Authors: Sujata Massey
As I scrambled up the path made of river stones, the water level dropped and my spirits rose. One kilometer to go. I scanned the few other old, great prewar villas on each side of the path. Heavy brown wooden shutters covered all their windows, and the luxury cars I remembered seeing in most of the carports were all shrouded in protective covers. I had made a fool of myself on the train and at Kita-Kamakura Station, but there was no chance that anyone in this area would notice me.
The long bamboo fence surrounding Takeo’s house finally came into view. I could see rain cascading off its tiled roof, creating a small flood right outside the front doors. Some of the tiles were gone, smashed to bits on the ground amid dozens of knocked-over potted plants.
I unlatched the gate and hurried around to the back of the house. As I’d feared, there were plenty more smashed pots, and the potted hydrangea that was supposed to be on the veranda was nowhere in sight. It could have been blown away—or, I realized, it might have outgrown its pot and been planted somewhere. Takeo would have found another place for his spare key, or changed his habits and decided against leaving it outside.
The house key was nowhere on the veranda, but it could easily have been lost in the grass. I bent my head toward the grass and realized the impossibility of the situation. I really did not want to break and enter.
Was there an alarm system? There hadn’t been in the old days, but given the value of what was in the house since Takeo’s renovation, an alarm would seem like a smart thing to have. I pressed my face against the glass of the sliding windows that led to the living room. The paper
shoji
screens that normally would have shielded the room from the outside were not closed, so I could see into the darkened room, though not very well. It didn’t look as if there were motion sensors.
Suddenly, I caught a blur of movement close to my face. To my shock, the sliding door was opening. As I tripped off the veranda in my haste to get away, the door was opened and a flashlight shone straight in my face.
Instinctively, I shut my eyes against the light. I knew I looked as gruesome and bedraggled as a mythical sea monster that had been thrown up out of the raging bay beyond the cliffs. And like a monster, I wanted to roar out my anguish at the trip I’d taken, only to be caught as a failure. But instead, all that came from me was a hoarse whimper.
The flashlight beam dropped, and I blinked my eyes to look at Takeo.
“Rei?” His voice was incredulous.
“Yes.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Then Takeo said something I never expected to hear. “Come in.”
Fifteen minutes later, I was in water again. But this time it was hot, surrounding me and still cascading out of a faucet. Takeo had sent me to his bathroom and had lit the candles, turned on the taps, thrown a towel and a robe at me, and left. I’d showered quickly, scrubbing off the dirt that had splashed over me outside, and entered the deep, hot bath. As I gazed at the candles on the bath’s edge, illuminating the room like the Kannon’s temple, I could admit to myself how foolhardy my journey had been. But I’d reached the end, I’d faced Takeo, and he’d let me inside.
I’d hoped to be alone, but if I played things carefully, I could still complete my mission. I was probably within a few rooms’ distance of the vessel. Of course, the rooms all looked so different now, full of furniture and new things. Just like this bathroom, which had been redone with tiny tiles of amber, gold, and cream-colored glass that winked in the soft candlelight. There was a new sink that looked like a
raku
pottery bowl perched on a slate ledge. The bath’s Grohe faucet was bronze and very modern, designed so that water tumbled out in a wide, flat sheet.
The sensual comfort of my bath made me feel guilty. The typhoon hadn’t reached its apogee. The bathtub should be used as a collecting device for cold water, not for soaking myself.
After I’d toweled off and wrapped myself in the quilted winter
yukata
robe that Takeo had given me, I went out, following the banging noises to find Takeo outside on the thin ledge of veranda that ran around the house, pulling closed heavy wooden shutters. He waved at me, looking oddly happy, although he was now the bedraggled one, with wet clothes and leaves stuck in his hair.
“I’m almost done,” he shouted, so I could hear him through the glass. “Just a few more rooms and all the shutters will be closed.”
He came in a few minutes later, and I helped him get off his wet raincoat and boots in the flagstone entryway.
