Japan, 1957
I sit with my family for the morning meal, a day like any other, and yet, after the conversation with Okaasan in the garden, it is a day like none before. Grandmother’s words haunt me: “Worry gives a small thing big shadows.” But a possible pregnancy is a big thing and the shadow it casts isn’t only monstrous, it’s life-changing.
Chewing each mouthful of rice, I stare and marvel at my mother. I may have encouraged her to speak up, just as Hajime encourages me, but it is she who inspires. When she attempted to persuade Father, and he silenced her voice, she used her savvy to outsmart him. She’s more than clever, she’s brave.
I study them over my bowl’s rim, committing every detail to memory. Father: the silver-white hair near his temples, his thick eyebrows and the deep-set lines that permanently rest between them. Taro: determined eyes, shoulders wide and high. Grandmother: knowing smile and meddlesome spirit. Kenji: Buddha cheeks and boundless energy. Okaasan...
“What are you saying, Naoko?” Grandmother asks. “Hmm?” She holds her cup out, so I pour.
“I didn’t speak, Obaachan.”
Taking a sip, she smacks her lips and harrumphs. “A silent man is the best one to listen to.”
I remain silent.
Grandmother wipes her mouth. “I remember when Okaasan prepared for her wedding, she became quiet, too. It’s a mixture of happy and sad to start a new life, but meeting is always the beginning of separation. You become a new daughter for Satoshi’s family, and we in turn will receive a new daughter once Taro marries.” Grandmother’s eyes cast to Taro. She’s insistent that he settle down.
“First secure a fortune, Obaachan, then a wife.” Taro turns from Grandmother to Father, who nods his agreement.
“Ah...” Grandmother raises a knobby finger and shakes it toward him. “Fortune and misfortune are two buckets in the same well.”
Taro swallows his bite. “He who has the fortune brings home the bride.”
“You do not wait until you are thirsty to dig the well,” Grandmother says, undeterred.
Kenji laughs. They all do. There is no beating Grandmother.
My throat constricts to hold back my sadness. My vision blurs through unshed tears. This is what I would miss most of all. I smile.
Mother’s expression drops. “Yes, and you both will miss school if you do not hurry.” She gathers the bowls and moves toward the sink, turning to hide her face. “Go on, or you’ll be late.”
Kenji leaps up to change from slippers to shoes, bumps the table and rattles the dishes. Taro and Father discuss plans for the day. Grandmother watches me. I hesitate. Am I saying goodbye? My eyes fix on Father. He looks up. But I have no air, so I have no words.
He raises his chin, but before he speaks, I bow—low and deep with respect.
As apology. Just in case.
“Naoko, hurry! Itte kimasu,” Kenji yells to announce he is leaving, but before anyone answers he is already gone.
As I change my shoes, Grandmother shuffles in my direction and stops.
I rise but cannot meet her stare. Instead, I focus on her plump middle and weathered hands, the liver spots that decorate them.
“Naoko, look at me.” She lifts my chin and stares. But she offers no wise words. She only nods, blinks and then hobbles away. The foxes tell her everything.
I stand alone. Not ready to move. I glance to my mother. “Okaasan...” My voice cracks, unable to form the word.
“Oh, so late, Naoko. Go. Go!” Her hand waves in the air behind her, but she does not turn.
So, with a deep breath, I do.
Outside, the sun blazes bright. Squinting, I spy Kiko coasting impatient circles at the bottom of our small hill. I know she betrayed me, so why does she wait? I march toward her, fists clenched.
“Naoko!” Mother runs from the front door, waving a bento box above her head. “You might be hungry later.” Her chest rises and falls from the short sprint. Her eyebrows crease as though to fight back emotion.
My lips tremble, but what to say? She pulls me to her and, just as quick, lets me go. With swift steps she returns the way she came.
Like that, I am released. Set free. Left to test my wings and choose my fate.
My feet ache to chase after her but Kiko yells for me to hurry. She has one foot propped on the pedal, the other positioned on the road, ready to push off and glide away.
I wish she would.
My nostrils flare from a fast inhale. I stomp in her direction with a weighted heart and loaded tongue. She had no right to tell Okaasan my secret! Instead of spewing accusations and questions, I clench my jaw and march right past, leaving her and my bicycle behind.
She pedals after me, but I move from the road to the tall, damp grass. They snap beads of dew.
“Naoko...”
