob. The bell, hanging on the door, rang, at the same time a
cartoonish, high-pitched voice greeted him.
“Welcome to Treasure Travel.” The receptionist smiled as she tilted her head.
Her pink vest and baby-pink shirt matched her blossomy cheeks. She had the most
pleasant smile a stranger had given Taka in a while.
Taka cleared his throat. “I brought shi, shi-Shimizuya’s strawberry mousse.” He
stammered once but said the last of the sentence in one breath.
“I see,” she withdrew her smile, “please have a seat. I will tell him that you are
here.” She ran at a trot, disappearing into the back.
Taka sat down, his back straight against the edge of a green leather sofa. There
was no one else in the office after the receptionist had left. The air conditioner turned his
shirt cold, and a chill crawled up to his neck. On a plain white wall, a handwritten sign
said, “All the places you should go!” Under the sign, there were several faded posters,
13
the Golden Gate Bridge, the Eiffel Tower, Niagara falls, and other places he had never
heard of. He gazed at them, his mouth open like a kid in front of a movie screen, then
recalling sadly that he had never taken his wife or kids to a foreign country.
Taka felt a chill again. This time it was because he thought about the agent. Could
he be a part o f the mafia? Taka imagined the agent wearing an Armani suit without a tie,
chest hair showing from under his shirt; his glaring oversized sunglasses sliding down to
his nostrils, and his evil eyes nailing Taka. He might be missing a pinky or two. Taka
swallowed, looking down at his ten perfect fingers, now closed, resting neatly on his lap.
Though soon it would not matter to him, imagining being involved with someone who
could take a life as easily as stepping on ants, quickened his pulse to a throbbing that he
could feel behind his ears.
“Sorry to take so long. I was preparing for a trip tomorrow.” A man in a white
polo shirt with coffee stains on his chest appeared in front of Taka. The man gave him a
friendly wave just as his coworker used to give after all night drinking with him. As he
was rising up from a deep long bow, Taka glanced at the man's ten fingers.
The man was about Taka’s age, five feet tall, small even for a Japanese man, but
heavy. His short arms and legs reminded Taka of a Mr.Potato Head doll that his daughter
used to play with. His hair was curly but he was bald at the center of his head. He had a
fair-complexion and large dark-brown eyes. If only he was 30 pounds lighter, one foot
taller with longer arms and legs, and had hair, he could have be a fashion model.
“Are you the agent?” Taka asked.
“Yes indeed,” the man responded.
“Thank you for meeting with me. I brought Shimizuya’s strawberry mousse for
you. I hope I got the right kind.” Taka bowed again as he handed it to the agent.
The agent carefully opened the box and said, “Yes, this is the one! You know what
I love about this strawberry mousse, it’s got small seeds in it that pop when I take a bite.
All the other bakeries take the seeds away. I don’t know why they do. Real strawberries
have to have seeds, don’t you think?”
Taka nodded and again cleared his throat, “Mr...Mr.... The reason I came here
today is that I really need your help.”
The agent closed the box and nodded. He raised one chunky finger, grinning, and
said, “Call me, Mr. Suicide.” Then he ushered Taka to a back room.
***
Taka had worked as a sales representative at the Itami Disposable Chopstick Co, a
subsidiary of the Itami Paper Group, the second largest paper company in Japan. At work
no one knew who he was, yet when some mentioned ‘Mr.Yamada with the perfect
attendance,’ everyone immediately pictured his scallion figure.
Drinking upset his stomach. His terrible golf swing nearly killed his client’s dog,
and due to his paralyzing stage fright, he would almost faint during presentations. His
name never appeared on the board for Salesman of the Month. Still, he worked harder
than anyone in the department. The boss, who failed to keep up with technology, asked
Taka to file data. His coworkers in the computer generation, who failed to acquire social
skills, asked him to deliver their complaints to the boss. The stress of all this led Taka to
have gallstones once, stomach ulcers two times. But, he lasted thirty years, working every
day all day, chewing Turns and drinking his green energy drink, all of it for just one
mission - to provide the life his wife and kids deserved.
Taka and his family lived in a small condo complex in a suburb of Tokyo, an hour
and a half from his company. There was no backyard, but there was a large park with a
bright play structure inside the complex which kids could spent most of the time when
they were little.
After twenty-nine years of marriage, Taka and his wife, Toshiko no longer shared
a bedroom. He knew it was coming since everyone told him that this was something all
healthy couples would go through - kind of like a new beginning, or, a better word - an
'evolution' in love. He had never had an affair, neither had he bought a young woman like
many of his coworkers had done. He knew that all functional males desired other women,
or at least their images, but when he thought of Toshiko waiting him at home, falling
asleep, and drooling in their cozy living room, the television still on, his dinner on the
16
table and a hot steaming bath ready for him, he felt right to be an unhealthy man. In his
definition, love was what you do for others. Taka brought home money and with that
money Toshiko took care of Taka and their kids.
They had two children. Their son, Yoshio was twenty-one years old, and
graduated from a small college. After college, he moved away to the southern part of
Japan for his job. He wasn’t the smartest kid, below average in fact, but it didn’t bother
Taka as long as Yoshio was not bothered by it. Their daughter, Mari, beautiful like
Toshiko, was getting ready for her high-school entrance exam. Taka remembered the days
when he used to hold her in his arms. On the weekends, he gave her piggyback rides all
day long because he knew one day his daughter would not let him hold her. Now Mari
did not let him hug her, she did not even let him talk to her anymore. The presence of
Mari was everywhere. Her vanilla perfume lingered in the hallway, the bathroom, by the
entrance, and especially in front of her room.The sign on her door read, “Studying. Do
not disturb!”, so Taka never knocked to even say good night. Instead, sometimes he stood
in front of her door trying to catch her voice, laugh, cough, sigh, and foot steps until the
light pouring from under her door flicked off. It comforted him - just knowing Mari was
home, that she was safe.
Being a sales representative was not his calling, he knew that. He had majored in
science in college and had wanted to obtain an advanced degree in computer science.
When he asked Toshiko’s father for permission to marry her, Toshiko’s father told him
17
that a heavy box with bunch of buttons would never make any money, and unless he
found a job that could support Toshiko, he would not accept their marriage. The New
Nippon Cigarette Corporation, the Tanuki Brewery Company, Itami Paper Group and so
on; he tried all the big names but none offered a job. Until one day an interviewer at Itami
Group called him to say there was an opening for a sales representative at one of their
subsidiary companies. Disposable chopsticks: as long as Japanese people exist, there
would always be a demand. In September 10th, 1975, under a clear blue sky, Taka gave a
vow to Toshiko, promising her happiness for the rest of her life.
It was much later that he realized the whole world would discover the taste of
sushi. This caused an increasingly high demand for disposable chopsticks to the point of
destroying many acres of Chinese forest which led to an environmental protest movement
forcing Taka’s company's sales to decline. That led Taka, the man who was terrible at
selling chopsticks and did nothing but work for everyone else, to be fired.
Without telling his wife, he began to commute between the unemployment office
and numerous companies for interviews. Everyone seemed to like Taka, but at the final
interview they all said that he was too old to start over. He ate his lunch that Toshiko
packed for him at the park, hoping that he would find a job in the afternoon. Toshiko was
a great cook but at the park, eating lunch alone around homeless people, thinking of
Toshiko’s smile, seeing him off in the morning, as she had done the last thirty years, he
18
no longer was able to taste her food. He lived a lie for another three weeks and the fourth
week, two days before payday, it was time for him to do the right thing.
***
“I was going to tell my wife once I got another job but there is nothing out there for a
fifty-year-old man. Nothing. In a few days, she will find out that there is no pay check
deposited into our account,” Taka said to the agent.
“You are not alone, Mr.Yamada. I’ve seen and I’ve heard it all, and this is a
common complaint from men like you,” The agent said, eating his strawberry mousse.
“We have a mortgage and our daughter is still in Jr. high.”
“Sure.” The agent sipped his coffee then scooped another bite. The room was so
quiet that Taka could almost hear the sounds of seeds popping in the agent’s mouth.
“I want to die,” Taka said.
“Oh don’t you worry Mr.Yamada. We have a very high success rate.”
“Really?”
“Really. I have been in this business over twenty years but never once received a
claim; you know why, because they are all dead.” His confident laughter reverberated in
the office.
Taka tried to laugh with him but was only able to give an awkward smile.
19
“But first I want to let you know that I do not kill you, okay? I don’t buy you an
illegal drug or drive to the Rainbow Bridge. I am a consultant. I can give you my advice:
what is the best way to kill yourself, cleanest, neatest, easiest, cheapest. I can tell you the
best spot to hang yourself without being found. 1 can help your suicide plan, help you to
write your suicide note, the haunted one to your boss or your wife, if that’s the situation. I
can assist you organizing paper work but I DO NOT kill you. Do you understand?”
“Yes, I understand. I just need to make sure that the way I die won’t be a burden
to my family.”
“That will be no problem,” The agent said, searching with his pinky for a
strawberry seed that had stuck between his front teeth.
“So, let’s talk about the price. First, it’s cash only.”
“Yes,” Taka touched the wallet in his back pocket.
“Normally, I charge a flat rate.”
Taka’s eyes widened and again he felt his wallet.
“But you seem to be an awfully nice man so I’ll give you a special deal, a family
discount for folks who leave their family behind.”
Taka took papers out of his bag and began to read from his personal savings, his
life insurance, and retirement. The agent appeared to randomly tap at the numbers on his
calculator. Then, Taka read the amount of his mortgage, a student loan from his son and
all the small debt he had so far. As the agent typed in more numbers, he furrowed his eye
20
brows, groaned and said, “And you have a daughter who is going to high school,
correct?”
Taka nodded.
The agent scratched his balding head and sighed, “Mr.Yamada, this is the best I
can do,” he said as he showed Taka the calculator.
Taka counted the number of zeros. At first he thought he counted too many zeros
so he counted again, and again but it was not a mistake.
“The ATM machine is around the comer. It’s not that much money once you, well
your wife receives the life insurance.”
“But then, my wife, she shouldn’t have to pay.”
“Mr.Yamada, in life we all have to make some sacrifices.”
They both sighed. The agent tapped the table with his finger and with his other
hand he picked at his teeth. Taka kept looking at the calculator, counting the zeros again,
hoping again that he had miscounted. He took out his wallet, looked away from the agent,
and counted exactly how much money he had. Then, he thrust his hand into his pocket,
took out all his change, and counted that too.
The agent took another sip of coffee, gargled with it, drank, and said, “I guess, I
have to ask you to leave.” He stood up and walked to the door.
“Mr. Suicide, just for five minutes? All I need is to know what will be the best
way to die. The rest I can figure out by myself.”
21
The agent shook his head and said, “Please...”
Taka shut his mouth tight, stared at the agent’s eyes, and shook his head.
“Good Luck, Mr.Yamada.” The agent bowed lightly, “And take the rest of the
cake to your family.”
***
Taka stood at the platform of the train station. Every fifteen minutes someone commits
suicide, he'd heard on the radio the other day. His upper body was leaning slightly
forward as he gazed straight ahead. The image of the man, from a few years back, lying
on his hospital bed, with his mouth open, crossed his mind.
It was one of the small duties his boss had required of him.
The room was dimly lit and cool. Taka took one deep breath, clenched the brown
envelope, and walked up to the bed. He wanted to say something to Mr.Suma before he
reached the bed, but if Mr. Suma said anything, even slightly turned his head, Taka knew
he would not be able to move his feet. The smell of the hospital reminded of him his
father’s nursing home, sanitizer spray mixed with over-cooked lasagna and body order.
And the sound, - the noise of silence - his trousers rubbing against each other, his soft
footsteps, and the tiny beeping close to his ears that he could not get rid of in the quiet of
this room. Mr.Suma’s body was under the smooth white sheets, his mouth slightly
22
opening in the shape of a crescent moon and his eyes gently shut - if Taka was not
informed prior to the visit, he would not have suspected that just a few weeks ago
Mr.Suma had tried to take his own life at the train station.
“Mr.Suma,” Taka whispered.
Mr.Suma did not open his eyes.
“Mr.Suma. My Name is Yamada. I am a sales representative from Itami.”
Mr.Suma’s pupils moved towards Taka. The hand holding the brown envelope
softened from Taka’s sweat, his feet no longer felt like his own, just separate entities,
holding the rest of his body, and his heart was beating so fast that it made him nauseous.
“I’m sorry, Mr.Suma.”
Mr.Suma kept staring at Taka.
“Mr. Haijima sent me to get your signature.” Taka opened the envelope and
smoothed out the form that had wrinkled from him holding it too tight. Mr.Suma finally
moved his pupil away from Taka and looked at the paper. “All we ask is that you read and
sign at the bottom.”
Mr.Suma opened his mouth like a fish gulping food. “Pen,” he said.
“A pen in your mouth?”
Mr. Suma nodded and gave him a look, so Taka took a pen out his chest pocket,
wiped it once with his sleeve then blew his breath and wiped it again.
23
“The company doesn’t care if the pen is clean,” Mr. Suma said. “They don’t see
you and even if they see you they don’t care. I now have medical bills, enormous
cleaning fees to the rail load company, and no job.”
Taka thought he heard voice outside the room so he glanced quickly at the door
but saw no one. “Could you sign the paper, please?” he asked.
“Now I can’t even sign a decent signature. How am I going to pay it all back?”
Mr. Suma finally held the pen with his mouth. And along with the sound of the pen
scratching the paper, Taka heard two women speaking in serious tones outside Mr.Suma’s
room. The pen fell off as Mr.Suma finished signing and just Taka sealed the brown
envelope, he heard a slight knock on the door.
“Daddy?” The girl in the uniform peeked out the door.
Another train was approaching to the station. Taka watched the train pass by, but
his body didn’t lean forward. Instead, he turned around, and ran back to where he came
from.
When Taka returned to Treasure Travel, the agent was getting ready to leave the office.
“Mr.Yamada! You found the money!”
“This is all I have,” Taka took out his wallet, the change from his pocket and the
train pass hanging on his neck, placed them all on top of the cake box, and push them
toward the agent. “It’s not much, I know, but please take it and give me some advice.”
“I already told you. I can’t,” the agent put his hand against the cake box but Taka
did not move.
“Then I won’t let you go beyond this door. If you try, I’ll kill you!”
Taka dropped the cake box, spread out his twig-like legs to cover the door, held
his shaking fists in front of his narrow body, and stared at the agent intensely with his
sad, teary eyes. The agent saw Taka's running nose, his neatly combed hair, parted at the
side, falling to his forehead - his breath short and rapid.
Not even once had a client threatened him. Though the agent never really
remembered their names or their faces, he did remember their shared characteristics.
They all gave up easily. They were brave enough to hurt themselves, but too cowardly to
hurt others. None of his clients had discovered a remedy for his bald head or committed a
terrorist act. They were simply disposable and replaceable. Even though they walked
away from their lives today, the country would exist just as it had yesterday and would
tomorrow. Why did he need to worry about them?
So when Mr.Yamada showed up at his office at exactly ten minutes before nine,
he thought he would have a day like the one before. Mr.Yamada was someone he would
forget as soon as he finished his strawberry mousse, collected the money, and have a
25
couple of consultation meetings in a sympathetic manner. But now Mr.Yamada was in
front of the agent, threatening him with his two small fists and his wobbly legs.
Mr.Yamada became not just a client, but the man who he would wonder about on
tomorrow’s airplane, on Sunday afternoon wine tasting in his sunroom, and years from
now when he would be an old man, free of most memories.
“Okay, okay Mr.Yamada, you win. I will give you my consultation.”
“Thank you.” Taka dropped his fists and bowed to him deeply.
“Come back tomorrow at eleven A.M. sharp. You have only thirty minutes to
consult before I leave for the airport.”
***
Without knowing how he got there, Taka was on the street that led to his condo. The sun
was down and only the street lights led his way home. The air was warm and humid, and
it felt so gentle that it tickled the back of his ears. He stood in the middle of the street,
closed his eyes, and felt the moist air passing him by. Then he opened his eyes, gazed into
the dark sky and found one bright star. The last group of small bats flew low, still looking
for prey. The sound of laughter emitted from the neighbor's house. From the same house,
the scent of minty shampoo cleared Taka’s mind. It was the quietest and most peaceful
night he had had in a while.
26
A girl appeared from the comer. It was Mari. Without noticing Taka, She turned
left to their house. Hunching her back, looking down to the ground, Mari walked in small
turtle steps. Taka wanted to run to her and ask, “What’s wrong?” but he couldn’t. Seeing
her alone, her shoulders sagging, all he wanted was to hold her one more time.
Instead, he followed her, and put his hand on her shoulder.
“Dad!” Mari said.
“Let me carry your bag,” He said.
“It’s not that heavy,” Mari said.
“That’s okay, let me.”
“No dad, it’s okay. Your hands are full.”
He realized he was holding the cake.” I bought cake for you and your mom,” he
said.
“Is this...from Shimizuya? How did you know this bakery?” Her face brightened
up.
“Do you know the bakery?”
“Well, you know...I think it was on TV just the other day.”
Taka saw Mari’s smile. This made him happy to know he'd done one thing that
would make her happy. They laughed about the half smashed cake box. Taka told her that
in the train he held it against the train wall to protect the box from smashing but so many
27
people came in at once that he finally had to held up the box over everyone’s head. She
laughed as she looked at Taka’s hand raising up the dark sky.
“Isn't it a perfect evening?” he said.
“Why?”
“Well let’s see because the sky is clear, we see one bright star and I found you.”
“I guess. ”
“You guess? If this is not the perfect evening, what would be? Come stand here.”
Taka held Mari’s shoulders and moved her in front of him. He looked at Mari while Mari
looked away.
“Dad, you are being creepy. Let’s go.”
“Is there anything bothering you?”
“Why do you ask?”
“I’m your father. I want to know if something is bothering you.”
“No, it’s nothing.” She smiled but he knew it wasn’t the smile she gave him when
he was talking about the box.
“You don’t have to worry about anything okay. You can go any high school you
wish, I’ll take care of it.”
“Sure, if I had that kind of brain. That you can’t help me with. Let’s go home.”
Mari looked away from him.
The stairs were too narrow to stay side by side so Taka walked behind Mari.
28
***
At exactly ten minuets to eleven, Taka returned to Treasure Travel.
“Oh, Mr. Yamada, you are early again. Come in, come in. Someone just came in
and left so I’m cleaning up the mess.” The agent ushered him in.
At first the freshly brewed coffee aroma welcomed Taka, but as he came in the
room, the familiar sweet vanilla perfume scent triggered his memory.
“Mr. Suicide, who was here?”
“Oh it’s a confidential. I can’t tell you.”
“Did she have long black hair? Was she wearing a uniform? And really, really
beautiful?”
“I suppose 1 could say that.” The agent wiped his hands on his pants.
Taka rushed out of the room, opened the door roughly, run down the stairs out of
the building. He looked right and left trying to find her. It was just past eleven o’clock but
the street was already crowded. Then he saw her, the only girl in a school uniform. He
screamed her name and waved but the city noise drowned his voice and people began to
block his view. He ran, zigzagging between people, still keeping his eyes on the uniform.
He screamed “Mari, Mari!” But again his voice vanished into the crowd.
29
The stop light turned red and she was on the other side of the street. Taka ran
through the red light, trying not to be hit. The cars honked, people rolled down their
windows and yelled, “Go away! You crazy, stupid!” But Taka heard nothing. He only
heard Mari’s voice from last night, “I t ’s nothing.”
Taka found her at the stairs to the train station. He called her again, “Mari, Mari!”
People on the stairs looked at Taka but she did not look back. He pushed people aside and
climbed the stairs, “Mari, Mari!” She was at the top of the stairs then she turned to the
right, in the opposite direction to their home. Stabbing pains rushed through his stomach
to his heart but he kept running. His legs trembling and his arms exhausted. Still he
continued to run to the right. Now she was going up the platform, the platform he had
never used. He ran and as he ran he recalled Mari’s chubby face when she was just bom,
her first word, her first step, her first drawing, her first test, her first uniform, her and
Toshiko’s identical smile, and her last smile...last night.
He found her at the top of the platform. He pushed everyone away with the last
strength he had. People screamed at him and pushed him back. He lost his balance,
stumbled and barely saved himself from falling to the track. The train was approaching
and he saw her back, walking towards incoming train. Three more steps then he could
grab her bag. Two more steps then he could grab her hand. One more step, he could
embrace her one more time in his arms.
And he did. He pulled her into his arms, pressing her face into his chest. There,
the middle of the crowd he cried, “Everything is going to be okay.” And he promised
himself that he would never let her go.
