Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet (25 page)

H
enry wrote to Keiko, telling her about his father’s
ill-timed
intention to send him away. Back to China, a small village where his father grew up, just outside of Canton. Henry still had distant relatives there. People he’d never met. Some not even blood relatives, but they were
calabash
, as Henry’s father put it, using some strange slang of
quasi-English
. They were together. They were of one mind. Everyone in the village was considered family. And they looked forward to visitors from America – Henry knew from his father’s stories that his visit would include a warm
homecoming
, and a lot of work as well. Part of him wanted to go. But part of him wanted nothing to do with what his father had manipulatively planned for him.

And he couldn’t go now. Keiko or her family might need him, and they knew so few people outside the camps. He was all they had.

Much to Henry’s surprise, Keiko thought he should go.
Why not
? she’d asked in her most recent letter from Camp Minidoka. She was a prisoner, they were apart anyway,
might as well use this time
, she’d said – for Henry to complete the schooling so many parents of American-born children wished for their sons.

Stubbornly Henry refused to give in to his father’s wishes. His father wanted nothing to do with Keiko. And had disowned him. Henry couldn’t set that aside. So he stayed, and continued
scholarshipping
.

He also wrote to Keiko, every week.

Henry spent his days at school, helping Mrs Beatty, and his free evenings wandering up and down South Jackson listening to the brightest jazz musicians the city had to offer. He caught Oscar Holden and Sheldon when he could, but other nights he just stayed home and wrote to Keiko.

In return she sent Henry notes, with sketches from inside the camp and even outside, when she was allowed beyond the fences. The stringent rules had been eased a bit after the camp had been completely settled – Keiko’s Girl Scout troop was even allowed beyond the barbed wire to have an overnight campout.
Amazing
, Henry thought. Prisoners being allowed outside, only to return freely. But that was where their families were, and besides, where else could they go?

At least she kept busy. Henry did too, walking down to the old post office on South King, near the Yong Kick noodle factory. As the months rolled by, his weekly journey had become more of a habit – one still filled with anticipation.

‘One letter – overland carriage, please,’ Henry requested,
handing over the small envelope with the letter to Keiko he’d written the night before.

The skinny girl who normally worked the counter looked to Henry to be about his age – maybe fourteen, with dark hair and rich olive skin. He assumed she was the daughter of the postmaster assigned to Chinatown, helping out her parents in Chinese fashion. ‘Another letter? This one carriage mail, you say? That’s going to get expensive – twelve cents this time.’

Henry counted out the change from his pocket as she stamped it. He didn’t know what else to say, he’d done this routine dozens of times now. Long enough to know what was coming next, already seeing the disappointment in the young clerk’s eyes.

‘I’m sorry, Henry. No mail for you today. Maybe tomorrow?’

It’d been three weeks now, and no letter from Keiko. He knew that military mail had priority over all domestic shipments, especially letters going to someone with a Japanese surname – not to mention that mail in and out of the prison camps was notoriously slow. But this was troubling, on the verge of heartbreaking. So much that Henry began mailing all his letters by overland carriage – special bus service that cost ten times the normal postage but got there quicker. Or so he was always told.

Still, no word from Camp Minidoka. No word from Keiko.

On the walk home, Henry caught Sheldon wrapping up an afternoon gig on the corner of South Jackson.

‘I thought you were playing at the Black Elks Club these
days?’ Henry asked, pausing on the street where he used to give Sheldon his lunch each day.

‘Still do. Still do, that’s for certain. More sold-out shows than ever. Oscar’s packing them in every night, even more now that there’s so many white folks moving their business into these parts.’

Henry offered a solemn nod of agreement, looking down toward what was left of Japantown. Most businesses had been sold for pennies on the dollar, or the local banks had seized the frozen businesses and resold the real estate for a profit. Those that were funded by local Japanese-owned banks were the last to fold, but fold they did as the banks themselves became insolvent since their owners had been sent to places like Minidoka, Manzanar, and Tule Lake.

‘I guess I just like to come down and reminisce with my horn once in a while. Think about the good ol’ days, you know?’ Sheldon winked at Henry, who didn’t feel like smiling. Those times were gone. Things were different.
I’m different
, Henry thought.

‘Looks like you’re heading home empty-handed?’ Sheldon half-asked, half-stated – as if Henry’s sad walk home from the post office would be made any better that way.

‘I guess I don’t understand. I thought we’d write more. Is it wrong to think that? I know she’s busy. Her last letter said she’s in school now, playing sports – even on the yearbook staff.’ Henry shrugged. ‘I just didn’t think she’d forget about me so quickly.’

