Red Berries, White Clouds, Blue Sky (10 page)

1943 | CHAPTER TWELVE

ROY
and the
ROYALS

NOW
that Helen was back in school, she ought to be happier, Tomi thought. She hoped Helen would smile and crack jokes the way the other bobby-soxers at the camp did. But she was wrong. Helen was as grumpy as ever.

Each morning, Tomi stopped at Helen’s apartment to pick up Carl. She took him to Mrs. Hayashi. Then she and Ruth went on to school. Mrs. Hayashi watched Carl until Helen came for him in the early afternoon.

But if Helen hadn’t changed, Mrs. Hayashi had. “Now that she spends the day with Carl, Mother’s as happy as she can be. She’s teaching Carl to fold paper into birds—it’s called origami—and they play catch and go for walks. Mother asked your mom to teach her to knit so she can make Carl a pair of mittens.”

“I know. Mom told me your mother’s even cutting out fabric squares and triangles, and plans to make Carl a quilt,” Tomi said.

“She’s happy again. She sings all the time. That was a good idea of yours, Tomi.”

“Well, Helen isn’t happy, and she doesn’t sing. She still hates Tallgrass. That’s all she talks about. She’s in my brother Roy’s class, and he told me she’s the most bitter person he ever met.” He’d also told her Helen was the prettiest girl he’d ever met, as pretty as a pinup. Pinups were the beautiful young women whose pictures were in magazines. Soldiers sometimes tore out the pictures and taped them inside their lockers. Tomi knew her brother had a crush on Helen.

“What’s the matter with her?” Ruth asked.

Tomi thought that over as they came across hopscotch squares someone had drawn in the dirt with a stick. She hopscotched to the end of the squares, then hopped around on one foot and went back to the starting point. “I guess it must be hard to have to take care of your brothers when you’re only sixteen. Helen blames the government. She told me once she wishes she’d gone to Japan.” At the beginning of the war, the government had offered to send
any Japanese living in the United States to Japan. A few, mostly those who had been born in Japan and had lived in the U.S. for a short time, left America, but not many.

“Is she
Issei
?” Ruth asked.

“No, her parents were
Issei
. They were born in Japan. She’s
Nisei
, second generation.” Tomi said. “Helen can’t speak Japanese.”

“Then why in the world would she want to go to Japan?” Ruth wondered.

“I guess she hates our country that much,” said Tomi.

One day, Roy announced he and four other high school boys were forming a dance band just like the Jivin’ Five band he’d had in California. They would call themselves Roy and the Royals. “
Roy
-als. Get it?” he asked. The band was Roy’s idea, and he was in charge. He went to his suitcase where he’d stored his clarinet when the family moved from the house in California, and took it out, playing a few notes. “We’ve even got our first gig scheduled. Too bad you’re little kids or you could come and hear us,” he teased Tomi and Hiro.

“I want to go!” Hiro said.

“You can’t dance,” Roy told him.

“I can dance with Wilson,” he retorted. Wilson, Helen’s brother, had become his best friend.

“And I can dance with Ruth,” Tomi added.

“We will all go,” Mom said. “We will go as a family.”

“A dance isn’t exactly a family event,” Roy said.

“We will all go, or none of us will go.” Mom gave Roy a stern look. After a year in Tallgrass, many Japanese families in the camp had fallen apart. Families didn’t eat with each other, and without real jobs, the men no longer felt they were head of their households. But Mom had done her best to keep the Itanos together. She insisted they go to church together every Sunday and attend the movies with each other. Tomi thought attending Roy’s dances was another way to keep the family connection strong.

For the next few weeks, Roy and the Royals practiced almost every day after school, in the Itanos’ apartment. People in the barracks kept their doors open to listen to the music. Although the walls between the apartments
were so thin, they probably couldn’t have blocked out the sound if they’d wanted to. Only Helen kept her door closed. Tomi asked her why she didn’t want to hear Roy and his friends. Helen said, “It’s only noise. I used to dance to a real band at home. I heard Benny Goodman and Tommy Dorsey play,” she said, naming two famous dance bands. “And once I went to a Frank Sinatra concert. I heard him sing ‘Green Eyes.’ He was dreamy. So why would I want to listen to a hick band like your brother’s?”

“They’re not hicks,” Tomi defended Roy. “The guy who plays the saxophone sings sometimes. He’s pretty good. I bet if you heard him, you’d think he was Frank Sinatra,” Tomi said.

“Bet I wouldn’t,” Helen replied. “I would know he’s not Frank Sinatra because Frank Sinatra isn’t Japanese. That means he wouldn’t be in this camp. So how could he be singing in your apartment?”

“That’s not what I meant,” Tomi began.

Helen shut the door in her face. Tomi remembered that word her teacher’s husband, the Boy Scout leader, had used—tolerance. It wasn’t just white people who didn’t have tolerance.

