I always thought that
Morning could heal bad dreams. But
Then I grew older
I couldn’t scream for long. My breath emptied from my lungs so quickly I was reduced to gasping for air.
But Anzu heard me and came back as fast as her kimono would allow her to run. She knelt at my side, forcing me to lie down with gentle strength, and began to knead rhythmically at my chest.
“Slowly, Mi-chan. Take slow breaths. Do not try and gulp for air.” Her voice was so commanding I automatically did as she instructed and, to my relief, I found I could breathe a little easier.
“Anzu, my leg. What’s happened to it? It won’t move and it hurts at the top when I try to force it. I can’t feel the rest of it at all. It’s as if it’s not there. It was fine yesterday. What’s happened to it?”
I was frightened and bewildered. How could this be? I had been a young, healthy girl when I went to bed last night. How was it possible that in that short time something had happened that had left me as weak and helpless as a mewling babe?
I stretched my leg again, but very cautiously, and immediately the cramp in my thigh came back tenfold. My lips stretched wide in a silent shriek and I forced myself to relax, feeling the pain ebb slowly, so very slowly, as the limb went back to where it wanted to be.
Panic flooded me. Tears clouded my eyes and I blinked them away frantically. I would not cry with my pain. Tears were for small children and their nursemaids. Tears were for Anzu. I would not show her such weakness. I took a deep, shaking breath—proud that I had managed it—and spoke with only the least amount of tremor in my voice.
“Anzu, I don’t understand what has happened to me. I can’t breathe properly. My leg…I can’t feel most of it, not at all. I’m sweating—do I have some sort of fever?”
Anzu shook her head. She would not look at me, and I understood that something very terrible had come to me. I waited a heartbeat and then repeated my words.
“Anzu, tell me. What’s happened to me?”
“I have sent for the physician, Mi-san,” she whispered. “He is the right person to explain to you, not me. Please, allow me to get you some tea.”
Anzu could be incredibly stubborn when she chose to be. I glared at her even though I knew full well she would not answer me. Very well. I would wait for the physician to arrive.
My lips were terribly dry. When I tried to lick them, my tongue felt too large for my mouth. I was starting to shake—no doubt with the shock of finding out that I was truly ill. I decided quickly that tea would be very welcome. I nodded at Anzu and she almost ran out of my bedroom.
Alas, the tea was a disappointment to me.
I inhaled the steam. I knew at once that it was not what I had expected and looked at it suspiciously. I recalled tea that was sweeter and more aromatic than this, with an under-taste that I had welcomed in my dreams.
“Drink it, Mi-san.” Anzu was hovering anxiously, ready to take the bowl from me should I let it fall.
“It doesn’t taste right,” I said firmly.
I handed it back to her half-drunk. A moment later, I was glad I was no longer holding the delicate, porcelain bowl.
With no warning at all, I began to shake violently. I bit my tongue, hard, before I realized it was between my teeth. It hurt, but the hurt was nothing at all to the pain in all my joints. Everywhere hurt. My shoulder that I had dislocated so long ago felt as if it was on fire. My stomach cramped so violently I folded over on myself and I could feel my skin streaming with sweat.
What is happening to me? I thought I had shouted the words out loud, but I could see from Anzu’s confused expression that I had said nothing. She wrapped the kakebuton around me and then put her own arms around my shoulders, holding me tightly and rocking me back and forth just as she had done when I had been a very small child who could not sleep for fear of the shadows dancing on the ceiling.
She stayed exactly where she was until the physician arrived, then let me go with obvious reluctance.
Either time or Anzu’s attention had done some good by then. I was still soaked with sweat, but the pains in my poor body had subsided to a dull ache and my stomach cramps were no worse than the pain I had most months when my courses were due.
The physician barely glanced at me before he laid down his silk furoshiki and picked at the knot with his long fingernails. I watched him miserably, too sunk in self-pity to even speak.
“Anzu, get a fresh bowl of tea, and make sure it’s hot. Quickly.” As he spoke, he took out a pottery jar and shook it, obviously assessing the amount that was in it. “So, you have awoken at last, Mi-san. And very well you look, if I may say so.”
He could say what he liked if he told me what was happening—what had already happened, I thought sourly. But my chattering teeth kept the rudeness behind my lips and prevented me from speaking.
Anzu must have run to the kitchen and back. She presented the tea bowl to the physician and he pulled out the stubborn cork from the jar with his teeth, spitting it neatly into the furoshiki. He took a long sip from the tea himself—my tea! I thought indignantly—and then topped up the bowl from the jar.
