So this developers been after us for the past five years, Yuki said. But then NHK compiled this report from America, about
hibakusha
in California. Who should we see on television, but this man named Joji Haneda.
Damn Riki. Mas remembered the CBS interview last year. Why did he have to be an
ochoshimono
and go after attention? Like bugs to light.
Joji Haneda in California, we think. What a coincidence. Theres another Joji Haneda over there. But then the developer starts getting ideas. What if this Haneda is the same Haneda? Then the land would automatically revert to him you know, son over daughter. Calls are made to various governmental agencies. Faxes are sent to the consulates office. Turns out this Joji Haneda is born in the exact same year, exact same village. And his parents have the exact same names. Then all of us start wondering, Is this the same Joji Haneda? My grandmother gets excited. Is this Joji Haneda my brother? She cant tell on the television screen. Its been fifty years, right? She wants to call him up, but I tell her not to. I need to find out for myself.
How much dis land worth?
Well, I guess, in American dollars . . . three million.
Mas nearly choked on his cigarette. Everyone has an angle, he thought. And this boy has a three-million-dollar one.
Its not about the money. Yuki furrowed his eyebrows, and his skin looked darker than ever.
Yah, right, thought Mas. Its always about money. With Akemis son dead, the grandson would be set to inherit it all.
Do I look like a person who cares about money?
I see all kinds in my job, said Mas. Looks dont mean nutin.
Yukis jaw tightened. I would never sell the land. Thats one thing my father told me before he died: Hang on to it. Keep it in the family. Dont let it go.
Thatsu all your business. Has nutin to do with me.
Yuki rubbed his head, the tips of his hair bristling forward. You know him well. That man who calls himself Joji Haneda.
The ash of Mass cigarette had burnt down to his knuckles. Mas now had no doubt that Yuki had been pursuing him ever since the medical exams. He knew that he had to be careful who knew what the boy was up to?
Yuki continued his interrogation. What was he talking about? Why was he so upset?
I talk to lots of sonafuguns at a poker game, big deal. Dis free country. Why didnt you go ova, ask him face-to-face?
And tell him about this property that may be in his name? I dont think so. I dont know this man. He could pretend that hes somebody hes not.
Mas tapped his cigarette and watched the ash blow onto the sidewalk.
So you tell me, Arai-
san.
Dont you know anything that can help me?
Mas swallowed. It was so early he wasnt thinking straight. Or maybe he had known all along what was going to happen to Yuki Kimura. Give me some paper and a pen.
The boy retrieved a mechanical pencil from his backpack and tore off a piece of notebook paper. Mas wrote down the information as best he could. Her name is Junko Kakita, he said. She ova there in North Hollywood. You ask her whatsu goin on.
Just when Mas thought he had gotten rid of one kind of trouble, another kind came along. This time it was in the form of a seventy-something Nisei woman in jeans, T-shirt, tennis shoes, and bifocals. Lil Yamada. Mas didnt know how shed gotten to the hospital, but she was there, outside, by the pay phones.
She was inserting quarter after quarter into the public phone like it was a video poker machine. She stopped for a moment and fumbled through her purse, most likely for more change.
Whatcha need? Mas said, pulling a fistful of dimes and nickels from his pocket.
Lil looked up, flustered. When she saw that it was Mas, her faced colored and hardened just enough for him to know that she was mad as hell. She hesitated, and then picked up some of the coins. Thank you, she said. Calling Joe.
Mas let Lil alone for a while. He overheard her talking to her son, saying words like concussion and tests. But mostly she kept her voice and head down as if she were trying to keep dry in a rainstorm.
As Mas snuck glances at Lil from the hospital driveway, the pain in his head and back slipped away. Instead, he felt a sharpness in his gut, one that Chizuko used to trigger.
Chizuko had been the daughter of a small-business man, and smart. She was wearing glasses when Mas met her for the first time, at a meeting arranged by her grandparents and his parents. She wasnt beautiful, but she didnt seem to care. Mas was impressed with the way she sat. Her back was rail straight, her thin legs folded underneath her body. Her blouse was striped and neatly tucked into her skirt. Her shiny glasses were perfectly balanced above her tiny nose.
