The Street of a Thousand Blossoms Read online

  Fumiko quickly ushered Ayako inside and slid the door closed. With Okata prowling around the neighborhood, she remained extra careful.

  “Mikiko and I must close the bakery,” Ayako said, lowering her voice. “The kempeitai have confiscated the rest of our equipment.”

  “Iie, no!” Fumiko shook her head and reached out for her friend’s arm. “What will you do?”

  “We’ll go to Hiroshima and wait out the war. Mikiko’s husband has family there and they would love to see Juzo. And when this is all over, we’ll return to Yanaka and reopen the bakery.”

  Fumiko could hardly speak. Along with everything else, Ayako’s leaving had knocked the wind out of her. “When?” she whispered.

  “The end of next week.” She smiled at Fumiko. “Don’t look so sad. It will only be for a short time.”

  Ayako, Ayako is leaving! It can’t be true! Fumiko thought, her dearest friend moving so far away. She knew there were words that needed to be said, as she watched Ayako talk of the move and what they would leave behind, but she could only nod in agreement.

  Scars

  While Hiroshi’s wounds healed, Kenji stayed by his brother’s side. He wanted to protect him though he didn’t know how. Even when Hiroshi was asleep or lay staring at the ceiling, ignoring him, Kenji stayed. He was afraid that his brother would die, leaving him an orphan a second time. He tried not to think of the parents he’d never known, because losing Hiroshi wouldn’t be the same. His mother and father were ghosts to him, while Hiroshi was flesh and blood.

  When he had told Yoshiwara-sensei that he wouldn’t be returning to the mask shop until his brother was well again, Yoshiwara handed him a tin of biscuits for Hiroshi. “With hopes that your oniisan gets better soon,” he said. Speechless, Kenji bowed low to his sensei.

  Hiroshi hadn’t spoken since that terrible night. He lay on his futon, pale and thin, his head bandaged, and his thoughts far away from Kenji’s small talk. “Mako and Takeo would like to visit,” Kenji droned on. “And Futabayama won another match last night.” Hiroshi turned away from him. Kenji couldn’t help but think that they’d somehow changed places; he had always been the serious, introverted one.

  And while his grandparents worried, they decided to leave Hiroshi alone. “Give him time,” his ojiichan advised. “He’ll talk again when he’s ready.”

  But Kenji wanted his strong, gregarious brother back. He heard the doctor tell his obaachan that Hiroshi would always have a scar on his forehead. At first, the stitches looked like small angry knots, the wound red and raw when his obaachan changed the bandage. But Kenji secretly admired the scar, the curve that abruptly ended at his brother’s temple. He couldn’t stop staring at it. It was a mark of Hiroshi’s courage, a scar that Kenji could only hope for.

  Initially, his brother’s silence bothered Kenji, until he became used to the new sound of his own voice. The change had taken place the year before, when his voice suddenly fell an octave. Each day after school, Kenji sat with Hiroshi, reading to him from Japanese folktales, sumo magazines, even occasional descriptions from The Book of Masks, whether he listened or not. Kenji hoped that if nothing else, he might slowly draw his brother’s attention back as his obaachan always did with her stories. By the end of the week, as he read, Hiroshi turned and winced, gave a low moan. Kenji dropped the book and looked anxiously at his brother to see if there was anything he could do. But Hiroshi had already turned away and lay quiet again.

  “Let me tell you another story.” Kenji cleared his throat. And before Hiroshi could make a move or protest, he was repeating the story of Hagoromo, or The Robe of Feathers, the Noh play he had seen last year with Yoshiwara-sensei.

  “There once was a fisherman called Hakuryo who found a brilliant, feathered robe hanging from a tree and wanted to take it home. Only, as he was about to leave with it, a beautiful woman angel appeared out of nowhere and asked for the robe back, or else she wouldn’t be able to return to heaven. At first, the fisherman stubbornly refused, only to relent, making a deal with the woman; if she would dance for him, he would return the robe to her. She in turn told him that she couldn’t dance for him until he returned the robe to her…” Kenji paused. He had heard enough of his grandparents’ stories to know when to capture a moment.

