Secrets of the Apple (11 page)

Ryoki looked sideways at Kate, wondering whether any of it was good. But Kate had already turned to Corinne and said, “Remember, I work for him, so try not to make me look bad,” her tone ranking him right on the line between human and humanish.

The child freed one hand from her mother’s grasp and began tugging urgently on Kate’s pant leg. “Apple!” she said, pointing to the Red Delicious embroidered on her jumper, “Apple!”

“Yes, apple,” Kate said. “It’s very beautiful.”

Ryoki wrinkled his eyebrows. A sardonic smile played across his lips. “Apple,” his ex-wife’s nickname. Naturally Kate managed to say
that
, rather than his own name.

The Porter home turned out to be a rambling red brick colonial nestled in a comfortable tree-lined neighborhood in the Wasatch Foothills, the kind of place where people clumped to gossip whenever the weather was good and the power was out. Kate entered the family room into a barrage of welcoming siblings and spouses. A knot of young, pajama-clad children burst from a blanket fort in the corner, all squealing and ricocheting off the furniture, not allowing her a word.

Given Kate’s tidy habits, the room was not as quiet or as neat as Ryoki had expected, nor was the house as grand as Brian Porter’s mansion. But the large family room had the same comfortable, overstuffed club room feel with a popping fire, deep brown leather furniture and three walls lined with built-in bookcases crammed with volumes haphazardly stacked in every direction. Off to the left sat an elaborate inlaid chess table Ryoki recognized as the twin of the one in Brian Porter’s home, and to the right sat a gleaming baby grand, with an ornate harp and wooden music stand in the corner—a solid six feet of floor-to-ceiling bookcases devoted to music books.

Ryoki was looking hopefully at the piano, when a cheerful young man with sandy hair and an open, honest face stepped forward to shake hands, introducing himself as Doug Carson, Corinne’s husband. He motioned toward the chittering group, now mostly females, simultaneously conversing together and calming the jumping, prancing children vying for their attention. “Can I offer you a drink or anything?”

“Water would be nice,” Ryoki said, liking him right way.

As they were leaving the room a young father stood up. “Okay, guys, Kate’s home, that was the deal. Time for B—E—”

“D” a few children said sadly, slumping their shoulders, until one bright-eyed boy piped up, “I’m hungwy can I have something to eat?” and every child burst into the same chorus.

“Ben, if you want to make your next birthday—”

Ryoki turned a corner into the kitchen and missed the end of the threat. As Doug handed him his water, a man came toward him who looked so much like Brian that he could only be John Porter, Kate’s father. They shook hands firmly, Ryoki bowing respectfully, wishing to make a good impression. “My goodness. I haven’t seen you since you were just a little bit,” John said. “But Brian’s kept me up-to-date.”

Ryoki felt John’s hand warming his own chilly fingers.

“I hope Kate hasn’t abandoned you already—” John said, but Kate breezed in before he could finish his thought.

“I saw him go off with Doug.” She tapped Ryoki once, one finger lightly on the elbow. “Follow me and I’ll show you where you’ll sleep.”

“Excuse me,” he said smiling, bowing again as he turned to leave the room.

“You don’t need to bow to them, only to me,” Kate said as he took his bag from her hands.

“Your family seems to have two distinct looks,” Ryoki said as he followed Kate up the stairs.

“The blonds are Nancy’s kids, two boys and two girls. My mom died eight years ago and my dad remarried.” She opened the door to a large bedroom painted pale green, furnished entirely in gleaming red mahogany and ivory brocade. As he set down his bag, he noticed three smudgy charcoal drawings of women reading, grouped with the same number of bold fashion illustrations painted in crisp black. He leaned forward for a closer look at the illustrations. Too strong to be watercolor, brush and ink maybe.

“There are some good titles in the bookcase,” Kate said, gesturing around the room. “The bathroom is down the hall, second door on the left, towels in the linen cupboard behind the bathroom door.” She opened the closet, revealing an inordinate amount of red, and shoved everything on hangers to one side to give him space.

“Is this your room, by chance?” he asked.

“I moved back home during my last semester of grad school,” she said, pulling some empty hangers to the middle before craning around. “How could you tell?”

Ryoki didn’t answer, his attention riveted on a glossy silk kimono hanging on the far wall, its arms flung straight out, soft spring colors, the shortened sleeves of the married woman, the heron pattern reaching high from the hem indicating a young wife, the silk threads of his mother’s family crest gleaming faintly in the light.

“If you’re uncomfortable in my room, Charlotte and I could easily switch with you. It’s no trouble,” she said, sounding uneasy.

