Zen Attitude (6 page)

“I bought while in a big hurry. When I examined the
tansu
at the apartment, I found a problem with the metalwork. The original lock plates had been replaced with older ones.”

“What do you mean?” Nana Mihori sounded more perplexed than angry.

“The chest was built during the Meiji era, not the Edo period. It’s old, but worth considerably less than what I paid for it. I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I feel I cannot present it.” I bowed my head, not wanting to see her reaction.

At last her voice came. “What will you do with it?”

“I shall return it.” Etiquette kept me from telling her that it probably wouldn’t work out.

“I see,” Nana said after another silence. “Certainly I am disappointed, but I defer to you. After all, I am no antiques expert. Just an enthusiast.”

“I’m sorry I let you down. I would really like to keep looking for a piece for you. I wouldn’t expect you to take the one I’ve bought.”

“I think we should just let the matter rest for now.” Nana turned a smooth face to me, the one I’d seen her use on guests she was meeting for the first time. It was chilling.

“Let what rest?” a rough, low-pitched voice asked.

Akemi Mihori had crept up behind us. She had swapped her
judo-gi
for a black Spandex sports bra and shorts that revealed bulging muscles in her legs and arms.

“Akemi!” Nana Mihori seemed flustered. “I was just showing your room.”

“So you’re the antiques buyer! Hey, aren’t you American?” Akemi said in English, grabbing my hand in a handshake like iron. I was relieved when it ended. She used the same hand to vigorously wipe her damp brow, raining a few drops of sweat on me.

“Yes. My name is Rei Shimura,” I answered, trying to pretend her body fluids hadn’t hit me.

“Shimura-san says there’s some problem with the
tansu
,” Nana Mihori said. I was no longer on a first-name basis with her.

“Really?” Akemi was persisting in English, although Nana and I were speaking Japanese. “Miss Shimura, do you run?”

“No. I’m not very athletic.” I had no idea where she was leading.

“You’re a swimmer, right? Given that you smell like the sea.” Akemi laughed heartily. “Come on, I thought all Americans were sports fanatics!”

“Sorry to disappoint. I’ve disappointed your family in a lot of ways.”

“Don’t worry,” Nana said in her newly cold voice, and Akemi’s gaze bounced from me to her mother as if she’d finally caught on to the tension.

“I must be going. It’s getting late,” I said.

Despite the discomfort of our situation, I expected Nana would offer me another glass of tea. She also might have asked about my expenses from two weeks of travel. Instead, she made a vague excuse about needing to return some telephone calls and sailed off in the direction of her office. I knew she was furious.

“Just a moment, Miss Shimura. I want to show you my jogging trail on the way out. How can you walk in those?” Akemi snorted at the sight of me struggling back into my tight pumps.

“You wear a
judo-gi
to work out, don’t you? These are part of my work uniform.”

“I’d think your fine shoes would get dirty, searching all over the country for antiques! That is, if you do it with any kind of spirit—”

“Obviously I have no spirit!” I wished she would retreat to her gym, but she stuck her short, wide feet into Asics running shoes and followed me outside. When we were a few feet from the house, Akemi slapped me on the shoulder.

“Catering to ladies like my mother must be hell.”

“I don’t understand.” I’d never heard anyone in Japan speak so disrespectfully about a parent.

“Don’t believe that I wanted that stupid
tansu.
To tell the truth, your failure will delay my dreaded bedroom makeover.” Akemi strode down a dirt path leading away from the house and into the woods. I hurried to catch up and started to say something more about what had happened between her mother and me, but she held up a hand like a
STOP
sign.

“Let’s not talk about antiques! I’m sick of them. Tell me, what do you think of this trail? Do you have them in your country?”

Disoriented, I struggled for words. “Americans are more likely to run on smooth-surfaced jogging tracks or the street. This is different.”

“Better, hmmm?”

“Well, it’s certainly more natural. I bet the local people love it.”

“What do you mean, the local people?” There was an odd expression on Akemi’s face.

“Well, surely they enjoy running and walking here.”

Akemi sucked in her breath. “No one runs on my trail! It was cleared for me so I could run without any bother.”

I thought briefly about how the president of the United States had had a jogging track built at the White House that his staff members were free to use. I didn’t bring it up, but asked about her trail’s length instead.

