Mary Waters - The Favorites

Mrs. Rexford snorted with impatience.

Mrs. Kobayashi sighed. “I wouldn’t mind so much if it was a quiet, dignified sort of religion,” she said. “But those people insist on going around and ringing strangers’ doorbells, like peddlers from the deep country.”

“I know. We have Jehovah’s Witnesses in America too.”

This was why the Izumis were visiting now in the beginning of July, instead of waiting until the midmonth O-bon holiday when families traditionally came together. Their new religion forbade the celebration of holidays: not just Buddhist holidays like O-bon, but also Christian holidays such as Christmas and-even worse in Sarah’s opinion-neutral holidays such as children’s birthdays.

“I don’t understand,” Mrs. Rexford said, “why she can’t spend two minutes making a gesture of respect to her forebears.” No one in the house, with the possible exception of Mrs. Kobayashi, was religious in a theological sense. Praying at the altar was routine, like eating rice or bowing hello.

Mrs. Kobayashi dropped a handful of onions into the sizzling oil, and its aroma drifted up into the dining room. Sarah, setting the low table, sniffed appreciatively.

Mrs. Rexford popped her head around the shoji screen. “Where is everybody?” she asked the girl.

“They’re all out in the garden.”

Her mother’s head withdrew.

Eventually Sarah heard her saying, “When you die, Mother, and your tablet goes on those shelves, what does she plan to do then?”

“It’ll blow over before that. Don’t worry so much. Just enjoy being sisters.”

Mrs. Rexford said nothing.

Sarah woke in the dark. Beside her, lying on sun-aired futons, her mother and her aunt were whispering.

She couldn’t quite follow what they were saying. She was groggy and the vocabulary was difficult. They seemed to be discussing philosophy.

She lay still, letting their voices drift through her mind. What time was it? The long drapes were shut, but above them a narrow rectangular window stretched from wall to wall. Through its wooden slats, the night sky glowed an eerie Prussian blue. The trees in the garden cast strange shadows on the walls.

She still had moments of dissonance when she felt like a Westerner. She was aware of the house’s smell: an exotic combination of wood, tatami straw, prayer incense, rice. Sometimes when she brushed her teeth she noticed, wafting in through the open window, some baffling night scent she could only associate with melons.

“…and his heart is so vast,” Mrs. Izumi was saying, “he feels identical love for each one of his children. Robber or saint, it makes no difference-we are all the same in his eyes.”

“It seems kind of impersonal,” Mrs. Rexford said, “to measure out the exact same love for everybody, like sugar in a rationing line.”

But it might be preferable, Sarah thought, to knowing that someone else was getting more than you.

“But that’s what makes it a miracle.” Mrs. Izumi seemed anxious to make her sister understand. “It’s exact and fair like a science, but it’s also extremely personal at the same time.”

Mrs. Izumi had a new Tokyo accent, not just because she lived in Tokyo but because she had purposely cultivated standardized speech. She used phrases like “namely” or “the truth of the matter.” Sarah knew this annoyed her mother, who scorned verbal posturing and took great pride in her Kyoto accent.

“…so you can see its significance,” her aunt continued. She had been talking for what felt like a long time. Sarah wanted to change position on the futon, but she was afraid to move. She had never heard this tone in her aunt’s voice before. The playfulness was gone; she was making a self-conscious effort to converse on the same level as her sister. Perhaps Mrs. Rexford sensed this too, for she murmured, “Nnn hnn,” without any more commentary or dissent.

It had never occurred to Sarah that grown people would want to change their identities. She’d thought identity was like height: it resolved itself by the early twenties, one accepted it and moved on.

In that moment, her longtime crush on her aunt Tama began to fade. It was a surprise, like ice cracking. She saw ahead to a time when her crush would be a faint, poignant memory, and she felt a pang of sorrow.

Outdoors, someone clapped two heavy wood blocks together. There was a long pause. Then the kon…kon… sound came again, closer and more piercing, leaving a high-pitched ringing in the ears. Heavy footsteps sounded in the lane, striding hurriedly over the gravel.

Mrs. Izumi paused in her monologue. “Hi-no-yojin duty,” she murmured, suddenly sounding soft and wistful. This was the traditional neighborhood reminder to make sure all fires were extinguished before going to bed. Centuries ago, their ancestors had listened to this same sound as they rested their heads on wooden pillows.

“Nnn,” murmured Mrs. Rexford. She yawned. “They’re late tonight.” So it was only ten or eleven o’clock, not the early hours of morning as Sarah had thought.

“Remember,” said Mrs. Izumi, “when we used to go with Papa, and he’d let us clap the blocks?” A hint of Kyoto dialect had crept into her voice, giving it a singsong quality. For the first time since her arrival, she actually sounded like someone’s little sister. For a surprising instant Sarah was transported back to a time before her own birth, to some long-lost ordinary night when these two sisters must have lain in bed as children. Then, as quickly as it had come, the moment vanished.

“Soh ne…,” agreed Mrs. Rexford, echoing her sister’s nostalgia. “Tama-chan, can you believe how fast the time went?”

“I know, Big Sister…so fast…”

The footsteps faded, and the intermittent claps grew fainter. In their wake, night settled with finality over the houses.

Then Mrs. Rexford said, “It was interesting, what we talked about. I’ll definitely think it over.” Her voice held the same gentleness Sarah remembered from the lunch with her uncle Teinosuke. For a moment, the girl wondered if her mother was actually thinking of converting.

“I’ll show you my books tomorrow,” said Mrs. Izumi. Those brief moments of shared nostalgia must have eased something in her mind, for she didn’t follow it up with any more big words. They lay silent as if in a spell, listening to the last faint echoes of the wooden blocks.

The next day, while the Izumis were away paying their respects at the Asaki house, Sarah saw her grandmother’s private photograph album for the first time.

She had been asking questions-about the war, about her real grandfather. “You’re becoming quite the historian,” Mrs. Kobayashi laughed, and turned to Mrs. Rexford. “What do you think, Yo-chan?” she said. “Is she ready to see some pictures?”

This album wasn’t kept in the storage recess like the others. Mrs. Kobayashi opened a bureau drawer and slid it out from between layers of seldom-worn kimonos.

“Let’s not mention this to anyone,” Mrs. Kobayashi said. She and Mrs. Rexford carefully turned the pages, with freshly washed hands smelling of soap.

“When your mother was young,” Mrs. Kobayashi said, “I used to show this book to her.”

Mrs. Rexford had very few memories of her real father. She had been three when he went off to war. Mrs. Kobayashi had been twenty-seven and pregnant with Masako.

“Here he is in his judo gear…Here he is at a company gathering…”

Shohei Kobayashi was handsome, like an old-time movie star, with perfectly proportioned features and eyes like elegant brushstrokes. Sarah had never seen a man like this outside of a samurai film.