Bicycle Days (24 page)

They were standing under a street sign. Mark jumped up, swatted it with his palm. The street exploded in sound, before fading to a metallic echo that clung to Alec’s ears as though it would last forever.

Mark said, “That’s just great. Sounds like you’ve really mapped out your place in the world: your own personal needs and wants. Congratulations.”

“You’re not even listening to what I’m saying.”

“Oh no? But you, of course, understand exactly what
I’m
saying. Every goddamn thing I’m feeling. Is that it?”

“Mark,” Alec said, but that was all, because it was the only safe thing he could think of to say.

“Mark
what?
Huh? There’s got to be more from you than
that, because you’re leaving me hanging, with nothing. Not a goddamn thing.”

Mark turned away, rubbing his hands over his face. Three men walked between them along the sidewalk, making derisive comments, obviously assuming that the foreigners wouldn’t be able to understand. Alec screamed at them in Japanese, telling them to mind their own business. For lack of anything better, he called the shortest of the three “Radish Legs.” The men walked away laughing. When he turned back, Mark was staring at him.

“Do you know what it’s like to live at home after a divorce?” Mark said. “I mean, have you ever even thought about what it might be like to be someone different from yourself? I didn’t go away to school the way you did. You never mention that, do you? There was no one calling me up to ask if I wanted to come home
for a weekend.
And there was no one but me around to take care of Mom after Dad moved out. Did you even know that Mom needed to be taken care of then, that for three goddamn months she was so upset she couldn’t get out of bed? That I made her breakfast every morning before I went to school? No. You never knew. You never asked. You always had your goddamn back turned, running in the other direction. You still do.”

Alec felt his head shaking back and forth like a rattle. “That’s not fair. That’s not goddamn fair. And you know it.”

“Do I?” Mark said, his voice hardly there. “Maybe there’s not a whole lot left to be fair about anymore.”

“What the hell kind of comment is that?”

Mark stared at him for a moment, then turned and started walking down the block toward the hotel. The neon signs above their heads continued as always to spatter the street with patches of color, a collage of light that seemed cold, indifferent. Alec wondered if the warmth had gone underground, harbored like gold in the subway tunnels and basement shopping centers, kept during the night hours from those who so badly needed it. Or was it hidden among the throng in front of the Almond, not ten
blocks back, waiting to be identified and absorbed? Wherever it was, it had left them all for the time being.

He walked after Mark. “Hey.”

Mark kept walking. “You don’t belong here,” he said. “Not the way you think you do, anyway.”

“That’s not for you to decide,” Alec said quietly.

Now they were facing each other in front of the entrance to the hotel. A pigeon-toed doorman in a sky blue uniform opened the glass doors when he saw them. Mark waved him away, the glass doors closed.

“Then what is there for me to do here? Can you tell me that?”

Alec slowly shook his head. “I don’t know.” A minute of silence passed between them.

Mark swung his left arm outward, but the sleeve of his shirt didn’t rise far enough to expose the watch underneath. He shrugged his shoulders. “It’s pretty late. You probably ought to be getting back.” He waved at the doorman again, this time to call him. The glass doors parted, the sky blue hat dipped down in a bow.

“Work tomorrow,” Alec mumbled. “You won’t forget about dinner with my family.”

Mark was already moving toward the doors. “Your family,” he said. “I won’t forget.”

Alec couldn’t look at him. “Mark …”

“I won’t forget,” Mark said.

And then he was gone. The smiling doorman had disappeared like a magician, leaving only the glass doors in his place, a fan closed up against the night. Alec stared at his distorted reflection until he was able to move himself toward home.

M
rs. Hasegawa went to the salon to have her hair done. She came back with three times more hair than she had before. It floated out from her head in an oblong shape. Her dress was new, too—pink chiffon with puffed shoulders and sleeves.

Wearing a stiff suit, a gold watch, and a diamond ring, Mr. Hasegawa looked as sleek as a gangster. Privately, he told Alec that he had been to the barber that day for a tonic treatment. Alec examined his bristles, told him that he had never seen anything quite like it. Mr. Hasegawa gave a toothy grin and reminded Alec that the tonic was used exclusively by company presidents.