“It’s just two kilometers. I kept it to that length, curving through the woods so it completely avoids the temple buildings.”

A little demon in me made me say, “I’d want to run by the temple to see what was going on and hear the monks playing their drums—”

“That’s because you’re a foreigner and like Japan! I’d rather listen to Simply Red on my Sony Walkman. You should run with me sometime. I’d jog slowly for you,” she added as an afterthought.

“You couldn’t possibly go slowly enough!”

“Your legs are longer than mine. Lucky. What sports did you play in high school?” Akemi was studying me in a way that made me blush.

“Like I said, I’m rotten at sports. I swim a little, but that’s with my head out of water. I can’t stand not breathing.”

“Running is very good for your aerobic capacity. I can tell you have a problem with endurance, from the way you were gasping when you caught up to me just now. You need to start slowly. Run until you can’t stand it, then walk, and start running when you get your breath back. It’s simple.”

It was a beautiful and peaceful place, this secret trail in Kamakura. No one would see me if I stopped, gasping for air. No one except Akemi Mihori, a former national judo champion.

“It’s hard for me to meet people.” Akemi stubbed her shoe against the trail. “Japanese women my age have all sold themselves to the highest bidders and are staying home with their babies. The only people I have around are guys like my trainer, the one you saw me working out with this afternoon.”

I thought she must be pretty lonely to have opened herself like that to me. Feeling tentative, I asked if she had plans for Saturday night.

“Nothing. Why?” She sounded startled.

“I’m having a party. I sent your mother an invitation, but I doubt she’s coming now. You should come—it might be interesting for you.” I was going to say,
You might meet someone
, but decided that would be overbearing.

“I’m not much good at parties.”

“It won’t be your typical Japanese party; there will be tons of foreigners. Have you ever been to a party with foreigners?” Hugh would be charming to her, although she would probably consider him a “high bidder” of the most repulsive sort. At least there would be others.

“But I’m vegetarian! I cannot eat your Western diet.”

“I’m vegetarian, too. We have something in common!” Strangely, I was delighted by this.

She gave me a half smile. “Okay, I might attend. As long as you come back later this week to try running with me.”

“If your mother sees me—”

“She and Tanaka-san are going into Tokyo to buy supplies for the tea convention. Neither of them will know you were here.”

What was I doing, making steps toward a friendship that I really didn’t have time for? Given my business troubles, I should be doing nothing but work. I also doubted I’d be in shape to run more than half a lap. But Akemi’s eyes were pleading. I nodded and submitted my hand to another crushing handshake.

Back at Roppongi Hills, I found Hugh asleep on the sofa with pages of
The Asian Wall Street Journal
strewn over him.

“Where’ve you been? I canceled my evening meeting to be here with you,” he murmured when I gently pulled off the newspaper.

“I can’t unload the
tansu
.” I stared at the bridal chest, still smack in the center in the living room. “Can we at least get it out of here? I don’t want to look at it.”

“Let’s move it into the study, then. Maybe my brother can use it for his gear.” Hugh stood up and stretched.

“Angus!” I had almost forgotten about the impending visitor.

“He’ll be at the airport early tomorrow afternoon. Is that still okay? I assumed your
tansu
problems would be over and you’d be able to fetch him,” Hugh said as we began moving each section of drawers into the study, a room already crowded with a fax machine, two computers, and the guest futon.

“My problems are far from over.” After we restacked the furniture in a place near the window, I sank down on the futon and told him everything: Hita Fine Arts’ refusal to take responsibility for the
tansu
, Mr. Sakai’s disappearance, and Nana Mihori’s humiliating rejection.

“So you ran around all day and showed no gain for it,” Hugh said, rubbing the spot between my shoulders that had tensed with worry. “Sounds like my day. Sometimes I wonder why I’m still working in Japan.”

“Well, you probably earned lots of money today. All I made was a new friend. Akemi Mihori.”

“The sportswoman?”

“Yes, the one who was in the Seoul Olympics. I think she’s lonely, because she invited me to go running with her the day after tomorrow, and she might come to our cocktail party.”

“Running? As in moving one’s feet quickly?” Hugh paused. “Darling, you can’t go from complete inactivity to marathons! If you want to take exercise, try my rowing machine.”