  Hiroshi stared up at the ceiling. “What did the fisherman do?” he asked at last, his voice a thin, dry whisper.

  Nervously, Kenji continued. “When the fisherman finally agreed to return the robe to the woman, she gratefully put it on and became an angel once again. Then she sang and danced for him happily, before she flew away to heaven.”

  Kenji stopped and the quiet felt abrupt, leaving a long silence between them. Too soon, he thought. I’ve ended the story too soon. But before he could think of anything else to say, Hiroshi spoke again.

  “And they lived happily ever after, just like in all the stories.”

  He wasn’t sure whether Hiroshi was being sarcastic, but he didn’t care. His brother had found his voice.

  Hiroshi turned to look at Kenji for the first time. “Do you think Mariko’s become an angel in heaven?” His face was drained of color and his eyes had dark shadows below them.

  “Yes,” Kenji answered. “She might have even found her fiancé again.” His answer was surprisingly calm and definite.

  “Hai,” Hiroshi answered, “I hope so.”

  “Are you all right?” Kenji asked.

  Hiroshi nodded. He shifted his body toward Kenji and winced once more, but this time he didn’t turn away.

  The sticky, malodorous heat of August stifled Yanaka during the day, without cooling off in the evenings. It was the breathless heat of decay, trapped and smoldering behind blacked-out windows at night, leaving tempers on edge. The smallest irritation led to sharp words, the low murmur of arguing voices—the suffocating remnants of the day.

  Three months after Mariko’s death, while walking home in the thick heat from the mask shop, Kenji saw a crowd gathered at the small park a few blocks from their house. Usually, Kenji would have kept going, but something about the animated faces made him slow down, push his way through the sweaty crowd to see what was happening. Their voices attracted him, voices he recognized from before the war, open and enthusiastic.

  Within a circle of rocks, on a makeshift dohyo, were two young men stripped of their shirts and shoes, wrestling. It took only a moment for Kenji to realize that Hiroshi was the smaller of the two wrestlers. Kenji pushed closer and watched his brother move slowly around the circle, light and fast, a serious, concentrated look on his face. Kenji saw his wounds as well—the puckered scar on his forehead an angry half-moon, the yellowish bruise of his ribs still visible.

  What was Hiroshi doing wrestling at the park? Kenji hadn’t seen Hiroshi fight in almost two years; he’d hardly attended any of his practices before then, or understood the enjoyment his ojiichan and brother found in sumo. His grandfather had lamented that word had come from the sumo association that all matches would be halted after the New Year. But watching Hiroshi now, he saw something akin to a dance as well as a sport. He had never liked the violence of wrestling, but the way his brother moved was another thing, like a Noh actor onstage, each movement meaning more than met the eye.

  Kenji’s heart raced as he watched his brother slip out of the other boy’s grasp. The bigger boy had let go of any pretense of a dignified sumo match, and was now street fighting, arms flailing as he tried to punch his opponent. Hiroshi moved quickly out of the way when the boy charged him. Instead of knocking him down, Hiroshi used the other boy’s own momentum to send him toward the edge of the circle.

  “Stupid fool!” an older man yelled from the crowd. The boy steadied himself. The crowd surged around Kenji. “If you expect to eat, you had better win,” the man yelled again. The boy glanced his way and Hiroshi made his move, charging at him with all his force and knocking him out of the circle. Cheers from the crowd filled the air, and Kenji felt a sudden joy racing up his body, his cheer joining thei
rs.

  “Enough!” The man’s voice rose above the crowd.

  Kenji thought the kempeitai had arrived and Hiroshi would be taken away to jail. Instead, it was the same man who had taunted the boy to win. Short and solid, he stepped forward and handed Hiroshi a burlap sack, bowing just enough to pass for respect.

  The man pushed the other boy, who stumbled forward. “Come along,” he said. “Look at you. You’re a disgrace to our family name!”

  The boy grabbed his shirt and sandals, bowing quickly to Hiroshi before chasing after the older man. Kenji turned to see his brother’s friends Takeo and Mako across the crowd, laughing, grabbing Hiroshi by the neck, and slapping his back in congratulations.