The children looked straight from the pages of the youth fashion magazines Alec had seen lying around the house. Yoshi wore an oversize linen jacket and pants that tapered to his ankles. The toes of his black shoes appeared razor sharp. Like her mother, Yukiko brought out her best dress, this one white
with bold black stripes. It was strapless, and Alec noticed Mrs. Hasegawa checking to make sure her daughter’s breasts were properly covered. Meanwhile, Hiroshi seemed the most uncomfortable of everyone, constantly pulling at his starched collar.

They all stood, stiff and formal, in a row along one side of the low table. As he led Mark into the room and made introductions, Alec wondered whether he was in fact watching a reenactment of his first night in Japan, everything hazy, not quite clear or real: people bowing, tea being poured; Mr. Hasegawa grunting like a wild boar; Mrs. Hasegawa getting slowly to her feet and going into the kitchen to fetch another platter of squid; Yoshi leaning forward over the table, brows slightly creased, earnest and friendly; a secret giggle from the younger children.

But then, as his eyes traveled more carefully around the room, and as he studied Mark sitting sullenly beside him, Alec had the feeling that things were going to be different. Now as he looked, he saw the Hasegawas arranged in a receiving line on one side of the table, their backs straight and their eyes upon the two American visitors.

“Alec,” Mark whispered. “Wake up and say something. It’s too quiet in here.”

“What? Sorry. I wasn’t paying attention.”

Alec turned to the Hasegawas and spoke in Japanese. “My brother says that it is a great honor to see a real Japanese home and meet a real Japanese family. He thanks you very much.”

In unison, the whole family nodded their heads in approval. Mr. Hasegawa grunted forcefully and said that Alec was the best American he had ever met, and so Mark must be, too. This statement elicited further exclamations of approval from the family. Yukiko let out a loud
“Sugoi,”
then covered her face with her hands when people looked at her.

“But Mark and I are different,” Alec said.

“Yes. Mark-san is taller,” Mrs. Hasegawa said. The entire family laughed.

Mr. Hasegawa said, “Mark-san looks like an athlete. He could be a football player.”

“Yes, Mark is big,” Alec agreed.

“Is Mark-san as smart as you, Alec?” Yukiko asked.

Alec nodded. “He is smarter than me.”

“Mark-san eats a lot of meat,” Mr. Hasegawa announced.

“All Americans eat meat at every meal,” Yoshi told his father. “Every meal, every day. Hamburgers, steaks, cows.”

“No,” Hiroshi said in his high voice. “Not cows. That is not possible.”

Mrs. Hasegawa shot him a disapproving look. “Eh? What did you say, Hiroshi? Now be quiet and let Alec speak.”

Mark nudged Alec’s foot. “What’s everybody saying?”

Alec ignored him. “I don’t eat a lot meat,” Alec told the Hasegawas. “Americans are all different. They eat different things and understand different things.”

Mr. Hasegawa chuckled. “Alec is joking. It is all as I said: all Americans are like other Americans. And Alec, he is the best American. Mark-san is his brother, so he is also the best.”

Mark jabbed Alec in the back with his finger. “Tell me what’s going on.”

Alec took a deep breath. “Mr. Hasegawa said that he thinks you’re one of the best Americans he’s ever met. Everyone agreed.”

“That’s it?”

“Yes.”

“So what about you?”

“What about me, what?”

“They don’t think you’re such a great American?”

“I think they see me a little differently. I mean, I live here.” Alec said the last words slowly, emphasizing each one.

“You think so? Just becau—”

Alec cut him off. “Listen. We can talk about this later. Okay? Right now we’re being rude.” He turned to the Hasegawas, said in Japanese how much Mark liked the house. Mrs. Hasegawa was on her way into the kitchen but turned to give Alec a beaming smile.

Hiroshi tugged on Alec’s foot. “Do you and Mark-san fight?”