I peer back over my shoulder, but don’t stop.
“Where are you going?” She abandons the bike, so it topples on its side and the suspended front wheel spins, traveling nowhere. “Wait!”
“Go away, Kiko!” I pick up my pace, making tracks for the trees. Yesterday, her teakettle disposition—soon hot and soon cold—confused me. Today, it hurts. Does she really believe I don’t know what she’s done? I veer from the easy path and cut through dense foliage. The woodland undergrowth nips at my ankles, jutting shoots, scratching at bare knees.
Still she follows.
I stop and turn. “How could you tell Okaasan?”
Her lips open but offer no explanation, so I continue forward without one. Ahead, trees part to open sky, and under a canopy of blue sits the remnant of a once-giant camphor tree.
My suitcase beside it.
I run, swipe up my bag and perch on the stump.
Kiko’s eyes go wide at the sight. Blunt bangs hide high arched brows. She storms toward me and shrills, “You are leaving?” Birds flap their wings, some take flight. “How can you even consider such a thing?”
“How can I not?” I remind her of our many trips to the temple’s Wishing Tree. How the temple priests offer a daily prayer for the granted wishes the winds set free. “Did I not tie white-ribbon requests from every limb, Kiko? So many, in fact, that the branches bent from their weight? Every week I asked for the same three things—my true love, a family of my own and a home to protect us all. Did mine not catch the breeze? Are they not granted?”
Kiko gathers her face into a frown, then using her words like an ax, chops down my wishes, one after the other.
“You’re blinded by love and cannot see what is true, Naoko.”
Chop.
“Your baby will be of mixed blood and therefore a mixed blessing.”
Chop. Chop.
“And your house is with Eta, in the old Burakumin community, so instead of protecting your family, it adds to your shame.”
Chop. Chop. Chop.
The last takes down the whole tree.
Then she turns and leaves me on its stump with only my decision.
Okaasan said to return home after school if I choose Satoshi. So why go to school at all? I should use this time to weigh my wish. Instead of staying in the woods, I find myself at the little house Hajime has rented. The one with splintering rails and sun-dried lumber in need of repair. I sit on its step, kicking against the brittle wood, listening to the furin bells bicker with the breeze.
Restless clouds play in the early-afternoon sky. They float high in dark rows that are in constant transformation. One a swift-moving mackerel, another a tall-footed crab. Now the animal clouds melt together, forming a giant sheet to billow as a sail. The prevailing wind guides its direction.
The prospect of a new life governs mine.
I could be pregnant. I have been ill, and I am late, but I believed it due to a belly full of nerves. Not anymore. Whether to go east or west depends on one’s heart or feet. My feet would take me home. But my heart? To leave Hajime and to clean the womb? That thought is unbearable.
Elbows to knees, I rest my chin in my hands and look around. The little village is alive with activity. There is a rhythm to its noise. The intermittent beat of hammers from a group of men who restore a battered building in the next row, chatter between women as they gather laundry from the lines and the young ones’ song as they play Kagome Kagome.
I watch them, weighing Taro’s and Kiko’s words of warning and Okaasan’s words of choice. Kiko said I would add to my family’s shame by living here, but Okaasan said by choosing Hajime and his child, I could never return to my family, so what indignity would they face? Quiet gossip over my disappearance? Okaasan forced to lie about my whereabouts? But they’d suffer no public scorn as I’d never return.
Never return.
It would be easier for everyone if I could go to America, but Hajime has yet to get the marriage paperwork approved, so it isn’t an option.
My heart drops lower than the knotweeds clustered near my ankles. And if I’m pregnant as I suspect... Will my future children pay for my selfish indulgence? Everyone suffers from the stigma and ugly history of this village.
Rumors say the Eta or Burakumin are pariah deviants not worthy of marriage or trusted to hire. The worst say they are hinin, nonhumans that lack one rib and have deficient sweat glands, and that’s why dirt never sticks to the bottom of their feet.
A muddy boy waves from next door. His mother ventures out to collect clothes from the line. She is thin with short hair in pin-curled waves and moves in quick, fluid motions.
The boy is at most four and dressed in clothes too big. He smiles and waves again, venturing closer.
“Hello, little boku-chan,” I say more to myself, and return the smile.
His curious eyes beam. He points to me, then wipes the back of his hand across his cheek, adding more mud there.