“Mi-san, drink this down quickly and you will soon feel a great deal better.”
I sipped at the tea cautiously and, finding it far more to my taste than the weak brew Anzu had given me earlier, I gulped the rest of it down eagerly.
The physician stood smiling at me all the while. He was beginning to irritate me—so many questions I needed answering, and all he could do was stare at me—but suddenly a great tranquility began to wash over me. I smiled, then laughed out loud as I felt the remains of my pain recede. I lay back down and watched the outline of the tree outside my shoji flicker back and forth. The movement looked as lazy as I felt, and I wanted to congratulate the tree on our kinship.
“That tea is good. Can I have some more?” I asked.
I was disappointed when the physician shook his head. “No more at the moment. Later, when you have pain, Anzu will give you some.” He glanced at Anzu and asked, “Do you still have some of the tincture?”
It seemed to me that Anzu was not at all happy, but she answered politely, with a downcast gaze. “Yes, sir, but only a little. Should I give Mi-san the same amount as before?”
“To begin with, yes. When your jar is empty, you may begin to give her a very little less each time. But be very careful. It would not do to give her too little too soon. If you find that the amount you are giving to her does not take away her pain fully, then go back to giving her the full dose at once. It may be a long time before she can manage without it. I will give you a full jar before I leave.”
I stared from one to the other, baffled. Why were they talking about me as if I wasn’t here? Perhaps he caught my puzzlement, as the doctor finally turned his attention to me. “Now, Mi-san, I am sure you find everything very odd. But you have been ill for a very long time, and that is only to be expected. I must congratulate you on your recovery. I was very worried about you.”
I smiled at him. My pain had gone completely. Not only that, but I felt wonderful. My futon was as soft as a cloud, the air that I had found unpleasantly chilly earlier caressed me like a cool kiss. I stretched and wondered almost lazily why my leg had no feeling in it at all, as if it no longer belonged to my body. Never mind, that could wait. I must explain to the physician that he was wrong, that if I had really been ill, it had been only for a very short time.
“But I saw you only yesterday.” How very long it took for the words to come out. When they did, I was sure I could see their shapes in colors on the air. How wonderful! “You were here with Father and Mother.”
The faintest touch of alarm sounded in my mind. Mother, here? I was sure I had seen her. But if she had been in my apartment, then truly I must have been very ill. But if I had been very ill, what could have persuaded Mother to be close to me? The conundrum circulated in my mind for a moment and then vanished like smoke before a breeze. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. I was so very content, so very languid. Yes, that was the word. Languid. I rolled it around my tongue and tasted it.
I was vaguely annoyed when the physician’s voice broke in on my tranquility. But the moment was fleeting; I was too content to allow anything to disturb me.
“Can you hear me, Mi-san?” I realized that my eyes had closed, and it took a great effort for me to open them. And an even greater effort to nod. “Good. Now, please, listen to me very carefully. What I have to tell you is important. You did not see me yesterday. Or rather, I was here, but you were not aware of it. Do you understand?”
I smiled, wondering lazily what he was talking about. Of course I had seen him yesterday. I was delighted with myself when I managed to speak.
“Yes, I understand.” I would agree to anything if it made him go away and stop nagging at me.
“Excellent. You have been ill for a very long time, Mi-san. What is the last thing you remember?”
That was easy enough. I remembered the physician, together with Father and Mother, all standing around my futon, looking down at me. Mother was very upset. The memory disturbed me, and I didn’t want to think about it, but I supposed he would persist until I answered.
“You and Father and Mother.”
“Good. And when was that?”
“Yesterday.”
Even as I said the word, I knew it was wrong. Yesterday had been hot and sultry, with—as Anzu had forecast—the promise of a humid, over-heated summer to come. The very air had felt heavy and unpleasant. Now, my bedroom was crisp and cool. The sun shining through the shoji was at the wrong angle and was barely warm.
A shiver of doubt ran down my spine. I looked hopefully at the tea bowl, knowing instinctively that my salvation from all that was disturbing me lay in its depths.
“Listen to me, Mi-san.” The physician was suddenly stern. I hunched my shoulders, trying to block out his voice. “You have been ill for a long time. It was spring when you were taken ill, now it is late autumn. You have had paralysis of the morning. You are very fortunate to be alive.”
I could hear him still speaking, but I had to concentrate to not smile widely, which would have been inappropriate at that moment. I had been fortunate? Indeed, I had. But far more fortunate than the physician would ever understand.
My fifteenth birthday had come and gone, and I had survived without even knowing about it.