“Get away from me!” The unfamiliar voice yelled at him and she elbowed his
stomach. Taka doubled over and then as he began to rise, he saw her face. It was not
Mari.
He collapsed to the ground and felt alive.
31
Autumn Rain
She was wrapped in its noise when she awakened. It took a minute before she realized
that it was the rain falling on the corrugated roof.
The roof wasn’t the only tenuous thing about this place. The floors, constructed of
plywood, topped with a gray, abrasive polyester carpet - the corners of floor stained with
water. At night, when she laid her ear to the damp futon, she heard the whisper of breezes
through the hollow space between the ground and the floor, along with the echo of her
heartbeat. Four walls divided the prefabricated house into five small rooms. The sound of
someone clipping their toe nails could be heard from another room through the walls.
Each room had its own kitchen, bathroom and shower, and each room was so narrow that
you had to suck your stomach in order to enter. As night deepened, she often saw the
ceiling lamp, slightly swaying right to left. She heard the floor squeaking, and heard the
young, newly married couple next door hushing each other. They reminded Setsuko of
how she used to sleep with Kichiji. Forty years ago perhaps, she and her husband used to
be just like the couple, whispering dull jokes into each others ears, falling to sleep
without even realizing it.
32
Closing her eyes, Setsuko waited once again for sleep to take her away. Tonight,
the rain drowned out the breezes, her heartbeat, and the young couple’s breathing.
This must be the beginning of fall, she thought, recalling the many seasons of
maple leaves changing color. The leaves always turning from green to red, falling to the
ground just before winter, waiting to decompose beneath the snow; their short life
defined. She wished that human life was as ordered, predictable and simple as that of
leaves.
On her left side she felt a familiar warmth. Miki, her granddaughter, rolled over to
her. Each night they laid their futons next to each other as tightly as possible. The idea of
having any space between them might give Miki fears of separation. When she awoke in
the middle of the night, Setsuko always found Miki right next to her.
On the day she lost her own daughter, she became a mother again. Someone
screaming, “Tsunami! Don’t look back!” she looked back and froze in the middle of the
long stairs. While everyone raced around them, one young man stopped and reached for
Miki and Setsuko, lifted them both, carrying Setsuko on his back and holding Miki in one
arm. As the tsunami grew closer, she wanted to tell him to leave her, to take only Miki.
Instead, she clung instinctively to the man’s shoulders.
At the top of the stairs was the shrine where she used to take her daughter, the
young man released Miki then sat down to drop Setsuko off. Setsuko’s arms had become
stiff, clinging to him still, locked like those of the many dead people she would later
33
witness. He unclasped her hands and she rolled off his back. Looking up to the ceiling
above her, a mural with the eyes in the face of a painted dragon met her own. The dragon
must have seen through her ugly, selfish desire to survive. She had already lived long
enough.
The rain continued, Setsuko’s eyes remained closed as she opened the white
plastic drawer on her right side. Swallowing one sleeping pill, washing it down with
leftover green tea, was all she needed to move on to tomorrow. Do humans inhale or
exhale right before they fall sleep? She didn’t know. How about when they died? She
didn’t know that either. Thinking of these two questions, she thought sleeping and dying
were perhaps the two greatest gifts humans possessed.
Several years of paper work, the receipts and the records of her expenses for Miki
required by the government, the souvenir bookmark given to her by the volunteer from
England whose name she was never able to remember; her hand now felt its way among
the papers, searching for the tattered paper bag.
She finally opened her eyes, sat up, and held the paper bag to her chest. Reaching
into it, she pulled out the things she had rescued from her house. On the lumpy comforter
under where she and Miki lay - one by one, she spread the soft, wrinkled photographs out
like a deck of cards...her eyes gazing at each, searching for emotion.
Through the steam of the hot springs, Kichiji stood straight, their daughter,
Yumiko in his arm, looking away from the camera, his hand gently holding Setsuko’s.
34
And another, Baby Miki wearing the Kimono that used to be Yumiko’s, crying next to her
smiling parents at the same shrine, Setsuko and Miki had been carried to.
Again, no tears.
One by one, she put them back and placed the paper bag back into the drawer.
She slowly crawled under her cover, found Miki’s warm hand, and pressed it to
her mouth. Miki’s moist hand smelled like the tangerine she had eaten after dinner.
Inhaling the sweet, tart smell as deeply as she could, she pulled Miki closer to her. As she
held her tightly, she imagined Miki, in her brand new yellow raincoat, holding Setsuko’s
hand, walking together to preschool, Miki smiling in the first autumn rain.
Lying there, she thought of tomorrow and that she would wake again. The rain
continued its assault on the tin roof, as she tried falling asleep. The same rain that was
sure to be there, waiting for them, in the morning.
35
In Winter, I Smile Under the Cold Rain
I lock my arms behind my back and watch my son sleep. I keep the left side of my bed,
the side closest to the bathroom, empty. Sometimes Alex comes to my bed after he goes
to the bathroom in the middle of the night and is too sleepy to go back to his own bed.
While I sleep, he wedges his feet in between my thighs as he falls to sleep. His face is
smoother, more innocent than when he is awake. I used to wake at dawn, before the
alarm, and find Alex next to me. I would stroke his cheek with my own cheek, to the
rhythm of his breathing, and recall summertime in Japan, the nights I would watch my
mother peeling the fuzzy skin from a white peach, the nectar running through between
her fingers. Taking advantage of Alex sleeping, I would check his head for lice, his eyes
for mucus, and count his freckles. I traced his forehead with the tip of my finger. I
touched his eyelids. And I touched his nose, which was like a slide made of porcelain, my
finger slipping over its bridge, again and again. Over and over. I can’t do this anymore.
Now I cross my arms tightly behind my back and just lie there looking at him.
Every September 21st, on the anniversary of my husband’s death, I call my mother-inlaw. I start our conversation with sniffling, just enough so she can hear me. Though my
36
nose is clear, I manage to play a rhythmic sniffling duet with her. She then blows her nose
three times and ends the conversation by saying, “Kyoko, it’s time for you to find your
happiness. You have sacrificed your life enough.”
So I tell her the truth, “Thank you, but I am happy the way I am.”
My mother-in-law bursts into tears. As I hear her thanking me for giving her son
the happiness he knew, I feel another layer of guilt thickening my heart.
On my husband’s birthday, I buy a strawberry shortcake from the Italian bakery he loved,
and I invite neighbors and some of his friends. They gather and flip through the photo
albums at the dining room table. The dim light illuminates them and their laughter with
the story of my husband building a 1970 Nova engine in our garage. I sit apart from
them, on a stool by the stove, scraping pancake batter from the counter surface while I
wait for the water to boil. When my guests silently begin to poke at the remaining
whipped cream on their slices of cake, I fear being asked how I am doing. Even more, I
fear being hugged, being pressed against someone until I can feel the temperature of their
body, because at that moment they might sense that I am not empty, or worse, that I am
content.
The morning I found out that I was pregnant with Alex, Michael and I met at St.Francis,
our favorite diner. I told him not to worry, that everything was under control, the place for
37
the abortion, the money, even the ride home. All taken care of. We had been together for
only a few months, just long enough to leave my toothbrush at his place, nothing else.
“Hungry?” I said to him, and waved to a waitress. Smiling at her, I ordered coffee
and a waffle.
Michael shook his head and sent her away. He didn’t look at her, his eyes stayed
on me the whole time.
“So what should we go see tonight?” I said.
He continued looking at me, and said, “Have you thought that I might want the
baby? Have you even thought that I want to marry you? You and me?”
The noise of the popular diner helped to fill the blank spaces in our conversation.
I watched Michael unroll his napkin, laying the silverware out, putting it back into the
napkin, and rolling it back up again. Then he pressed his fingers to the inside comers of
his eyes.
I reached for his hand, and said, “Yes of course, honey.”
Perhaps it was my love for him that made me lie. If so, then my theory was
correct - love disrupts peace.
In my second trimester, lying on my bed, I would often imagine cutting my wrist, my
blood dripping onto the floor, the life of my fetus slowly ending before ever being
exposed to the hardships of life and a mother who did not love him. What i f the fetus not
38
only absorbed my nutrition but also my feelings? What if my daydreaming imparted
abandonment issues on to the child? Instead of my blood, my tears stained my pillow so I
turned to look at Michael. Placing my hand on his ribs, feeling them expanding and
contracting, I imagined his reaction if he found me lifeless beside him. I decided I would
keep the fetus alive. Not for the baby. Not for Michael. I would keep Alex for myself.
Alex was bom with the look of a famous Japanese boxer who later became a slapstick
comedian. His face red and swollen, his body bruised. When I pressed him to my breast
to feed, he could barely open his eyes, his eyelids still swollen, like an alien...no whites to
his eyes.
“He's here! He's in my arms!” I shouted to my mother in Japan, over the
telephone. “He is as red as baboon’s butt, and looks like Guts Ishimatsu. Mother, he is
here with me, and when I hold my finger under his nose, I can feel him breathing. He is
alive!”
My mother laughed or cried or both, and said, “You are lucky. He sounds
adorable!”
“Yes, though it doesn’t make sense.”
“Why does it need to make sense?” my mother said.
39
Two or three times in winter, when my bed is too cold to put my feet in, I climb up to
Alex’s loft bed and nudge him awake.
“Alex, Lex, Alek, Lexy, Lulu. Lala. Come to my bed,” I say, tickling him under
his arm. He mumbles in his sleep and turns away from me. “Alex, come sleep with
Mama,” I say. He doesn’t move and his body feels like a heavy dense log. After several
shakes and whispering into his ear, he gets up, his eyes still closed, and climbs down the
ladder. I hold his back to keep him from falling, and when he reaches to the floor I carry
him to my bed. Our feet intertwine, his feeble, listless hand lying on my cheek, and I am
not cold anymore.
I have been collecting Chinese zodiac holiday cards. I've written fifteen of them so far
and packed each in a brown envelope. My brother is a good man who keeps secrets to
himself. He is also a businessman who travels around the world. When Alex leaves to
college someday, I will tell my brother to send one card to Alex every year from some
foreign country. Alex will think I am enjoying country hopping and he will say, “My
mother! She is the most free-sprited woman I know. Last year, the card was postmarked
in France and this year in Brazil.”
Two days ago, while Alex was silently sleeping next to me, our legs wrapped together, I
awoke with a mucus-like wetness, a wetness that lingered on my body, a sensation I
40
could not quiet let go of. My nipples erect, and when they brushed against my T-shirt, I
felt a tickling sensation, like just before I sneeze. The sensation rushed down from my
chest to my belly, passing through my wet underwear and ending at my toes. I released
Alex’s legs, hid my lips under my teeth and gripped my thigh. I tried to stop my body
from swaying to my heartbeat by tightening my grip. It didn’t work. I was still rocking.
Today, I move away from him, tuck him in and leave for the kitchen. I turn the oven on to
broil, crack two eggs in a bowl, add some milk, whisk and pour it into the pan. I put a
slice of bacon into the oven and toss two slices of bread into the toaster. The wetness. The
sensation. I make breakfast for me too so Alex can have someone to eat with. Eating
breakfast alone is what lonely kids do. My son is not lonely. I won’t allow it. I know I
don’t deserve to eat but if I don’t eat who is left to love him? I eat a piece of toast and a
scrambled egg but not bacon because a slice of bacon costs 80 cents compared to a slice
of toast and one egg, which cost 25 cents. I cut a cucumber and place the slices on our
plates. I make two cross cuts on the top of an orange and removed the peeling so that he
will eat the fruit and not just suck the juice. I pour some milk into our cups. No coffee in
my house. I take the bacon from the oven, place it on his plate, and wonder where I went
wrong.
The alarm goes off. It’s time for him to wake up. I sit next to him on the bed with
my hands crossed behind my back. His mouth opens slightly. I inhale his exhale. His
41
seaweed breath, not that pleasant but I cannot resist sucking it in. I’ve read somewhere
that it’s better to breathe through your nose. I lift his chin with my chin. It’s six o’clock in
the morning, still dark out.
“Baby, it’s time to wake up,” I say.
He wiggles, pulls me into the bed and buries his face in my lap. I freeze. My
arms, still crossing behind my back.
“Five more minutes,” he pleads.
“No, time is up,” I say.
He grumbles, but rolls off the bed and walks to the bathroom. I see his back
standing in front of the toilet then hear the trickling sound.
“What’s for breakfast?” he asks, washing his hands.
“Same as yesterday,” I reply.
There is no one in this house, just him and me. There is no one he sees in this
house, just me. And there is no one I see in this house, out the door or anywhere, except
him. Who is going to love him if not me?
We sit across from each other. The food is still warm, just perfect.
“Do you love me?” I ask him.
“Sure why?” he says.
“Because I’m happy,” I say.
He shrugs.
42
It hurts to be happy.
“Ms. Smith told us about heaven and hell yesterday,” he says, “She doesn’t
believe either exist because when she was a child the teacher at Sunday school told her
that her dog could not go to heaven with her, only humans can.”
“That’s funny.” I laugh. “So what do you believe in?”
“I believe in everything, heaven, hell, reincarnation, the field of punishment and
the field of Asphodel. How about you?”
“I don’t believe any of it.”
We finish our breakfast. He brushes his teeth, change his clothes and grabs his
backpack. Just as he reaches for the door nob, he stops, turns around, and looks at me.
“Yes you do, Mama. You’ve got to.”
43
Scar Tissue
But she must live, so she bit deeper into inside her mouth. As she finished imagining the
scenario, she stopped biting her mouth and the blood poured. After the scar had become
too tough to feel the pain, she came up with a new scenario and bit into a new place.
Now, three years had past. When she traced inside her lower lip with her tongue, she
could feel the countless bumps, like stones on a cobblestone path. No one had seen the
scar, only her.
The first scenario Kyoko imagined was about Alex’s preschool teacher taking his
lunch bag away. The teacher pushed him aside then yanked the bag and threw it. When
Alex began to cry, the teacher shoved him into a closet and locked the door. Alex heard
children singing, so he quietly sang along with them, hoping his teacher would let him
out. Soon, he needed to go to the bathroom. He knocked on the door, screamed for his
teacher, but the children’s merry singing drowned out his screams. By the time the
teacher came to yell at him to be quiet, he had peed in his pants. She pulled his hair,
dragged him in front of the other children and asked the children in a sweet voice, “Can
you tell me what is wrong with Alex?” Everyone spoke at once, “He peed in his pants.”
She asked Alex why he had peed on himself, then Alex said, “Because I am a bad boy.”
The teacher smirked and asked all the children to repeat it. Everyone said, “Alex is a bad
boy, so he peed on himself.” As the teacher continued to tell the children how good they
were compared to Alex, he looked down and went back into the closet. In the end, Alex
was found dead, his thumb in his mouth, his pants soaked.
He was going to fix his favorite classic car, her husband told her on the phone
before he was found dead in the garage, under his 1964 Chevrolet Impala. Alex and
Kyoko were visiting her parents in Japan while her husband had stayed working. Just
three weeks, that was all they were supposed to be apart. What remained after his death
was a mortgage, and the lingering smell of his deodorant on his dirty laundry. The scent
of the clothes crushed Kyoko’s heart just like his car had crushed his chest. She threw the
dirty laundry in a garbage bag and his deodorant away. She donated his suits, his dress
shoes and his vinyl record collection. She sold his tools, the car that killed him, their bed,
their fridge, his drum set and everything she could. As his smell disappeared, the memory
of their life together began to fade as well. She looked around her house once again
before leaving. The sun, now free of obstacles like furniture, increased the light from the
windows. Even if the house burned down, she had nothing more to lose. But then Alex,
who was sleeping in the baby carrier, woke up and began to fret. She took him out the
carrier and soothed him but he pushed her, kicked her and refused to be held. She let him
go. Although Alex was eighteen months old, he ran from the sun room to the kitchen,
passing through the dining room to the living room with his unsteady steps. There was
45
nothing ahead of him, no table, no chairs, no plants, still the image of Alex breaking his
skull haunted Kyoko. She caught Alex before he reached the living room bay window,
and squeezed him until he could not move. Alex began to cry. She had to let him go
again, to let him get hurt. To bear his growth, she had to accept the fear of losing him.
She bit the inside her mouth in order to endure the pain.
The man they met at the grocery store had a parrot on his shoulder. All child molesters
needed a prop to attract kids, Kyoko knew this from one of the scenarios she had
imagined before. His curly hair thinned on the side of his forehead and tied into pony tail.
His glasses, the lenses as thick as the bottom of a soda bottle, made his eyes appear as
small as sesame seeds. His T-shirt had green bird droppings, and he wore baggy pants,
big enough to hide children in both legs.
“Mama, look!” Alex pointed at the parrot.
“Good Morning Max,” the parrot said.
“My name is not Max, my name is Alex, and it’s afternoon,” Alex told the parrot.
“We’ve got to get carrots Alex,” Kyoko said, pulling his hand.
“His name is Max and he says, ‘good morning’ even in the afternoon.” The parrot
man smiled at Alex. Kyoko saw the gap between the man’s stained front teeth.
“Come Alex, sweetie. Let’s go get ice cream,” Kyoko pulled Alex into her side.
“Pretty Alex, cool Max,” the parrot said.
46
“My name rhymes with his!” Alex said.
“Alex, let’s go,” Kyoko said.
“No,” Alex said.
“They are shopping and they need to go,” Kyoko said.
“No,” he said, pushing her off.
“Alex!” Kyoko said.
“Hey Alex, do you like dogs?” the parrot man squatted to Alex’s height and asked.
Alex nodded.
“Well then if you come to the park behind the store on Sunday morning, you get to
meet a dog that falls down when you pretend you are shooting him.”
“Really?”
The parrot man nodded and said, “If it’s OK with your mom.”
Alex looked at Kyoko.
“We will see,” she said.
In her scenario, when Kyoko took her eyes off Alex for a second, he was abducted, to
North Korea. The solders handed Alex a riffle. They taught Alex how to use it and took
him to a fenced field. At the field, a few kids, just like him, hid behind tall grasses. They
told Alex to shoot the kids and if he didn’t, these kids would eat his body and chew his
bone, then, he would never be able to see his mama. Alex held the heavy gun to his
47
shoulder then screamed, “mama!” and with his eyes closed, he began shooting. At night,
the shooter and the target shared the same jail. Cold and hungry, the kids piled together
where they ate maggots out of a dying child's infected leg.
When the night deepened, the soldier who gave him a riffle called for Alex to come.
Alex stood slowly and followed the soldier. The man opened the door for Alex and there
was a single bed awaiting them. “As long as you survive in the field you get to return to
my bed at night. Now take off your filthy clothes and warm me up,” the soldier said,
sliding his hand on Alex’s back.
Kyoko finished imagining the scenario as she was falling to sleep. She tasted her
blood, but she didn’t feel the pain. She imagined the same scenario again. The boy who
was shooting, was Alex, the boy who was picking maggots, was Alex, and the boy who
went into the man’s bed, was also Alex. But she didn’t need to bite inside her mouth as
she recalled the scenario again. She opened her eyes and looked at Alex's sleeping face.
With her lips, she traced Alex’s nose, then pressed her lips closer and felt him breath. She
felt contentment so she thought of the parrot man - his pony tail, his gapped front teeth,
his baggy pants and thought of Alex and the parrot man together. Once again, her teeth
went deeper into the side her mouth. Her tears and pain came up. She bore the pain. Her
skin popped inside her mouth and she tasted new blood.
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Just as he had said, the parrot man waited them at the park. Several kids were gathering
around him and pretending to shoot his St. Barnard which was hiding under the bench,
snoring.
“Have you been for a while?” Kyoko asked.
The parrot man said, “No, I just got here.” Beads of sweat formed on the parrot
man’s forehead and the redness covered his face as he looked away. She lifted his coffee
cup to sit down next to him. The cup was still full but cold. He was lying, she knew it.
Alex stayed next to Kyoko pretending to shoot the dog with the other kids.
“Why don’t we move to the other bench?” the parrot man said.
They walked to the shady side of the park.
“My name is Chris and this is Chevy, and you are?” The parrot man said Kyoko.
“Alex,” Kyoko whispered to Alex, then picked him up and whispered him again, “I
will be right there, watching you guys, okay.” She bowed to the parrot man then walked
away.
After she had walked about ten feet and looked back to make sure that they weren’t
looking at her, she slid to the side to hide behind bushes. She bit inside her mouth, hard,
the familiar pain spread from her mouth to her jaw, and she felt a strange relief.