“You look like you need to warm up. I left the bath full,” I said. It was Japanese custom to enter a bath clean, as I’d done, and reuse the same bathwater for the whole family. And if Takeo relaxed in a bath, I’d have the perfect opportunity for a quick look around the house.
“Okay, I’ll go in. It could be the last hot bath for a while, if the town shuts off the gas supply,” Takeo said, running a hand through his wet hair.
“I’d like to clean it out afterward and fill it with clean water,” I said. “You’ll want to have water stored, just in case.”
“You’re right. There was flooding here back in the seventies, when I was a child,” Takeo said. “The house wasn’t damaged, but we were without water and electricity for days. It was exciting for me then, but not so exciting for my father. I seem to remember we had houseguests who wound up stranded with us for a week.”
“I don’t want to do that to you,” I said quickly. “But things are pretty bad outside—”
“You must stay overnight,” Takeo said shortly. “You said the trains have stopped.”
“Well, I’ll do what I can to help you. I’m going to go through the rooms to make sure no delicate ceramics are near the windows, and so on. Would that be all right?”
Takeo smiled. “Thank you. You always remember the things I forget about.”
“I hope Emi won’t misinterpret my being here. Did she drive down with you?” My question was automatic, out of courtesy. I was certain that Emi wasn’t around.
“No. She’s back in Setagaya at her parents’ house.”
“Did she go there to stay during the storm?” I remembered how Norie had wanted me nearby.
“No, she’s always there. It’s her home until after the wedding, of course.”
“Oh, of course.” I was relieved to know she wouldn’t be stumbling upon me in Takeo’s robe. “But that’s rough on the two of you, I suppose, all that parental control.”
“We find our moments, here and there.” Takeo winked at me and then went off to the bathroom.
After he left, I pondered what he’d said. This wasn’t the way an arranged marriage was supposed to operate. But I’d caught a strong sexual current flowing between Emi and Takeo. It was a relief, really; I wouldn’t have to worry about any unwelcome advances from him, though I hadn’t understood why Takeo had winked at me. Was it because he now saw me as a buddy, an old friend with whom he’d share gossip about his girlfriend?
I reminded myself of what I really needed to be thinking about, and I got to work in the living room, going first to the sliding-door cabinet along an interior wall. I’d always admired this particular cabinet, which was covered in hand-painted paper that showed two girls, one in kimono and the other in a modish 1920s dress, sitting on a cliff overlooking water—a view similar to that of the east side of Takeo’s garden. I thought, looking at it more carefully, it had to be the house’s garden.
As I continued my flashlight tour of the various reception rooms, I found plenty of vases, small and large, but no ibex vessel. I was fortunate that I’d have the night hours to keep looking. If the vessel really were in the house, I’d definitely find it.
By the time I was done putting away the breakable items I’d mentioned to Takeo, the wind was at a nightmare pitch outside and there were frequent, ominous bangs against the closed shutters. Out of curiosity, I opened the front door a crack and felt myself stagger backward from the force of the sea wind.
There really was no chance of getting out tonight. After latching the door, I ventured into the kitchen to see what kind of provisions Takeo had. He’d expected to be staying in his house alone, so I doubted he’d have stocked enough for two people to get through more than a day. I also knew he wasn’t the kind who believed in canned and packaged foods. Not that he was someone who cooked from scratch; Takeo liked to order restaurant food at the last minute, but I doubted that the local pizza and ramen shops would be making deliveries.
I found uncooked rice and a few other basics in the cupboard, but the best prospect was the contents of a shopping bag from Matsuya’s basement food arcade that I found sitting on the kitchen table.
It was better than I’d expected, and perfect for a vegetarian like myself: marinated tofu, pickled vegetables, roasted yams, spinach croquettes, and a petite apple tart. I put a saucepan of water on the stove to boil for the rice I’d make. Now there would be plenty for dinner and perhaps breakfast the next day.
I checked the refrigerator and found cans of energy drink and soy sauce, but nothing more. No bottled water. This was a new worry, so I went back to the crowded kitchen cabinet and took out the largest container, an old
miso
jar, and began filling it at the kitchen sink.