‘Henry, there’s no way she’s forgotten about you.
I guarantee
that
. Maybe there’s just more to do, more to be busy with, what with ten thousand Japanese folks all crammed into
one area. Beats what she was used to up at that
white-bread
, blue-blood elementary school y’all used to hang out at.’

‘At least we were together.’

‘At
most
you were together – and that’s a beautiful thing,’ Sheldon said. ‘Don’t worry, she’ll be back someday. Keep the faith. Keep writing. Time and space is a hard one to deal with, let me tell you. Moving all the way up here from the South, I can testify to that one. People relations is hard business. Hard to keep that going. But don’t give up, something good will come of it all – things have a way of working out just fine, you’ll see.’

‘I wish I was as hopeful as you are,’ Henry said.

‘Hope is all I got. Hope gets you through the night. Now you run along now, go home and take care of that mama of yours – and you have a fine day, sir!’

Henry waved goodbye, wondering if he should try to see her again. Then he thought of what Keiko’s life must be like right now. How wonderful it must be for her finally to go to school with nothing but Japanese kids, all just like her. A whole community growing in the desert. Maybe there was more for her there than here with me? Maybe she was better off. Maybe.

‘Good news, Henry.’ The young Chinese clerk brushed the hair from her eyes and held out the tattered envelope with both hands. ‘Looks like she does care after all.’

Henry looked up and took the letter, detecting a wisp of a sigh. ‘Thanks’ was all he could muster. It had been three weeks since the last correspondence. He had grown nervous
and sometimes even anticipated a Dear John letter – the kind of dreaded brush-off normally reserved for enlisted men.

He held the envelope in his hand, unsure of whether to open it or not, then walked outside and around the corner, finding a bench at the nearest bus stop.

Opening it, Henry drew in a deep breath and exhaled slowly as he unfolded the letter. He noticed the date immediately; it was from last week. Seemed like the mail was still occasionally running on time.

‘Dear Henry …’

It wasn’t a Dear John letter. Just one of Keiko’s normal heartfelt missives – catching Henry up on the crazy day-
to-day
life in the camp. About how all the men were required to sign loyalty oaths, which would then make them eligible for the draft and military service fighting the Germans. Some, like Keiko’s dad, had signed up immediately, so eager to prove their loyalty. Others became resisters, refusing to sign; the worst of them were taken away and imprisoned somewhere else.

The note made little mention of Henry’s own letters, saying only that she missed him dearly, and hoped he was doing OK.

Henry wrote her again that night and mailed the letter the next day.

This time he waited months for a reply, and when it came, Keiko seemed more confused and busy than ever. He’d written her two more times while waiting and couldn’t tell which letter she was responding to. Or had a letter been lost?

Henry was learning that time apart has a way of creating distance – more than the mountains and time zone separating them. Real distance, the kind that makes you ache and stop wondering. Longing so bad that it begins to hurt to care so much.

H
enry rounded the corner of South King and ran into Chaz heading home from the post office. Henry had grown a foot since he last saw Chaz and now realized he wasn’t just looking directly into the eyes of his former tormentor. He was actually looking down an inch or two. Chaz looked small and weak, even though he outweighed Henry by twenty or thirty pounds.

Face-to-face, all Chaz could muster was a grudging
hello
. He didn’t even smile. Henry just stared back, doing his best to look cold and intimidating. Chaz, by contrast, looked soft and doughy, cracking first, stepping around Henry and passing him by.

‘My father’s still going to own your girlfriend, Henry,’ Chaz muttered as he walked past, just loud enough for Henry to hear.

‘What did you say?’ Henry grabbed Chaz by the arm and
spun him around, a move that surprised both of them.

‘My father’s still buying up what’s left of Nip-ville, and when your girlfriend gets back from that concentration camp she’s holed up in, she’s not going to have anything to come home to.’ He shrugged Henry off and backed away, more pathetic and annoying than menacing. ‘Then what are you going to do?’

Stung, Henry let him go, watching him waddle off, up the hill and around the corner out of sight. Henry looked down the street to what was left of Nihonmachi. Not much. The only fixtures that remained were the larger buildings, too expensive to buy, like the Panama Hotel, which stood as the sole remaining evidence of a living, breathing community. Little else remained that wasn’t completely gutted, torn down, or taken over by Chinese or white business interests.

Henry could hardly believe that two years had passed. For his father it had been two years of air raids and war updates – from Indochina to Iwo Jima. For Henry it had been
twenty-four
months of writing to Keiko, occasionally getting a reply, maybe every few months. Just catching up, her concern for him waning.