The dog laid on the ground quietly even though Alex was pulling his ears and lying
on top of him. The parrot man squatted down next to Alex and said something. Kyoko bit
her mouth harder but that wasn’t enough so she pinched her hand with her nails. The
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parrot man and Alex stood up and the dog sat, looking at the man. The parrot man
reached his hand toward the dog and the dog lifted his paw. Alex clapped. Alex put his
hand out and the dog lifted his paw. Without letting go of the dog’s paw, Alex looked at
the parrot man and he smiled back at Alex.
“Up,” the parrot man’s mouth moved. Then the dog stood up. The man made a gun
with his hand and held it up to the dog. The dog’s tongue hung down as it looked at the
man. The man attached his other hand to the gun hand. Alex looked at the man. Kyoko
swallowed iron tasting saliva and bit down again inside her mouth. “Bang!” The man’s
mouth moved. The dog laid down on its side and slowly rolled over onto its back. Alex
jumped up and down and clapped. The man looked at Alex with a gentle smile. “Up,” the
man said and the dog got up. Next it was Alex’s turn. As Alex made a gun with both his
hands, the man said something to his ear, pointing at the dog. Alex took a moment.
Kyoko took one deep breath then “Bang!” The dog laid down and rolled over. The man
and Alex looked at each other and laughed. The dog was still on the ground with his
tongue out. The taste of blood remained but she wasn’t biting herself and her hands were
gently held together, only the crescent moon shaped nail marks stayed her left hand.
That night, Kyoko kissed and apologized to Alex while he slept. She held his hand
that held the parrot man’s dog. Without letting his hand go, she licked her scar inside her
mouth with her tongue. When she pushed into her scar, opening it again, the taste of
blood filled her mouth, and the stabbing pain ran through her body.
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After that every Sunday, although Kyoko never told the parrot man that they would
come again, he always waited at the same bench with his coffee and Chevy. Alex hugged
Chevy while Kyoko moved the parrot man’s cold coffee, sat next to him and gave a small
nod of recognition. Every so often, Kyoko said good morning to him but as soon as the
parrot man began to talk, she bowed to him and went to the bushes. Once the parrot man
attempted to touch Alex. It looked like slow motion to Kyoko. Alex and the parrot man
were laughing together, but the moment the parrot man’s arms moved towards Alex’s hip.
Kyoko ran towards to them and picked Alex up. The parrot man’s hand had no where else
to go so he scratched his head. Alex stretched his arms and feet and said, “I’m flying!”
The parrot man said, “Your mom came so fast. She is the one who is flying.” They
laughed again. Kyoko couldn’t laugh with them.
The parrot man never tried to touch Alex again even though Kyoko always hid
behind the bushes. Once, when the parrot man was trying to teach Alex how to throw a
Frisbee to his dog, he showed his throwing form until Alex mastered it then handed the
frisbee to Alex, but never held Alex’s hand to teach him.
Kyoko’s scenarios switched to the recollection of Alex playing with the parrot man.
While she imagined them, she told herself that she was putting her son into the hands of a
child molester. The gouged scar turned into white cranker sore and it began to sting when
she drank orange juice. Still, she touched the scar with her tongue and her saliva gushed
out. And as she felt it, she was able to assure herself that she was getting stronger.
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“Would you like to come to my house next Sunday?” The parrot man caught Kyoko one
day when she was about to carry Alex away. He hunched his back as if someone had
stolen his backbone. His eyes fell to the ground, his ears began to blossom to red and his
hand moved into his pocket.
Kyoko stared at the man and held Alex’s hand tightly.
“Alex told me that he wants to see the other animals I live with. I mean if you can,
if you want or if you’d like. No pressure though, only if you want to. You can choose not
to come,” he said and handed her a crumpled yellow piece of paper and ran away.
At times, as she was about to fall sleep, the parrot man would slip into her thoughts. In
the world between sleep and awake the man played with Alex just like he always did, and
Kyoko watched them just as she always had, except that she was not behind the bushes
but next to them. Then her body would jerk awake. She would tell herself that the parrot
man was only good to Alex because he wanted to molest him. Biting inside her mouth
was not enough for those nights. She had to hit her head with her fists.
“Welcome,” the parrot man said as he opened his door.
Alex and Kyoko arrived the parrot man’s house at ten A.M., the time they normally met
on Sunday.
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“Where is Max?” Alex asked.
“He's in the back in the sun room, come, I will show you,” the parrot man said.
“Excuse me,” Kyoko said, “I baked a cake but I forgot to bring it. I'll go back and
get it if you can watch Alex.” Kyoko said, then looked at Alex. “I will be right back,
Alex.”
She saw Alex running to the back of the house. The parrot man walked behind
Alex, looking back to her. She bowed at him and left.
She had been planing to walk around the park three times before she would go back
to his house. She counted each step, one, two, her son going to the man’s bedroom, three,
four, five, and he was forced to remove his clothes. She found a new place to bite her
cheek. The pain replaced the images and she was able to count her steps again, but
between the numbers the image of naked Alex shaking in the parrot man’s arms slipped
into her mind. She bit another place, but the image didn’t leave her. Still she kept walking
until she had walked three times around the park. She grabbed a stone and walked back to
his house.
She did not knock. She opened the door slowly, not to make any noise. She passed
the living room. Five fish tanks placed along the wall. In the mini jungle, she spotted a
lizard and a big bright yellow frog. She opened the door in the hallway. It was a
bathroom, empty, except two small turtles in the tank of the toilet. There was another
door on the opposite side, she opened it. It was his bedroom but Alex wasn’t there, only a
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black cat and grey Persian cat curled up against each other in the middle of his bed. She
passed the kitchen dining room. In the center of the table a base full of sunflowers
bloomed, and next to the base, shortbread cookies neatly placed on a plate. She heard
birds chirping but didn’t see them. Then, no more rooms. She was at the end of the house,
the sun room. She saw Alex in the yard, feeding goats but no parrot man.
“Alex!” she shouted.
“Mama look, he has goats!” Alex ran into her arms.
She dropped the stone and held him.
“Mama, come look at his yard. He has two goats. The brown one is Coco and the
white one is Cream. He has three chickens and two rabbits, and five kittens that come and
go. Inside, there is Lizzy the lizard, Sam the salamander, Stripe the spider. And lot’s
more!”
She kissed his cheek and squeezed as hard as she could.
Alex pushed her away and said, “Come, I’ll show you.” Then, he ran back to the
yard, beckoning her but all she could do was to stand up, trying to smile.
“Are you okay?” The parrot man was standing next to her.
“Where were you?” she said.
“Behind the bushes,” he smiled.
Kyoko stared at him.
“Oh, is this the cake you baked?” He pointed at the stone and said.
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She quickly picked the stone up and held it to her chest.
“It must be hard,” he said.
Two goats, three dogs, including Chevy, and three cats, lazed in the sunny yard.
There ware two cages on the right, one for hens and the other for two rabbits. Alex was
snuggling with Chevy and two other St. Bernards, using them as pillows.
“Kyoko, I am not a bad person you know that. I know that you know because you
leave your son with me. I wish you would talk to me too, something.. .anything,” the man
said.
Although she couldn’t hear Alex’s voice, Kyoko knew Alex was talking just the
way he did to her before he went to sleep at night. She bitinside her mouth trying to hold
her tears. She saw so many lives waiting to end.
“Then tell me, how can you bear it?” she asked.
“The animals? I guess I don’t think about it. I don’t remember how it started, but
people began to leave their pets at front of my door. I tried to find new owners, but in this
city it’s so hard to find homes for them. Now I'm surrounded by animals. I’ll never have a
date.” He smiled, looking away from her, and scratched his head.
“No, I mean death,” Kyoko said. Alex kept snuggling up with the three dogs. As the
chicken clucked, the cat scratched the chicken coop and one of the goats chased a
butterfly. One, two, three...sixteen lives crammed into sixty square yards.
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“I can’t,” the man said, “I live with death until death dies in me. But when death
dies in me, it means I gain the death of death. It just never ends.”
The parrot flew from somewhere and landed on the man’s shoulder.
“And you? How do you bear it?” the man asked.
Her eyes met his, so she closed them.
The parrot m an’s palms slowly traced down A lex’s belly to his pants. Alex was
standing pigeon toed. The man pulled A lex’s pants down. She bit and chewed her cheek.
She turned her vision onto Alex: his shaking lips, his stiff body and his scream for his
mother. No, he didn’t, he laughed instead. She winced her eyes tightly, trying to replace
Alex’s smile with a frightened face, but Alex didn’t let her.
“You don’t have to answer me. I’m just happy that you are here,” the man said.
She opened her eyes. There was the man, Alex, the animals and Kyoko. No pain
was visible except inside her.
She looked into his eyes again and said, “I have a lot of scar tissue inside my mouth
which will never go away.” She pulled her lower lip with her hand to expose the scars.
The man brought his face to her lip and kissed the scar tissues.
56
The Pain of Losing You
The coffee maker gurgled and spit the last drop of water. The smell of caramelized
banana hazelnuts pancakes filled the kitchen. The overweight, elderly Bull Mastiff, had
wedged his head into the undersized doggie door, barking at an imaginary possum in the
backyard. This was an ordinary morning for the young family in the quiet neighborhood,
except for Sumiko, she was forty dollars short of what she needed to have her Plantar
wart removed.
In the last seven years, since becoming a housewife, she had never gone over
budget. However, several unexpected expenses had came up this month - Eli needed
money for a field trip, Sumiko had to buy Happy Meals five times, and then there was the
luncheon she had to attend at Eli’s school for a new family. Things really added up.
She stood like a Flamingo on one leg as she flipped pancakes.
“Good Morning, Mama. I’m hungry. May I have some pancakes?” Eli came down
dragging his security blanket.
“Good morning, my baby.” She squeezed him. His soft cheek bounced on her lips.
She tickled his neck with her nose and smelled the warm, sweet fragrance of his sweat
blended with the faint scent of laundry soap. Eli, at first wiggled, but soon he
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stopped and returned her hug, leaning his head against her shoulder. She held him as long
as he let her, finally releasing him with one last kiss.
Eli wiped his cheek and asked her again, “Mama, may I have some pancakes?”
“Eli, I love that you ask so politely. Now, if you can say, please, I'll serve you my
special pancakes.”
“Please,” he said.
She served him two pancakes and one for herself, then sat down.
“Good morning,” Ben came in smiling, dressed in his business suit.
“Good morning,” Eli said.
“Breakfast?” She stood up immediately, her voice rising awkwardly.
“Just coffee. I'm running late.”
She poured the coffee into his thermos. As she passed it to him, she took a deep
breath, then said, “Honey...?” But as soon as she said it, she shut her mouth, breathed in
through her nose, and looked at him. A patch of toilet paper on his chin stained with
blood and his thinning hair still wet - she thought about how cold he must feel walking to
the train station while Sumiko comfortably sat down at the breakfast table by the large
window, in the warmth of sunshine, with a cup of fresh brewed coffee in her hand and
beautiful Eli next to her enjoying his pancake. “We are out of milk. Will you get some on
the way home?” she said, then she ripped a paper towel into a tiny square and replaced
the tissue on Ben’s chin.
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“Just milk? Is that all?” Ben stroked her hair.
“No, nothing else,” she said.
Eli walked Ben to the door and hugged him. Sumiko stayed in the kitchen, cutting
her pancake into tiny pieces, resting her chin on her hand. Mikey gave up on the possum
and walked over, wagging his tail and sniffing her pancake. She kicked him gently and
pointed to his bed.
“I love you, honey,” Ben shouted as he opened the door.
“I love you too,” she said after she heard the door closed.
“Give me some milk,” Eli said as he skipped back to the table.
“Eli, say please,” she said.
She stopped at the fast food restaurant after dropping Eli off at school. Three week ago,
Sumiko discovered that Olie the octopus toy that Eli received from the drive thru, fast
food restaurant was missing an eye. I can do this, yes I can, 1 am strong, I speak good
English, I can do this, yes I can, she chanted herself as she waited for the car in front of
her to finish ordering. She continued to chant driving up to the speaker, but when she
stopped by the speaker and the man said, “Welcome to Sunny Burger, how can I help
you?”, she ordered another Happy Meal. In frustration, she banged her head on the
steering wheel as soon as the speaker turned off, then she sighed, glanced in the rear view
mirror and backed up. Her tires rubbed the side of the curb but she managed to avoid
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hitting a car coming in from the street, driving like she was escaping from a bank
robbery.
Driving home, she recalled Bubbe saying, “Watch me,” as they were ordering at
the drive thru near Bubbe’s town. “My grandson,” Bubbe said to the casher, “has been
looking for this polar bear for the last three weeks. He’s from San Francisco and only
visiting until Sunday. But now he has to go home with a one eyed polar bear. I don’t
know how I can explain this to him.” She only spoke the truth to the cashier, her tone was
never accusatory or overly dramatic. The cashier, excused himself, backed away and a
minute later, the manager came to the window with his hands full of toys. Bubbe reach
through the window and gave the manager a hug and kiss, and promised she would only
buy Sunny Burgers from this store.
Bubbe’s diamond rings blinded Sumiko. She was five foot two, two inches shorter
than Sumiko, yet her straight back and jutting chin gave her the appearance of being
much taller.
“This is America. You speak up,” Bubbe said as she drove from the drive thru.
When Sumiko came back to the kitchen, she noticed the pancake she had been saving
was now gone. She looked at Mikey, lying on his bed, licking his nose with satisfaction.
“Mikey!” she said.
Mikey gave a start and looked away lowering his head.
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“Go outside!” She opened the back door and pointed to the back yard.
Mikey slouched and staggered outside. She crossed her arms and closed the door
with her shoulder. It was not his fault that he could not resist pancakes or any food on the
table, he was just being a dog. She was the one who forgot to put the food on the counter.
Mikey stayed by the door, wagging his tail while she pressed her forehead to the window.
Leaving Mikey outside, she began clearing the table. After putting the maple syrup back
in the refrigerator, she stopped, gripped the door handle and looked at the bottom of her
foot. The wart was still there. She wished she could freeze it with a popsicle or the
stainless steel bowl in the freezer. She'd tried cutting it twice with her sewing scissors,
and once with a small fruit knife, but every time she cut it, it grew back even bigger and
more painful than before.
She sat on the floor to give herself a better look. Blood vessel dots packed under
the hard skin - it looked like a sliced pomegranate. She scratched. There was no
sensation, as if it was no longer her skin. She pressed it with her nail. The pain suddenly
rushed from the bottom of her foot and her eyes became teary. As long as she didn’t press
it so hard the pain was still bearable.
Hopping on one leg, she grabbed the appointment card and phone. She dialed the
doctor’s phone number and before she pressed the call button, she recited her full name
three times.
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“Hello, Dr. Chang’s office, Manuela speaking,” the receptionist said with a heavy
Spanish accent.
Her mind went blank.
“Hello, ahh my name is Sumiko Tanizaki-Herman, I have appointment with
Doctor but could I reschedule...”
“Could you spell your last name for me?”
“Yes, it’s T, T as tall, N,I,Z,A,K,I.”
“P as in Paul?”
“No, T as...”
“Yes, of course, one moment please.”
Sumiko listened to classical music as she waited for the receptionist to return,
absentmindedly tapping the tip of her tongue to the roof of the mouth, practicing her Ts.
“Well, I can’t find your name, mam.”
“I have an appointment at three and I want to change it because my wart isn’t so
bad.”
“I can give you a three o’clock appointment if you like.” The receptionist slowed
down.
“No, my appointment is already three.”
“Oh...I see. I am sorry, someone put your name as Tanizaki.”
“It’s okay,” she said, “I would like to reschedule.”
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“That will be twenty dollars.”
“What?”
“We have a twenty-four hour cancellation policy. It’s written on the back of the
appointment card.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t know,” Sumiko sighed.
“We take credit cards, VISA and Master card.”
“No, it’s okay, I will keep the appointment, please.”
“See you then,” the receptionist said pleasantly.
Sumiko threw her phone on the couch and walked to her bedroom. She pulled her
jackets out the closet. She searched inside each pocket, sometimes finding only an old
movie ticket and a crumpled tissue. She shook Ben’s jeans and his suits. She emptied her
purse - two pennies and a tampon dropped to the floor. She opened drawers, pulling out
socks and underwear and threw them on the floor. She removed an entire drawer and
threw Ben’s T-shirts, his underwear and his socks to the bed and found a chocolateflavored condom package in the comer of the drawer. Leaving a mountain of clothes
piled on the bed, she walked to the living room and glanced around. By the window sill
she saw a small cookie tin, part of Ben’s vintage toy collection, which used to be full of
change. She stuck her hand in the can. It was empty. She thrust her hand between the
couch cushions then under the rug. She looked inside the fridge, stuck her hand in the ice
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cube box. She flipped Mikey’s fur-covered bed, and shook his glass cookie jar. There was
no money.
She picked up Eli’s pajamas from the top of the stairs like a magician unveiling a
silk hat. Nothing appeared. She tossed the pajamas on Eli’s bed. As she was leaving his
room, she stepped on a piece of Lego, right on her wart. With a high pitched scream, she
fell backward on her tail bone. She picked the Lego piece up, tried to crush it with her
teeth, but this only caused her more pain, so she threw it against the wall. She lay on her
back and banged the floor with her fists, then her head, just like a kid throwing a tantrum.
After several more screams and banging the floor, she finally calmed down and grabbed
onto a shelf from the bookcase to help her get up. The books began to fall, showering
Sumiko and the floor, but there was another thing besides his books which fell on the
floor. The blue polka dot piggy bank. The piggy and Sumiko lay there together looking at
each other. Sumiko remembered Eli's grandmother had given him thirty six dollars as a
Hanukkah gift and his aunt had given him eighteen. With that money, he was going to
buy a big dinosaur Lego set but it was too expensive so he decided to save his money
until he had enough. Sumiko slowly got up. The piggy bank was light, but when she
shook it, she could hear a slight rustling sound. She thought about the time when Eli
jumped up and down as he opened the envelope with the money and when he slumped in
tears, finding out that the Lego set was too expensive. Ben and Sumiko told him that if he
cleaned Mikey’s poop they would give him an allowance. One poop for fifty cents, that
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was the deal. Since that day he'd cleaned up after Mikey. Even when it was raining, he
went out the yard with a blue plastic bag in his hand. Sumiko flipped the piggy bank over
and opened the rubber lid. If she could put the money back next month, Eli would not
notice. Still, her heart felt pained as she pictured him on those rainy days, wearing his
green raincoat and froggy rain boots, his eyes sparkling like the water dripping from the
side of his rain hat. Eli showed the plastic bag filled with sticky, wet brown Mikey
droppings, dangling back in forth in front of his toothless grin as he smiled at Sumiko
proudly.
Sumiko held the piggy bank in one hand and inserted her two fingers into the dark
tiny hole where only little kids’ hands should ever enter.
Eli ran to her and jumped into her arms when he found Sumiko at the school yard. She
held him tighter than usual trying to avoid seeing his face. She took his backpack from
his shoulder which felt much heavier than the morning.
Sumiko opened the backpack in the car to see if Eli had finished his lunch. She
found five apples inside.
“What is this apples doing here?”
“No, no, Mom. What are these apples doing here?”
“Yes, what are they doing here?”
“I got them from the lunch lady.”
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“How?” She took out Eli’s tuna sandwich.
“I asked.”
“You just asked?”
“No, I said please.”
On the way to the doctor’s office, she stopped at a stop sign and counted one
Mississippi, two Mississippi, but before she could say three, a Honda Civic began
honking. She waved in apology, quickly scanned for a police car, then drove through the
intersection. She wanted to move to the right lane to get into the hospital garage, but cars
kept coming from behind. When she had finally changed lanes, a red convertible cut her
off and entered the garage.
“Shoot!” She said, hitting the break.
“What, Mama?”
“Nothing, Eli. We are okay.”
“Where are we going?”
“To the doctor but I was too slow. We will go around again.”
Eli sucked his juice box, kicking the back of the passenger seat.
“Eli,” Sumiko said, “I think next month whether you have enough money or not,
we will buy you the Dino Lego. You have been such a good boy. Mikey appreciates you a
lot.”
“Yeeeeh!” Eli shouted and raised his arms.
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The hospital garage was packed so she decided to go up another level. As she was
driving around the garage, she checked in the rear view mirror and saw Eli squirming.
“Eli, do you need to go pee?”
“No, I’m just itchy.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes I am.”
She found a spot, but a large SUV came from the other side with its blinker on
just before she could take it.
She sighed and continued driving. She saw a car pulling out of another space so
she stepped on the gas, but this time an old station wagon cut in and pulled into the spot.
She almost hit the car as she slammed on the breaks and smacked her head on the
steering wheel.
“Are you okay, Eli?”
“Yeah, I’m okay,” he said as he crossed and uncrossed his legs and wiggled.
