Authors: Malena Watrous
“Of course,” I say, although his request surprises me, since he's the one who told me that teachers here never take sick days. “Are you okay?”
“I'm fine,” he says. “I have to take someone to the hospital in Nanao.”
“Is it your father?” I ask.
“No,” he says, pausing to sip his tea. “Can you keep my confidence?”
“Of course,” I say. “Who could I tell?” For the first time, I notice that there are honey-colored rings around his irises. His face is dangerously close. It would be so easy to make the same mistake twice. “It's Ritsuko,” he says. “She is in a kind of trouble. Maybe she wasâ¦unprotected. With huge consequence. Do you catch my meaning?”
“She's pregnant?” I guess, hoping that I'm wrong.
“Mmm,” he says. “Tomorrow she will have procedure to terminate.”
I think back to the way Ritsuko left SMILE club early this week, claiming not to feel well. Then I remember what we were discussing right before she left. I've been told that abortion isn't stigmatized in Japan, that it's not considered a big deal. But I've also seen countless roadside shrines filled with row after row of
mizuko
or “water babies,” faceless granite dolls that look like chess pieces, dressed in pastel rompers and hand-knit bonnets, toys and candy arrayed at their feet. These
mizuko
are available for purchase by women who've miscarried or had abortions, to serve as vessels for the frustrated spirits of their unborn children. It's the stuff that makes me sad, the clothing piled behind the statues in larger and larger sizes, all that guilt.
“Again, I must ask you to keep my confidence,” Miyoshi-sensei says. “If anyone discovered that I took her to the hospital for this reason, I could get in huge trouble. But it's my responsibility, so⦔
“What do you mean, your responsibility?” I ask.
“Ritsuko is my student,” he says. “My best English student. I encouraged her to go abroad to study English this summer in California. I helped arrange homestay. Ri-chan's dream is becoming tour guide. It's not impossible. She is very determined. But she is only sixteen years. Sixteen is so young. She shouldn't be alone tomorrow.”
“What about the father?” I ask. “Shouldn't he go with her?”
“She won't tell.”
“You mean she won't tell you who he is, or she won't tell him she's pregnant?”
“She wants to keep private.”
“Nakajima is her boyfriend,” I say.
“My responsibility is to help Ri-chan,” he says, “not to force confession.”
“You keep talking about responsibility, but shouldn't he at least help her pay for the abortion? He got her into this mess. It shouldn't be your job to clean it up.”
“My job is to take care of my student,” he says. “I am doing my job.”
“You are very kind,” I say. “Most teachers wouldn't do what you're doing.”
“Most teachers are probably smart,” he says.
“I'd like to help,” I add. “If there's anything I can do, please let me know.”
He places his stein of tea on the table and circles the rim with his fingertip. “Maybe there is something you could do for Ritsuko⦔ I nod, and he clears his throat. “Following procedure, she will feel discomfort. If she goes home, she will have difficulty hiding this
from Sakura. Maybe, if you don't mind, she could stay here for one night? She could say you are helping her with English. You will speak English together,
ne
? So it's kind of true.”
“Sure,” I say.
He thanks me and stands up and I follow him to the
genkan
, where he bends down to put on his shoes and finds them still on his feet. “I forgot to take off my shoes!” he says, sounding as upset as if he'd discovered that he weren't wearing any pants. I tell him not to worry about it, that I wear my shoes indoors all the time. “You do?” he asks. “Really?”
“I'm a temporary person,” I remind him.
“I wish you were not,” he says before slipping outside.
After he leaves, I go to the kitchen to put the flowers that he brought me in water. As I arrange the cherry branches in a Mickey Mouse stein, his envelope tumbles out. I take the letter upstairs to read in bed.
Dear Miss Marina,
This is final attempt to write speech on why English is useful for me. You said before, “Why not make speech on memory from homestay in Eureka, California?” Now I will show you why not.
I was eighteen years when I went to California to participate in immersion-style English program. According to dictionary, “immersion” means sinking in, like drowning in water. Immersion also means living in a host family. To my surprise, I arrived in Eureka and learned that my “family” was just one man, divorced DEA officer. Do you know DEA meaning? It's “Drug Enforcement Agent.” He told me to call him “Dad.” Then he laughed when I said “Dad” in front of other DEA officers. He called me “Son” and they laughed more.