“Hiroshi!” Yukiko elbowed him.

“No, it is okay,” Alec said. “At your age, Hiroshi, we fought almost every day.”

“I think Mark-san always won,” Hiroshi said.

Alec nodded slowly. “Yes. Mark always won.”

“Enough, Hiroshi,” Yoshi warned.

Mark exhaled sharply through his nose. “Are you going to tell me what they’re saying?”

“They asked if we fought a lot. I said yes. They guessed that you killed me every time. I said yes, you always won.” Alec looked quickly at his brother. “You see, Mark? I’m impartial. That makes me a hell of a good translator.”

Mr. Hasegawa said, “It is surprising to have two American brothers with us at the same time. If our house had another room, we would invite Mark-san to stay with us, too. Eh, Alec? Then there would be two Americans in one Japanese house. Of course, Mark-san would come to my barber. After Alec’s visit, my barber is honored to cut the hair of Americans.”

Before Alec could translate for Mark, Mrs. Hasegawa returned from the kitchen with steaming bowls of pale green tea.

Mark leaned over toward Alec. “To tell you the truth, I’d really prefer a beer.”

“No beer. Tea,” Alec said without looking at him. “Now, how about saying something interesting to the group?”

“Okay. Ask them if you’re the first foreigner they’ve ever had stay with them?”

“I’m not,” Alec said quickly. “There have been two before me.”

“Okay, then,” Mark said. “Why don’t you ask your family why they like to have foreigners stay with them in the first place.”

Alec felt the frustration rising inside him. He fought back the urge to say something on his own.

Mrs. Hasegawa listened to the translation, then waited for her husband’s nod of approval before answering. “We have only been to America once, and that was for a very short time. Of
course, Yoshi was there for longer, so he knows more about it than his parents. But we are very interested in Americans and how they live. New York is a very exciting place. Every day, we learn new things about America from Alec—he is very funny.” She laughed. “He has brown hair, and so now we know that all Americans do not have blond hair.”

The other family members nodded in agreement. Alec nodded along with them, his mouth smiled; he may have even produced sounds of laughter. Feeling very far away from himself, he translated word for word to Mark.

Beside him, Mark pursed his lips and gave a quick nod, as if Mrs. Hasegawa had simply confirmed a suspicion. He took a small sip of tea, raised his eyebrows. It was okay, he said.

Alec tried to ignore him. He asked Mrs. Hasegawa for more tea, although his bowl was still half-full. She gave him an odd, questioning look. He tried to ignore that, too. He wanted to ignore everything, make it all disappear. Hiroshi was tugging at his foot again, fighting for his attention. Did Mark-san like sushi? he wanted to know. And had he heard of Hulk Hogan?

As he translated, the questions evoked in Alec memories of the time when he had been their recipient, the one being looked to for answers. He saw the dark and bitter side of remembrance. And it seemed cruel beyond belief, and certainly beyond deserving, as though his life within the family were being turned into some kind of game show parody right in front of him. There was a new big-winner contestant on “Ask Your Gaijin,” and his name was Mark. Poor Alec simply didn’t have the goods anymore. What people wanted was a fresh face, a new look. After all, the perspective was always the same, wasn’t it? Only the little things were different: hair color, height, hobbies, things like that. But certainly the basic mold never changed.

Suddenly the room was too small, there were too many things in it. Three television sets, clocks, chandelier, china, home video game console. Not a single inch of free space. And they were all staring at him, expecting him to be the Great Translator, to
facilitate the important cross-cultural flow of information. Anger and frustration knitted themselves into a ball in his stomach.

They were already eating dinner. He was amazed to find that, outside himself, he was still functioning, translating sentence after sentence, making inappropriate comments appropriate, adding small jokes to lighten the atmosphere. Almost against his will, he felt the obligation to perform the role that had been chosen for him, to take some satisfaction from his ability to mold himself into the type of person that was expected for the occasion; to act Japanese and somehow remain immune to the irony of it.