She drove to the third floor then the fourth floor. She spotted a mother with a baby
in a stroller walking to a car so she drove two miles an hour over the posted speed limit to
follow them. The mother put the baby in the car then buckled him up. Then she folded the
stroller, placed it in the trunk and got in the car. But then she got back out and opened the
trunk to get a sippy cup and a small bag of cookies for the baby. Sumiko waited, her
blinker still on. A white pickup truck pulled up behind Sumiko, stopped for a second then
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came up next to her. She looked out her window. The driver rolled his window down, and
shouted, “Fuck you!”
Sumiko stared at the man. He had a double chin with thick charcoal colored short
hair. From the car, sound blared loud pop music. The pickup truck lurched forward and
passed her. She rolled her window down and yelled to his back, “Excuse me sir, did you
just curse at me?”
Sumiko followed the truck out of the comer of her eye. The mother finally pulled
out from the space. She parked her car, grabbed Eli and ran, her footsteps echoing
through the garage. She held Eli in one arm like a rag doll and kept running until she
caught the man by the elevator.
“Hey, Mr,” she said, “why did you cursed me?”
“You were too close to the middle.”
“No, I stayed on the right side. I put my blinker on and waited. 1 did not do
anything wrong.”
“Huh,” he laughed through his nose.
“You cursed me in front of my boy! My boy!” she screamed. Her face turned red,
and her voice now echoed.
“I didn’t see the boy.”
“Yes you did! You need to apologize me.”
“No.”
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“You cursed in front of my child. You need to apologize me!”
“You’re crazy,” he said, circling his fat finger around the side of his head.
“I need apology from you. I need apology from you!” she repeated,
The man looked to the top of the elevator door.
Drawing in all the air around her, she howled, “I NEED APOLOGY! I NEED
APOLOGY FROM YOU!” screaming into the man’s face, she stomped her feet. Eli’s
hand loosely waved as she swung her arms. The pain of the wart, now transmitted
throughout her body, but she no longer cared. She continued stomping her feet and
swinging her arms. The entire garage seemed to shake, as “I need, I need” echoed loudly.
The elevator was taking its time coming to the fifth floor. People had begun
gathering, but Sumiko continued to shout at the man, demanding he apologize.
“Sorry,” the man said, looking away from her, at the comer of the elevator door
now.
Sumiko paused, took a deep breath as if she’d been running, then continued to
look at him.
“That’s all I need,” she said.
The bell rang and the elevator doors opened. Sumiko pulled Eli’s hand and went
inside. The man turned, and walked away toward the stairs. People stepped into the
elevator, packed into one corner - away from Sumiko. She looked at these people for a
moment and realized that she had never felt closer to anyone, ever.
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The Boy from Over the Sea
The boy had not come back yet. It was July, a week before summer vacation, still Yuta
had not seen the boy at school.
“See you next year,” the boy had said as he disappeared into the condo complex
where his grandparents lived. While the blinking street lamp attracted moths and the bats
trying to catch them flew across Yuta, the boy looked back to him, giving car window
wiper waves, and for sure he had said, “See you next year.”
Yuta could recall the first time he met Aki in his class. Aki had huge hazel colored
eyes with fluffy curly hair and fair skin like someone had rubbed Yuta’s skin with an
eraser. He looked like a serious clown, Yuta had thought as he looked up and down at
Aki. Except his outfit; just like Yuta, Aki wore a faded color T-shirt and jeans with hole
on the knee.
“I am announcing that you are to become Aki’s courtesy counter. You will teach
him about school and walk home with him. He goes in the same direction as you do,” the
teacher had said to Yuta, then pulled out the desk next to him and tapped it, motioning for
Aki to sit down. A pleasant scent tickled Yuta’s nose when Aki sat next to him. So vividly
he remembered their first meeting but he had no recollection of why the boy came to his
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school every summer. What Yuta remembered was the taste of ice cream that they often
pretended to eat on the tall oak tree, and the void he felt the morning after the boy left.
“Nature’s fridge,” they used to say on the oak tree as they pressed their cheeks to
the moist trunk.
“Nature’s ice cream,” Aki would say, pretending to lick the trunk.
“Yummy, ice cream. Tastes like soda,” Yuta would said too, pretending to lick the
trunk.
“You know, in my city we have a two-headed cow ice cream shop,” Aki had said.
“No way.”
“Yes way. The head is on the wall. It’s brown and white, pretty cute though.”
“If the head is on the wall, the cow is dead. How does it make milk?”
“I don’t know, the store must have more cows in the backyard, I guess.”
“What’s their ice cream taste like?”
“They taste like beer, curry, lavender and...”
“What’s lavender?”
“It’s a flower with bunch of small purple flowers clustered together like
raspberries. My mom likes it for our laundry.”
Lavender, lavender...Yuta repeated several times but each time he had said it he
could only think of a sweet and tart raspberry.
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“Lavender, lavender,” recalling the moment, Yuta murmured at the breakfast table
across from his mother.
“What did you just say?” His mother asked.
“Aki is not back yet.”
“W hoisA ki?”
“The boy who sent me a holiday card from America. He told me he was coming
back for summer.”
His mother was feeding a bottle to Yumie who had just been bom a month ago.
The milk in the bottle disappeared quickly. When Yumie sucked the last drop of the milk,
her face gradually wrinkled into a raisin then she burst like fireworks.
“I’m so sorry. I wish I could give you my breast milk,” his mother said and went
to the kitchen.
“I’m going to visit Aki’s grandparents’ house,” Yuta said.
“Not so soon, you have to finish your miso soup,” his mother yelled from the
kitchen over Yumie’s crying.
Yuta slurped the rest of his soup and scraped at the stuck seaweed in the bowl,
then he went to the front door.
“Don’t go near the puddle. Avoid dirt and walk on the concrete. Don’t loiter
about. You must wash your hands when you get to Aki’s house. And until you wash your
hands, don’t eat anything,” his mother gave him endless directions, and while he listened,
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Yuta put his rain boots on. He also put on his rain coat which his mother forced him to
wear.
Outside, the uncomfortable air following the rain brushed Yuta’s face. Along the
windows he saw purple morning glories blooming, and along the fence, blue hydrangeas
covered in rain drops shone in the sun. By tracing the wall of hydrangeas with his hand,
Yuta caused the raindrops to fall away as he walked to Aki’s grandparents’ house. On the
ground, he found a half smashed worm snaking its body. He squatted down and recalled
the day Aki urinated on three worms to prove the Japanese superstition was wrong.
“Puff my penis, if you can!” Aki had said as he gave a yellow shower to the
worms. Yuta tried to stop him but Aki wouldn’t listen. The next day Yuta asked him if he
was alright. Aki had no clue what he meant and only responded by tilting his head.
Yuta cut off the squashed part of the worm’s body and held the part that was still
alive. Although this was during a break in the rainy season, not many people had been
seen outside. There was no familiar echo of anyone beating a Futon mattress, and no
laundry hanging from the balconies. Two joggers wearing flu masks passed him by. He
followed them with his eyes until the worm tickled his palm. He looked ahead and he saw
a park in front of him and beyond that he could see Aki’s grandparents’ condo complex.
As he arrived at the park he bent down and released the worm onto the dirt. Alone,
he ran by the empty playground structure, under the monkey bars and rode the zip-line to
the oak tree where they used to climb. Watching the other kids playing tag or soccer, they
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used to tease the kids by calling out; a kid would stop playing for a moment, looking for
the voice, then get hit in the head with a ball. Aki and Yuta would laugh.
“I’ll never be able to do that,” Aki once told Yuta.
“Do what?”
“Go to a park or to a store by myself. Where I live it's too dangerous, my mom
said.”
“You should move here. You can be my classmate.”
“But my dad.”
“Then he can move here with you.”
“He doesn’t want to live with my mom.”
“You mean they don’t like each other? Like, like they are divorced?”
“No, they are separated.”
“What’s that mean?”
“It means they don’t know what they want.”
Dvorak’s Symphony No. 9 played from the community speaker, followed by the
siren which signaled to the children that it was time to go home. As the noise ceased, all
the kids at the playground would disperse.
“You’ll get in trouble.” Just as he had always done, Yuta’s classmate, Kawabata
stood silently behind the tree without making any sign of his appearance.Kawabata never
played with Yuta or anybody in the class. At recess he sat at his desk going over the extra
workbook that his mother sent with him. As he completed a page, he plucked a hair from
top of his head. When he finished the workbook he would begin to shape his pencil or a
piece of stick with a chisel which the teacher provided for woodworking class. At the five
minute warning bell he gathered the wood scraps and his hair together, staring at it until
his eyes crossed, his chin lightly pressing to the top of the desk.
“Come on, we're not in school,” Yuta said.
“Yeah, it’s a free country,” Aki said.
“This is not your country,” Kawabata said. His body, thin as paper, slightly
slanted to the right from the weight of the bag he was holding, his blood vessels
protruding from his temples.
“Who cares,” Yuta said.
“Who cares,” Aki followed him. “You too. The bell came on already, what are you
doing here so late?”
“I’m going to my English lesson.” Kawabata looked away and stuck his hands in
his pockets.
“Then come up here and learn from Aki.”
Kawabata clucked his tongue, kicked the tree once, and said, “His English is fake,
my mom told me. I’m learning real English.” Muttering something to himself, he dug at
the ground with his toe, muttering still, then walked away.
“Weirdo,” Aki said.
“Weirdo,” Yuta followed. And they saw Kawabata disappearing into the condo
complex.
“Someday, Aki, when we are older and can go anywhere we want we will build a
house and live together.”
“Yeah, we will make a house bigger than this park,” Aki said.
Building twenty-three, where Aki’s grandmother lived, was the closest building to the
park. The black moth with one white stripe that had survived the bats’ attack over night,
was hanging onto the ceiling at the entrance. In the corner of the ceiling there was a
spider's web spread out with three trapped mayflies. On the ground, a horde of ants
carried a beetle, its legs still moved faintly. It looked like a funeral procession for a
sacrificial martyr. Yuta hopped up the stairs, thinking about how Aki might react to his
visit. Would he invite Yuta in the house, if not the day was just starting so they could go
to the oak tree. Anything was fine as long as Aki was back just as he'd written in his
holiday card.
Yuta reached the fifth floor, made sure of the name on the door and pressed the
door bell. A familiar voice, Aki’s grandmother’s, came from the speaker. He introduced
himself. A few seconds later Yuta heard the sound of a latch and then the door opened.
There was no Aki, only his grandmother.
“Where is Aki?” Yuta asked.
“Oh dear, he is not coming back. Not this year,” the grandmother said
apologetically. “Why?” he asked. “I am so sorry. Oh, such a terrible thing for you,
children.” She held her hand to her mouth.
“Why doesn’t he come visit?” he asked again.
She didn’t answer him, instead, she gave him a paper bag. “It’s nothing, but take
these home.” Then she slowly closed the heavy metal door and locked it. Opening the
paper bag, Yuta found candies, bags of chips, all from the local store, but the paper bag
had the smell of Aki’s clothes.
The parade for the beetle was gone. The moth was still there, so were the mayflies
and now a spider. Yuta walked away from the condo and the contrast of the bright
sunlight and the darkness of the complex blinded his eyes.
“What are you doing here?” Kawabata was standing in front of him.
“I was at Aki’s. Where are you going?” Yuta asked.
“None of your business,” Kawabata said, holding his bag tightly. “Was he there?”
Yuta pulled at some nearby leaves and threw them. He shrugged.
“I thought so. He is a coward just like my English teacher.”
“He is not. I know he is not!” Yuta said.
“Scared of getting bald, losing his limbs, bleeding from his nose or eyes, or dying.
That’s a coward. You saw it on the TV, didn’t you? I will be okay because I’m eating
seaweed. Are you? I hope your mom is feeding it to you.”
Yuta didn’t know what happened, but Kawabata was on the ground, crying,
looking at his scraped elbow. The snack that Aki’s grandmother had given to Yuta was
everywhere, along with Kawabata’s textbooks.
“What’s that for?” Kawabata said, wiping his nose.
Yuta didn’t pick up the snacks and didn’t help Kawabata pick up his books. Yuta
slowly walked past Kawabata then ran.
When Yuta got home, his mother was sitting on the toilet, with the door open. She
asked him how it went. He shook his head and walked into the living room. Yumie was
sleeping on her blanket, her face as peaceful as Buddha. His father poured a beer, then
sipped it before it overflowed. As he wiped the foam off his lips, he asked Yuta, “Do you
want to lick the foam?”
On the dining table there were cold noodles along with cooked eggs and sliced
cucumbers, among them Yuta found a heaped bowlful of soft seaweeds. He took some
and ate it. The slimy texture spread throughout his mouth. Perhaps because he was
holding something back, something that he couldn’t figure out, saliva spouted inside his
mouth. His mother went to the kitchen to finish preparing lunch. His father kept drinking,
and at the end of each sip he sighed with satisfaction.
Soon Kawabata’s mother would give his mother a call yelling about her son’s
scraped elbow, Yuta thought as he continued to chew.
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The Death of a Fish
The day after Alex’s fifth birthday, he asked me if he could have a fish for his sixth
birthday. A boy his age changes his wishes often so I assumed he would change his mind
by his next birthday. He not only remembered, but also began writing about the fish in his
journal. It started with one simple line, ‘I want a fish.’ As his birthday neared, it turned
into a story called,‘How to Teach Guitar to My Fish.’ Alex won a school writing contest
with the story.
***
The weekend Alex turned seven, we were at the pet store.
In less than five minutes, he spotted a fish and said, “I want this fish.”
He pointed to a shiny blue body with a long wide tail and red fin. A sign read
“Betta.” It said that as long as it stayed alone in a fish bowl, it would be easy to maintain.
Before my son could change his mind I placed the fish container in my basket, got a
small fish bowl, water solution, fish food, some decorations, and went to the cashier.
“I want to hold it,” he said to the cashier who was about to put the container into a
plastic bag.
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“O f course,” she said and handed it to him.
Alex cradled the fish container the way he would hold a kitten.
“It is easy to take care of, right?” I made sure.
“Oh yes, all you need to do is be careful with the water. They are a tropical fish so
they like warm water,” the cashier said as she put the rest of our things into the bag.
His fish, named ‘Coodybug,’ was placed in the center of the dining table. Inside
the bowl the fish seemed to love the single leafy plant very much. He often hid in its
rolled-up leaves. Alex said that Coodybug was playing hide-and-seek. Before Alex left
for school he said good-bye to the fish and when he came home, he gave him five tiny
nuggets. The fish sucked up the nuggets one by one like a vacuum.
After two weeks, the water was dirty so I suggested him to change it. Alex
carefully scooped up the fish with an empty yogurt container and dumped the rest of the
dirty water. I cleaned the fish bowl with a brand new sponge then filled it with warm
water. Alex dropped in exactly seven drops of water solution. We waited five minutes,
then we put the fish back into the bowl. The fish happily splashed for thirty-seconds, then
we saw him sinking to the bottom. I shook the bowl but the fish was no longer scared of
the shaking. He swayed right and left, with the water. I rolled up my sleeve and put my
hand into the bowl. The lukewarm water was not warm but hot. Looking at the poached
fish in my palm, I groped with how to explain this to my son.
“Is he dead?” Alex asked.
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***
The summer he turned four, it was a baby blue flower. I cannot recall the type of plant,
but Alex named it, Fluffy. He often squatted on the ground, trying to smell Fluffy. ‘If you
touch the flower it will die.’ He listened to my warning. He never even tried to touch it.
The tip of his nose only came so close, yet never kissing the flower. After a vacation to
see my parents in Japan, we found Fluffy in the garden turned into a dried flower. My son
and I covered Fluffy with dirt and buried it where it was. We gave a short Buddhist
prayer.
The first time we visited my parents’ house was the fall he turned two. My husband
Michael had to work so he stayed home. Michael, who couldn’t stand for a day to go by
without talking to us, did not call for three days. He had not answered the home phone,
his business phone or his cell phone so I called my mother-in-law and she called the
police. Back then a 1964 Chevy Impala, as big as a boat, occupied our garage. I will
never know what Michael was trying to do under the car. The jack slipped and the 5,000
pound Chevy crushed his chest.
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“He lost consciousness. Within three minutes he was dead. He did not suffer.” I
was told after the autopsy. The medical examiner told us that Michael was in no condition
to be seen just then. Despite the suggestion, I pleaded, then went to see Michael.
The gray walled hallway continued as far as I could see, then a cold metal door
appeared in front of me. I opened the door and in the comer of the room, I saw a body
covered with a white sheet. Except for the bruise on his left eyelid, he looked in good
condition. He might have been sleeping, I thought. With my ring finger, I touched his
cheek. He was cold. It was not the coldness that sinks into your bones, and not the
coldness that children bring after coming back from snowball fight. It was a coldness I
could never warm - never change.
I haven’t found the words to describe this sensation, yet when I think about that
moment, my now empty finger feels the chill.
***
“Even though he’s a child, it’s always better to tell the truth,” my therapist told me, so I
explained to Alex what had happened to his father. I even brought him to my therapist
once or twice. Alex loved the tiny figures in the sand box so much that he did not want to
leave the office. The therapist gave him a red lollipop at the door. I asked her if it was
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some kind of medicine to ease his sadness. She said no. I licked it once and gave it to
him.
“Alex, the water was too hot. I killed Coobybug. I am so sorry.” I fought the urge to say
more.
“Yeah.”
“You can be mad at me. You can scream at me or hit me. Anything.”
“Okay,” Alex said but just looked at the fish.
“What should we do?”
“Return him to the water.”
“The ocean?”
“In the toilet.”
We walked to the bathroom and returned the fish to the water in the toilet, gave a
short prayer, and flushed.
“Good-bye Coodybug.” We waved as he turned in the swirling waves.
“Are you sad?” I asked.
He nodded.
“Let me read you a book.” I held his cheeks in between my hands and kissed his
forehead, thinking the book would comfort him.
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I brought a book which my therapist had given me. It was about a leaf on a tree
losing his friend in winter, but gradually accepting the death of his friend and happily
going back to the soil when it was his turn.
We sat on his bed, reading. In the middle of the story Alex laid on his back,
moving his arms and legs, made a snow angel, and said,“Did you know that Luke can
touch his nose with his tongue?”
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Zaydeh’s Dream Home
Early one morning, Zaydeh, my father-in-law called from the airport in Austin, Texas to
tell me that he was flying to San Francisco. Before I could answer whether we would
even be home, he hung up. Five hours later he was at our door, carrying one small
suitcase.
He asked me to show him around the neighborhood, so each of us took one of my
son, Alex’s hands and walked. It was a winter in San Francisco, eighty degrees and
sunny.
“What a beautiful day. I believe it’s snowing right now in Boston,” Zaydeh said.
The term ‘Global warming’ came to mind, but I swallowed it. My father-in-law
didn’t believe in Global warming. He didn’t believe in universal healthcare. And he was
against immigrants even though I was a Japanese immigrant. As I tried thinking of
something to talk with him about, I glanced at Alex’s feet, trying to keep up with our
pace. I asked Zaydeh if my husband also walked pigeon toed because I no longer seemed
to remember how he used to walk. He said no, Michael didn’t, but he had legs as long
and skinny as a giraffe. That would be appealing to Japanese people, I said. He chuckled.
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Alex stopped walking and instead, folded his legs, like a monkey, so together my fatherin-law and I held and swung him.
“Wee, wee.” Alex continued, and although my arms were becoming tired, and I
was beginning to worry that his arms might fall from their sockets, I didn’t stop, neither
did my father in law.
Later, we stopped by a Thai restaurant and had Pad Thai. Zaydeh said it was the
best Pad Thai he’d ever eaten. He asked me if I wanted dessert and I shook my head, but
he insisted, so I asked for the cheapest one on the menu. He ordered three different kinds
of ice cream. I had coconut ice cream, Alex had vanilla and chocolate and Zaydeh had
none. He ordered five more coconut ice creams to take home. He wanted to walk more,
so as before, we held Alex’s hands and left the restaurant. He told me that a small airport
in his town, near Boston, was looking for a Japanese customer service agent and that I
could make a great life there. I nodded and said politely it sounded like a great job.
The sun was beginning to set and the air was becoming colder and closing in.
Eventually we came to the house my husband and I used to own. My father-in-law
stopped and looked up. I looked up too. The lights were on, and from the behind the sheer
white curtains we could see that a boy of about ten years old was lying on his bed,
bouncing a ball off the wall.
“The only way for me to recover from this is to bring him back,” my father-in-law
said.
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The boy behind the curtain got up and left, leaving the light on. My father-in-law
just stood there, a look of loneliness on his face, as he stared through the window, at the
empty room.