“I thought you were putting away the ceramics, not taking them out,” Takeo said when he joined me a minute later.
“I didn’t see any bottled water in your fridge, so I thought I should take a few preparations. And this was the largest container I could find.”
“And one of the nicest,” Takeo said. “You chose a two-hundred-year-old Kyushu piece.”
“I didn’t mean to use your oldest piece, but I didn’t see anything more suitable. Sorry!”
“Oh, it’s not the oldest ceramic in the house, but it has a great deal of sentimental value. It’s been in our family a few generations, you know—”
“Do you want me to put it away?”
He shook his head. “Of course not. If it has held
miso
without accident for a couple of hundred years, it can hold water for a night or two. The fact is, I only have a half-case of bottled water in my car, which we’d better leave for emergencies. And I’ll open sake tonight. Or would you prefer wine?” Takeo pried open the storage compartment that was built into the center of the kitchen floor. Where most Japanese would have stored root vegetables, he had squeezed in a wine rack and a wooden sake box.
“I—it doesn’t really matter. I’ll just have a glass of—whatever. Did you refill the bathtub with clean water?”
“Yes, indeed. And what do you mean, it doesn’t matter? It’s not like you to defer to anyone else about taste.” Takeo’s voice was teasing. Clearly, the bath had relaxed him.
“I’d say the same was true for you, too, except for your diplomatic reaction to the handbag painting.” I smiled at him.
“The handbag painting—damn!” Takeo said. “After all of Emi’s reminders, I still forgot to bring it. I was just thinking about the shutters.”
“I hope Emi’s not too upset.” I didn’t meet his eyes, but went instead to the stove, where I saw that the flame under the rice had gone out. “Hey, I can’t get the burner back on.”
Takeo went to the Tokyo Gas heater next to the kitchen counter and fiddled for a minute. “Well, I can tell you why. The gas has been turned off at the source.”
“What does that mean?” Suddenly my thoughts were back to the storm outside. “Let’s put the radio on.”
There was no working radio in the house, so Takeo put a raincoat over himself and ran out to his car to listen to its radio. He came back ten minutes later with a report that the storm was at its peak, no great surprise to either of us.
“I wish there were better information than that,” I fretted while Takeo shook off his wet coat for the second time in half an hour and laid it down in the entryway to dry.
“Well, if something really awful happens, we’ll hear about it on the town loudspeaker. They broadcast from the police department, don’t you remember?”
Any announcements of disaster would come after the fact, I thought grimly as I began arranging the takeout food on a blue-and-white Imari platter. The Kayama villa, perched on a hill, would be a terrible place to be stranded or involved in a mudslide.
But I couldn’t brood fatalistically, not when I’d been given such a succession of good luck: the miraculous passage to Hayama, un-forced entry to Takeo’s house, and food to sustain me. I was safe inside, and that was what counted.
Five minutes later, I had fixed the dinner tray and followed the sound of tinny, nostalgic music coming from the sitting room. Takeo had lit the room with hurricane lamps and candles. I set the food down on a low, lacquered art deco table and looked over at Takeo, who was hunched over a vintage windup gramophone I’d never seen opened before. Nearby there was a stack of old records, some of them just in paper sleeves and others in the original cardboard cases, their illustrations so faded that I could barely make them out.
“These are my grandfather’s
enka
records,” Takeo said, as if in answer to my inquiring glance.
I nodded, because I could have guessed as much.
Enka
was a kind of people’s music, a songwriting tradition that combined current events with human feelings and flourished in Japan from the late nineteenth century into the early twentieth. I’d written a paper in college about the illustration of songbook covers, but I’d never actually heard a recorded
enka
song from this period. Listening to a wavering male voice barely audible against the wind outside, all the while standing in an almost dark house from the period, made me shiver.
I saw also that Takeo had filled a hibachi, a Japanese wooden table with a built-in brazier, with coal and lit it. A little screen sat above the glowing embers, and on it he’d placed a bowl of water, and within that, a flask of sake. I suggested that we finish cooking the rice on it. After I took the rice off to rest and finish its last ten minutes of steam-cooking, Takeo put the sake back on. It was time to eat.
