Bridge of Scarlet Leaves (40 page)

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Authors: Kristina McMorris

BOOK: Bridge of Scarlet Leaves
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Unless Lane was too late.
An enemy soldier stepped out from the jungle and yelled in Japanese, “Private Asano! What did you discover?” Tucked below his patch of a mustache, the man’s scowl looked as tight as the grip attached to his rifle. Behind him, a younger guard kept watch over a cluster of POWs seated on the ground, shoulders hunched, barefooted and tattered.
Lane jerked his gaze back to the frowning guard; the slightest reaction to spotting TJ could blow his cover. “It’s a rebellion,” he announced in Japanese. “By the prisoners.”
The man’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. Obviously he was expecting a different messenger.
Lane pressed onward. “Commander Yamazaki has ordered me to supervise the inmates.” Thankfully, the captured corporal had shared the leader’s name. “Both of you have been ordered back to the camp to help subdue the uprising.”
The mustached guard moved closer. He wrinkled his nose as though preparing to sniff out a stranger’s identity. “I’ve never seen you before. What’s your unit?”
Lane squeezed his elbow to the side of his borrowed tunic. Bloodstains were understandable, but the bullet hole would raise questions. “I’m with a reinforcement troop from Luzon. We arrived late last night.”
Permeating with scrutiny, the man lowered his eyes—toward Lane’s boots.
Shit.
Lane should have forced his feet into the other pair. “The commander’s waiting,” he reminded the guard sternly. At the lack of response, he shouted, “Go now!”
The second guard, a lean, clean-cut guy, convinced the first to obey. Together, they jogged off down the road. Once they disappeared around the bend, Lane turned to the POWs, who stared up at him watchfully. His mind switched back to English before he spoke.
“Don’t be afraid,” he told them. “I’m with the U.S. Army.”
 
That voice. TJ knew that voice. He’d recognize it anywhere, but still he struggled to believe his ears. He rose to his worn feet, and from the rear of the group, he edged his steps forward. “Tomo ... is that you?”
Their eyes connected, confirming it was Lane. Yet how could it be?
TJ wondered if he was hallucinating, or maybe already dead, until Lane marched over and embraced him.
“Thank God,” Lane breathed. “You’re alive... .”
TJ managed to raise his arms. The fabric beneath his hands was real. His old friend before him was real.
“Hey, where we supposed to go?” another guy interjected. The anxious prisoners were all now standing.
Lane released his hold and motioned to the west. “Cut through the jungle this way. Go past the rice paddies. Stay off the road.” He instructed them on how to reach the rendezvous point by the beach. “I’ll give you a head start, just to be safe.”
The group took off in a run.
Lane started stripping off his costume, to avoid getting hit by his own guys.
“So,” TJ said, struggling to find the words. “You were in the neighborhood, I take it.”
Lane’s mouth quirked into a smile. “Something like that.”
TJ again tried to talk, hindered by a rise of emotion.
Appearing to understand, Lane replied with all he needed to say. “Let’s get the hell home.”
Home.
No word could have sounded better.
Lane flung off his Japanese field cap, and they turned to follow the others.
“Yamenasai!”
A shot burst through the air.
TJ’s hands flew up in surrender, an ingrained reflex. He told his legs to run, but they wouldn’t. Two years of cowering to that voice, of being terrorized by the man and his bamboo stick, had robbed TJ of his will.
He listened as Grumpy marched up from behind. TJ’s body braced to be struck down, executed at close range. Instead, once beside him, the guard aimed his rifle downward—at a form on the ground. It was Lane, grabbing his side, legs writhing; blood leaked over his hands. TJ yearned to reach for him, but his limbs remained immobile.
Grumpy spewed a scolding at Lane in Japanese, so harsh and fast TJ could understand only a few of the words that might normally register.
American. Lies. Dishonor.
The guard’s instincts must have prompted his return to investigate. Eddie strode over from the trees and confirmed that the POWs were missing. Grumpy belted out a roar and trained the barrel on Lane’s forehead. Before he could pull the trigger, a tide of strength instantly gathered and swept through TJ.