“Hold me Zaydeh.” Alex stretched his arms. Zaydeh lifted Alex and squeezed. We
headed back home. I watched the two of them as I walked two steps behind.
For nearly eight years, my father-in-law has been fighting with the town he lives in over
wanting to purchase the property behind his house. It was his dream, he said, to build a
house for his each of his children and live as one big family. I was moved by his thought
so I told the first person I encountered.
“Who would want to live with him?” my sister-in-law said, presenting her empty
hands in front of her as if to emphasize her point.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Exactly,” she said. “I never even lived with him when I was a child.” she gave
me a half smile and went to chase her kids.
Every Christmas day, at Zaydeh's house, Alex unwrapped all his gifts and stacked them
like a tower. The tower came to just above his chin no matter how tall he grew, and it
never failed to make him smile and make me cry.
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“But we're Jewish!” my mother-in-law, who had divorced Zaydeh thirty years
ago, said as she looked at the picture of Alex standing next to the world's tallest stack of
gifts, the Christmas tree in the background. “And Zaydeh is still Jewish!” she added with
her hand dramatically on her forehead as if she'd suddenly gotten an acute fever. This
happened every December 26th, at Alice’s Chinese restaurant, with red colored pork
spare ribs and sweet duck sauce.
Deep down in his heart, the gifts were only secondary to Alex. I knew that,
because every Christmas Eve, in his bed, he spent his last waking moments, raising his
fingers one by one and naming all his nine cousins and how old each had become. Two
families and five grand kids from Zaydeh’s new wife’s side, three families and five grand
kids from his side, for a family of two, having more people than his fingers could account
for, was what excited Alex the most. Zaydeh didn’t care about his Christmas gifts either,
he didn’t care about them even if they were called Hanukkah gifts. He didn’t care about
his new Red Wing work boots, his new American made air compressor, or his wife’s hand
knitted hat; just like Alex, he was only truly excited about having his own children, his
grand kids, and us in his house.
Christmas dinner started at six o’clock but he always told his kids to come at fourthirty. Around four-fifty, Zaydeh would begin to flip cushions on the couch. One year's
worth of dust danced in the living room while his wife, in between sneezes, yelled at him
to stop as she covered her mouth with her elbow trying not to spray on her mashed
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potatoes. I never understood what this had to do with his children’s visit. Maybe nothing,
except to give him something to distract himself from his excitement or disappointment.
At five fifteen, when the house began to smell like turkey, his wife’s side of the families
showed up. They brought the cold air in from the outside, and the smells of their own
houses as well. At five-thirty, Zaydeh would go out to work in his front yard. I wiped the
frosty window and saw him using a shovel to pointlessly scrape dead leaves off the icy
driveway, occasionally looking at the front gate. Six after ten, his daughter's family
arrived with her two kids. Each of them gave Zaydeh a hug and light kiss on his cheek,
then moved onto Alex for a big squeeze. Almost every year one of the children, either
Sophie or Isaac, would become upset and run to Zaydeh’s wife because someone didn’t
let them use the bright red gun or they were hungry. This happened right around seven
fifteen, so we started dinner without my brother-in-law. We all sat down on cold folding
chairs, and by the time the chairs warmed up, we'd finished the meal. My sister-in-law
never sat down with us. With a cup of coffee in her hand, she stood behind Alex, combing
his hair with her fingers, gazing at him as if she could see a remnant of her brother in
Alex’s bird nest hair. When three different kinds of semi homemade pies lined up on the
kitchen counter, my brother-in-law family would show up, by then the house was rattling
and shaking with kids running up and down the hallway and the adults talking about
football so that no one noticed his entrance, except my father-in-law, who had been
waiting for his son to show up since five o’clock, or maybe the whole year, could hear the
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car pulling up to the driveway. He didn’t open the door for his son, just stood by the door
patiently waiting him to enter.
There were twenty-one DVD's, covering the time from of his first grand child’s
birth, now seventeen, to my son’s first birthday. Zaydeh loved to play them after
everyone had eaten their pie. “Everyone come sit in the living room!” his wife would
shout. The tone of her voice commanded attention, so all the adults squeezed into the
living room. As soon as the part with Alex’s father appeared on the screen, my brother-inlaw would leave for the basement, mentioning that he was getting soda, followed by my
sister-in-law who ate and drank nothing except her coffee. When Zaydeh found himself
surrounded by his wife, his wife’s children, me and ten grand kids, all of whom were
either texting on their phone or running around pretending to be cowboys, he would come
to me and whisper, “Where did everybody go?”
My husband was ten when he drank a whole bottle of Rubitussin. His brother caught him
drinking the last drop of the bottle and called an ambulance. This turned out to be
fortunate for my husband because it meant that he didn’t need to work cleaning floors for
his father that weekend. It wasn’t so much the cleaning he hated, it was Zaydeh’s ritual
inspections that he feared. My husband once told me that he never forgot the shapes of
the scuff marks on the left toe of his father’s boots, and his father’s grumbling as he
pulled white gloves from his pocket.
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My husband would end the story smiling, explaining to me that the white gloves
were probably already stained in order to teach him a lesson but only succeeded in
teaching him what kind of father he wanted never to become.
My father-in-law purchased everything in threes; soap, shampoo, cereal boxes, cans of
evaporate milk, cars, motorcycles, even houses. One winter visit, I forgot to bring dental
floss. I asked Zaydeh if I could have some. He brought me about seven inches of floss
and told me not to worry, that he could give me more tomorrow. I cut it in two halves to
share with Alex, but as I tried to floss his teeth, it kept slipping off my fingers. After the
several attempts, I gave up and asked his wife if I could have more. She brought me a
brand new box of floss and said, in a conspiratorial tone, “Hide it from him.”
For my husband’s coffin, my father-in-law wanted a pine box, the traditional Jewish
coffin, one that would eventually decompose along with my husband’s body to be one
with the earth. I liked the idea of returning to the earth but it also happened to be the
cheapest one in the catalog.
My sister-in-law rushed out the door, followed by my mother-in-law, my brotherin-law, Zaydeh, then the funeral director. Alone in the room with the coffin catalog, I
turned the pages and studied them: The pink casket with rose stitches inside the velvet
padding, anl8 gauge turquoise steel with copper trim, a poplar coffin with red velvet like
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the kind vampires slept in. After all these years, I can still recall those coffins in the
catalog, but I have no recollection of the color of the coffin my husband ended up laying
in. When my husband’s family and the funeral director returned to the meeting room,
they asked me which one I would want for my love. Five sets of eyes suddenly became
one set of eyes. I couldn’t decide, so I appointed the person who had always looked
saddest. My brother-in-law bought the most expensive coffin, one with cement insulation.
With this one, my husband, they told me, would never disappear from the earth.
Without looking out the window, I can always tell when the snow piles up over night on
Zaydeh's yard, enough to make a snowman or snow fort. Because these mornings are
much quieter than other mornings, as if the snow separates me from myself and the
moment. I move the curtain aside and see the snow flakes joining each other on my
window sill, and far away in the haze, I can spot Zaydeh’s dream land, slowly sinking
into the snow. For the moment I no longer know where and who I am and a strange peace
begins to take hold of me. Then, Alex jumps on my bed and asks me to make him
breakfast. I followed him into the kitchen, where I pour some cereal into a bowl. He can’t
wait for me to pour the milk so he begins to change into his snow pants and a snow
jacket. Zaydeh helps Alex, putting on his snow-boots and snow gloves to complete his
astronaut look, then he puts his knit hat on last. When Zaydeh finishes dressing him, he
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squats down to Alex’s height, pats Alex’s cheek and whispers, “If we blow snowflakes,
we can turn them into rain.”
Alex practices blowing warm air at Zaydeh’s face. Zaydeh places his hand on
Alex’s head and continues, “Good work, now let’s take a shower in the rain and save
some hot water.”
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Saying Good-Bye in Another Language
We were up late one night in our beautiful home, our beautiful daughters asleep upstairs
while we were living our perfect lives. Ellen was sitting on the kitchen stool, kicking her
legs - her flats barely hanging on her toes. There was an empty ashtray, a cigarette
package and a cup of cold coffee by her side. She kept circling around the edge of the
ashtray over and over until a strand of her hair fell on her hand and distracted her. She
picked the hair up and tried to roll it into a ball but it didn’t corporate, so she dropped it
into her coffee.
“I have to go,” she said. “I don't mean that I want someone else. I’ll always want
you and our children. I just cannot have you. I only want to go and I want you to forgive
me. Promise me that you will forgive me." She looked at me. The kitchen was dark, only
lit by the top of stove light. But her pupils were constricted and I could see three dots
scattered over her eye. I clearly remembered these dark spots and her pupils because I
could no longer find myself in her green eyes.
I reached for her. I held her, my arms around her, thinking that they could keep
her beside me, silently hoping that the night would not end and that the next day would
never come. She kissed my cheek and asked me to step away and to leave her. She smiled
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and seemed happy. She said, “I don't want to see you anymore and I don't want to hear
you speaking. You bother me, now GO!”
A few days later, Ellen called me and told that she had to take our daughters lives away
because they would be in so much pain once they lost their mother.
Why don’t you let them decide if they want to die or not when they get older, I
suggested talking into my cell phone while making an illegal U-turn to go back home.
“Oh, that’s a good idea. I have never thought about that. Thank you,” she said
pleasantly.
For the next twenty minutes, as I drove switching from lane to lane, I kept her on
the phone, asking things like what color she would love to paint our dining room, what
kind of flowers she was going to plant in our garden, and at one point, I began singing
Twinkle Twinkle Little Star because she'd told me that no one ever sang a lullaby to her. I
sang slowly so the song would last a long time, hoping to keep her attention. More than
anything, I wanted to hear my daughters’ voices. But I knew that as long as I kept Ellen
on the phone the girls would be safe.
“You are the funniest person I’ve ever met.” She laughed as she listened to me
singing. “You made me want to go to pee.” And that was it. She cut off the phone. I felt
my blood leave my body. The cars around me suddenly began to move slower and it
seemed as if I was the only one who cared about life. I hated the kids who were crossing
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at the stop sign and an elderly woman with her cane. I prayed that Ellen forgot why she
was on the phone with me or forgot that she was their mother so she had no reason to feel
sad for them. Finally, I got home and ran to the living room, there I saw Ellen dancing
with our girls to Disco music.
The day I decided to ask her to leave, she had been standing by the front door, waiting for
me to come home. I didn’t know how long she had been there. She probably didn’t know
either. As I entered the house, something hit the corner of my eye.
“I will never ever have sex with you or ever touch you. You look at these women
and fuck yourself!” she said.
A paper bag fell on the floor and five magazines came out. They were Playboy
magazines. I knelt down on the floor and put all the magazines back in the bag while I
listened to Ellen yelling at me, something about a rabbit, bacon grease and how much she
hated me. She began hitting my back as if she was stabbing me with a knife. She lived on
cigarettes and coffee. She was petite and weak. Her fists didn’t hurt me much. When I
stood up I asked her if she would have coffee with me.
“I would love to,” she said, smiling and buried her face into my chest - her leg up
in the air. I hugged her and stroked the top of her head with my nose. As we walked down
the hallway, she held my hand, swinging it like a child.
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I made coffee and asked about her day. She told me she painted our bathroom
baby blue and tomorrow she would organize the books on the bookshelf by color and the
size. “Anything that doesn’t fit must go,” she said as she drew her finger across her neck
in a slashing motion. I loved reading, loved holding books in my hand, and I loved being
surrounded with their smell. But I told her they were just books and that she could do
whatever she pleased with them.
The girls were in the living room, playing with dolls. We watched them as we
drank our coffee, Ellen still holding my hand and playing with my wedding ring.
“Aren’t we lucky?” she said. I nodded. The sunlight fell on our girls through a
large window. When the girls got bored playing dolls, they passed through the kitchen to
go upstairs. Ellen’s hand suddenly let go of my hand, grabbed the large glass ashtray and
threw it at them.
“Get the fuck out of here!” she screamed. They ran upstairs. For a split second, I
was torn between staying with Ellen or running up to the girls. The hand that had just
thrown the ashtray tenderly took my hand again and she was talking about my books and
her plan for tomorrow. I brought her hand to my lips and looked into her eyes. She
giggled. I told her that I was going to go check on girls.
That night, I asked Ellen to sit on our bed and explained we were not safe living
together. I wanted her to sit there the way she used to, while I stroked her hair, but I had
to wait until she touched me because I was never sure which Ellen I was with. She
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nodded, then looked down at her toes. She nodded again and asked me to help her
pack.
Everyday after I got off work I brought the girls to visit her at her mother’s house. Ellen
sometimes came out the door with her arm open hugging the girls until her legs became
numb from squatting, and other times she would peek from behind the kitchen window
curtain. We waved, but she would not open the door.
One day, she called me in the morning, on my way to work, and asked to come
by, alone.
She was still in her pajamas and a bathrobe. There were no cigarettes or coffee at
the kitchen table, just her and a book.
“Don Quixote is dying,” she said, putting her hand on the book. “I just found
out.”
Yes, I said.
“When he dies, I die.”
I asked if she wanted me to make her some coffee. She said no.
“I was counting the days until my girls were eighteen, until they were independent
and no longer needed me, but I can’t make another 4700 days without Don Quixote,” she
said.
I asked her if she wanted a cigarette. She said no.
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“Do you know he dies at the end? Did you know this?”
The truth was that I forgot what happened to Don Quixote at the end. I only
remembered the book kept me occupied me from reality for months as if my life didn’t
matter anymore, as if it took the life out of me, it took my life away from me. In a good
way tough.
“What about Sancho?” I whispered to her and tried to touch the tip of her hair.
She was no longer listening. She stood up and began cleaning the stove top, saying
something about how she would never again fry bacon, and that if I knew what was good
for me, I wouldn't do it again either.
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The Snow Blanket
The key was useless. The window was smashed to shards. Inside, the house was dark and
gray, overrun with dirty sea water. The first floor used to be our store front, the bedding
store. The second floor was our living space. There was only one bedroom, one dining
room with a small kitchen, a single bathroom, and we raised our three boys there. The
house was always crowded and noisy, but we were surrounded by laughter. We were
happy.
I covered my mouth and nose with my collar as I entered. “Find the picture of our
granddaughter at her piano recital, if you can.” My wife’s voice rang in my ears but I
passed through the store front and our living space, ignoring scattered broken dishes and
pictures, and climbed the stairs to the attic, being careful not to fall through the steps.
I lined up the four numbers of my wife’s birthday to open the padlock. I took off
my shoes, wiped my hands on the sides of my pants, and entered the attic. The storage
had kept its shape, just the way it used to be. The lustrous pink and orange down
comforters were like threads of light in the cold dank attic. The sight of our newest
merchandise, the goose feather comforters I had imported from Canada, warmed my
chilled body. I touched them as if they were my children, soundly sleeping. One, two...the
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numbers never changed and were not hard to count, but still I'd counted them every day
and if I could’ve, would have all day. Three comforters, that’s all I had left. I breathed in
deeply, savoring the sealed air, the cool concrete walls and silent comforters as I
imagined reopening my bedding store in some far away future. Then I left the attic and
my house to go back to the Tsunami shelter where my wife waited for me.
The mile-long road between my house and the elementary school shelter used to
be full of stores. My neighbor owned a watch shop but his son always dashed to school,
trying to make it on time. Across from us was a small market. The couple used to fight at
least once a week. We, the store owners, got together every weekend, betting on how
many plates would hit the husband before he’d say, “I’m sorry.” The kids occupied the
street and the cars just waited until the kids decided to move. Now I see no kids, no
fighting, and no house, only the skeletons of houses, covered with sludge where people
now dug trying to find any evidence of how they once lived.
I saw four cracked and broken wall-clocks, all pointing to two-forty five,
reminding me of the day we lost everything. The brown leather photo album, wire
fencing, hangers, men's underwear, dumped into the street as if some giant hand had
grabbed the houses one by one and emptied them. A white van lay on its side in the
middle of the street, its owner lost. I walked beside the van, looking down, trying not to
step on anything, but when I glanced at the front window of the van, I saw a child’s arm
coming from the back.
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I stepped back, lost my balance and tripped over fissured ground. Pain ran
through my ankle, but more than anything my heart ached. I stood up slowly, and peeked
inside the front window. It was only a knit scarf. I squatted on a brick and caught my
breath.
A rescue worker in a navy blue uniform, white mask, and helmet passed by, a
bloated, purple corpse on his back. The sweetened, rotten fish odor filled my nose. I felt
nauseous. I frowned. This was an everyday scene, yet I could never get used to the smell.
I pushed my breakfast back down into my stomach, covering my mouth with my jacket
and turned to see the rescue worker again. Human fluid streaked and stained his shirt. As
he walked away, becoming smaller and smaller, I thought of these men, serving my town,
not being able to change their clothes for months, surviving on cold canned food and
camping in the freezing deserted fields. I felt ashamed to be bothered by the rotten smell.
I bowed to the rescue worker’s back deeply and did not raise my head again.
“Are you okay?” Someone spoke above my head.
A man was standing in front of me. He looked at least ten years older than I, full
of small wrinkles with a slightly hunched back. His red nose and cheeks contrasted with
his tanned face. Everyone watched the weather forecast, saying it would snow today, but
the man did not have a jacket, only a flesh-colored pajama top and black sweat pants.
“Yes, I'm okay. I just tripped and hurt my ankle, nothing bad,” I said.
“Let me see.” He placed my leg on his knee and began to move my ankle.
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My face tightened as he moved my ankle to the left.
“You just sprained your ankle, but it shouldn’t take long to recover,” the man said.
“Are you a doctor?” I asked.
“I am a fisherman. We are often alone at sea so we know how to take care of
ourselves.”
“Thank you,” I said.
“No worries.” He sat next to me and we both stared at the surrounding rubble.
There was a young man with a ring in his nose, like a cow, and large circular
ornaments in his earlobes, and another man with dreadlocks and a bandana wrapped over
his mouth. With one big shout, the two of them lifted a piece of lumber, the same size as
their skinny bodies. Until a few days ago, I had never seen such odd-looking Japanese
people and had never seen young men so focused on physical labor. They were two of the
many people called volunteers. They carried the wood out of the broken house, tossed it
into the pickup truck, then moved to the next lumber pile. Again, with one shout, they
lifted and carried the lumber out, tossing it into the truck.
A boy was absently looking up to the sky. Just above was a woman hanging in a
tall tree: another body the rescue workers had not been able to get to yet. She must be his
mother, I thought, because he had been there every day when I walked from the shelter to
my house. I’d never seen him move or cry. Next to the boy, a pretty young woman
wearing a brightly colored scarf, brand new hiking shoes, and stylish down jacket, was
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rubbing the boy’s back. I could tell by the way she dressed that she was not one of us - a
victim.
The things covered by sludge, dumped into the street, the mother’s body in the
tree, a boy looking up at her: it would be hard to see it if I did not find the rescue worker,
the cow ring man and the well dressed woman at the same time.
I heard the patter of helicopter blades. The U.S Army was here again, bringing
food and supplies.
“Were you bom when the American Navy attacked the ironworks?” the old man
spoke.
“Yes, but only just. You?”
“I was eight. I was running to the bomb shelter. The airplane came so low that I
knew they were going to shoot me. I looked up and saw the soldier’s eyes looking at me.
He aimed his gun, ready to shoot so I jumped into a ditch.”
“You were lucky,” I said.
“And this time we are fortunate that everyone comes to help us, not fight with
us,” he said.
“I agree. Who would imagine that people would come just to help us for no
money,” I said.
“This is your house?” He pointed with his thumb to the house behind me.
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“No. See the blue sign?” I pointed out the bent blue iron sign across from the
white van, “That’s my house.”
“Yorozu Bedding Store, very nice. And your family, okay?” he asked.
“Yes, my wife is in the shelter. Three boys, all grown up, living in Tokyo. And
you?”
He paused for a moment, then said, “I was looking for a tarp. But I couldn’t find
one. Isn’t that strange, I see so much stuff but I can’t find a piece of tarp?”
“I believe it.” I looked to my third floor window. It was a miracle the attic had
survived.
“Well, I'd better go back.” The man stood up, patting my knee.
“Me, too.” I stood up but I landed on my injured ankle and fell back again.
“Where is your shelter?” he asked.
“The Seihoku elementary school.”
“You hold my shoulder.”
I protested, but the man would not move until I agreed. As we started to walk to
my shelter we saw the rescue worker coming back from the morgue. He walked up to us.
“Are you okay?” the worker asked me.
“Yes, don’t worry about me. You have a more important job to do.”
