Mary Waters - The Favorites

“Not personal? Against the mother who gave you up?”

“It’s like I have two versions of her,” she had said. “There’s the one in my head and there’s the actual woman who lives down the lane. The one in my head is who I get mad at or sentimental about. I talk to her in my head sometimes. But it doesn’t really count, because it’s almost like she’s imaginary.”

The truth was that Mrs. Nishimura felt physically incapable of the kind of anger she had seen in her big sister. She had seen Yoko stand up to bullies and back them down. Where did that intensity come from, that overpowering rage that blotted out everything else? It simply wasn’t in her. Besides, her own situation didn’t warrant it. Or did it? She was too close to have perspective. She sometimes wondered if her reactions were normal; this was another dark secret that she kept to herself.

But today, such thoughts were the last thing on her mind. Still humming-pichi pichi chapu chapu-she reached her own house and rolled open the slatted gate.

The mind is mysterious. Sometimes, when people feel buoyant and their insecurities are farthest from their minds, their guard goes down and they are even more susceptible.

In Mrs. Nishimura’s case, singing had a lot to do with it. She had joined this municipal choir only a few months ago. She had a rich, strong alto-all the Kobayashi daughters were blessed with good voices-but she had never done much with it. For a year or two, when her girls were small, she had sung in a short-lived choir consisting of fellow mothers on the PTA committee. Lately, with Momoko about to leave for college and Yashiko not far behind, she had felt a nameless yearning to sing again. On a whim she auditioned for Akimichi, a female choir known for its high standards. She told no one; she was embarrassed by her own audacity. But luckily there was an opening for a second alto and she was accepted-on the condition that she work hard to catch up.

The practices were rigorous, nothing like the PTA chorus in which the housewives had pleasantly passed the time. This choir director made them repeat, and repeat, and repeat a note until they got it right. Such intensity of effort did not allow for holding back, for being self-conscious. Soon Mrs. Nishimura forgot herself in the process of becoming a conduit for something larger than herself, something pure and exhilarating and rich and joyful that surged through her and dislodged tiny fragments that stayed swirling in suspension for hours afterward. With this constant outpouring of emotion, something within her began to shift. There was an imperceptible loosening of that airtight seal that had surrounded her feelings.

It was a subtle disequilibrium of which she was unaware. Now, still dressed in her outdoor clothes, Mrs. Nishimura stood before the telephone alcove in the dim hallway. Her lungs still enlarged from singing, she dialed the Kobayashis’ number.

“We’re all set for lights,” Mrs. Kobayashi told her. “We just replaced them a few months back. But thank you, it’s kind of you to ask.”

“Soh? You already replaced them?”

“We had Teinosuke do it while he was here.”

“Ah, well, that’s fine then,” said Mrs. Nishimura. “I just thought I’d ask.”

And it was fine. Truly…although there was just the slightest disappointment that Mrs. Kobayashi hadn’t made a similar offer to them. But that was silly. Mrs. Nishimura preferred not to indulge in petty thoughts.

But this little pang-which should have been no more than a pinprick, or at worst a vague sadness soon muffled on impact-shot past its proper stopping point with a force that alarmed her.

“I thought I heard your footsteps on the gravel a minute ago,” said the older woman. “Did you just get back from somewhere?”

“I was at choir practice. Remember? I have choir every Tuesday.” That pang was building in her chest, fierce and forlorn and extravagant. She vaguely recognized this sensation from choir: the gathering, the escalating, in preparation for a sublime launch of sound. But it had never happened in real life, and certainly not in anger.

“I tried to catch you, but you’d already turned the corner,” the older woman said. “Ne, I have a good cut of snapper I’ve been meaning to give you. The two of us can’t eat it all, and with this rainy season it won’t keep long.”

“You don’t have to bother,” Mrs. Nishimura said.

“What’s that?”

A small part of her mourned what she was about to say even before she said it.

“You never wanted me,” she whispered. No sooner had she said it than she was gripped with fear. Fumbling, she hung up the receiver before her mother could respond.

When Mrs. Nishimura gathered up her handbag from the telephone alcove, her hands were trembling. Her ears registered no sound, as if she were underwater.

What had she done? Who could have guessed that today, of all days, would mar the long tradition between the houses, so carefully and faithfully upheld over the years? And her gauche outburst was as distressing as the act itself. Over the phone! In between talk of light fixtures and fish! It was nothing like the secret fantasies of her childhood. She had pictured a formal, civilized exchange in a parlor, like the one with her adoptive mother. She had imagined herself speaking with dignity and (since this was fantasy) sharing her deepest feelings with eloquence. Instead she had struck and run, like an ill-mannered child.

Aaa, she was nothing like her sister Yoko.

But somewhere in the back of her mind-behind this feeling of shame, behind the dread of facing Mrs. Kobayashi again-there was a curious sense of…not anticipation exactly, but wonder. She had always believed there was nothing new to discover about herself.

How long she stood there she didn’t know. Her words seemed to echo in the empty hall as if she had screamed them. She hoped her mother, upstairs taking a nap, hadn’t heard.

From force of habit, she headed into the kitchen.

She was immediately aware of a dark outline behind the frosted glass panels of the kitchen door. Someone was outside on the doorstep, holding a dark umbrella. As Mrs. Nishimura paused, the figure tapped gently on the glass.

It was Mrs. Kobayashi.

Never, in Mrs. Nishimura’s lifetime, had she come to the back door.

In the split second before hurrying to open it, Mrs. Nishimura felt a relief so great that her knees almost gave way. Only then did she realize she had been waiting for this her whole life.

Her mother had come. This was what mattered, whatever might happen in the next few minutes. Her child had needed her and she had come, at the risk of meeting Mrs. Asaki and putting herself in an impossible position.

Mrs. Nishimura rolled open the door, and her mother’s eyes met hers with an expression so tender and regretful she had to look away. She noticed Mrs. Kobayashi wore socks on her feet and plastic gardening slippers; she must have been in a big hurry.

Reaching out her free hand, Mrs. Kobayashi drew her daughter outside onto the doorstep. Mrs. Nishimura stepped into a pair of plastic sandals lined up outside. She rolled the door shut behind them; even in this charged atmosphere, they were aware of Mrs. Asaki’s presence.

They stood beneath the hanging eaves, which extended far enough to shield them from the rain. Mrs. Kobayashi closed her umbrella and turned to face her.

“Ma-chan,” she said.

The rain was steady, not so much a force but a slow, languid dripping. The scent of loam rose up from the earth, mingling with the clean, sharp smells of ozone and greenery. It occurred to Mrs. Nishimura that smells were just as heady as music.

“I did a terrible thing to you.” Her mother’s voice had a quiet fervor, the same fervor with which she sometimes talked about Yoko. It surprised Mrs. Nishimura that she, too, could merit the same passion.