  And then Hiroshi saw Kenji in the crowd, gestured for him to come over, and happily told him the story: Tonuki was the name of the boy he was wrestling with. Hiroshi had heard his uncle was the farmer assigned to raise livestock for the kempeitai. According to Takeo, Tonuki also liked to gamble, mostly cards and small yard bets. After a fair amount of needling over the past weeks, Tonuki had agreed to fight. It was arranged that they would meet at the park for the match, between the late afternoon and early evening, when the kempeitai changed shifts. The prize would be a chicken. If Hiroshi lost, he would be cleaning their henhouse for a week. Even obaachan would be happy. A chicken won fair and square. His words came out in a breathless rush.

  Kenji peered into the sack, a spray of brown feathers floating through the air as the chicken fought to get out. A film of dirt like two handprints streaked Hiroshi’s chest where Tonuki had pushed him. He had never been prouder of his brother as they walked home; Hiroshi’s forehead glistened with sweat, his scar still red and intimidating. Kenji knew the scar would fade in time, become invisible to many, but to him it would always be there, never losing its significance.

  7

  The Fallen Sun

  1944

  A cold wind, though not as icy as the week before, blew through the tower. Yoshio’s tobacco was long gone but he still felt solace in holding the pipe, placing the stem between his lips and biting down. He must be regressing in his old age, he thought, needing to suck on an object for security like a child. In the next moment, Yoshio cupped the pipe in his palm and with one violent swing threw it as hard as he could. He didn’t need an empty pipe for security. He imagined it sailing high and far, most certainly landing like an uninvited guest in someone’s courtyard. He leaned forward and listened for the dull thud of its landing but never heard it. What Yoshio heard instead were voices at the front gate. He recognized Okata’s voice from the neighborhood association, followed by two unfamiliar voices, and hurried downstairs to the kitchen.

  Yoshio listened as the front door slid open, then Fumiko’s voice, then a rough, disrespectful grunt demanding, “Go-shujin, your husband!” No formalities. The two with Okata must be kempeitai. He heard Fumiko’s pause, that minute intake of breath before she began to say something, only to be abruptly cut off. Then Yoshio heard Okata’s scheming voice give directions down the hallway, heard the heavy thump of boots as they came directly to the kitchen, where he sat, waiting for them.

  The command was hard and terse. “The watchtower in your backyard must come down immediately,” ordered one of the policemen, his voice coarse, his words laced with a strong country dialect. Yoshio gazed out the window in the direction of the tower and back toward the policeman. Okata didn’t say a word.

  Then, as if the policeman thought Yoshio’s silence meant he hadn’t heard or didn’t understand, he repeated, “The tower must come down. There will be no allowances. Some men will be here tomorrow to take it down for you. I’m sure you will donate the wood afterward.”

  The only surprise was that Okata hadn’t reported him long before this. Yoshio sat back, looked again out the window and in the direction of the tower. He had built the watchtower with his own hands, and he would be the one to take it down. He refused to waste words on the fools. Yoshio simply turned back to them and nodded.

  Then he heard the same heavy thumps down the hall and they were gone. He could still smell remnants of their presence, sweat and cologne and, even worse, the flowery scent of Okata’s hair oil, which made Yoshio sick to his stomach.

  After Okata and the kempeitai left, Fumiko came into the kitchen and put hot water on to make tea as she did every afternoon, even when there was no tea, only the hot water. Yoshio listened to all the sounds that filled their silence, the hollow kettle being filled, the soft scrape of her slippers against the floor, her quiet sigh.

  After a long while, Fumiko asked, “Do you remember the ginkgo tree in my uncle’s yard?”

  Yoshio thought back. Hakodate was such a long time ago.

  “The one you were sitting under the afternoon I dared to speak to you?” he asked.

  “Hai,” she said, softly.

  He heard her fingers scrape the bottom of the tin for a pinch of green tea to put into the hot water.

  “So long ago. Do you think it’s still there?” he asked.

  She placed a cup in front of him, the steam rising. “It doesn’t really matter, does it? You have always told me that once we have a memory, it never leaves.”

  “Hai,” he answered. Until illness or death, he thought.