He nodded several times, then he looked at the man next to me, bowed deeply and
said, “Forgive me, but I need to carry two more bodies, then I’ll come for your wife.”
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The man nodded.
“Were you able to find a tarp?” the worker asked.
The man shook his head.
“Anything?”
He shook his head again.
“Thankfully, it is going to snow soon.” The worker touched the man’s shoulder,
bowed once again, and left us.
“But she is going to be cold,” he said weakly.
For a moment, I looked to my blue store sign and the undamaged third floor attic
standing out against the snow clouds.
“Mr. Yorozu,” he said meekly, “Would you have a blanket in you house that I
could use to cover my wife before the snow? It’s okay even if it’s dirty.”
I felt the man's gaze burning my face but did not have the courage to make sure it
was me he was really looking at. I tried to hold back my breathing, but the white breath
poured from my nose, blending with his own. The people around us now seemed like
extras in a movie, some with serious faces, some smiling, all manner of expression and
emotion, but their voices disappeared from the scene, distant. A silent movie. I was alone
now with this man.
“I wish I could but I lost everything,” I stepped away, letting his arm drop from
my shoulder. The pain in my ankle was suddenly gone.
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He looked down to his feet and nodded silently.
“I am sorry about your wife.” I whispered.
“Thank you,” he said.
He tried to put his arm back on my shoulder but I could not and did not want to
accept his help anymore. I repeated “I’m okay. I’m okay,” but it only sounded like “I’m
sorry. I’m sorry.”
He finally understood that I no longer wanted his help and began walking away. I
felt relieved.
The snow began to fall and I thought about what an unpleasant face I have. The
first perfect flakes only melted when they landed on my ugly nose while all around me,
everything slowly began turning white. The empty foundations where the houses once
stood. The road, the sludge, the bodies, the volunteers, the vehicles and the sky, all of it:
all white now, as if under the blanket of this new snow, all was somehow forgiven and so
very beautiful that it could make a man cry.
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My Father
My father was a city worker who managed the entire sewage system in Tokyo. According
to my mother, he was the happiest man that she had ever known.
Once in a great while, when he was drunk but not enough to pass out, he would
ask me to bring a scratch pad and a pen. My brother and I were excited because that
meant he was going to draw.
“What do you want?” he would ask, and I would say, “A Koala!” and my brother
would say, “No, a robot!” Then he drew a Koala robot on a building which looked like a
tree. After that he asked for more papers but didn’t ask us what we wanted. He just drew
one animal after another as my mother sat next to him, ripping junk mail into quarters
with ruler to make scratch pads. A giraffe on a trampoline. A juggler juggling three balls.
The three wise monkeys drinking beer in a hot tub served by dogs who were supposed to
be guarding the shrine. Snakes who dressed up as dragons, saying, “It’s not easy to
pretend to be strong.” By the time he finished the scratch pads, we had a collage of
animal cartoons. My brother and I made up stories that went with each drawing and my
father smiled, showing his crooked teeth, lit a cigarette and drank more sake.
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“There is nothing he cannot draw,” my mother said as she brought another bottle
of hot sake. I remember the dusty orange light shade above our living room, the smokey
air and my mother’s gaze at my father with her melting eyes.
“That’s all for today,” he would say, collecting them all and handing them to my
mother, who took them to the trash can. And that was that. We went to bed.
Once in a great while, when he was not drunk, I would ask him to draw me a
hamster. Most of the time he refused, but when he did, he drew with his left hand instead
of his right.
“You’ve got to it do for yourself,” he said. Then he spread a newspaper and began
cutting his nails. I remember feeling frustrated, as I was crumbling the picture, which
looked like it had been drawn by a two year old. As my mother said, he could draw
anything, but not unless he felt like it.
When I told my father that the steam from the coffee cup looked like a ballerina dancing,
he told me to write a poem.
We had no art in our house. Our house was too small to fill with art. The single painting
on the hallway had always been there but I didn’t notice until I was in junior high school.
“Your father did it when he was young,” my mother told me. It was of a village
with a mountain behind. I can’t say it was beautiful or memorable, the different shades of
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greens, the red houses, and a river - typical of northern Japanese scenery - like a painting
that I might see in the bathroom of a rundown restaurant. At the time, I was undecided
about whether I should become a nuclear power plant worker, a seeing-eye dog trainer, or
just quit living.
“Where are his other paintings?” I asked my mother.
“Gone. We had no space for them,” she said.
Twice I discovered my parents’ old journals. Once, when I was twenty-five, I found my
mother’s with a list written to us; where she hid the code for the safe key, the life
insurance company’s phone number, and which medical facility to donate her body. The
other time was right after high school. In the bathroom, a small blue notebook lying on
the floor. I picked it up and opened it. In the journal, my father had written, “Day 1 :1
have failed the college exam two years in a row. It’s cold outside. I am destined to
wander and to paint, on this mountain. No job, no money, no love, just me and a pencil.”
My father was twenty years old, alone on a cold mountain in winter. I closed the
notebook and sat on the toilet seat. I thought about opening it again to make sure what I'd
read, that he was not just a sewage worker, but I didn’t have the courage to hold that
reality, so I pushed it to the side with my toes and counted to three hundred before I
flushed the toilet. I opened the door to the living room where my father was. He was
holding a newspaper in one hand and with the other, pulling at his nose hairs.
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My father drew a picture for me when I was suspended from high school. I didn’t do
anything wrong except that I missed school for two days, without permission to get my
driver's license. My teacher found out because I called her by mistake, thinking I was
calling my piano teacher, and left a message saying that I had to miss a lesson to take the
driver license exam. It was two weeks before graduation, we had no more homework or
school, still, my teacher was so upset that she suspended me and assigned me to write an
essay expressing my regret. I was always a good student, a role model, and a teacher’s
pet, but at the end I was a terrible student. That night, as I was writing the essay, crying,
thinking there would be no future for me, my father sat across from me, and drank sake
as usual. He stole one of the paper from me and drew a Japanese monkey, the classic
remorseful monkey, its face looking halfway down, its hands on its knees, and its
shoulders slouched as if under the weight of a large sack of rice.
“The key to survival in this world is to pretend to be like this monkey,” my father
said, and gave me a nod. He finished his sake in one gulp and wrote the essay for me.
“Don’t be too serious. Suspended before graduation! That’s a story. Copy my
essay and give it to your teacher, she will be impressed.”
1 didn’t tell my father when I found out that I was pregnant and had decided to marry
Michael in a country where my father had never stepped in. I told my mother to tell my
father and report me back his reaction. But I didn’t call her back and I turned my phone
on silent. Two weeks later, the letter arrived from my home. It was from my father.
“7 don’t care i f he is Jewish or Muslim. I don’t care if he is the President o f the
United States or a construction worker, as long as he works to feed you and your baby.
Your father ”
For the first time, he drew my face. On the bottom of the letter I saw a sleeping
baby and his mother hold him in her arm.
My mother phoned to tell me that Michael had died. I am now on the bullet train to my
hometown after visiting my best friend. In my right hand I am holding a warm rice ball,
and in my left, two ten thousand yen bills that my friend gave me. My parents and Alex
will be waiting at the train stop. According to my mother, my father is the happiest man
she’s ever known. In the last thirty-five years, he has solved all the problem of the entire
sewage system in Tokyo, often times with a hang over. His job never caused him stomach
ulcers, cancer, or kidney stones. The job was easy as combing his bald head, he said.
The train stops and I hear the announcer calling the name of my hometown. As I
step on to the escalator and move toward to the exit, I picture my father’s face as he finds
me in the crowd. I think of tripping over a crack in the ground, right in front of him,
something to make him laugh, to make him forget why he is here, and to make him hold
me without looking into each other’s eyes.
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Failure
“Take this box to the recycling bin, and on the way, also get the trash by the stairs.” I tell
Alex, who has finished Swiffering the floor and is now lying on his bed, reading a comic
book. Eight years old, so as always it takes several tries to get him to do anything. One,
two, I count how many seconds it takes Alex to get up. ...Twelve, and he is still not up.
“Alex, take that box and the trash by the stairs now! Otherwise, I will throw away
your new board game.”
Without answering me, he stands up, carries a card board box, and runs to the
stairs.
“Don’t forget the plastic bag by the stairs.” I scream behind his back and hear him
say, “Okay, mama.”
A few minutes later the washing machine buzzer goes off. I go downstairs to put
the clothes in the dryer. As I carry the wet clothes to the dryer, I spot the plastic bag with
dog paw prints on it under the stairs. It was the trash I had asked Alex to take to the trash
bin. I shove all our damp clothes into the dryer, set it on delicate for sixty minutes, then
scream, “Aleeeeex!” I dash upstairs with the plastic bag in my hand. We meet in the sun
room.
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“Why is this under the stairs? I told you to take it to the trash bin,” I say, dangling
the bag in front of him.
“I don’t know,” says Alex.
“How can you not know? Who else would move the trash from upstairs to
downstairs?”
He shrugs his shoulders and looks at me, indifferently.
“Alex, did you wash your hands when you came in the house? Yes mama. I see
blue paint on the back of your hand. Alex, did you give your teacher the field trip slip?
Yes mama. I got a phone call from Ms. Smith, she is missing the slip. Alex, wash your
hair, yes mama, and you come out with your hair dry. You are lying to me again, Alex.
Are you always going to lie to me?”
He says no, no.
“Take this trash to the trash bin, please,” I say.
He passes me, taking the bag.
“And what else do you hide under the stairs? Homework? Dog poop?” I say.
I hear his footsteps becoming smaller and smaller.
I drop down on the couch in the living room and stare at the photos of the three of
us together in front of the house we used to own. Alex in Michael’s hands, smiling. We
were all smiling, even me. Alex was only one and half. I wonder what Michael would say
about Alex lying, if he was still alive and could see us now.
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I see Alex coming through the kitchen and towards the living room, skipping and
humming.
“Alex, I think I have failed as your mother,” I say.
He stops skipping by the entrance to our living room, and begins to climb the
entrance way using his hands and feet like a gecko. He nods from the top of the ceiling.
“What should I do?”
“I don’t know,” he says.
“I don’t know either. I raised you to become a liar.”
He tries to reach to the ceiling with one hand while the other hand is still holding
the edge of the entrance. “Look, I am almost there!” he says, his face parallel to the
ceiling.
“ I don’t think I demand too much of you, do I?”
“You do,” he nods three times.
“Then I quit. I will quit being your mother for one week. I’ll feed you, take you to
school and tell you to go to bed. But that’s all. Otherwise, we don’t talk to each other.”
He looks down at me from the ceiling.
“In thirty minutes, we are leaving for the grocery store and I have to take you,
otherwise I'd go to jail,” I say.
Alex goes to his room saying, “Can I buy something?”
I ignore him.
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At the store I walk a little faster than usual. I do not hold Alex’s hand and he does
not ask me to either. Even in the parking lot, I didn’t hold his hand, instead, without
speaking, I motion for him to stay right behind me. We walk like a mother and baby
duckling, except I am not his mother today.
Out of the comer of my eyes I see him trotting, trying to catch up with me. He
almost crashes into the mother with a baby in her cart, runs between two teenagers, and
dodges under the store clerk stacking some glasses on the shelf. I see his every single
movement. I can see him without looking back. But I don’t wait for him. I am not his
mother. I walk whichever pace I choose.
I normally stop by the toy aisles because Alex likes to look at the boxes and make
up stories in front of the displays. I walk faster by the toy aisle, aiming for the cleaning
supplies.
In front of the display, his hand flies in the air as if he is holding the tiny toy
figures. “To the moon, no, to Mars! I am your father. No, you are not!” His world is a
mixture of several of his favorite movies and cartoon shows. This is the way it used to be,
the way it has been. If I let him, he would go on playing for thirty minutes or more. He’d
squat there with empty hands. His cheeks blushing as he’d occasionally spit to make the
sound effect of an explosion. I’d stand behind him and listen, trying to find out if he feels
anything about the absence of his father, trying to listen for his suppressed emotions,
sadness, a void, things he keeps to himself. I want to know where I go wrong and what he
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is missing. But his world doesn’t seem to cross over into reality. He’d never asks me to
buy these toys. I realized that to him, he has them all in his hand, in his mind.
I can no longer see him. I go back to where I came from and peek into the Lego
aisle. He is there. I want to yell at him, “Alex!”, but I am not speaking to him. Standing
behind the Barbie dolls, I continue to watch him. He doesn't notice that he is away from
his mother. I watch him for a while, and still he is on one knee, looking at the display. I
finally come out and stand next to him lightly touching his shoulder. He looks up at me
and stands. I begin to walk fast, and he tries to keep up.
I grab some dish soap. When we arrive at the cashier, I grab five gift cards.
“Mama? Can I buy gum with my own money?” he says, tugging at my jacket as
he shows me his wallet. I see two big front teeth, too big for his small mouth, when he
smiles at me. Suddenly I want to smile with him but I am not allowed to. He places the
bubble gum onto the black conveyor belt next to my gift cards. I move it to the edge
where it does not move to the cashier. He puts it back on the belt, I remove it again. He
puts it back again, and I give him a stern look, and he gets it. He reaches for it and holds
it in his hand.
The cashier scans the dish soap, then asks me, slowly, carefully pronouncing each
syllable, “HOW MUCH WOULD YOU LIKE TO PUT ON THE GIFT CARD?” While I
am thinking of how much to put on it, I see her writing, "ten, twenty, and thirty?"
“Oh, no, no. I can hear. I can speak. Twenty each, please,” I say.
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The cashier tilts her head, crumpling her note. She scans the gift cards, and puts
them all in a plastic bag with small envelopes.
“And what are you getting. Mr?” she asks Alex.
The food court is crowded but we manage to get seats. I don’t ask Alex to choose
what he wants. I point to a seat at a table, directing him to sit. He sits and says, “Mama, I
want a com-dog!” I stare at him for an instant, then leave.
As I wait in line for the food, I stretch my neck to see if Alex is still at the table.
He is swinging his legs and gazing at a large Christmas tree. I raise my hand to wave, but
before I make a waving motion, I stop. I wonder if I am already failing in my attempt to
quit being his mother.
Alex begins to play with his package of gum. He traces the package, flips it back,
and puts his mouth on it. Then he decides to balance it on the top of his lips. From that
position he puts his hands up in the air, like a propeller and the package drops on the
floor. He picks it up and sits back in his seat, staring at the package with his nose
touching it. Without even trying to look at me to hide his sin, he opens the package,
unwraps the gum, and chews it. We are having lunch! I want to scream, nearly forgetting
that I am not supposed to talk to him for a week and we are at the mall.
I come back to the table with two com-dogs, milk and water. I sit in front of Alex.
The flavor of the watermelon gum is so strong that I can smell it across the table and
among all other food smells.
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“Good news, this gum is sugar-free!” he says, holding up the package in front of
me.
I see his jaw moving up and down, and the fear of losing him rises up in me, so I
say, “there are bad chemicals in sugar-free products. You have two choices, you can eat
those chemicals and get cancer or you can throw it away and live longer.”
“What’s cancer?” he asks.
“A disease that will possibly kill you. Do you want to die?” I say.
His shoulders slouching, he walks to the garbage can to throw the package away
and spits the gum from his mouth.
“This is not working,” I say. “I can’t go a day without talking to you.”
Alex nods.
“There is only you and me. That’s it, no one else! We’re all that we have. We have
to help each other. You understand? So help me, Alex. What did I do wrong to make you
lie?” I say, looking into his eyes.
Then I see the comers of his eyes begin to shine. His mouth shuts tight then
opens. “Nothing,” he says.
“Nothing won’t make you lie. See how you are lying!”
“I only make you mad, mama,” he says. “You are always yelling.”
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I see tears filling his eyes. He quickly holds his com-dog, bites it and looks down.
The noise of the crowd ceases. It all stops as if they'd heard my boy’s tiny voice. Alex
bends his neck I see the whorl of hair on his head.
“Do I yell at you that often?”
He nods his head three times.
“Will you tell me when I yell so I know because...I don’t seem to know.”
He nods once.
My com-dog tastes like a sponge so I stop eating, instead I spend my time
watching Alex eating his com-dog and washing it down with milk. He tells me something
about the toys he saw at the store and which one he is getting from his grandparents for
Hanukah. I nod but inside I only hear my screaming.
We walk back to the store, holding each other’s hand. He hops when he is excited
about something. We return to the cashier to find gum with real sugar. Alex and I read the
nutrition on every package on the shelves. We go through them one by one and top to the
bottom, but don't find any.
“It doesn’t seem to exist,” I say.
He lifts himself on to the black conveyor belt, trying to be the same height as I am
then says, “Let’s go home.”
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The Umpire’s Call
My grandmother’s anus looks just like her puckered mouth after she eats sour pickled
plums. The thought makes me smile a little as I try to rake her feces. I gave my
grandmother Jyunchotou, which my mother had concocted during her lunch break at
work, but it has had no effect on my grandmother's constipation.
After a two minute intermission, my grandmother begins to push on the toilet
again. Her sphincter opens and closes as it stretches, yet not even gas comes out.
“I can't do it anymore, Hiroyuki. Let’s call it off for today. You go play with your
friends,” she says.
“Don’t give up yet. Remember Eiji Kunimoto? You told me before that he’d never
given up selling his novel. When all the publishers in Tokyo refused to see him, he pulled
his hair and teeth out and grew a beard to disguise himself so that he could go back to the
same publishers again. Before the war, they rejected his novel as “anti-patriotic”, and
after the war they refused it saying it was too ordinary. Still he tried, and at the end he
performed his story as a Kamishibai and that’s how it spread throughout the country. If
Kunimoto took thirty years to push one novel into the world, you can push a little
longer,” I say.
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“Are you sure it was thirty years, not thirty minutes?” she says.
“Gram!” I laugh. “Thirty minutes is nothing. I do it at school every day. Get a
grip!”
“Alright my dear. Things that go in must come out.”
“I’ll massage your belly.” I tell her looking at her relaxed mouth.
“Thank you.” Her husky voice, like the rubbing together of a pair of old jeans,
echoes in the small toilet room.
The sound of the neighborhood kids playing baseball leaks from the fan on the
ceiling. The exhilarating clang of a metal bat almost causes the bathroom to vibrate. I rely
on my ear to guess how many bases the batter has reached, and I imagine the wind he
must be feeling. I close my eyes to picture myself as the batter, my spikes digging into
the soil, and I am running to the cheering of the crowd. The center fielder throws the ball
to the shortstop, and then to third base, but I am fast and I slide. My helmet rolls away
from me. The crowd is hushed as we wait for the umpire’s call. Then my grandma clears
her throat of her chronic phlegm and I notice my hands have stopped moving. I’m back to
massaging her belly. Now I hear only the dying fan straining, no kids and no umpire's
call. I glance at the wristwatch that my mother bought for me. It’s five P.M. It’ll be
another hour before my mother comes home. I swallow my sigh and say, “No worries,
Gram,” in the same tone as I say ‘good morning,’ or ‘good evening,’ so my grandmother
won’t say, ‘I’m sorry.’
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“Thank you. You are such a kind boy,” my grandmother says. She has a habit of
repeating ‘thank you’ two times.
My grandmother is my best friend, but I hate her when she wakes my mother up
twenty, thirty times a night to ask to be taken to the toilet. When I close the door to my
room I hear nothing, not even the sound of frogs croaking outside. But somehow, my
grandmother’s sliding foot steps, my mother’s yawning, and my grandmother’s grunting
sound from down the hallway, slip under my door. And when those noises reach my ears I
instinctively wrap myself in my blanket like a frozen pot-sticker. My face becomes damp
and hot with my own breath but I stay frozen and let my sleep take me into a dream.
“How is it?” I ask my grandmother as I rub her lower belly.
“I feel something coming down. Let me push.”
“You should wait until the last minute, Gram. Everything has its own timing. Eiji
Kunimoto said that, didn’t he?”
“You’ve become too wise for your age. I’m so sorry, Hiroyuki,” she says.
I shake my head and say, “No problem. I don’t want you to have a hemorrhoid
again. Now let me massage your butt.” I reach behind her, hold her butt cheeks with my
thumbs. I begin a push and release motion with my eight fingers around her anus. Her
muscle outlived her butt-cheeks a long time ago and now it’s only bone and veins that
even though I massage her, my fingers don’t sink in. Her legs have abandoned her except
for the trip between the dining table and the bathroom. If Kunimoto was me, how would
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he express this texture, ‘the skin of a ray’, ‘a deflated ball’, or ‘the feeling of despair in
smoothness’? And as I begin to imagine what expression Kunimoto might use, I begin to
dream that my job is not about helping my grandmother but to describe this scene as
accurately as I can. Maybe not just the texture, but he would describe the temperature, the
color, the odor and his feelings...my feelings. My fingers become numb from massaging
her yet my senses becomes sharp and alert. My feelings.