“Dad” had a big moustache and he always wore mirror
sunglasses, like police from a TV show called Cops that he enjoyed watching so much. His refrigerator only had beer and milk. Other host parents took foreign students to the movies or Disneyland, but “Dad” only drank beer or milk and watched Cops show. I think he was kind of depressed because of divorce, and because his children hated his guts. This is what he said so often, after drinking many beers. “My kids don't get me. Only you get me,” he said and I nodded and said, “Mmm.”
One day he brought me on “drug bust” to secret garden filled with marijuana plants. Together with DEA team, “Dad” seized criminal property. It was like Cops show, only nobody was beat up. “Dad” said to me, “I'll bet you don't see much weed back in Japan,” and I agreed. “I'm giving you a real American experience,” he said. “Fuck Disneyland.” After that, I never mentioned my desire to attend Disneyland again.
To tell the truth, this “immersion” experience was kind of lonesome. So I was happy when “Dad's” daughter came to visit at the end of the summer, even if she took guest bedroom and I had to sleep on bumpy couch in family room. Sliding glass door of family room went to backyard. Every night, Kathy left through this door, and every morning she came back again before sunrise. I don't know where she went. I pretended to be sleeping. In the morning, “Dad” would say to me, “I thought I heard you go out last night, Son,” and then Kathy would say, “Me too!” and I would feel panic. If I don't tell truth, I betray him. If I tell truth, I betray her. I decided to keep her confidence. One time, she took me to the beach with her friends. Listening to their conversation, I could enjoy learning slang and idiom. “Beats me,” she said when her friends asked who I was. “Some dude my dad's milking for child support money. He's supposed to be learning English, but he's like mute.” I had to look up this word.
One night I am lying on bumpy couch, pretending to sleep, when Kathy comes and sits next to my body.
“Dad's working tonight,” she says.
“Oh,” I say, sitting up.
“Have you ever smoked dope?” she asks.
I say, “What's dope meaning?”
She says, “The weed you helped my father to harvest.”
I say, “This is confiscated police property!”
She says, “You are kidding, right?”
I say, “I am man, not kid, and I can speak!” She laughs and so I laugh too. After smoking dope, I become hungry, but of course only beer and milk live in the refrigerator. Kathy orders a pizza with ham and also pineapple, which is delicious or not, I can't decide, so I have to keep biting it again and again to check.
“You are stone,” Kathy says.
“I am not stone,” I say.
Suddenly she says, “Remind me what your name is.” I say, “What?” She says, “Your name, I forget what it is. I asked my dad, but he doesn't know.”
WHAT?!?
After
two months
, “Dad” does not remember my name? Then I realize: maybe he never knew. Maybe this is why he calls me “son.” I feel humiliation. I try to speak, to answer the question, but nothing comes. Why? Because I can't remember my name! Probably you think it's impossible. But it is truth! My own name is like an English vocabulary word I learned and then forgot. I am standing in a flooding river and I can't swim. I am immersed.
“I don't know!” I say.
“I guess you really are stone,” Kathy says.
“I am not stone!” I say. “I am man. But it's true that I often feel like stone.”
Then she lies down with (next to? beside? on?) me and admits that she also feels like stone so often. But not that night. After that happens, we never talk about it. Maybe she feels regret. I don't know. Once more, English was not so useful for me.
After I returned to Japan, every year I send New Year card to “Dad,” and after he remarries, I begin to receive Christmas newsletter. Like such, I learned that Kathy got married to the mayor of Eureka. So I had idea to form sister-city relationship. Shika rhymes with Eureka. Also, both towns are close to the sea. I think it's good match.
In my official proposal, I said that Shika's town hall would pay their airplane tickets. First Kathy wrote to say thank you, that they felt so excited for this trip and opportunity. But after I sent travel itinerary, she wrote again. In American newspaper, they read about power plant accident in Tokaimura. Article mentioned other plants in Japan, including Shika. So she learned about the campaign to close our plant. She tells me her husband feels nervous to form relationship with nuclear power town. Maybe people of Eureka don't want it. “We're still coming,” she said, “but we can't promise to sign a contract until we see Shika and talk to people.” I have not admitted this to my father. I told him, “It's a done deal.” I told him, “You will be on TV, and everyone will feel so happy and remember what a good mayor you were.”