“I don’t believe in indoor workouts,” I said, feeling vaguely insulted. “In fact, I’m going to run around the park tomorrow to practice.”

“Tomorrow’s forecast is up in the nineties. It’s not the day to start running, especially for someone who isn’t the world’s greatest athlete.”

“I’m doing it anyway. I have to.”

Hugh kissed me. “Think about it tomorrow morning. In the meantime, you need a relaxing bath followed by a massage. Let me show you what I learned in Thailand.”

The massage led into something even better. I relaxed beautifully, but we overslept the next morning and had just twenty minutes for a rushed cup of tea before Hugh drove off to work. I was still determined to run. Not having proper workout clothing, I slipped on one of Hugh’s Marks and Spencer undershirts, a pair of shorts, and the stained sneakers I usually wore for furniture-refinishing jobs. I took the subway to Yoyogi Park, a huge, manicured expanse of green with smooth cement paths. After some cursory stretches remembered from a long-ago gym class, I set off, pacing myself against an old man. Within a few minutes, my heart felt as if it might explode. I slowed to a walk, as Akemi had recommended, and my breath came back. I started jogging again, the old man now being a quarter mile ahead.

I’d heard that running could clear your mind, put you in a blissful trance. It didn’t happen for me. All I could do was mourn the fact that I hadn’t done anything with my body in the last six months outside of sex, which obviously didn’t work enough muscle groups to count. The other park exercisers were overtaking me, even a group of mothers walking with their toddlers. I would have died of embarrassment had I not already been dead from the heat.

In the end, I had no idea of my mileage but suspected it was low. I’d run about seven minutes and walked twenty. I repaired to a soft-drink machine, from which I bought a frigid can of Aquarius, an “ionization beverage” supposedly designed for athletes. I didn’t know how I would survive a workout with Akemi.

After dragging my tired bones home, I showered and set about organizing the rest of my day. Because a big chunk would be taken up traveling to and from Narita Airport, I had only a couple of hours to locate Mr. Sakai’s moving company. The English-language telephone directory didn’t cover Hita, so I had to call Information. I was talking with an unhelpful operator when my call waiting beeped. I said good-bye and switched over to the new call.

“It’s Jun from Hita Toyota.” There was a lot of static; he was probably on his car phone.

“Elvis!” I said without thinking. “How are you?”

“I’ve found someone very important. Your buyer.”

“For the
tansu
?” I was confused.

“Yes, I’ve found the car buyer you were looking for. We’re on the east side of Tokyo. Can you meet us?”

Someone was in the car with him. That was the only explanation for him replacing the word
tansu
with
car.
“Do I know this person?”

“Yes, you do. He’s here for a limited time.” Jun’s voice was heavy with meaning.

“Sakai?” I breathed sharply. “Jun-san, how did you get him into your car?”

“Not now. I’ll explain when you get here. I don’t know Tokyo well. I’ve been driving around in circles—”

I thought it over. “You said you were on the east side? Go to Ueno Park. There will be signs for it everywhere. I can meet you in half an hour there by the main entrance.”

“Got it. We’ll probably be parked illegally, so come as fast as you can.”

While Yoyogi was a modern, sunny place to run, Ueno was shady and historic and had considerable urban flavor. In fact, the steps leading to the park’s south entrance had in recent years become a hangout for men from the Middle East in search of “3K” jobs:
kitsui, kitanai
, and
kiken
, meaning hard, dirty, and dangerous jobs no one else wanted. Japanese police had begun throwing these foreigners out of the country, ostensibly for overstaying their visas but really because of a public outcry over foreigner-related crime. Ueno Park was no longer a safe place for black-market laborers to congregate, so I was startled to be approached by a man with dark curly hair.

“Need a telephone card? I’m selling ten cards for two thousand yen! Fully charged, perfect for telephoning overseas.”

I paused, remembering my perpetual troubles mustering up change for the pay telephone. Legitimate telephone cards cost one thousand yen each—more than eight dollars for maybe thirty minutes of local phone calls. Black-market phone cards were a better deal, but if I were caught using one, I could be imprisoned or sent back to San Francisco. I shook my head and went into the park, intent on finding Jun.