The minute I’d sat down across from him and started to serve the food, a wrenching sound came from above.
“It sounds as if the roof’s coming off!” I looked up in alarm.
“It’s probably just some tiles. I remember, when I was having the roof replaced, you weren’t pleased with the adhesive. Now I regret not following your advice,” Takeo said.
“Well, I didn’t push you very hard on it. You had a valid point about its toxicity, and whether it might get into the water supply.” I couldn’t put a finger on why Takeo was so mellow and gentle all of a sudden. I knew I should be grateful, but it made me a bit uneasy.
“Speaking of toxins, this is for you.” Takeo handed me a brimming, gold-edged sake cup. “To what shall we toast?”
“How about to—just being here?” I offered. This was the way I felt. I’d thought getting into the villa was going to be impossible, and now I was in, having a cozy evening with an old friend. But now, of course, I found myself with a new problem. When I located the ibex vessel—as I was almost certain I’d do, tonight—what would happen to Takeo? I’d been angry at him the last two days, but now that our friendship had been restored, what I was going to do could turn out very badly for him.
“To being here. Together,” Takeo added as an afterthought.
I joined him in clinking glasses. The sake burned my throat after the first sip, so I put down the glass. And while the carryout food was delicious, I found myself unable to eat more than a few bites.
“You’ve hardly eaten. Is there something wrong with the food?” Takeo said after a while.
“Not at all. I was just thinking I’d better—save it. I know there’s not much for tomorrow, and what if—”
“What if we’re here for days?” Takeo laughed. “There is a bag of rice in a kitchen cabinet, and we won’t even have to go down to the beach to fish. The fish will be thrown up here—I remember that from the storm when I was a boy.”
“And there’s
daikon
growing in your garden, right? We’ll be fine.” Fine—except that the idea of playing house with a suspected international art thief made me feel queasy. Takeo’s glass of sake was already empty, so I did what Japanese etiquette called for and filled it for him. Promptly, he refilled mine even though it was still two-thirds full.
“I saw a picture of this room in a magazine,” I said. “It looks so different tonight, and I don’t think it’s just the lighting. Did you put a lot of the valuables away—I mean, things that were arranged in the room for the shoot?”
“I don’t think we define valuable in the same way,” Takeo said, instead of answering me directly. “To me, the first camellia I planted and raised as a boy is more valuable than any painting. Hey, why aren’t you drinking?”
“I don’t want to get a headache.” It was interesting, but while I was away from Hugh, I was drinking about a quarter as much.
“I’m sure you won’t,” Takeo said. “Unless it’s from that screaming wind outside. Shall I put on a new record?”
“All right,” I said reluctantly. Maybe I’d gone too far with my questions.
This time, the recorded voice was that of a woman. As her sweet, high-pitched voice crackled from the old machine, I heard snatches of phrases about school, a school uniform, a lover. At the end of the song, the needle ran on, bumping again and again at the record’s edge. Takeo seemed lost in thought and didn’t move, so I got up and put the needle back on its rest.
“What did you think of the lyrics?” he asked when I returned to the table and sat down on the
zabuton
cushion.
“I caught something about a lover and pine needles and a school uniform, but that’s about it,” I confessed.
“The song is called ‘Voice of the Pine.’ It’s the story of a young student who, after she lives away from her family for the first time, becomes corrupted.”
Too close to home for me. I asked, “What about the rest of the lyrics?”
“She sings that she’s forgotten all her teacher’s lessons because of her nighttime lover. She wears a schoolgirl uniform wrapped around her shameless heart by day, but by night, she changes into fancy clothes, and wonders to whom she’ll show those colors.” Takeo paused. “It’s a very sad ending, maybe not right for tonight.”
“It sounds like a Japanese Lolita story,” I mused aloud. “You’ve got to tell me the ending!”
“After her family and lover desert her, she knows there is nothing left to live for, so she drowns herself in the Sumida River.”