So why do I admit all of this to you now? Two reasons. Reason one: to explain why this festival is so important to me, and also why I can't make a speech. When I first came back to Shika after my summer in Eureka, everybody asked “what was best experience of your trip?” I couldn't admit truth. Best experience was forgetting my own name. This is effect of immersion. This freedom comes from new language. But also, I think, from “dope.” This is reason number two for sharing my story with you.
I know you smoked some “dope” at Shika's beach, together with
Carolyn and Joe. I am not judging. The black pot shouldn't judge the black kettle, ne? But I should warn you to be more private when you practice risky behavior. One male student spotted you, and he reported your transgression to me. We are lucky. If he reported to principal, I could not protect you, no matter how much I want to. You would be sent home, or even to prison. I really don't want this. So please take more care.
Yours,
Hiroshi Miyoshi
abunai:
(
ADJ
.)
dangerous; risky; close
Please rank the following on a RISKY BEHAVIOR
scale from 1â10.
1 means SAFE SEX (
anzen na sekkusu
).
10 means DANGEROUS SEX (
abunai na sekkusu
).
Â
1. French kissing (a tongue goes
inside
another person's mouth): ____
Â
2. Masturbation or “jacking off” (a person touches his or her own genitals):____
Â
3. Frottage (two bodies rub all
over
each other, without penetration):____
Â
4. Making out (kissing, touching fingers
to
breasts or genitals):____
Â
5. Fellatio or “blow job” (a penis goes
inside
someone's mouth):____
Â
6. Cunnilingus or “eating out” (a tongue goes
inside
someone's vagina):____
Â
7. Protected vaginal intercourse or “fucking” (penis,
inside
condom, goes
inside
vagina):____
Â
8. Unprotected vaginal intercourse (penis,
without
condom, comes
inside
vagina):____
Â
9. Anal intercourse or “ass sex” (penis comes
inside
anus):____
Â
10. Rimming (a tongue goes
around
anus):____
I
leave the faculty room ten minutes before the boys return from the nuclear power plant, to hang the posters around their classroom. Today's worksheet was easy to make. I just pictured Nakajima's face. All night long, I couldn't stop thinking about the things that Miyoshi-sensei has told me recently: that it's against the law to teach sex-ed here; that boys won't wear condoms for fear of seeming gay. I kept thinking about fifteen-year-old Ritsuko at the abortion clinic, and about Nakajima sneaking into our house with his classmates' school uniforms. He must have been there when we went to the beach. He must have followed us, and reported everything back to Miyoshi-sensei.
The boys enter the shed still dressed in their red nuclear power plant jumpsuits. They circle the room like sharks in an aquarium tank, taking in the posters I taped to the walls. They stare at the two naked men holding each other, the woman lying with her head on another woman's lap, the Asian girl offering the white guy a condom.
“Nani wo kore
?”âwhat the hell?âmutters Nakajima.
“Avoid risky behavior,” I read the caption. “Do you understand?”
He ignores me as usual, unzipping his jumpsuit and peeling it off.
“Dame
!” I say. That's forbidden. “Keep your clothes on!”
“Atsui yo
,” it's hot, he says, and he's right. The windowless portable classroom feels like a sauna, rank with the mingled smells of B.O., hairspray, and the dried guppies that the boys like to snack on. As usual, Nakajima's classmates follow his example, stripping to their underwear, sprawling in their seats, fanning themselves with the worksheets I placed on each desk before they got here.
“Today we are studying safe sex,” I say in Japanese, hoping that I got the phrase right. When I looked up “intercourse” in the dictionary, I found
sekkusu
, a word imported from the English. I understand why
sekkuhara
or “sexual harassment” had to be brought over from English, but
sekkusu
? What did they call sex before?
“Where's Miyoshi?” asks Sumio, picking at his infected nipple piercing.
“He couldn't be here today,” I say. “He has some important business to take care of.” I stare at Nakajima, wondering if he has any idea what his girlfriend is doing. He takes a plastic pick out of his pocket and begins fluffing out his Afro-perm. His hair, bleached a coppery shade of orange, looks like a dandelion gone to seed.
“We scared him off,” he jeers.
“You are not scary,” I say. “But you are dangerous.”
“Dangerous-o!” the boys repeat after me. This is the one English word they all know, their equivalent of the girls' favorite word: “cute-o.”