This woman was a woman of principles, Mas had thought. And his hunch was right. Chizuko had the cleanest
kokoro,
character and soul, of any person he had ever met. She was the personification of
chanto,
of doing things just right. She read instructions to everything, from the Bisquick baking mix to tax forms to Dr. Spock to car manuals.
And she followed each instruction with every power in her being. Shift the car to D2 on the freeway above 40 miles per hour. You must do it. It says so in the manual, she said as Mas was driving their new Datsun to San Francisco.
She valued her female friends, and often gathered flowers in her garden, wrapped them up in newspaper, and presented bouquets on a regular basis. Sometimes she baked cookies or rolled sushi strips of avocado and imitation crab stuffed into sweetened vinegar rice and covered with black seaweed. Always the rejects, the cookies with burnt bottoms, or crooked slices of sushi, were left for Mas and Mari.
Always the
kuzu
. Mas munched on a piece of sushi in which the avocado and crab were coming loose from the rice.
Mari fingered a cracked oatmeal cookie. Yeah, how come we get the messed-up ones?
Because you give the best away. Tastes the same, anyway, right?
Mas complained too, but he secretly agreed with Chizuko. Friends should be given the best of everything. But now, without Chizuko, look what he had served up for Tug and Lil. He had mixed them up in a world that they had no business in. He needed to separate them again, but deep down inside he knew it was too late.
After Lil finally got off the phone, Mas mustered up all the courage he could. Tug
orai
? he asked.
Well, you know how he is. The doctor wants to keep him overnight for tests, but Tug doesnt want to listen. Says hes fine.
Umm. Mas kept his hands awkwardly at his sides.
Didnt even want to make a police report.
Police? Mas didnt know how far they were going to get involved with this.
Well, this is a crime, Mas. Assault and battery. That man could have killed Tug.
Mas gritted down on his dentures.
To see him all banged up like that Lil shook her head. Mas, how could you take him to a place like that? Her eyes, magnified by her bifocals, were steely black. The sun was starting to rise, and Mas could see the strong lines around her mouth and chin. He wanted to run and escape, but he couldnt. This was his punishment. His responsibility. He had to hear Lil out.
Hes an old man, Mas. I know he still thinks he can do anything, but we only have a few good years left to enjoy. Go places weve never been before together. Hawaii. Even Europe.
Sorry, said Mas. Very sorry.
I was worried sick. When he didnt come home by eleven, I even went by your house.
Very sorry, Mas repeated.
Tug and Lil were inseparable, especially as they grew older. They had met during the war. She was in a camp in Arkansas; he was in Camp Shelby, Mississippi. She and some other girls had formed a group to cheer up the Nisei soldiers. They made chicken teriyaki and rice; Tug was the only one who bothered to help. When he was sent overseas to Europe, they wrote each other every day until he was wounded. They got married a few months later in an army chapel.
Lil paused and looked at her watch. You must be tired now. Why dont you go home?
No, I fine.
No, please, well be all right.
As Mas stared at Lils face, he realized that she wasnt trying to be polite. She wanted him to leave because she couldnt stand looking at his face.
By the time Haruo was released, it was already nine oclock. It was way past breakfast, and Mas was hungry. Im stoppin ova at the store, he told Haruo, who was resting in the passengers seat of his car.
Mas was driving, and sped to the old Hondas limit, causing the car to tremble and cough like Maris dog in its last days.
Mas parked in front of Franks, a plain, one-story concrete building with barred windows. Haruo was sleeping now, so Mas entered the liquor store alone.
Hey, Mas, havent seen you around in a while. A black man with grizzled hair stood behind a counter surrounded by rows of potato chip bags and shiny bottles of distilled spirits. He wore a short-sleeved cotton shirt over a white undershirt curved at the neck.