“Remember Hiro, there is nothing worse than constipation. If you get a cold, you
sleep or take medicine. If you get cancer, you treat it or you die. If you can’t eat, you
shove food into your mouth or stick a needle in your vein. But for constipation, you just
have to push your crap out. I should stop eating but I can’t. People choose to fast to stop
war, but we don’t choose to fast to stop constipation. As a person who has gone though
war, breast cancer and child birth is telling you, so trust me, this is the worst thing a
human can experience.”
“Do you think Gandhi suffered from constipation?” I ask.
“If he had never experienced this pain, he would not have had such a great
understanding of human suffering,” she says as she bends forward deeply.
“Hitler must have never been constipated.”
“Perhaps he forgot the pain. A person who remembers human pain can never be a
great dictator.”
“I have never been constipated. I don’t want to be a dictator, Gram.”
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“You’ll be fine, Hiroyuki. You’re a great kid.”
“I don’t want to be another Gandhi either. I want to be Kunimoto! Where does he
stand?” I say as I continue moving my fingers.
“There is no one between Gandhi and Hitler. Gandhi is Gandhi, Hitler is Hitler,
Kunimoto is Kumimoto and Hiroyuki is Hiroyuki. Humans are not judged on a scale. We
stand apart and alone.”
“You think my father is constipated every New Year's day and my birthday?”
“He is not in pain. He is guilty. There is a huge difference.”
I stop massaging, and as I shake my hands I think about the difference between
guilt and pain.
“I don’t understand it,” I say to my grandmother.
“You might be too young to understand it,” she says.
“No, I know how guilt feels, Gram.”
I want to tell my grandmother about the nights and the pain in my heart but I
don’t want to hear the sound of my speech echoing in this small toilet room.
“Hiro, it’s coming! Let me push again,” my grandmother says in an intense voice,
putting her hand to the side to stop me from massaging.
I move away from her and sit at the edge by the door, watching my grandmother’s
face tighten. Her mouth closes into a straight line as her body shakes.
She takes a break again. And after several pushes, still nothing is coming out.
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The five-thirty sirens announcing that it's time for kids to go home begins ringing
outside.
“A baby who has someone to change his diaper is the happiest baby. You might
not understand it yet, but you must remember, that’s the ultimate expression of love,” she
says with a sigh of relief.
“Then I must had been the happiest baby, Gram,” I say stroking her feet.
126
The Myth of the Serpent
One spring day, Susanoo, the youngest Son of God, who was sent by his father, landed in
a little town.
On the small grooves of the tall concrete buildings caked with white droppings,
pigeon cooed. Since the neatly planted cherry blossoms had bloomed on the sidewalks, a
few people, a mother with a small child, an elderly couple holding hands, might have
been expected to be taking a walk near the Shinto shrine, yet there was no one.
The story was told that centuries ago, a giant eight-headed serpent had washed up
on the shore and blasted the air with his poisonous breath. The old chronicles say that the
people who inhaled the poison breath became insane and suffered many fatal illnesses.
Everyone ran for their lives, abandoning their houses and farm animals, traveling many
miles inland, tearing down forests, leveling hills and mountains to create new towns. No
one knew how nature itself could survive in such a harsh and poisonous environment.
Taking advantage of the devastation and the vanishment of humanity, the plants and wild
life gradually returned to reclaim the uninhabited village. Though the air was poisoned, in
time the animals adapted and the forest flourished, coexisting with the serpent.
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A large screen, mounted on a nearby building, overlooked the Son of God, the
bright light flashed every five-seconds as if it was trying to win over the dimly lit day. On
the screen, a cartoon woman with mustard colored hair, and eyes nearly the size of her
face, sang about the newest teeth whitener. At the end, a ten digit number popped up and
her pleasant voice echoed in the desolate street; its audience missing. Advertising signs,
their colors faded and tom here and there, now only appreciated by crows as a quick rest
spot before lumbering home. In the tall apartment complexes a few blocks away from the
screen, the windows were shut and the curtains drawn, but the lights were on. The
shutters of store fronts were beginning to rust.
As has been said, the Son of God was sent by his father. As the bravest and most
righteous son of all, his father had ordered him to rescue the Earth from its long suffering.
This was a test, his father had told him, to see if he was wise enough to take over his
father’s role. But the Son of God was not told what caused the Earth to suffer.
A delivery truck rumbled, the driver carelessly tossing a chicken bone. Pigeons
dove, pecking at each other, fighting over their prey. Crows arrived and the pigeons
backed off As another truck passed, the pigeons and crows scattered like flies, shedding
feathers, and before the feathers settled back to the ground, yet another truck passed and
the feathers flew into the air again. The signs of the humanity were there, yet there were
no humans. The Son of God felt dizzy from the light and the noise of the screen, and the
car exhaust made him cough. He looked up into the sky, the dark smoke from chimneys
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creeping in to cover the remaining blue sky, making it impossible for him to seek
guidance from the heavens. He felt lost in the dirty, lonely town.
He walked a great distance. Still there were no humans on the street. As the
sounds of the huge screen's noise began to fade, even the pigeons, the crows and trucks
disappeared. The farther he walked, nearing the edge of town, the more quiet it became.
Finally, a towering, enormous forest appeared in front of him. The many shades of green
seemed to stretch to the sky and the flowers bloomed like hopeful promises. Just in front
of the forest he spotted three small dots - people. He walked toward them.
“What is the matter?” the Son of God asked them.
“My father has to leave today. He received the letter,” the young woman said,
weeping.
“What letter?” he asked.
“He has been chosen to be sacrificed to the eight-headed serpent that lives in this
forest,” the older woman answered, weeping as well.
“There is no need to cry, my family. If my sacrifice will save the nation and my
family, it is an honor to give myself,” the father said.
The mother and the daughter burst into tears.
“The serpent,” the Son of God said, “is this the reason the town is spiritless?”
“Yes,” the father said, “its breath poisoned the port village and is still poisoning.
Though the town is far enough from the serpent, the air is not clean enough. We are afraid
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to go outside. The old chronicles say that to minimize the contamination, we must keep
sacrificing the head of a family to the serpent. Human sacrifice is the only way to save
our land.”
“If the serpent is gone, you will be released from this obligation and the forest
will be returned to you,” the Son of God said.
“But who will be brave enough to slay the serpent?” the father said and the young
and old woman began sobbing.
“Forgive me, but I am the Son of God, the bravest of all. I have come to the Earth
to end the suffering.”
The mother, the daughter and the father looked at him in shock.
The daughter, putting her hand on her chest, spoke softly, “You came to rescue
us.”
“Yes, that is my purpose, my mission. I will disguise myself as your father and
enter the forest. I will slay the serpent and bring back its heads.”
The father collapsed beside his rucksack. Now it was his turn to cry.
The daughter, though her hands were shaking, quickly opened the rucksack, and
said, “here is the letter which was sent, along with the clothing you are supposed to
wear.”
She showed him a hooded robe, goggles and a mask.
“No need to worry. I am the Son of God.”
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“But please wear them, just to be safe,” the daughter pleaded.
“Yes, just in case...” the mother said, “we don’t want to lose you,” as she bent
down next to her sobbing husband, holding his shoulders.
“And hang this from your neck,” the daughter said, taking a large pendant
mounted with a red stone from the rucksack. “First it will blink. As you get closer to its
nest, it will stop blinking and change into a solid red light. In the end, it will vibrate.
Follow the stone.”
The Son of God quickly dressed into the white robe. He then strapped on the
goggle, tightened the mask straps, and hung the pendant from his neck. After bidding
farewell to the family, he disappeared into the deep woods.
In the forest, the canopy of large trees blocked most of the sun, allowing moss to
grow like velvet. Occasionally, sunlight reflected from the dew of tiny yellow flowers.
Large luminescent-blue butterflies danced in the air. On the tips of pine tree branches,
young pine cones, green and hardened, were slowly maturing, ready to give birth. As the
gentle wind moved through the trees, the rustling of the leaves formed a chorus with the
melodies of birds. Far away, in the distance, he heard the howling of wolves.
He stopped for a moment, removed the eye goggles and mask, then took a deep
breath. Although the air was toxic, it felt clean and crisp, nothing like the stifling,
congested air in the town. Like the town though, the sunlight was limited, yet the plants
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grew strong, the butterflies danced, and the wolves howled; they still lived the way they
could and the way they wanted. There was life here, he could feel it.
In his contentment, the Son of God had forgotten about the red stone, and when
he remembered, the stone was already emitting a solid light. He quickly put the goggles
and mask back on. Forcing his way farther into the woods, he saw blue sky and an even
deeper, blue ocean, then, there before him, an immense neglected cathedral. He walked
closer to the imposing structure as the red stone began to vibrate. On one wall was
painted what appeared to be a large yellow heraldic symbol with three trapezoids
encircling a large black dot. As he climbed over a rusting fence, he realized that he had
forgotten to bring a weapon, then quickly remembered his father saying that once, as an
infant, he had killed two snakes using only his hands. He was confident that he could slay
the serpent.
He pushed at a large iron door and surprisingly, it opened with little effort.
Finding the first floor empty, he discovered a staircase and ran up. On the top floor the
red stone was vibrating forcefully. He opened the door to the top floor and heard a hissing
noise coming from one of the rooms. He tightened the mask’s strap, caught his breath,
and broke into the room, shouting, “I’m the Son of God. Prepare for your death!”
He saw a small man, standing against a large glass window, dressed just as he
was.
“Ah, finally,” said the man, pulling his mask away from his face.
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“I came to slay the eight-headed serpent. Where is it?” the Son of God asked.
“The eight-headed snakes? They died a long time ago. Their life span was short,”
the man responded.
“But the old chronicles said...”
“The old chronicles? You mean, our distorted history? Never mind all that, there
is something I need to show you,” the man said, beckoning him. Beneath the man’s
hands, spread out across a large table, were many artificial colored lights which were
blinking in what seemed to be random patterns.
“You see that chest?” said the man, pointing to under a glass window, “It blasts
the poison into the air, or as the old chronicles say - the serpent's breath. Ha, ha, ha!" The
man laughed.
There was a large tank filled with water, and a red chest lying at the bottom.
“It’s all under control, I believe. This has never happened, but if the alarm goes
off,” the man pointed out a large ruby red light on the wall, “or the water ever goes below
the black line there, you need to pull this lever. The wall will open to allow sea water in
to cool the chest. It’s that simple, but people’s lives depend on us.”
“There is no serpent, only humans?”
“Right, just us.”
“If I rescue the humans, the forest will be just like the town. But if I rescue the
forest...who am I supposed to rescue?” The son of Gods murmured.
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“Only god knows. Just watch the chest, will you? Someone has to do it.” The man
interrupted their conversation, then quickly stripped off his robe and goggles. From under
it all, emerged a pale skinny old man, hairless, his head as smooth as a hard-boiled egg.
“What are you doing?”
“Leaving,” the old man said, “I believe my time is limited, but I am too
contaminated to be with my family. At least let me die in this place, surrounded by life.”
He then smiled, waved, and rushed down the stairs.
Speechless, the Son of God looked out the window, catching sight of the man
disappearing into the woods. From the window, he looked over the beautiful forest.
Beyond the forest, the tall buildings stood, and above the sky was gray and cloudy. Then
he turned around and saw the huge glass window, not knowing which one his father was
asking him to rescue, vanish the chest to give the beauty, the life and promise of this
forest back to the people, or to let the chest explode, promising that never again would
the Earth be destroyed by humans.
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Kobushi
All she needed to do was say yes.
At the retirement home, eighty nine years old Matsuko sat on her bed,
straightening her stooped back, her chin slightly up and facing the window.
“They were only accidents.” Matsuko had been telling her daughter the last
couple of days, yet her words only skimmed her daughter’s head. All the history, and so
many memories, but it had come down to this, this rest home, this room, her daughter and
a diaper.
“Go east, go to the east. There were rumors... They are poisoning our food. ” 1942. They
hid their money, sewing it into their pants. Taking only one change o f clothes and a few
rice crackers, then, just before the government was to come and take them to the camps,
they carried their child in a baby sling, left their farm and escaped to Colorado. This was
the choice they made.
A cold morning in Colorado, the fuzzy buds of the Magnolia dressed in unmelted snow.
In the south of Japan, Matsuko’s hometown, and Northern California, where she had
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moved to marry her husband, Magnolias had been her favorite flower. Until she moved
the rest home, she had never imagined them blooming in a place like Colorado.
“You are so stubborn.” Her daughter crossed her arms, shook her head and fell
into the steel chair beside Matsuko’s bed.
Once her daughter stopped talking, the room grew quiet. Only the forced air from
the heater filled the silence. Three pair of Matsuko's panties hung over the heater; one
dry, one damp and one dripping, as steady as the ticking second hand of a clock. Trying
not to be a burden to the staff, Matsuko had washed them with foamy hand soap, but
because of her arthritis, she didn’t have the strength to wring them out. She pulled her
blanket down over her knees and rubbed her new pants. Only accidents, she thought.
On the wall in front of her bed, hung a huge painting of two palm trees, the leaves
leaning into each other, creating an arch, and in the background, small dolphins jumped
through a blue sky. A plastic lei was draped over the door knob, and from the half opened
door she could see the nurses smiling, wearing aloha shirts and scrub pants as they passes
her open door, right to left and left to right. Sincerity and superficiality are what she
thought when she saw them, always the mask of a smile for everyone, no matter
who.
Tropical Acres, in contrast to the name, had trees and flowers in the garden which
represented all four seasons. The faintly pink cherry blossom petals fluttered each spring
in the warm wind. The bright yellow sun flowers fought to grow in summer. The golden
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gingko leaves covered the ground, dropping their smelly fruit in fall. And her favorite
flower, the Magnolia, came into bud in late winter. So beautiful, Matsuko wanted nothing
more.
“I brought you broiled eel with rice.” Her daughter broke the silence as she placed
two plastic bags on the bed. She removed the bowl and handed it to Matsuko. The sweet
baked soy sauce smell tickled her nose and her stomach began to growl. Looking at the
foggy lid, she could feel the heat coming from the steamed rice, as well as her daughter’s
warmth, transfusing to her arms and her heart. But when she glanced at the bag of
diapers, the warmth stopped.
“No,” Matsuko said.
She placed the bowl on the roll-away bedside table and pushed it away from her.
The table now separated Matsuko and her daughter. She heard her daughter sigh loudly,
in rhythm with the noise from the heater.
Matsuko turned her head back to the window. The sun was coming up and the
light blinded her. She squinted as she raised her arm to cover her face, thinking about the
snow on the buds.
“Too bright?” her daughter asked as she stood up.
Matsuko extended her other arm to her daughter, shaking her head.
“What mother? What is it?”
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After the war had ended, they rented a room above a saloon before eventually buying a
run down house next to the Buddhist temple which had once been a house o f prostitution.
The Buddhist temple, their Japanese grocery store, the noodle house and the fish market,
the heart o f Skid Row; a seedy strip ofgambling dens, flophouses and brothels
transformed into Little Japan.
In time, her husband fell ill and died. Still, she kept the store open from eight to
six, seven days a week. People came and people stole. Her daughter, then a teenager,
chased them with an old straw broom that she kept by the counter. Each time, as her
daughter returned, catching her breath, she glared at Matsuko.
“We have the best produce in Denver, ” Matsuko responded to her daughter,
smiling. Rooting behind the counter and bowing to each customer or possible thief,
Matsuko let them take what they wanted and sold to people who were willing to pay. Her
daughter cursed the thieves in perfect English, no longer remembering formal greetings
in her native tongue. Never speak Japanese again, her determination had paid off.
Matsuko had raised her daughter to become American. The best American. This was not
her loss, this was her choice.
The temple relocated. The son o f the fish market owner, now a dentist, refused to
take over his fa th er’s business. Matsuko saw her daughter o ff to marry a doctor as she
had dreamed. The temple was gone, the fish market was gone and she sold her store to
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developers. They didn't care if she was a Jap. All they saw was a piece o f land in the
heart o f Denver. This was how it should be, as i f the war had never happened.
Her daughter moved the table to the side and sat on the bed next to Matsuko.
“The research shows that pull-up underwear also keep you warm,” her daughter
whispered. Her tone of voice was now sweet as if trying to coax a child into doing
something that she doesn’t want to do.
“Mother, I don’t want you to be kicked out.”
Matsuko looked from the window to her daughter.
“It’s hard I know, but you will get used to it.”
Her daughter no longer had toughness in her face. Her face and her eyes had
softened.
Matsuko reached for her daughter’s hand. Touching the fingers, she said,
“Kobushi.”
Her voice disappeared in the noise of the heater. Her daughter asked her to repeat
it. Instead, Matsuko made two fists with her curved arthritic hands.
They were nothing like the Magnolia.
She wanted to give her daughter the knowledge that still remained within her. But,
it didn't make sense. It would not make sense to her American daughter. Magnolia did not
mean fist. Magnolia only meant Magnolia.
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The Elephant in the Room
My brother’s dead skin crumbled and stuck to my mother’s palm when she rubbed the
purple ointment into his back. It’s a special kind of ointment, my mother had explained, it
keeps his skin moist and helps to heal the scratches. It smells delicious, like roasted
sesame seeds, I told her jokingly, and she responded that it does contain sesame seed oil.
I was thinking about my son, Alex. Every summer vacation Alex and I visited
Japan to see my family. Unlike in America where we lived, Japanese public schools keep
going until the end of July. We welcome foreigners, the principal had said two yeas ago
when I asked if Alex could join their school for the final four weeks to learn about his
culture and to make new friends. Alex enjoyed school the past two years but this year, in
the third grade, he had been complaining about going to school as if he had just realized
that he had been cheated of his vacation time for years. He was right, though I was not
entirely wrong. At least, that was what I told myself.
I thought of our summer vacation if Michael was still here, still alive. We would
visit my parents three weeks at most but we would go camping in Yosemite, small road
trips here and there and be amazed by how big America is. I would not have to be the
only one to be responsible for Alex’s entire summer.
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It was a hot humid morning. The air conditioner was already on and my brother
turned the fan up to full speed. As the fan began to rumble louder, Alex turned the TV up.
My brother was naked, stark-naked, not even wearing a towel. He was thirty-one,
two years younger than I was. He lived with my parents as many Japanese people did
until they married. Unlike other kids, he contributed to my parents, a thousand dollars a
month while also paying his student loan. He had graduated from the second best
university with honors, was working at the best IT company as a consultant, and last year
he won the best web designer award. This man, my brother, was sitting on a purple
stained cushion, naked, crossing his legs, back facing us, in front of me, his nephew and
his mother.
“I can’t believe you can get atopic eczema, even here,” my mother said as she
gently pushed his penis to the side to rub the ointment into his testicles. My brother said
nothing; he was too sleepy to respond in the morning.
I remembered his pinky size penis; wrinkled yet smooth. When we were little we
used to take baths together. Now his penis was no longer pinky size, and not smooth. I
looked at it and the closest thing that I could think of was an elephant’s trunk. Rough and
dry with innumerable cracks and wrinkles, except his entire body was red instead of gray
because of the inflammation and because while he slept he scratched his back like a dog
on the floor. I imagined my brother as a red elephant with his trunk hanging between his
legs, though his human head still sat on his neck. The image didn’t make sense to me but
that was what I came up when I imagined my brother’s body.
“You are lucky,” my mother said to my brother, “because as long as you wear
long sleeves, no one will know.”
“No one cares how I look. I am good at what I do and that’s all that matters,” he
said, laughing through his nose.
“With your shirt on, you look just like everyone else,” my mother said.
My brother stretched his legs. I saw red dots on his feet and toes as if someone
had etched a distorted version of an American map. The eczema had finally reached there
as well. Luckily, my brother had not scratched it yet.
My mother scooped up the purple ointment from the can, rubbed it into her palm,
then massaged it into his legs and his feet. The red dots disappeared and his legs were
transformed into purple.
Alex dodged right to left and left to right as my brother stretched his body. Alex
didn’t see my brother, only the cartoon on TV.
“Hey, time for your breakfast. Turn off your TV,” I told Alex.
Alex gave me a sigh as he slowly sat down at the table. With the TV off, suddenly
the noise from the fan became louder. My brother looked at his belly, picked at his dead
skin, then he slapped his neck several times. He knew scratching could make his eczema
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worse, we all knew, and even if he wanted to scratch himself, he couldn’t, he cut his nail
so short that we could touch the soft skin between his nails and fingers.
“What time are you picking me up?” Alex asked.
