The reporter worked fast. The story appeared later that week on the front page of the Chicago Daily Tribune under Skip Cooper’s byline with the headline police blackmail scheme uncovered. Sergeant Graves was named by three anonymous females and one middle-aged housewife who went on the record. Rose’s name was left out of the article since she wasn’t alive to be quoted.
I called Skip to express my appreciation.
“Couldn’t have written the story without the interview with the receptionist and those other girls,” he said. I had Nancy Kowalski to thank for that. Nancy was the one who had convinced the receptionist to talk to Skip. The receptionist, in turn, provided him with sources who had been blackmailed by Graves, who threatened them with jail time for engaging in an illegal procedure.
“The DA is going to charge Graves with bribery,” Skip continued. “He’s bringing down other officers in the station.” It didn’t surprise me that Trionfo was one of them.
We said our goodbyes. I didn’t want to be late for my morning appointment at the WRA office.
Once I arrived, the same long line snaked out of the office. Even more Japanese Americans were entering Chicago; I had heard that it was in the several thousands. Where would the WRA place all these newcomers? There had been some conflicts between Nisei workers and established unions. Had we come to Chicago to work as low-wage laborers and take away American jobs? The only thing was, most of us were American-born, too.
Instead of waiting in the line, I stuck my head in the doorway and waved at Harriet, who was distributing a list of job openings. She gestured for me to enter and this time, unlike the first time I entered the office, I didn’t feel self-conscious. I had an appointment.
Harriet introduced me to a hakujin woman about my mother’s age. Her plaid suit accentuated the curves of her strong, wide body. Her curly hair was the color of pennies.
“This is Mrs. Sappenfield. She’s a representative of the National Japanese American Student Relocation program.”
“Well, hello there.” Mrs. Sappenfield warmly shook my hand. She wore no lipstick. Her bare face made me feel more at ease. As if she felt that she didn’t have to impress me. “You can call me Linda.” Of course, I wasn’t going to call her by her first name.
She began to open up brochures promoting various nursing programs and I felt my pulse quicken. I learned that quite a few hospitals were accepting Nisei women into their nursing programs and that through the US Cadet Nurse Corps, my tuition might be waived.
Mrs. Sappenfield gave me an application to fill out. “I understand that you were in the Manzanar hospital’s nurse’s aide training program.”
I nodded.
“We’ve placed a number of you in schools across the nation.”
A warmth spread throughout my chest. Was this what hope felt like?
My heart soaring, I promised to return with my completed application. Could this really be my new life? Once I stood on the street, I felt the full force of the autumn wind swirling trash and old leaves from the ground. I thought about my Manzanar friend, Hisako Hamamoto, the first person to tell me that I’d make a good nurse.
“Hisako, it’s happening,” I murmured, hoping that one day I could tell her face-to-face.
As I walked home, I stopped by the Mark Twain Hotel, my regular routine when I was around Clark and Division. The same snub-nosed hakujin clerk was at the desk. Georgina, her hair in curlers, was reading a magazine while sitting in a green armchair in the lounge.
“Oh, sweet Aki, what brings you here?” she said.
“Have you seen Keizo?”
“Who?”
“You know, Keizo. The Nisei man who works the front desk.”
Georgina sucked on her bottom lip. “Come to think of it, I haven’t seen him for a few weeks.”
“He’s hurt some girls, women. Including my sister.”
Georgina put the magazine on her lap. “We’ll keep our eyes peeled. We’ll make sure that he doesn’t have a place on Clark and Division anymore.”
When I arrived back at the apartment, my parents were ready to go send Roy off. I put the brochures away in my drawer and picked up a letter that I had written to Art. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen to us, but I had written the whole story about Rose. I even mentioned that his first visit to my apartment had been based on a lie—I hadn’t been sick. I had been recovering from the black eye that I had gotten at Aloha. I pictured Art in his mud-soaked khakis reading my multipage letter in Mississippi. Would the real Aki Ito still hold a place in his heart?
“Don’t be guzu-guzu, Aki,” my mother prompted me. “We don’t want to miss Roy.”
We splurged and took a taxi. Who knew when we would see Roy again? We ran into Union Station, the same place that Roy had met the three of us that miserable day in May. A tight knot of Nisei friends had already gathered to see him off. Ike and Kathryn were now officially a couple, leaving Chiyo out in the cold. When her parents arrived from Heart Mountain, Wyoming, Chiyo moved from the Clark Street apartment and, as she had predicted, was no longer able to attend as many Nisei dances and social events. She had become more involved in the new Buddhist temple a few blocks away, and there was even talk of a Young Buddhist Association chapter being formed there.
“I like how you let your eyebrows grow back,” I told her on the platform.
“Really? I think they look ridiculous. My mother said that my plucked eyebrows made me look like a call girl.”
Roy’s thick locks, on the other hand, were gone as a result of the mandatory military buzz cut. The younger Bello brother at the barbershop had done the deed, and my mother had been the one to sweep up the cut hair and put it in the trash.
“Hope that you’re not like Samson and lose all your powers with your hair gone,” Ike said.
That comment went over my mother’s head and she merely bowed toward Ike, dazzled that he was going to be a doctor.
Roy’s hair actually didn’t look bad. He had become a different version of Roy, one who had definitely left his produce market and Manzanar days behind.
“Seems like all we do lately is say goodbye,” I said.
“We’ll see each other again,” Roy said.
“Probably not here, though.”
“No, not Chicago. But back in California.” As soon as Roy mentioned our home state, a warm feeling spread throughout my stomach. Could we return home someday?
“The winter’s coming, Aki.” Roy readjusted his grip on the handle of the duffel bag he was carrying. “I doubt that you can survive a Chicago winter.”
I thought back to the story of when Roy feared that his toes were frostbitten during that cold snap earlier in the year.
“No, I will,” I said. That much I was definitely sure of.