Minae Mizumura - A True Novel

YOKO AND TARO were in the same class again in third grade. That was when she must have made up her mind to do something.

It was a day in early April, when cherry petals covered the ground. Yoko came running into the house, her pack bouncing on her back, and went straight in to see her grandmother. “After school today,” she announced, “they were teasing Taro and wouldn’t stop. So I said, ‘Who cares if he’s not Japanese? My dad says that it’s better not to be Japanese anyway.’ ”

“You said that?” said Mrs. Utagawa, looking slightly uncomfortable. She studied Yoko’s face.

“Yes, I did! The kids looked shocked. Then they left him alone.”

“Really? Well, then, you did the right thing. Good girl.”

Yoko may have been cocky at home with only her grandmother and me there, but she was nervous and timid outside. She was not the type ever likely to be chosen as a class leader. But her classmates knew she lived in one of the better houses in the neighborhood, and that her father was somebody important. She also attracted attention because she dressed well, thanks to the smart clothes she inherited from Yuko, Mari, and Eri. These things probably helped her stick her neck out that day. For her part, Yoko was pleased about her act of bravery and could hardly wait to tell her father. Even as she sat playing in her grandmother’s room that afternoon, she was clearly restless. Takero got home earlier than usual.

“Papa’s home!” cried Yoko, and went rushing out to meet him. With Takero standing in the front hall, his shoes still on, she stood with her hands clasped behind her back, suddenly bashful, turning her upper body left and right, before telling him her news.

“Good for you,” was all he said. He took off his shoes, came into the main room, and, seeing that Natsue wasn’t there, asked, “Is Mama going to be late again today?”

Yoko must have realized how annoyed he was, and silently watched him, holding her breath. Without another word, he walked up the dark stairway to his study.

I think it was around this time that he began to feel disenchanted with Natsue. It isn’t hard to see why. After all, it was clear that his wife’s heart belonged to Seijo, not Chitose Funabashi. She didn’t seem to mind that her house looked a bit bare and bleak. Natsue, on her side, claimed she didn’t want to impose her own taste on her mother-in-law, which may once in fact have been true. But I also think that at some point she just stopped caring about where they lived. Takero, won over by the most “charming” of the Saegusa sisters, and drawn to her simplicity, had married her from genuine affection. Yet as the years passed, he couldn’t help seeing that the very qualities that had attracted him only meant that she was not to be relied on. He seemed lonely.

Since we hadn’t been expecting him till later in the evening, we rushed around trying to put something together for dinner.

Yoko hovered around her grandmother, looking for another chance to blow her own horn. Mrs. Utagawa didn’t know about her son’s reaction to the story, but she did understand Yoko’s need for praise; so she tossed out compliments—“What a good girl!” “That was so brave of you!”—as she kept on working. Yoko seemed to find some comfort in this.

Natsue arrived home at her usual time, around half past eight. Reading a foul mood on her husband’s face, she countered with a complaint of her own: “You know perfectly well you should have called. What are we supposed to do if you come home early like this, without any warning?” She knew perfectly well he disliked calling Seijo. If the house in Chitose Funabashi had had a telephone, then he could have called me and I could have called Seijo. But though an application had been made years before when the family moved in, no telephone line had yet been installed.

SEVERAL DAYS LATER, I learned that even children understand the notion of repaying debts. Yoko came bounding home, all excited, and again ran in to share some good news with her grandmother, who, as usual, was sewing, her back bent.

“In gym class today we were running relays, and Taro ran in the race instead of me and, guess what? Our team won! He’s really fast.”

Yoko was slow on her feet. The only reason she managed not to finish last in a regular race was that the retarded Kewpie, not understanding what a footrace was, would just walk, taking her time. Running slowly in a regular race is one thing, but running slowly in a relay hurts the whole team, so Yoko looked gloomy, as usual, as she waited for her turn. Taro, who had already run and rejoined his team, must have seen how much she was dreading it. He came over and tapped her on the shoulder. Her eyes went wide with surprise just to be touched by this grubby boy. “I’ll run for you,” he said, pointing at himself. Her teammates weren’t any happier about Yoko’s running than she was, so they just grinned and kept quiet about it.

“The teacher didn’t notice. Anyway, we won!” Yoko reported. She wrapped herself around the neck of her grandmother, who was still sewing.

“Then I gave him two pencils,” Yoko added. “They were still pretty long and I’d hardly used the erasers at all.”

“You gave him some pencils?” Mrs. Utagawa asked in surprise. She pushed her reading glasses down her nose a bit and turned to look at her.

I was ironing in the adjoining room—which became the children’s bedroom at night—with the sliding doors open. I too looked up.

“Yeah. I’d actually wanted to give him some even before.”

“He doesn’t have any pencils of his own?”

“Sometimes he does, sometimes he doesn’t,” Yoko said. “A lot of the time, he doesn’t even have a notebook. I think his brothers take everything away from him, just to be mean.”

Just then, we heard the voice of the bakery man as he made his way through the neighborhood on his bicycle, calling, “Hot buns! Get them hot!” Mrs. Utagawa and I both must have had the same idea. As I stopped in my ironing, I saw her lifting her head and straightening her back.

It was she who spoke first. “Let’s buy an extra fried bun or something and give it to that boy.” I grabbed some change, jammed my feet into clogs, and went running down the gravel road.

GETTING THE SNACK to him turned out to be quite a challenge. O-Tsune had injured her back loading and unloading a three-wheeler van with those stacks of ceramic bowls, and had then been able to quit for good when her eldest finished middle school and started earning some money. At this point, she was taking in piecework at home. According to her, with Roku bedridden much of the time, she needed to be there to take care of him.

I certainly didn’t want her to know what we were up to, so I went out to the garden shed and started puttering around, tidying things up but really waiting for Taro to come out to do one of his usual errands—but he didn’t appear, however long I waited. Once or twice, Yoko peered out of the kitchen door and asked, “Not yet?” As evening was descending, I started making dinner—still no sign of him. It was close to six o’clock already. Just as I was about to give up, he came out of the house carrying a shopping basket.

The front doors and verandas of the rental houses faced south; it was easy to watch any comings and goings over the fence.

“Hey!” I called out, opening the kitchen door. I ran outside, and Taro stopped. He looked puzzled, and then suspicious. I stood near the well and gestured for him to come over.

I held out the brown paper bag with the fried bun inside.

“Your name’s Taro, right?” I asked, watching a new expression appear on his face in the growing darkness. He held his chin up a little and pursed his lips. There was a challenge in his look.