“Same as yesterday, two-fifty,” I answered.
“Too long. Grandma, can you picking me up at two?”
“Oh I wish I could my dear but I have a hair dresser appointment today,” my
mother said.
“Oh maaaan.” Alex stubbed his sunny side egg with his fork. The yoke ran out to
the side.
“But tomorrow I will pick you up and we can play at the arcade,” my mother said.
“I wish today was tomorrow,” Alex said.
“Hey, at least I am picking you up. Other kids have to walk back home by
themselves,” I said.
“When is summer vacation going to be over?” Alex said.
“What are you talking about? We are going camping, white water rafting, and so
many fun things waiting for us. Besides, you are very fortunate to experience two
different schools in two different countries. No one has that kind of privilege.”
“Well, Dylan has, Mayo has, so does Kai.”
“They are also Japanese. I'm talking about your other friends from school in
America.” I gave him a stem look, meaning no more discussion.
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“Done,” my mother said, patting my brother’s neck.
My brother cracked his neck, then put on his underwear, pants and shirt. He now
looked like a young business man, just like everyone else.
Alex finished his egg and went to brush his teeth. My brother sat across from me
and began eating his breakfast. He looked like a high school kid, the way I remember
from fifteen years ago when I used to live here.
Alex who came back to the living room.
“Time to go. Say bye-by to your uncle and your grandma,” I said.
Alex gave a hug to my mother then waved to my brother.
“At two-fifty, I will be at the front door,” I said to Alex who was putting his shoes
on.
“Can you walk with me to school, mama?”
“No, you go with the morning walking group, but I will be watching you from the
window.”
Alex gave me a kiss on my cheek and waved at me. I saw him off until his
morning group passed the first stop light and merged with other school kids. Even from
the fifth floor of my parents’ condo, I could see that Alex walked his face down. I closed
the window and stared at the stop light. I am right, I am right, I told myself and walked to
the living room.
“I don’t know mom,” I said as I sat down at the dining table.
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“About what?” My mother was slurping her miso soup. Finally, it was her turn to
eat her breakfast. My brother went to work and my father had gone to work long before I
was up.
“Alex is not enjoying school this year. If he has to go to school here, he says he’d
rather not to have a summer vacation,” I said.
“It’s school, no one likes school.”
“I know.” I sighed.
“It’s not like he has to study. He just needs to go so he will be with kids his own
age,” my mother said.
“I know.”
“Besides, what are you going to do with him for two months, just two of you?
You’ll go insane.”
“I know,” I said it but I didn’t know if I was doing right thing.
There was a big plastic bag full of my brother’s medicine water bottle under the
table. I could feel with my toes.
“What are these medicines for? Is Daichi turning into an old man or what?” I said,
again, jokingly.
“It’s not really medicine. It’s just the water that his new holistic doctor
prescribed.”
“That water smells like bleach.”
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“Maybe it is bleach because in the U.S., there is a treatment called a bleach bath.
Have you ever heard of that?”
“No, is it safe?”
“Safer than steroids,” my mother said then threw tofu into her mouth.
“No more steroids, ha?”
“Just a tiny bit on his neck.”
I nodded and took out five bottles of supplement from the shelve by the table;
collagen for his skin, placenta liquid tube for his kidneys, a mysterious tiny green pill to
boost his immune system and two different kinds of Chinese medicine that my mother
bought from her favorite pharmacy.
“Remember the pill?” She pointed out the green pill bottle with her chopstick,
“Four years ago, he got better with the pill.” She nodded several times as she widened her
eyes and spoke with high pitched voice.
“Maybe you're taking care of Daichi too much,” I said.
My mother smiled and stopped chewing her food. “Maybe you are right,” She
said.
“Maybe these pills have expired or is defective,” I said looking at the expiration
date on the bottle.
“Daichi is getting better,” my mother said. “With this disease you have to hit
bottom before you get better.”
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She stood up with the loud sound of her chair drawing back. She dumped her
small pickled dish into the half emptied miso soup and stacked the black with red rim rice
bowl on top. The white rice piled in the bowl, untouched, like the first layer of snow on
the roof of a pagoda. She walked away into the kitchen with the pagoda and said, “So he
is getting better.”
Five minutes before two-thirty, I arrived at school. I parked my bicycle and walked
through the front doors. The row of shoe shelves welcomed me and the cool air touched
my arms. I inhaled the dusty, moldy air a couple of times. With every breath I took, my
childhood memories came back; the sudden screaming of the kids with the two fifty
alarm, the unsigned love letter in my shoe shelf, and the texture of forbidden, melted hard
candy in my pocket to eat later with my friends on the way home.
As I was revisiting my memories, the alarm went off and the scream with foot
steps rushing out the front door. I looked for Alex by the stairs and when I found him, I
waved at him. He ran up to me and gave me a hug.
“How was school?” I walked next to Alex, pushing my bicycle.
“Fun. We had art and P.E.”
“Was math okay today?”
“Boring. Math, Japanese, Science, these are all boring.”
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“Well you don’t have to understand them, you just listen and maybe glance at
other kids to see what they are doing, you know, pretend like you are in a movie.”
“Oh I know, I know! How about I open my textbook like everybody else,
pretending like I am reading with them but actually, I hide an English book behind it?”
He jumped when he thought he had come up with a good idea.
“No, you should at least give a shot at reading with them or listen with them, but
not reading an English book.”
“Oh maaaaan.” He stomped on the ground.
“Listen Alex, one day you will remember this school and the kids you met. They
might become your best friends and you might want to come to Japan to work, you never
know.”
Several kids that I knew from his class passed us by, waving at Alex, saying, “let’s
play together tomorrow.”
Alex waved back to them.
“See,” I said.
“But I’m not going to work in Japan,” he said.
The muggy air interrupted my sleep that night. Alex and I slept the room next to the
living room and I heard my parents speaking, quietly, almost whispering. I couldn’t go
back to sleep so I laid next to Alex.
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“Why?” I heard my mother speaking to my father.
“Because it’s not going to kill him, not like cancer,” my father said.
“He is getting better.”
“Then why aren’t you eating?” My father said.
“But he is getting better!” She spoke louder and hit the table; the dishes chimed
in unison. I covered Alex’s ears with my arm. I tossed my body slowly toward the living
room, slightly opening my eye. It was past twelve o’clock. My father was having a late
dinner. I couldn’t see my mother’s face, only saw my father shaking his head.
“Please just eat some. That’s all I ask,” my father said.
Every morning, my brother bathed in lukewarm water with Vitamin C powder. He said
that when he was in the tub, he felt the best. My brother often fell asleep in there until
one of us had to go and wake him up. After his bath, he came straight to the living room
and turned the fan on low and splayed the special water. As I smelled a swimming pool,
my brother sat in front of the fan, on the purple stained cushion, until the water dried out
so my mother could rub the ointment on him. This was a new ritual for my brother and
my mother, new for two years.
“You are lucky,” my mother said to my brother, “because you don’t have to go to
work so early.”
“No, because I love what I do for living,” he murmured.
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“The dry patch is gone” my mother said, stroking the left side of his back.’Tt’s
clear. It’s healed.”
“It doesn’t itch there anymore, but look at my eye lids.”
My mother went in front of him. I saw half of her face and her tightly closed
mouth beyond my brother’s head.
“It’s showing up,” she said.
“I have to put the steroid on. I can’t go to work in purple face,” he said.
She ran to the kitchen to get the steroid cream from the fridge. It was a tiny plastic
case with a blue lid on it.
Alex was eating his breakfast early. He had swimming classes in the first and
second period, his favorite subject at school. I opened Alex’s backpack to put in his
swimming pants and towel, then I found his folder which had been missing for two days.
In the folder, there were several prints from school, unanswered exam paper, which was
graded zero, and his notebook. I opened his notebook just in case his teacher had written
something important. And there it was, a note from his teacher, saying that she had
concerns about Alex.
“His teacher has some concerns,” I said to my mother.
“Well, aren’t you glad she’s not his real teacher?” my mother said.
“What if she is kicking him out.”
“She can’t do that. The principle loves him,” she said.
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I was going to watch Alex in his classroom. But right before his room, his teacher found
me on the hallway.
“We could talk on the phone,” the teacher said, slightly bowing.
“Well, I am worried that he might be causing trouble in class.”
“Oh no, that is not it. It's just that Alex doesn’t seem to be enjoying school, which
I can completely understand. He seems like he is forced to come here.”
“I understand that he cannot do exactly the same things as other kids in math,
Japanese and science, but he loves swimming and art class and being with other kids.”
“Yes but in third grade, we are much more academic than last year. He is not a
burden to me. I just feel sorry that he has to stay in a place all day long where he doesn’t
want to be.”
I didn’t know what to say to her. I looked down to the floor, looked into his
classroom, and from the view I had, I couldn’t find Alex but I saw kids looking at us. I
felt like a kid who was in trouble.
“Again, I don’t mind having Alex, and the kids love him, but perhaps there is
some better way to learn the Japanese culture...you know, with you and your family.”
I looked away from the classroom lowering my eyes. I saw her wedding band,
plain silver with one tiny diamond embedded. I imagined her life outside of school. After
she says good-bye to the kids and finishes up her paper work, she goes home, leaving all
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her troubles in school. Her husband comes home, gives her a kiss and asks her, “How was
your day?” She tells him she has a kid from America whose mother just dumps him at
school although she informs the mother that the kid doesn’t like being there. Her husband
says to her that the parents nowadays don’t know what’s important for kids. She agrees.
They agree that when they have children, they will always listen to their kids.
It would not be her fault if she screwed up her child. It would be their fault, her
and her husband. We were supposed to be a team, but my teammate died six years ago. If
I messed up, it would all be on me.
“How about I pick him up after lunch,” I said, “skipping fifth period because Alex
loves eating school lunch. That is one of his favorite things at school.” My heart was still
pounding and I felt the heat and the pressure building within me. Still, I managed to
respond in a sweet, pathetic voice.
I looked at the teacher, waiting her to respond. After the long pause, she opened
her mouth again. “If you insist, sure no problem. Again I don’t mind having him. I’m just
thinking what will be the best for Alex.”
She paused again, smiled and said, “And I hope you do the same.”
I didn’t feel like going home right away. I didn’t want to be asked by my mother about
the meeting, so I passed my parents’ condo, the rice field and eventually stopped at the
park. The park was empty in the morning, only a few people walking their dogs and
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feeding pigeons. I climbed to the top of a play structure. From there I could see my
parents’ condo unit, my old piano teacher’s house and the rice field. This park used to be
just an abandon field when I was a child. I remembered coming here with my brother to
fill up our insect cages with grasshoppers and the praying mantises. When the insect
cages were too full, we went to the rice field, got naked and splashed the mud at each
other. Once, we even rescued a stray cat with a broken leg. As we splinted its broken leg,
the cat held onto my calf. Her nails went into my calf so deeply that they didn’t come out.
Both me and the cat wanted to run away from each other so we tried to walk the opposite
way. Me, hopping on one leg, crying, and the cat jumping with its broken leg. When it
finally came off, my face was covered with tears and snot and I saw three bloody dots on
my calf. I dashed to the water fountain, and squeezed the wounds under the running water
so that the germs would come out. My brother and 1 saw the cat licking its nails, then it
ran away as if it never had a broken leg. Seeing the cat’s behind, its tail standing up like a
cane, we laughed so hard that I forgot about my leg.
We had everything we needed, the rice field, the stray cat, and the freedom to be
mischievous. My parents knew what we needed or maybe they didn’t even think about
such things because back then they didn’t know much about choices or options. Not the
way it is now, it was much simpler to raise kids then.
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The teacher had not written a note for two weeks. Alex missed school for a week. We
went white water rafting and my father took Alex camping with his friends. Twice his
classmates came to ask him to play at the park. He came home soaked, telling me that
he'd had the best water fight ever in his life. I was happy and scared, thinking this could
be the calm before the storm...and it was.
When Alex and I came home from his swimming lesson, I found the blinking
light on the phone. His teacher had left a message saying that Alex threw his textbook at
recess because he said he was frustrated with math. The book accidentally hit the girl
next to him. She was okay and he apologized to the girl.
“I just wanted to let you know because he had never done this before.”
I heard his teacher saying at the end of the message.
I sent Alex to take a bath, then sat down at the dining table.
“I’m going to see Alex in class tomorrow. Maybe I am wrong to send him to
school,” I said to my mother.
“You don’t know what she really means,” she said.
“It’s our summer vacation. It’s supposed to be fun. Why am I struggling?” I said
and put my face down on the table.
“You are lucky. Your life is so simple,” my mother said cutting a cucumber. “Can
you bring a chair from other room?”
“Is Daichi coming home for dinner?”
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The rhythmical sound of my mother cutting cucumber seemed to go on forever.
Then she said, “He is cutting back on his work. No more overtime for a while.”
That night, in the living room, I searched on the computer to find out how other parents
spent time with their kids during summer vacation. It was past two. My mother, my father
and Alex had already gone to sleep.
I heard a noise in the hallway, someone going into the bathroom and coming out.
Then the living room door opened, it was my brother.
“Hey what’s going on?” I said.
“I am filling up the tub. I can’t sleep,” he said.
“Is it really itchy?”
He nodded. “I’m still taking Alex to the amusement park on Sunday. It distracts
me from itching when I am outside.”
“If you don’t feel well, don’t worry, I’ll take Alex,” I said.
He nodded again and sat down on the floor in front of the fan where he always sat
in the morning, but he didn’t turn on the fan. He just sat with his head down.
“I don’t care if I look ugly,” my brother spoke, “Or maybe I might if my eczema
starts showing up on my face not just my eyelids but on my cheeks, my forehead and my
ears. I don’t know, I don’t think so. But if I can’t sleep, I can’t work. First there is a
request from the client, then an idea, an outline, a prototype and finally we launch the
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website. It’s so fun to make something out of nothing with other people. Do you know
what I mean?”
I nodded, though I had never felt the joy of making something out of nothing. The
closest thing I could think of was Alex, but no one requested us to make him. Michael
and I just wanted him. And now, without Michael, I didn’t know what it was like to make
something with others.
It was a quiet night. I could almost hear my brother breath. I wondered if he could
hear me breathing too. I tried to see him in the dim computer light but I onlysaw his
silhouette. And in his silhouette, he didn’t look like an elephant. He was a man who just
wanted to sleep.
“Do you know where mom keeps the sleeping pills?” he asked.
“All the medicine should be by the tea pot,” I said and walked to the kitchen.
My brother followed me. We searched quietly, in the dark, careful not to wake
anyone else.
“Do you know how to take this pill?” I asked.
“Yeah, I have taken it before.”
“Are you going to take it then take a bath?”
He nodded.
“You are not going to drown, are you?” I asked.
“I don’t think so.”
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“Keep the bathroom door open.”
He laughed and said, “You looking at the shower door doesn’t really save me
from drowning.”
“But I’ll feel better, if I see the light on,”
He shrugged and took the pill. “Don’t tell mom about this.”
I nodded.
He went into the bathroom and turned on the light. I had already seen him naked a
hundred times but right now, under the bright fluorescent light, seeing him this way, I had
to shield my eyes. I stayed another hour and when I saw his shadow appearing behind the
frosted shower door, I went to the room where I slept with Alex.
In the morning, I was still thinking about the message from Alex’s teacher. I hadn’t asked
Alex about it. It was not intentional and he already apologized to the girl. What else could
I ask for?
Alex had his breakfast, but was still in his pajamas, now lying on his stomach,
laughing as he flipped the page of his comic book. In America his teacher had told me
that he was a high level reader and an expert at Mad Libs, without the usual obscenities.
He was fast at solving math problems, and was always enthusiastic about trying new
things. He was a great kid. What else could I ask for?
“Alex, do you want to quit school?” I asked.
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He looked at me as if I was offering him cotton candy for breakfast.
“Do you?” I repeated.
“Yeah!” he said.
Suddenly I felt as if all my responsibilities had left my shoulders. Alex lay on his
stomach and went back to reading his comic, his legs kicking up and down with joy and
he began to hum a song from Star Wars. I lay next to him too and kissed his cheek,
scratched his back, kissing him more and hummed the song with him.
“Kids change their mind every second! You don’t listen to what they say. You
decide what you want for your child. Just go talk to his teacher!” My mother came
screaming from the kitchen, a knife in her hand. Alex and I stop humming. We froze
there, our backs straight.
“Alex, put your clothes on. You are going to school,” I said.
“But ma...” he saw my face, my mother’s face, then my face again and said, “oh
maaan.”
Alex changed his clothes, brushed his teeth and went to the door. It was the fastest
Alex had ever moved in the morning.
When I saw him out the window, two kids in his morning walking group
approached him and three of them began to sword flight with their umbrellas. I went back
to the living room, shaking my head.
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“Sometimes, kids need to learn to bear. Don’t rush to make a decision. Just go to
see Alex in his class and talk to his teacher,” my mother said. No longer holding the
knife, she began wiping her hands with her apron.
“I’m not good at raising Alex. I’m tired of making decision all by myself,” I said.
“No one knows what’s right. No one knows what they are doing! You think your
friends know? You think his teacher knows? You think your father knows? You think I
know? If I knew, then why...”
We heard the door open and my brother came into the living room.
My brother turned the fan on with his toe, sprayed himself, and sat on his cushion.
The fan rumbled low and I smelled the bleach. My brother wiggled as if ants were
crawling all over his body, then he whipped his neck with his hands over and over. His
back was covered with many scabs and fresh wounds. From the wounds I spotted a
yellow-white discharge creeping over his back like a spider’s web. I held my breath,
covering my mouth and glanced at my mother.
She was crying.
I wanted to give her a tissue, instead I pretend that I didn’t see her tears so that my
brother wouldn’t notice what was going on behind him, and my mother could continue
what she was supposed to do each morning; her ritual, her job. She went to the kitchen to
get the purple ointment. The fan kept rumbling and I just stood there, staring at my
brother’s grotesque looking back.
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“This is good. You’re getting better,” my mother said, opening the can of
ointment. She wasn’t crying anymore, instead she sounded calm, just like yesterday
morning, the day before yesterday, a year ago, and when we were kids.
There was an order to applying the ointment; first his back, his waist, then his
arms. Little by little my brother turned purple.
“I’m thinking about moving,” My brother said.
“Moving where?”
“My friend’s condo. He is transferring to Silicon Valley. He said I can stay his
place for free.”
He stretched his legs and my mother rubbed the ointment onto his penis, his
testicles and his legs.
“For how long?” My mother said.
“For a year, possibly longer,” he said
“For a year? Or more...” my mother said.
My brother stood up and my mother stood in the front him and rubbed the
ointment into his chest and belly, then she came behind him and rubbed the ointment into
his buttocks and thighs.
“Let’s face it, mom, this is as good as it gets,” my brother said. His voice was
crisp, not murmuring like most mornings. His back was facing towards me but I knew he
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was looking at my mother and so did she because even if she wanted to avoid his eyes,
she couldn’t. She still had a one more job left - to put the cream to his eyelids.
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The Book Cases
The light poured from the kitchen where my mother sat at night. I used to tell her not to
close the door, so she kept it open. My windows faced a busy street. As cars passed by the
neighbor’s drive way, their garage front lamp automatically turned on and I saw the blue
light blinking like camera flashes under my eye-lids. My room was never dark and I
wasn’t scared of the dark, but I wanted one consistent light, the orange light from the
kitchen.
My room and my mother's room used to be one room. As if we were destined to
rent this house, there were two doors to the big room.
On my ninth birthday, she divided it in two with two book cases she found in the
street. Three blocks and one steep hill, my 5'2” mother, carried the book shelves on her
shoulders. I helped her by carrying the boards that made up the shelves. One shelf had
water stains on it, and another shelf was missing the entire back. But she said it was okay
because soon it would all be all hidden under the books we’d find. By my eleventh
birthday, we found enough books to cover the water stains and a half of the missing back.
The books she collected, she didn’t read, besides, the book shelves faced my room, not to
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hers. She told me she once heard that keeping books in child’s room would make him
smart. I asked if she might have misheard, “would make him look smart?”
But she insisted, “Not, it will make you smart.”
The light leaked between the books and the curtain into my room. I used to
pretend to be sleeping. The noises I could catch were her sneeze, and light foot steps that
only continued three steps maximum. She hardly ever watched movies or turned on a
radio. No one called her after eight; no one called her even in the day time. There weren’t
any dishes in the sink because she washed them while she ate dinner. In her leisure time
she didn’t watch, listen or talk. She sat, took three steps in the kitchen, and sat. What
could you possibly do in three steps? I think now. But at the time I had it all - the light,
her sneeze and my book cases.