“People must have died along the coast today. Flash floods like those I saw, flying tiles—”
“You’re so pessimistic.” Takeo leaned over and took my left hand, which I’d been using to shred up the paper doily from under the croquettes.
“You must be careful not to corrupt yourself,” I said, finding myself unable to withdraw my hand from the caress. In a room this dark, with the wind howling outside, the feeling of Takeo’s touch was electrifying.
“And what about you?” he asked. “When you started your perilous journey to this house, did you telephone your own fiancé in Washington to tell him whom you were going to see?”
“He’s not my fiancé,” I said defensively, as thoughts began to whirl through my head. Takeo thought I’d come to Hayama to see him. “This evening is starting to feel strange. I apologize if I have confused you.”
“Wait a minute. Did you just say that you are not engaged?” Takeo’s voice sounded strange.
“I’m not. There’s no ring. Didn’t you see that?” I extracted my left hand, the one he’d been holding, and waved it at him.
Takeo’s expression, in the dim light, appeared almost dazed. “After missing you for three years, your hand wasn’t the first thing I looked at. It was more—the rest of you—the whole person—”
“I’m sure I look older,” I said drily.
“You look more sophisticated, actually. And the way you carry yourself—your body, it’s quite—muscular and more firm now, isn’t it?” Takeo finished his glass of sake and poured himself another, as if he’d forgotten all the rules about drinking.
“Emi is absolutely exquisite,” I protested, suddenly noticing that my
yukata
was gaping open on one side, exposing a bit more than my trapezius.
“I agree. And sometimes I feel quite ready to be married to her. Other times, not so ready.” He looked at me again. “What would happen if I kissed you?”
“I guess I’d have to knock you through the shutters out into the storm. Although of course, it’s your house, not mine, so that doesn’t seem entirely fair—”
“You are the one who’s not fair!” Takeo said, his voice rising with emotion. “I didn’t know that you decided not to marry. And look at what’s happened to my life, in the meantime.”
“You never loved me, and I remind you that you willingly entered into your
omiai
.” I couldn’t figure out whether Takeo was drunk or just a bit tipsy. I had barely had more than a few sips because I knew I needed to stay very sober for my night’s work—if I ever got around to it.
“Forget the
omiai
.” Takeo’s voice cracked, and then he kissed me.
Hugh.
I absorbed the kiss, and began to respond to it.
Forgive me
. It was odd; the more I tried to think about Hugh, the less clear his image was. He was like the faded illustration on the record jackets. Everything that I had feared, back at the Smithsonian conference table, had come to pass.
Was it really wrong to do this?
I wondered as the wind howled outside. Quickly, I’d moved from nervousness to something entirely different. We weren’t sitting at the table anymore, but were stretched out on the floor, the hallowed ground where nobody ever wore shoes and we’d made love. And if I stopped Takeo, what would become of the night, the vessel, the whole reason I was there?
This was good, I said to myself as Takeo discovered the navel ring, laughing softly before he moved lower. I dug my fingers into Takeo’s straight, thick hair and closed my eyes, giving in to my rising level of excitement. It was about time I relaxed, because ever since my arrival I’d been anxious about everything: the theft of my phone, my lack of progress in the mission, and the beautiful young girl who’d taken my place.
Well, now I was the one with Takeo, not Emi, and that in itself was arousing. Takeo, as corrupt as he might be about antiques and love, was also bizarrely safe—a man on the verge of marriage who would never come after me with messy, emotional demands.
So I did it: everything that he wanted, and then the things that I wanted, too, things I’d been afraid to ask Hugh, because they seemed too—foreign. Too Japanese. It was fate, I told myself, as Takeo sank into me so deeply that the tatami matting underneath me indented my skin. Then I didn’t notice the scratchy mat anymore, didn’t notice anything except the desire inside me gathering and intensifying, a typhoon that had come out of nowhere but seemed incapable of lessening.
Afterward, Takeo led me into the bedroom, where I was stunned to see the Chinese altar bed made up with fresh linens. It was only then, when he asked me to lie down again, that I really heard the sound of the wind outside the house, and I realized it sounded like someone crying.