My Year of Meats (24 page)

After watching Suzuki knock back a fourth shot, the sheriff went home for dinner with a warning not to celebrate too strenuously. But Suzuki was determined to make up for two nights on the wagon.

“Jane-chan,
nomé!”
he ordered, drunk as a monkey. “Drink! Drink!” Tennessee whiskey had made his blood boil and stained his face like a new bruise. He lifted his shot glass and drained it, summoned the bartender and ordered another round.

“Kampai!”
he cried, picking up one of the brimming glasses that were aligned in front of me, untouched. “You are not keeping up!”

“Suzuki-san,” I began,
“cbotto, damé
—I can’t drink....”

“Can’t drink!” He exploded with drunken laughter. “Don’t make me laugh! Of course you can drink. You are a splendid drinker! For a girl, no less! Most girls haven’t got what it takes, but you! You are the finest—”

“Suzuki-san ...
ninshin da yo
—I’m pregnant.”

The news stopped him dead. He stared straight ahead, then slumped against the bar; his head thumped solidly on the counter.

“Suzuki-san?” I placed my hand on the back of his sweaty neck.
“Daijobu desu ka?
Are you okay?”

And then he surprised me. Straightening up again, he swiveled on his stool to face me, draped his arms around my neck, and pressed his shiny forehead against mine.

“Takagi-san,” he announced, in slurred Japanese, “you will never have to worry about the child as long as I live. I will marry you tonight if you wish. Whatever you want, you must simply tell me and I will do it for you. If your baby needs a college education, I will work hard to provide one. You are my dear comrade, and I will always support you.”

And with that, he slid off the barstool and fell to the floor.

There’s a fairy tale about the first Japanese wanna-be astronaut, another drunken monkey, who saw the moon in a deep and quiet pond and bragged to his friend the badger that he could fly all the way there and bring back that moon in a bucket. He drowned in the attempt. I suspect it was the lunacy blooming in my face that galvanized Suzuki. His offers were sincere and I was touched. I got him back onto his barstool, thanked him warmly, and left him there, staring gloomily into the bottom of his glass.

 

 

The next morning we went to Cemetery Hill to shoot the panoramics of the town. It was one of those beautiful Montana mornings, when you wake up and walk outside and it hits you: Oh, right, this is why they call it Big Sky country. I mean, the sky is so big and so blue, you can’t really think about anything else.

Cemetery Hill wasn’t much of a hill at all, but it provided enough of a rise to simulate a vista. A chain gang was working at one end of the cemetery, weeding and tending the graves, though most of the men were just enjoying the weather, smoking and sitting on the headstones. These guys were from the penitentiary, where at one point the sheriff had threatened to send us. I recognized a deputy, who waved to us. After a brief discussion of my editorial needs, I left Suzuki to get the shots of the town. He tends to work better on his own, especially when he is hungover, which is most of the time.

Two white moths were chasing each other, and finally they locked together and tumbled out of the air, landing on the thick green grass of a grave, where they fluttered and mated, then came to rest. The small battered headstone read:

Ann Wren. It was a sweet, plain name. Her parents had given it to her, known her for two weeks, fourteen short days, before she slipped away from them—buried here, belov’d for eternity. I wandered on, moving from stone to stone, reading off the names of the early settlers and the dates of their lives and deaths: Nathan Field, 8 years old; Jasper Beckwith, 3 months; Elsa May Foster, 2 years.

So many children.

There were adults buried here too.

But the tiny, crooked headstones were the ones that drew me.

Then suddenly it came to me, why I was here.

Whispering the beautiful names of these dead pioneer children, I was testing them for sound, invoking their identities, trying them on the nascent son or daughter who had settled inside me. It was unreal.
Name is very first thing. Name is face to all the world.

But you shopping for one in
graveyard?

I could hear Ma’s horror and it made me smile. One thing was finally clear—I wanted my baby.

The loose bow at the collar of Akiko’s silky white blouse looked like moth wings, glowing in the flickering candlelight. She sat primly at the
kotatsu
next to John, like an OL or a hostess at a bar, adding ice cubes to his glass. As she leaned forward with the whiskey bottle to pour a drink, the loopy wings closed, and as she sat back, they softly opened again.

John was big and bombastic, and his face was maroon. He grabbed the bottle of Suntory Old from her hand and poured a huge swig into her glass.

“Drink,” he slurred. “Drink up. It’s good to see you having fun. I like having a wife I can drink with.”

Around her neck she wore a choker of pearls, and a pearl-studded barrette held up her hair on one side. Tucked about her knees was a straight, rose-colored skirt. Underneath it was the garter belt. Just before dinner she turned off the overhead fluorescent light and lit the two candles, which she placed on the
kotatsu.

She had intended to tell John about her periods right after dinner, but it was so hard to bring up such topics of conversation. So then she thought perhaps a little whiskey would make it easier, but even after several drinks, she hadn’t spoken. The candles had burned down and the wax was hardening onto the tabletop. Still hopeful, she was reluctant to break the mood to clean it up.

John was recounting the successes of the BEEF-EX campaign, all due to his skillful handling of the American sponsors. This was a good sign, thought Akiko. He seemed to have forgotten her lack of enthusiasm for some of the programs.