“Tatsu, Tatsu!” his mother calls, a basket of clothes balanced on her hip. “Tatsu, do not bother the woman. Come.” She holds out a hand to gather him near.
When he turns to run, I strain to glimpse his bare feet. They are filthy. See? Rumors.
I jump from a distant thunderclap. With the threat of rain, I hoist my travel bag up and drag it to the door, but warped wood sticks. With a lift and steady pressure, it slides. Stale dust dances with the disturbed air. I cough, then stare.
The main room, furnished with an old futon, is the size of one partitioned space at home. The small bathroom attaches near the back. I peek in and blanch. It’s a porcelain squat toilet. It sits in the floor without a seat. My stomach rolls queasy from the rancid stench.
A translucent screen of handmade rice paper sections off the kitchen. The back wall consists of a counter with a bowl-sink to hold water. It’s small, dirty and in need of much repair.
I stand in the middle with my suitcase. What will happen at home if I remain here? What will Father say to Okaasan when he discovers I’m missing? And what of Kenji? My mind jumps from one thing to another, a grasshopper avoiding puddles.
A burn builds in my belly and coils high in my throat. My eyes prickle from the pressure. No crying, Naoko. I push it down. Spilled water cannot go back to the tray. I consider the dimming sky to calculate the time left before my decision is due. A few hours at most.
I must choose.
With a sigh, I set my unopened case on the futon’s edge. The latches release with a simple click-click, and with exaggerated care, I lift the lid to see what Okaasan has packed.
Sorting through the clothes, I find casual skirts and tops, basic kimonos, sleeping wear and even my slippers. I slip them on and wiggle my toes, happy to have their comfort. I run my hand in the lid’s pocket to feel for tabi socks and...wait. Paper?
I pull the fabric pocket out, peer inside and spy silk-bordered paper, sumi ink and stone, and two of my calligraphy brushes! Another luxury from home. Okaasan thinks of everything. I contemplate how I’ll use them to pass the time. I place my hands across my middle and consider the probable life I carry. A gift? Yes, a scroll for Hajime that announces his child.
Boy or girl?
An old method to predict the sex—that midwives claim with ninety-eight percent accuracy—is to add the mother’s and father’s lunar birth month with the date of conception, then divide by three. If there’s no remainder or if it’s two, then you will have a girl. If it is one, a boy. I do the mental math with the date, then recalculate to be sure, and smile.
If I am pregnant—a girl.
To wait out the rain, I set to work on my announcement. If I stay, it will serve as a wedding present. If I leave, it will serve my conscience, forever marking the possibility of this baby’s presence in the world.
Fat round drops splatter on the deck. First dotting, then building, till nothing remains dry. The sky strobes bright, then darkens again. I concentrate on the clean lines of Shodou, the art of calligraphy, trying to ignore the jagged flashes that rip through the sky. I plan the message—the time frame, his blessing, a girl—and with each stroke of my brush attempt to transfer my spirit so the words contain life.
The heavens crack and I jump, dragging ink in the wrong direction. This changes the intended meaning. One slip and the straight line of moon has become the prolonged tail of a dragon in the wind.
I stare as though it stares back. Grandmother’s dragon story whispers from memory.
There once lived a man who loved dragons. He kept paintings and statues of them everywhere and could talk on and on about the majestic beasts to anyone who cared to listen.
One day, a dragon heard of this man and his appreciation for his kind. He thought it would surely make him happy to meet an authentic dragon. So, he caught a strong wind and changed his course to visit him in his cave dwelling.
When he arrived, the dragon found him sleeping. The man woke to see the giant beast coiled by his side with glistening teeth and green scales reflecting in the moonlight, and he was terrified. Before the dragon could make his introduction, the man reached for his sword and lunged, causing the dragon to jump back and slither away.
Sometimes, when Grandmother told this story, she said the dragon represented liking the idea of something more than the thing itself. Other times, she said the true dragon is our real selves, a truth we must sit with and face.
I sit with mine. He curls at my feet. We share a silent conversation and I know. It’s him, casting my big and monstrous shadow. The one I feared. The one I sought. The one I stare at even now. Tears build and the back of my throat aches from trying to hold in what I’ve known all along. Hajime holds my heart and I may hold his child, so there was never any choice.
Only an acceptance.
For I am granted every wish: my true love, a family of my own and a home to protect us all.
But just like the man in Grandmother’s story, when faced with it, I am terrified.