Minae Mizumura - A True Novel

Moving only his shoulders, he spoke at first in a strangely impassive way, but as he went on his thoughts seemed to grow darker, until before long his face was flushed with desperation.

I listened quietly, shaken by it all. It wasn’t only the wretchedness of what he said. I was appalled by him himself, sitting there in front of me. What had happened to the little boy who was so sparkling, as if he wore a bright star on his forehead?

There was a short silence. Then perhaps I sighed too loudly, for he raised his head and looked at me.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“What for?”

“I used up my savings after the divorce, so I can’t help you. All I can offer you is a little spending money.”

“I didn’t come here looking for a handout.” He looked away and drew a deep breath. “Sometimes I think I’ll help myself to some of their money and run for it.”

“No, don’t.”

“All I’d have to do is take the cash I collect from other factories. It’d be so easy.”

“Don’t do it—that’s robbery. If you were caught, your life would be ruined. You mustn’t ever steal.”

“My life’s ruined already.”

Then it came to me. “Why not stay here?” I said. “You could work somewhere nearby in the daytime and study at night for the high school equivalency test or the college entrance exam or whatever.”

He stared at me for a moment, then slowly looked around the little room as if he were seeing it for the first time. I am a fairly well-organized person, so everything was tidy. The table was new, but the room contained a variety of other things that brought the Utagawa family vividly to mind: their wedding gift of the Western-style chest; the low writing desk, the dresser, and the full-length mirror Mrs. Utagawa had left me; and some familiar objects from their main room—a clock, a vase, a painting Grampy had done in oils of Mount Asama.

“Live here with you, you mean?”

“That’s right. If it’s too cramped, you can always sleep in the kitchen.” I laughed.

The first time I ever saw Taro, he was nine and I was nineteen. Now, ten years later, we were nineteen and twenty-nine. But he was like a younger brother to me, one far closer than my real brothers, so there was no awkwardness between us.

“All you would have to pay is your board.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

His face slowly lit up, showing some of his old animation. It was the first time he hadn’t looked dismal since he’d come in.

“And when you’ve saved up enough money, you can find a boardinghouse or rent an apartment on your own.”

After that we walked over to the stores in front of the station and I did some shopping, taking advantage of Taro’s presence to pick up a few heavy items. Finally, I stopped at the fish shop and splurged on some tuna sashimi. Standing next to him to make supper in the kitchen, I saw that despite his size he was as deft as in the old days and not at all in the way.

When we had eaten dinner I saw him off at the station. “Explain things properly to Mr. Azuma,” I told him. “Don’t just run off without a word. He did bring you up after a fashion; you owe him that much.”

“He might not like it.”

“Yes, but he took your money. He can’t complain.”

“I’m leaving even if he does.”

When I returned to my apartment, I felt so happy that I found it surprising.

Floor cushions I had two of, but there was just one full set of futon and quilts. I could let him use one slim mattress and a quilt, but I only had a single rice bowl and set of chopsticks. After New Year’s, when I got back to Tokyo I could stop off somewhere after work and pick up this sort of thing, bit by bit. As I made plans my heart sang, far more so than when I was about to get married. Before I knew it, my mind spun with ideas, looking even further ahead. Yes, if I took in some sewing he might not have to go out to work at all, or at least would not have to work much. If he could focus on his studies, next spring might be too soon, but surely the year after that he could pass the equivalency test and, beyond that, start college. This way he’d be able to get on with his education with minimal loss of time. Even as a college student, he could take a part-time job and commute. Plans for the future rose in my mind one after the other. Tuition at the national universities was low at the time, even by my standards, so none of this seemed far-fetched.

Back in Saku for New Year’s I must have been preoccupied with what would happen after I returned to Tokyo, since my little sister, home with her two children, gave me a sidelong look and said archly, “What’s going on, Fumiko? You’ve got something up your sleeve, don’t you?”

Then one Sunday a week or so after the holidays, Taro dropped by my apartment again. Though not quite cheerful, he was much more composed than on his last visit, and since he had brought no luggage I could tell immediately that the situation had changed.

The news that he was leaving had evidently dumbfounded the Azuma household. They were under the illusion that, since they’d brought him up out of obligation, Taro himself was obliged to do as they wished, and the idea that he might not go on living under their roof had never occurred to them. His brothers, both furious, would have beaten him up again if their parents, after the initial surprise and anger had subsided, hadn’t sized up the situation for once in a more grown-up way. After all, as Mrs. Utagawa had well known, Taro had already made himself useful at the age of nine; he now got more done than their other two sons combined. The adults calmed the older boys down, and O-Tsune, though privately mad as a wet hen, pulled herself together. That evening they sat and talked with Taro, and the conclusion they arrived at was that they would pay him almost as much as a live-in worker; that he would only work during designated hours, from eight in the morning to six in the evening; that he would have Sundays and holidays off; and that he would no longer be stuck at the end of the hallway but would have a corner of the warehouse for himself, a place where he could sleep and study as he pleased. Point by point, they yielded to all his demands. Fortunately for him, O-Tsune had a good head for figures. For the first time, it sank in that he was old enough to go out and work somewhere else. She must also have realized that it was impossible to keep someone of his caliber with them unless he was given the pay and treatment he deserved.

Taro quit night school after New Year’s and began studying on his own. His new routine was to go to the public bath around 6:00 P.M., eat supper as soon as he got back, and go to sleep around seven. He then got up at one or two in the morning and studied. His brother’s wife brought him meals on a tray, covered with a cloth. The food might be cold or skimpy, but he was able to eat three meals a day away from the family. His brothers, once they began to think of him as outside the family circle, seemed to be resigned to the new arrangement and so far were causing no trouble. By the time he was ready for college, he would have set aside some savings, and there were also scholarships to be had, so if he left the Azumas and worked part-time as a tutor, or at worst if he took a leave of absence for a year or two and concentrated on making money, he should be able to graduate from the faculty of medicine within a reasonable time, even though it was a six-year program.

Perhaps for the first time in his life, Taro realized he was fully capable of standing on his own two feet.

“I see.”

Rather than be happy for him, I felt thrown off course by this unforeseen development.

“Anyway, I’ll try it for a while, and this time if they don’t keep their promise I’ll leave there and move in here.”