“They liked the Thayer Show very much,” he told her. “So it’s very fortunate I made that trip to Memphis to intervene, don’t you think? They would never have stood for that black family. And so far I’ve managed to keep the Lesbian Show from them. The Wyoming Show was a success....” He sighed and drank another shot of whiskey. “All you see is the finished programs,” he told her, suddenly morose. “You cannot possibly imagine what I have to go through to keep the sponsors happy.”

She leaned forward expectantly, but he fell silent, elbows on the table, head in his hands. Perhaps she should ask him a question, Akiko thought.

“What is wrong with them?” she ventured. “The sponsors are American. Don’t the Americans find their programs interesting?”

John snorted. “BEEF-EX is just a bunch of cowboys pretending to be international traders. They don’t know the first thing about television. And neither does the New York staff, for that matter.”

“Is the staff not competent? Don’t they do as you say?”

John laughed out loud. “Do as I say? Hah. Not that stupid woman. She goes out of her way to do the opposite. She makes a point of it.” His voice was getting louder, and his face glowed. “She knows nothing of loyalty or obedience. All she thinks of is herself. Lesbians on Saturday morning! It’s disgusting. I mean,
families
are watching! No proper Japanese person would enjoy a program like that!”

John slammed his palm on the table to emphasize his dissatisfaction. Akiko knew she should change the subject, but she couldn’t help herself. She was too curious. “Is this Takagi-san?”

“Yes. Takagi ... Last thing I heard, she managed to get herself and her whole crew thrown into jail! I wish they’d kept her there. Thrown away the key.” He laughed and seemed very pleased with this, so Akiko laughed too.

“She must be quite a woman! I should think you’d like a woman with so much spunk.”

“Spunk, hah! She must be a lesbian too.” Then John looked at her, and his eyes narrowed. “Why did you say that, anyway? Are you jealous?”

“Oh, no.” Akiko shook her head. “That’s not what I meant at all. I only meant—”

“Well, you should be, you know. A proper wife would be very jealous, with all the traveling I do, to Austin, Texas, and places like that.” He watched her. “Do you know what they have in Austin, Texas?”

Akiko looked down at her hands, folded in her lap. She had given herself a manicure this afternoon, but one of the nails had already started to chip. She shook her head.

“They have this big club you can go to for lap dancing. Do you know what lap dancing is?” He leered at her and then drained his glass. He stared sullenly at the melting ice at the bottom. “Forget it.”

“No, please tell me....”

“Forget it,” he said. “You don’t care. You don’t care about sex. You are a cold, dead fish.”

“No I’m not!” Akiko cried out. “Look at me! I’m not like that anymore.” She stood up so he could see her skirt and blouse. John watched her, his face expressionless. As an afterthought, she spread her fingers in front of her so he could see her manicured nails. Then he grinned.

“Kimi wa kawaii, ne,”
he grunted, patting her cushion on the floor with an amused, conciliatory nod. “You are cute. You look very nice.”

Akiko knelt slowly back down. He was not acting at all interested. She wondered whether she should try doing something erotic. Maybe she should lift her skirt and show him the garter belt. He poured her a drink and pushed it across the table.

“Here, don’t sulk. Drink up. I’m sorry I said that.”

She caught hold of his hand and raised it to her mouth. Now what? She kissed his fingertips one by one and glanced up in what she hoped was a coy and provocative manner. He pulled his hand away, but she held fast, then she bit his little finger as hard as she could.

“Ow!” He gasped in pain, then he snatched his hand away from her and belted her across the face, knocking her sprawling.

“You fool,” he snarled. “How dare you ...”

Akiko lay on her side, holding her head, her skirt pulled up to reveal the top of her garter. John stared at her leg, then leaned over and yanked the skirt up farther. He frowned. Akiko watched him through the tangle of her hair. Her nose had started to run from his blow. She sniffled and wiped it as discreetly as she could on the back of her hand, hoping it wasn’t blood. He crawled over and straddled her, rolling her onto her stomach and pulling down her panties. She heard him unzipping his fly and held her breath. She waited, her bottom in the air, for what seemed like a very long time, but nothing happened, so she twisted around a bit and peeked. He was kneeling above her, pulling violently at his limp penis. His eyes were closed and his face was deep red and sticky with sweat. He looked like a red-faced oni, she thought. Then he opened his eyes. She averted her face as quickly as she could, but it was too late. He’d seen her watching. Abruptly he stopped and put his penis away. He got slowly to his feet. He zipped up his fly and walked toward the
genkan,
then sat down heavily on the little step and put on his shoes.

Akiko rolled over and sat up quickly. Her head was throbbing. She pulled down her skirt and followed John and knelt just behind him. She placed her palm on the center of his broad back. His white shirt was wet with sweat, and his back was hot and humped.

“
Anata
... ?” she said. “Dear ... ?”

His back started to shake. She left her hand sitting there until he turned and put his arms around her waist and buried his face in the front of her blouse.

“Daijobu
...” She patted him gently. “It’s all right.... It’s all my fault. I’m sorry.”

She held him, wiped her nose surreptitiously on the top of his head, and let him cry. When he quieted down, she took his shoes off and helped him to his feet. She walked him back into the apartment and undressed him and tucked him into bed.

“Next time,” said John as he drifted off to sleep. “I promise you, next time it will stand right up. It will be all right.”

It was the bite, she thought, arms folded, watching him snore. She shouldn’t have bitten so hard. She didn’t mean to. Her jaws just sort of snapped shut.