Each time he visited the post office, the same young clerk looked at him with what Henry regarded as a sad combination of pity and admiration. ‘She must be very special to you, Henry. You’ve never given up on her, have you?’ The clerk didn’t know much about Henry, just his writing habits and his dedication. And maybe she sensed his pang of emptiness, a hint of loneliness as Henry left the post office empty-handed each week.

Henry thought about taking another bus trip. Back in
the
belly of the big dog,
as Sheldon liked to put it, that long Greyhound bus ride through Walla Walla all the way to Minidoka. But he let those thoughts go. He was busy here helping his mother keep up with things, and Keiko seemed OK from the few letters that he received.

In her early letters, Keiko had wanted continuous updates on life in Seattle. At school, and in the old neighborhood. Henry had slowly broken it to her that little remained of what she’d once called home. She never seemed to believe that it could disappear like that, in such a short amount of time. She loved this area so much – a place with so many memories. How could it be gone? How could he tell her?

When she asked, ‘What’s become of the old neighborhood – is it still deserted?’ He could say only, ‘It’s changed. New businesses have moved in. New people.’ She seemed to know what that meant. No one seemed to care what happened to what was left of Nihonmachi. Chaz had gotten off on his vandalism charges years earlier – the judge wouldn’t even hear of it. Henry kept that news to himself, and in the meantime, he’d updated Keiko on the jazz scene on South Jackson. How Oscar Holden was once again holding court at the Black Elks Club. How Sheldon was a regular in the band and even played a few of his own numbers. Life was moving forward. The United States was winning the war. There was talk of the war in Europe being over by Christmas. The Pacific would be next. Then, just maybe, Keiko would be coming home. Back to what? Henry wasn’t sure, but he knew he’d still be here, waiting.

At home, Henry spoke politely to his mother, who seemed to regard him as the man of the house now that he was fifteen
and helping with the bills. He’d taken a part-time job at Min’s BBQ, though he didn’t feel particularly helpful. Not when other kids his age were lying about their birthdays and enlisting, fighting on the front lines. But it was the least he could do. Despite his mother’s best intentions and his father’s wishes, Henry remained at home – his schooling in China would wait. It would have to. He had promised to wait for Keiko, and that vow was one he intended to keep, no matter how long it took.

His father still had not spoken to him. Then again, since the stroke, he spoke very little to anyone. He’d had another mild one, and his voice was little more than a whisper. Still, Henry’s mother turned the radio off and on near his bed when there was a report on the fighting in the Philippines, or Iwo Jima – each battle in the Pacific drawing a breath closer to the expected invasion of Japan itself, a daunting task since Premier Suzuki had announced that Japan would fight to the very end. When the news was over, she’d read the newspaper to him and report on fund-raising activities at the benevolent associations that dotted Chinatown. She told him about how the Kuomintang had expanded their office into an outpost where expressions of nationalist pride could be printed and distributed, along with various fund-raising efforts to arm and equip the factions that were fighting back on the mainland.

Henry would sit occasionally and have one-way conversations with his father. It was all he could do. His father wouldn’t even look at him, but Henry was certain the man couldn’t turn his ears away. He had to listen; he was too weak to move on his own power. So Henry spoke gently, and
his father, as always, stared out the window, pretending not to care.

‘I ran into Chaz Preston today. Do you remember him?’

Henry’s father sat motionless.

‘He and his father came by a few years ago. His father was looking for your help in buying some of the vacant buildings – the ones left behind after the Japanese left?’

Henry continued despite his father’s lack of response. ‘He tells me they’re buying up the last of Nihonmachi – maybe even the Northern Pacific Hotel. Maybe even the Panama.’ Despite his father’s silence and frailty, he was still a highly regarded member of the Bing Kung Benevolent Association and the Chinese Chamber of Commerce. His age and health only made him more revered in certain circles, where honor and respect must be paid to those who had given so much. After he had raised so much money for the war effort, Henry’s father’s opinion still mattered. Henry had often seen members of the business community come by to get his father’s blessing on business arrangements in the neighborhood.

‘You don’t think they’d let Chaz’s family – the Prestons – buy the Panama, do you?’ Henry had hoped the hotel would remain unsold until Keiko returned, or at least that it might be bought by Chinese interests. But few had the money to make a worthy offer.

Henry looked at his father, who turned back and, for the first time in months, intentionally made eye contact with him. It was all he needed to know. Even before his father mustered the energy for a crooked smile, Henry knew. Something was in the works. The Panama Hotel would be sold.

Henry didn’t know what to make of it. He had waited for Keiko for nearly three years. He loved her. He would wait longer if he had to. But at the same time, he wished that, when she came home, it would be to more than just him; that part of her old life, part of her childhood would still be there. That there might be a few of the places she had drawn in her sketchbook, those memories that meant so much to her.