“No!” he screamed, and tackled the guard to the dirt. The rifle flew out of reach. They rolled over once, twice, grappling, punching. TJ got in a hearty slug to the guy’s temple, but the knock only heightened Grumpy’s rage. In a flash, he was cinching TJ’s neck. Fighting for air, TJ tried to shove him off. The world was graying, its lines blurring....
Then two quick shots blasted, and Grumpy collapsed beside him.
Coughing and inhaling, TJ looked up and found Eddie with a rifle ... . Eddie had killed him. He’d come through in the end.
TJ started to speak, just as the guy turned his aim onto Lane.
“Don’t!” TJ scrambled over. “Don’t do it.” He threw his arms up into a barricade. “He’s American. Just like you, Eddie.
Just like you.
”
“No ... no, he’s a traitor. Now get out of the way.”
TJ shook his head. “I can’t do that,” he told him. “He’s my family. You shoot him, you shoot us both.”
Eddie adjusted his grasp, holding firm. “I don’t want to kill you.”
“And you don’t have to. Not anymore.”
At that, the weapon shuddered. Eddie’s eyes swam with confusion.
“It’s over now. Don’t you see? It’s all over.” TJ let the words hang in the air.
Slowly, Eddie glanced down at his hands. He appeared startled by the revelation of what he was doing, of the stranger he was becoming. Then, to TJ’s surprise, he lowered the rifle. As it hit the ground, TJ hastened to face Lane. Immediately he put pressure on the wound. Blood was seeping through their layered fingers. Lane’s breaths were short and labored.
“Get some help,” TJ called to Eddie. “Get a medic!”
“Wait,” Lane rasped. “In my pocket.”
TJ reached in and retrieved a white cloth.
“For his arm,” Lane said. “It’ll tell ’em ... he’s American.”
Once TJ passed it over, Eddie stared at the wadded band, as though amazed something so simple could return his identity.
“Hurry,” TJ urged. The word spurred a fresh alertness in Eddie, who took off racing down the road.
TJ yanked off his T-shirt and pressed it against the wound, just below Lane’s ribs. “Rangers will be here soon. So you just hang on, all right?”
Lane nodded, despite his body’s trembling. Gradually, his eyelids began to droop.
“Stay awake, buddy. You gotta stay awake.”
Lane’s eyes opened, yet the weight of his lids seemed to be growing.
“Don’t you dare think about dying on me. You got it? You do that, and I swear I’ll kick your ass.”
A muted laugh puffed from Lane’s mouth, morphing into a gurgled cough.
Next to this, even TJ’s most horrific moments spent in this island hellhole withered in comparison.
Someone get here, please, God, please....
“
Tell her,” Lane breathed. “Tell Maddie I love her and ... that I’m sorry.”
At the message, the goddamned resignation, TJ pushed harder on his balled undershirt. Red was devouring the fabric. “Tell her yourself.”
Lane grasped TJ’s wrist. “Promise me.”
TJ tried to uphold a wall against his tears. He succeeded until he replied with a nod, and that wall came crashing down. Through the sheen, he saw Lane’s eyes close. They closed and wouldn’t open.
“Tomo, wake up. Please, don’t do this. Not now.”
But TJ could feel it. His friend’s spirit had broken free, released from the binding ties to his body. Already, Lane was drifting away on the ocean breeze.
Stunned and weakened, TJ let the shirt drop away. He wanted to scream, to curse high heaven.
His lungs managed only a whisper. “I’m so sorry.” Over and over he said this, wishing he and Lane could trade places. “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry... .” He held Lane’s head to his chest and shook as he wept.
When something touched his shoulder—the hand of an Army captain—he realized help had arrived. Yet it was too late.
TJ fought to hold on, even while soldiers went to cart Lane away. He was prepared to go to blows if needed, disregarding all rational thought. It was solely through the captain’s words that his arms yielded their grip. “You gotta let him go,” he told TJ. “You just gotta let him go.”