“Sumio,” I say. “On a scale from one to ten, if one is very safe, and ten is very dangerous, how risky is French kissing?” I approximate this in Japanese.
“Dangerous-o,” he says. “Ten!”
“Come on,” I say. “Kissing is not that dangerous. You could catch
a cold, or maybe herpes, but it's a lot less risky than other sexual acts.”
“Dangerous-o,” he says again. “After you kiss a girl, she sticks to you like rice.”
All of the boys crack up, Nakajima the hardest of all.
“Let's skip to number eight,” I say, standing beside him. His skin looks even darker than usual, tanned from daily sumo practice. “Unprotected vaginal intercourse,” I say. “What does that mean, Nakajima?”
“Penis
without
condom comes
inside
vagina,” he reads in a monotone.
“Do you know what a penis is, Nakajima?”
“Yes,” he says, spreading his legs ever so slowly, making the boys laugh again.
I lean forward, careful not to touch him as I reach into his desk. The banana is still in the bento box, more black than yellow now. From my pocket I pull out a condom that I bought from the vending machine behind the grocery store this morning, while every passing car slowed down to watch. “Please put this on your banana,” I say. He crosses his arms and glowers. “Maybe you can't,” I push him. “Maybe you don't know how. Let me show you.”
I rip open the wrapper, pull out the condom, which is slimy with lube, and try to shove it in his hand. He resists, but I am stronger, forcing his fingers around the condom and the condom over the banana, squeezing so hard that the banana spurts out of its jacket, splattering white goo all over our fingers, my shirt, his Afro-perm. It's such a stupid moment, the punch line to such a dumb joke, but the boys have laughed at dumber ones, and I'm surprised when they remain silent. Then I realize that they're looking behind us, where a square of sunlight is spreading across the floor. The classroom door is open, and people are standing there.
“Miss Marina,” an oddly uninflected male voice says. “We. Have. Visitors. Today. From. America.”
I turn around to see the Japanese mayorâMiyoshi-sensei's dadâstanding beside a petite blond woman with a baby strapped to her chest, facing out. The baby has her mom's sharply bowed lips, round face, and blue eyes, but her skin is nut brown and her hair is a wild tangle of coppery curls. Standing next to them is a trim, light-skinned African-American man with a bald, shiny head. He blots his face with a handkerchief as he enters the classroom, followed by a scrawny boy of eleven or twelve wearing pants so baggy that it seems like he could walk right out of them.
“What's going on here?” the man asks, looking at the posters with a frown.
“Nothing,” I say. “We were just in the middle of an English lesson.”
“What. Are. You. Teaching.” Mayor Miyoshi says. His voice box doesn't allow for subtleties of tone, but his expression is appalled. The school principal, by contrast, is smiling hysterically.
“Prepositions?” I say.
“You've got a funny way of teaching English,” the American mayor says.
“We're trying to make it useful,” I say. “Useful and fun.” I hope the principal catches these words.
“I think they used these same posters in my sex-ed class,” says the woman.
“Sex. Ed.” the Japanese mayor repeats. “You. Teach. Sex. Ed.”
“I think Hiro got these posters in California,” I explain nervously. “He said that he pulled them out of a trash can at a school in Eureka.”
“That sounds like Hiro,” she says. “He was always collecting weird souvenirs from the trash, asking me what it all âsignified.' What did he used to call them?”
“Curiosity objects?” I guess.
“That's right!” she says. As she laughs again, the baby laughs too, kicking her feet against her mother's belly. “I'm Kathy,” she introduces herself, “and that's my husband, Benedict, and Ben Junior, and this little person attached to me is Phoebe.” I introduce myself and she asks where Hiro is. “I can't wait to see him,” she says.
“He had to run an errand today,” I say.
“That's too bad,” she says. “Can you believe it's been fifteen years? I wonder if he'll even recognize me without my big bangs.” She laughs again, glancing at her husband, who is stroking the narrow band of hair encircling his upper lip and chin as he scrutinizes the boys. No, not the boys. Nakajima. I watch him take it all in: the giant Afro-perm, the synthetically darkened skin, the gangsta medallion and the notebook scrawled with the words
BLACK FACE
over a drawing of a clenched brown fist.
“I think I've seen enough here,” he says.
