CHAPTER 91

They had gotten off the train at Zenko-ji, a couple of stops before the main Kofu station, because they didn’t want to be standing around there waiting for their connection to Shizuoka. Kumi would leave Thomas and the others there, taking the train to Tokyo and the rest of her life. She sympathized, she said, but she had to walk away. They would say their farewells here at her request, in a place that had once been special to them, then walk the rest of the way to the main station and their respective trains.

But Kumi had one piece of news to offer, something she confessed she had been wary of telling Parks. Thomas, forcing himself to the decision, said she should tell them all what she knew. They needed to trust each other. She shrugged, unconvinced, but told them anyway.

“Devlin,” said Kumi. “His visit isn’t just about taxes. He’s hammering out the details for a trade deal. Guess what he wants to import?”

“Fish?” said Jim.

“Yep,” said Kumi. “Japan is the biggest importer of fish in the world and he wants in.”

“From Illinois?” said Thomas, skeptical. “From where, Lake Michigan?”

“He’s sponsored some semisecret farming program,” said Kumi. “There are these greenhouses in southern Illinois growing tomatoes and such hydroponically . . .”

“Hydro what?”

“No soil,” said Parks. “The plants grow in nutrient-rich water.”

“And they are farming fish in that water,” said Kumi. “Tilapia at the moment. And they are trying the same conditions for a specially cultivated hybrid striped bass. Could be a massive boon for the Illinois economy if Devlin can pull off an import deal here.”

“He never mentioned it,” said Thomas, looking to Jim for confirmation.

“Keeping it quiet,” said Kumi. “Get an edge on the competition.”

“Maybe,” said Thomas.

Parks was looking thoughtful. Thomas could feel them all trying to make the connection in their minds, but either they didn’t know enough, or it wasn’t there, so they sat in silence.

In any case, Thomas had something else on his mind. The faded red temple where they had first met after Tokyo was private and secluded after the grandeur of those they had just visited. It was the perfect place to give voice to an idea that he had been holding on to like a man protecting a candle flame in a strong breeze.

“Listen, I’ve been thinking,” said Thomas. “I know it sounds crazy, but has anyone considered the possibility . . . ?”

“What?” said Kumi. She looked wary.

“Now just hear me out,” he said.

“Go on.”

“Has anyone considered the possibility . . . ?”

“That Ed isn’t dead,” said Jim. “That’s what you were thinking, isn’t it?”

“I was just wondering,” said Thomas.

For a long moment they all just stared at him, and the silence of the temple precinct seemed absolute.

“Your brother’s dead, Tom,” said Kumi, at last.

“So they say,” said Thomas. “But we haven’t seen a body. We don’t have clear evidence where or how he died. Maybe he didn’t, maybe he just went underground . . .”

“Tom,” said Kumi, cutting him off like someone laying down a heavy burden as gently as possible. “We know there was some sort of explosion. A lot of people died. He was among them.”

“We don’t know that for sure,” he said. “If there were lots of bodies, if they were . . . damaged, unrecognizable, who is to say someone didn’t just assume he was among them because he’d been in the area or . . .”

“They were sure, Tom,” said Kumi, weary again, and sad because she didn’t want it to be true but couldn’t make herself believe it wasn’t.

“And how can we trust what we’re being told anyway?” Thomas continued. “We’re being given the runaround by everyone. Why should we believe anything they say? Why do we take it on trust that he’s dead?”

“You can’t let yourself believe this, Tom,” said Kumi.

“I’m just saying . . .” Tom began.

“Let him go,” said Jim.

“You too?” said Thomas, rounding on him. “I thought you were the man of faith, the man who could believe things?”

“Not this, Thomas,” said Jim. “I believe he’s dead.”

“It’s hard,” said Kumi, “but you have to accept it.”

He turned on her then, an old anger suddenly boiling up inside him as if a forgotten wound had split open.

“You tell me to accept it?” he snapped. “You are telling me to get over it? Oh, that’s perfect.”

Kumi flushed. “That’s enough, Tom,” she said, though there was the hint of a plea in her eyes. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what, Kumi?” he shot back, the pain making him cruel. “Don’t what? Don’t mention the little stone babies over there?”

“Shut up, Tom,” she said, tears starting to her eyes, her hands rising to her ears to block him out, silencing him as a child might.

But Thomas didn’t stop. He got hold of her and spoke loudly into her face. “Don’t mention the child-sized hole in your gut you’ve been carrying around for the last seven years? Are you getting over that any time soon, Kumi?”

She hit him then, a sudden stinging slap across his face that brought silence to the temple garden. Then she fled, stumbling a dozen yards away, sobbing into her hands. Jim went after her, but slowly and keeping his distance. Parks stood for a moment, frozen, his eyes wide, and then he drifted away by himself, leaving Thomas alone with his grief and his shame, as it had always been. The shadows of the four people that had blurred into an amorphous whole resolved and separated, drew on the gravel their stark, negative images of loss and isolation.

“You lost a child?” said Parks, turning to Thomas. He was whispering in a strange way and his eyes were still wide.

“No,” said Thomas, hollow. “Yes. Anne. A late-term miscarriage.”

“Does that make a difference?” said Parks, looking toward Kumi. It was an accusation, bizarre coming from him, but an accusation nonetheless. Thomas was also watching her, but he was seeing only that day when they had sat in the parked car outside the obstetrician’s clinic, crying together but already separate. Now he just shrugged like a man exhausted, and spoke the question he had nursed as long as she had.

“How do you mourn the loss of what you never had?”