Roy and the Royals played their first dance on a Saturday night in the summer of 1943. Tomi wore her red dress, the best of only three dresses she had in the camp. Mom washed Tomi’s hair and braided it wet. After her hair dried and Tomi unbraided it, her black hair was a waterfall of curls. Ruth promised to get dressed up, too, just like Mom and Mrs. Hayashi, because Mr. Hayashi promised that after the dance, he would take them all to the canteen. That was what they called the room in the camp where the evacuees bought soda pop and candy bars. It was as close to a restaurant as anything at Tallgrass.

“We’re picking up Carl and Wilson on our way,” Mom said, then added, “and Helen, of course.”

When they reached Helen’s apartment, the boys were standing in the doorway waiting, but Helen had on her old dress, and her hair wasn’t combed. “I’m not going,” she told them.

“Of course, you are,” Mom said.

“It’s just a crummy little dance. I’d rather stay home.”

Mom had had enough. Helen had been bitter and rude ever since she’d moved into the barracks. “My son has a
very nice band.”

Helen shrugged. “I didn’t mean to say—”

“Yes you did,” Mom interrupted. “I expect you to come and see for yourself how good it is.”

“I’m staying home.”

“To do what? Sit in the dark and feel sorry for yourself, the way you always do?”

Mom must have been very angry at Helen, because Tomi had never heard her speak to anyone that way. This must have been another of Mom’s changes. Once or twice, she’d even spoken her mind—something that was rare among Japanese women. This was one of those times. “Do you think you’re the only one who didn’t want to come to this camp? Are you the only one who’s been deprived of school and work because you’re Japanese? It was Tomi’s idea that Mrs. Hayashi would take care of Carl. Have you thanked her?”

Helen stared at Tomi. “I didn’t know.”

“You don’t know how nice people have been to you. Mr. Hayashi is taking us out for a Coca-Cola after the dance, and you would insult him if you didn’t come. Now change your dress and brush your hair. We will wait for you.” Mom grabbed the door handle and banged the door shut. Then
she turned to Tomi and put her hands over face. “Such awful things I said. This place has made me a harsh woman.”

Tomi beamed at her. “I bet it worked.”

And it had, because in a few minutes, Helen opened the door. She wore a green dress that Tomi had never seen. Not only was her hair combed, but she had put on lipstick.

Mom and Tomi walked behind Helen and her brothers, far enough away so that Mom could whisper. “I am proud of you, Tomi. You don’t want to be at Tallgrass any more than Helen does, but you work hard to make the best of it. You try to be happy and to make the people around you happy.” Mom took Tomi’s hand. “I’ve seen what you’ve done for some of the other children to help them adjust to the camp. You are a good girl. And you are a good daughter.”

Tomi blushed. She wasn’t used to compliments, and she didn’t know what to say. She was glad when they reached the Hayashis’ barracks and she didn’t have to reply. Instead, she admired Ruth’s silk dress. Mrs. Hayashi had sewn one of her own dresses to fit Ruth. Mrs. Hayashi was becoming quite a seamstress.

They walked together to the building where the dance was held. Mr. and Mrs. Hayashi led the way, followed by Helen and her brothers. Next came Mom walking alone
and finally Tomi and Ruth. As she watched the Hayashis walk arm in arm, Tomi thought how lonely her mother must be without Pop. Mom had written letters asking if Pop could join them at Tallgrass, but nobody had answered her. And Pop’s letters didn’t say much. He had been transferred to a camp in California, but he didn’t tell them why. Tomi wondered if Pop would stay there for the entire war.

The dance floor was lit with colored lights, and high school girls had decorated it with crepe paper streamers. The band was already playing, and couples were dancing. They weren’t just high school kids, although the older people left the dance floor when Roy and the Royals played a jitterbug because they didn’t understand the new dance steps.

“I wish I could jitterbug,” Ruth said, watching the dancers.

“I’ll teach you,” Tomi replied. “I already know how.”

“I’ll look silly,” Ruth said.

“No you won’t. Look at how many other people don’t know how to jitterbug, and they’re having a good time.” Tomi gestured at the couples stumbling around the dance floor. The two girls joined them, and in a minute, they were waving their arms and kicking their heels.

Roy saw Tomi and grinned. He seemed glad his family had come. Tomi noticed him glancing at Helen and realized he was especially glad that Helen had come with them. Tomi and Ruth came close to the bandstand where Roy was. Tomi said, “She’s beautiful, isn’t she?”

“Who, Ruth?” Roy asked.

“As if you didn’t know who I mean! I’m talking about Helen.” A boy had approached Helen to dance, but she shook her head. Instead, she stepped out onto the dance floor with Wilson.

“Oh, I hadn’t noticed.”

“You did so.”

Roy blushed, and Tomi knew she was right. “She won’t even look at me,” he said. “I’ve tried to start a conversation with her, but she won’t say a word.”