Â
When Miyoshi-sensei arrives at my house, he is wearing a small pink gingham backpack and I smile before remembering why he's here, whose backpack he must be carrying. It takes five minutes for Ritsuko to cover the distance from the car to the door. She is walking like a very old person, but she looks terribly young in her gym suit and pigtails. She bows and says, “
Ojamashimasu
.” The formal greeting upon entering someone else's house translates literally: “I'm in your way.” Miyoshi-sensei crouches to untie her sneakers, easing them off her feet, then stashing them in the shoe rack next to his own.
“How are you?” I say.
“I'm fine, thank you,” she says.
But she doesn't look fine, and I'm scared by the thought of the long night ahead, the two of us alone. I know so few words of com
fort in Japanese. Or in English, for that matter. She winces as she sits on the couch.
“Do you want another blanket?” I ask. “Some tea? A magazine?”
“I'm fine, thank you,” she insists, tucking her legs beneath her.
Miyoshi-sensei beckons me into the kitchen. “I brought sushi,” he says, holding up a plastic bag. “So you won't have to cook. Also, for us, sushi is a kind of comfort food.” He begins to divide the sushi between two plates.
“Won't you stay and eat with us?” I ask, not wanting him to leave.
“I can't,” he says. “I must dine with my father and the visiting mayor.” I note that he doesn't mention Kathy. “How was class today?”
“Well⦔ I hesitate, “the mayor and his family stopped by for a surprise visit.”
“I know,” he says, squeezing soy sauce into a saucer.
“You do?” I ask, assuming that his father must have told him what happened, and relieved that he's not more upset.
“I arranged for this visit. I knew the boys wouldn't be rude in front of them.”
“Thanks,” I say. “I wish you'd told me.” Warned me, I mean.
“Sorry,” he says. “I had many things on my mind.”
“Kathy was sad to miss you.”
“Mmm,” he nods.
“She said she's changed a lot. What was she like before?”
“Kind of
itazurako
,” he says. “Like a bad girl. Wild and rebelling. I felt surprised to learn she married a town mayor.” He hands me the soy sauce and leads the way into the living room, carrying the sushi. Then he kneels beside Ritsuko, telling her that she should really try to eat something. She sits up and reaches for a piece of tuna sushi, chewing slowly as if even her teeth hurt.
“Can I have cup of water?” she says in a small voice. “Is that okay?”
“Of course,” I say quickly. “You can have anything you want.”
“No,” she says. “I mean, is âcan I have cup of water' okay English?”
“You don't have to speak English,” I say. “Just relax. Speak Japanese.” For the first time since she got here, her eyes fill with tears. Miyoshi-sensei presents her with his handkerchief, its corner monogrammed with the characters for his name. I wonder who made it for him. His mom? “You should say, â
May I
have a glass of water,'” he tells her.
“May
I have a glass of water,” she repeats.
“Good,” he says. “That's correct. Very good pronunciation,
ne
?”
And this is how he comforts her. He is her teacher, and she is his responsibility, and he takes care of her simply by sitting next to herâbeside her, with herâwhile I slip into the kitchen to get that glass of water she asked for correctly. Only there are no glasses in the cupboard, and none in the sink either. I remember seeing more Mickey Mouse beer steins in the box in storage. But while the box is still there, it's now filled with uniforms. I call out to Miyoshi-sensei, who joins me in the storage area, and I open one box after another to show him my find. He takes it all in, then pushes aside two boxes and presses his face to a rusted out patch in the aluminum siding.
“He can see you coming and going,” he says. “He knows when you're home and when you're gone, so he can enter without detection⦔
“Nakajima?” I ask, shuddering.
“No,” he says, shifting the box to block the hole. “Haruki.”
“Is he still upset because we got him in trouble about the cat?”
“What cat?” Miyoshi-sensei says.
“The one he trapped in the broken refrigerator.”
“Your refrigerator was never broken,” he says. “That is why Haruki got in trouble. For doing this same thing many times. Entering your house. Sometimes unplugging your refrigerator. He wanted to sabotage you.”
“But why did he take the technical boys' uniforms?” I ask.
“Maybe you guessed correctly that those boys bullied Haruki. Maybe he felt relief when they stopped coming to school. Maybe, when they returned every afternoon for your special English class, he blamed you. He hoped that without uniform, they couldn't come to school anymore. Or you would feel frighten and refuse to teach them. Then they would go away, and he could be a stone again.”