  She sat down beside him and he leaned toward her warmth. “And so it will be the same with the tower, neh?”

  How could he not love her? In his darkness, he saw the beautiful girl sitting under the ginkgo tree, the young girl dancing with the white flower in her hair, the step-beat of his heart once again.

  “Hai,” he whispered.

  After tossing and turning most of the night, he had no more dreams. Yoshio lay still in bed, listening to Fumiko’s steady breathing. On their futons, they hadn’t said a word to each other in the dark. And in the stillness, Yoshio’s decisions were made; the sudden dismantling of their lives would begin with the tower, followed by the departure of Fumiko and his grandsons to the safety of the countryside. They would evacuate to Nagano, to stay with his niece Reiko’s family until it was safe for them to return. Yoshio swallowed his fear, filled his darkness with the light of his grandsons, his many years with Fumiko. He knew the house, knew the alleyways, the small corners and crevices of this world he loved. It was too late for him to adapt to a new place again. He would stay in Yanaka, alone.

  When the first whispers of morning arrived, Yoshio rose quietly from the futon into the cold darkness of late winter. He took each step up to the tower with steady purpose, and stood silently gazing up toward the sky. He imagined the light slowly revealing each detail of the world around him. He had built the tower to honor his daughter, Misako, and for the boys, only to realize that in the ensuing years, it had become his place of refuge. The watchtower stood just above the real world, where he mourned the past and welcomed the future. Now, it, too, would be gone and the future felt bleak.

  Yoshio made his way down the steps and back into the kitchen. He knew every piece of the tower, had quickly determined which of the support beams to weaken first in order to bring it down. He took eleven steps, turned to the right, and knelt down. By the window was the second wood plank he had loosened, hollowing out the earth underneath. Now his fingers dug still deeper into the dirt, until he touched the cloth he’d wrapped the sledgehammer in, lifting its solid weight with both hands.

  Yoshio slipped back out the kitchen door. He stroked the wooden beams for one last time, felt for the joints, and carefully removed the wooden pegs that held them together. If he weakened the crossbeams in the right place, he judged, the tower would collapse within itself, out of harm’s way. Yoshio took a deep breath, stood to the right of the first beam, and swung hesitantly as the sledgehammer connected with a dull thud against the wood. He pulled back and swung again. With each swing, Yoshio felt lighter, just like when he heard the Joya-no-Kane, the traditional New Year’s gong being struck, each toll dispelling an evil hindrance, a malicious thought from his heart and mind, each swing carrying with it a
private wish that he could never explain to Kenji. Death to Okata! He swung hard, hearing the wood crack. Death to the kempeitai! Yoshio swung again harder, crashing into the beam, revitalized with a strength long diminished by age and hunger. Death to this imperial war! His blood raced. Sweat clung to his back. He swung once more, heard the groan of the wood splintering. He paused a moment, swaying from side to side, then stepped over to the second beam, anxious to finish before his strength failed. With each blow, the watchtower creaked and shifted. Yoshio felt a long, sharp moan throughout his body as each evil hindrance left him, floated up and away into the early morning light.

  The Watch tower

  Hiroshi woke with a start—a rhythmic pounded echoed through his dream and into his waking. At first he thought it was his own heart pounding, but the thumping reverberated through the entire house. Kenji had thrown his comforter over his head and didn’t stir. The windows were blacked out and Hiroshi couldn’t tell whether it was light or dark outside. He flickered through the possibilities of an air raid or earthquake as he rushed downstairs to the kitchen. The pounding grew louder. His obaachan stood motionless at the window, pushing aside the blackout curtain as the early morning light filtered in.

  “What is it?” Hiroshi asked. His voice was hoarse, still dazed with sleep.

  “The tower,” she whispered.

  Hirsoshi hurried to the window and saw his grandfather swinging a sledgehammer, striking the support beams that held up the watchtower.

  “He’ll hurt himself.”

  His grandmother reached out and grabbed his arm. “Hiro-chan, listen to me,” she said firmly. “Your ojiichan needs to do this himself.”

  Hiroshi looked to his grandmother but she remained quiet. “Obaachan, you must stop him. He can’t even see what he’s doing,” he pleaded.