PART SEVEN
Empty-handed I entered the world
Barefoot I leave it.
My coming, my going
—
Two simple happenings
That got entangled.
 
—Zen teacher Kozan Ichikyo
66
A
ll day long, cars honked and neighbors cheered. Celebration crammed the sun-drenched streets of Boyle Heights. They were the same, no doubt, as every city in America.
Creak, creak ... creak, creak ...
Maddie swayed in her rocking chair, still wearing her nightdress. She waited to feel even a prickling of the joy wafting through her bedroom window. “Victory over Japan Day.” That’s what the radio broadcaster had called it during the official announcement that morning. The last of the Axis powers had finally surrendered. The war was over.
When Jo phoned with the news, Maddie had infused a smile into her voice, another projection of appropriate behavior. Nearly three seasons of allotted grieving had passed, after all. Since that morning of Western Union’s delivery, her feet had thawed and skin had warmed.
The numbness, however, remained. To this day, she scarcely remembered the walk she had taken through the February snow, mindless, barefoot in her bathrobe—among the few garments she hadn’t yet packed for their move. Ida had fetched her with a pickup truck, found her three miles down that Illinois road. Evidently Maddie had dropped the telegram onto Mr. Garrett’s front porch. The clue had sent them searching.
She was relieved no one asked where she’d been headed. She hadn’t known. Even now, there was no planned destination. She was merely putting one foot in front of the other. Any goals aside from rising out of bed each day had been shredded into scraps from a different life. No compositions to master. No conservatory to attend. The concertos that once played in her mind had fallen silent.
Maddie glanced over at her encased violin. It was a good thing, not hearing the notes anymore. Too many memories resided in those sharps and flats, the double-stops and trills. For six months she’d been back in this old house, which presented plenty of hazards. Every corner, every dust particle, carried a frozen moment if she let herself remember. She’d avoided visiting her father for this exact reason. Some things were best left in the past.
That was what she’d told herself when Lane’s letter had arrived. His final letter. Dewey Owens had passed it along after her husband’s death. She had yet to break the seal. What difference would a message from the grave possibly make, except to rip open a barely healed wound?
Maddie resumed her chair rocking. She averted her attention from the night table, where that letter remained stored. The same as the framed military portrait she’d retired from display. She didn’t need a daily reminder of what she was missing. The numbness wasn’t thick enough to shield her from more devastation than what greeted her each morning anew.
Naturally, she shared none of this with her brother, who would soon return from a long stay at an Army hospital in Hawaii. She actually went to great lengths to assure him of the opposite. In weekly posts, she made it clear that she and Suzie were fine, that TJ wasn’t to blame for whatever had happened during the raid.
Someone was to blame, of course. Someone was always to blame. But it wasn’t her brother.
“Shh-shh, Suzie-
chan,
” Kumiko said, appearing in the room. She picked up the toddler from the crib in the corner.
Maddie tugged on a smile. “Oh, I didn’t hear you arrive.”
“Yoshi yoshi, daij
bu,”
Kumiko soothed, patting Suzie’s back. Perspiration darkened the girl’s little summer dress, matted her auburn hair. She sniffled back her tears.
Maddie had forgotten Suzie was in there napping. How long had she been crying?
“I guess my mind was wandering.” Maddie offered her hands. “Here, I can take her.”
Emma peeked in. “Everything okay?”
Before Maddie could say yes, Kumiko handed Suzie to Emma and said, “Baby hungry. Milk in kitchen.”
Emma nodded, and Yuki pranced after them down the hall. “I’ll come help,” Maddie called to them, rising, but Kumiko stopped her.
“No. We going to talk.”
Since Lane’s death, the woman had retreated into herself. But gradually, having Nobu and Emma to mourn with, she had again torn down her shell inch by inch—which was why her sudden coolness threw Maddie off. All this for not greeting them at the front door?
“Sorry I didn’t hear you,” Maddie appeased once more.
“You will sit.”
Maddie recognized that voice, from their early days together. A voice that wouldn’t budge. Although reluctant, she lowered back into the chair.
Kumiko perched herself on the corner of Maddie’s bed and took a breath. “In camp, always we say, ‘
Kodomo no tame ni.
’ For sake of child. You are mother now. For Suzume, you must wake up. Be good mother.”
Maddie bristled. “Are you saying I’m a bad mother?”
“No. But you are walking in sleep.”
Suddenly self-conscious—hair unbrushed, not dressed for the day—Maddie folded her arms over her nightgown, and tried to play it off. “Suzie was up and down last night,” she lied. The restless one had been Maddie herself. “So we just got a late start.”
“Bea tell me, this morning she come here. Bring you pie. She say you know she is coming, but you not answer.”
Oh, no ... the visit had slipped Maddie’s mind. She must not have heard those knocks either.
Still, that had
nothing
to do with the devotion she held for her daughter. And who was Kumiko to criticize the skills of another mother? How dare she sit in judgment.
“I must have dozed off when she came by, that’s all.”
“For long time, I am asleep too. Asleep with eyes open. I feel alone because baby die. I forget rest of family.”
“Yes. You did,” the retort flew out. Maddie immediately thought to retract the snipe. But she didn’t have the strength, or the inclination.
After a moment, Kumiko’s tightened lips relaxed. “Soon, we go back Japan. I have to know you be okay. And Suzie-
chan
okay.”
“We’ll be
fine
.”
If the woman were truly concerned, she would have refused Nobu’s suggestion that their family repatriate. Only two days after the second atomic bomb dropped on Japan, sealing the Empire’s demise, the couple began making plans to move themselves and Emma back to their decimated homeland.
Granted, resettling in California wasn’t all peaches ’n’ cream for many Japanese Americans. There were cases of burned-down houses and defaced gravestones. Groups like the American Legion and the Native Sons of the Golden West made no secret of their hopes to keep the returning families out.
Yet for every opponent, a staunch supporter surfaced—like Major Berlow, a Marine who had served with Lane in the South Pacific. The man had seen to it that the Moritomos received top priority for housing nearby in Aliso Village. The American Friends Services had even offered to help Nobu find a job.
Regardless, Lane’s parents had made their decision. In a matter of weeks, any semblance of family that Maddie had come to cherish would vanish.
“If you’ll excuse me,” Maddie said, rising from the chair. “I need to go take care of my daughter.” She stressed the sentence to make a point.
“We not finished.”
“Oh yes we are. You and your husband are making sure of that.” As she started to leave, Kumiko stood to block her.
“Look yourself in mirror,” Kumiko demanded. “Takeshi no want you live like this.”
A fizzing of emotion shot up from the base of Maddie’s chest, an eruption from a dormant volcano. “Your son,” she spat out, “is the reason my life is ruined!”
The slap to Maddie’s face came in a blaze of fury. Bent over, she grabbed her cheek with both hands. With every throb, bottled sorrow poured into her muscles, her limbs. Anger and guilt pumped through her in beats that echoed in her ears.
Only then did Maddie realize she’d actually wanted to hate Lane, to blame him for everything, just so she wouldn’t have to face how much she’d loved him. How much she
still
loved him.
Slowly she forced her head up. Kumiko’s eyes awaited, but rather than a deserved rage filling them, there were tears of grief and, more than that, empathy.
Maddie shook her head as moisture glazed her vision. “I didn’t mean ... I just ...” Her voice and lips quivered. “Lane saved my brother, and I’m grateful for that. I’m so very grateful. But what I don’t understand is ...” She pushed herself to finally craft the words. “Why weren’t we enough? Why wasn’t
I
enough to keep him here?”
A long unreadable pause followed. Then, for the first time ever, Kumiko reached out and enfolded Maddie in her arms. Together they sat and cried, over the tragedy that had passed and the unknown that lay ahead. And as the freeze of Maddie’s heart melted away, she felt again the warmth of a mother’s love.

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