“Your kimono, where did it come from?”

She opened her mouth as if to expel a quiet “Ahh,” but made no sound as she walked over to the kimono, checking her hand for smudges before running it over the smooth silk.

“The summer after my family moved back from Brazil, I worked for your parents in San Francisco.” Ryoki didn’t know if he’d ever been told this, but he tried to look unsurprised. “Your mother sent it to me after she went home. She said she was too old for it and intended to obligate me to write her, said if I didn’t practice my
kanji
I’d lose it, such as it is.” She began tracing the pattern with her finger. “I used to store it folded flat in tissue, but I wanted to enjoy it, so when I redid my room I hung it on the wall. It reminds me of your mother.”

Ryoki wanted to ask why a Japanese kimono reminded her of his American mother, but instead he said, “Did you write to her then?”

“Every week ever since.”

He began to wonder if Kate’s surprise at his arrival had all been an act, a set-up between scheming women. “She didn’t tell you I was coming to San Francisco?”

“Last time she mentioned you, you were in London. Mostly she writes about looking after your father or managing the household, whatever she’s up to at that moment.” She walked over to the bookcase and pulled out the first of three large blue binders, all with
The Politics of Running a Japanese House
printed in black Magic Marker down the spine. “These are her letters. She has a real gift for words.” She placed the binder on the little table by the overstuffed armchair and reading lamp, apparently assuming he’d be curious to read his mother’s domestic ramblings. He smiled politely, but looked back at the kimono.

“Have you ever worn it?” he asked.

“Once, to a costume ball in college. I didn’t really do it justice, what with not being Asian.” She seemed much more open and friendly than in the office, as though all the bubbly sister-talk hadn’t quite worn off.

“Did you white your face and wear a wig?”

She shook her head. “No, I looked like myself in a costume. I hadn’t realized kimono were so narrow. I couldn’t take a normal step. It was fun to wear, though.” She went back to the bookcase and pulled out a photo album, setting it on the high bed and quickly flipping through the pages. “I think I sent your mom a picture—here.” She stopped to show a photo of herself wearing the kimono, two lacquered chopsticks pushed through her bun and her lips painted an intense shade of red. She did indeed look like herself, but with a difference he couldn’t quite place, something about the expression that made her look impossibly young, naïve even. There was a glare from the overhead light and he pulled the photo from its sleeve to get a better look. Another photo fell out from behind it, another shot of her in the kimono, smiling at the camera, but joined by a handsome blond pirate who stared at her wide-eyed, awed and entranced.

“Who’s that?”

“My husband, before he became my husband.”

Ryoki stared.

“
Was,
past tense, divorced a little over a year now.” She replaced the photos and returned the album to the bookcase, her open mood drawing to a close. “I think everybody’s going to bed. Don’t worry about getting up early. Sleep in as long as you like.” She left the room, clicking the door shut behind her.

Ryoki looked at his suitcase and realized he hadn’t seen his computer or his phone since entering the house. Probably hidden by Kate or one of her accomplices.

Hardly knowing how to act in a gadgetless room, he sat on the edge of the high rice-carved four-poster, remembering the top of the mattress hit Kate at the waist, and wondered what had possessed her to buy a bed that required stairs.

In his opinion the room contained entirely too much furniture, yet as he ran his hand over the supple ivory silk comforter, he had a sense of sitting in an abundant living greenhouse surrounded by fertile dark earth and blossoming ivory orchids, even though there wasn’t a single flowering thing in the room.

His gaze drifted to Kate’s large double-stacked bookcase. How long since he’d taken the time to read for pleasure? Last vacation? The vacation before? Really he shouldn’t get started. Hands in his pockets, he sauntered over and scanned the spines. The books were stacked two-deep, and first one hand came out of his pocket, then the other as he began to mine the contents, pulling out a handful from the front layer to read the titles behind. One by one he ran his fingers over the covers, taking his time, ferreting out the perfect book to take to bed. Hard to choose. Can’t spill past the weekend.

She appeared to read widely, perhaps rather snobbishly, heavy on canonical titles he was too tired to face. He came across a hardcover
Gone with the Wind
riddled with sticky notes and found the margins intricately tattooed with her spidery handwriting. He laid it on the nightstand and kept reading titles until he came across
The Screwtape Letters
in the back layer.

Two hours after going to bed he set the book back on the night table and turned out the lamp. But instead of falling asleep, he lay in the dark luxuriating in Kate’s warm, comfortable bed, listening to the lively stillness of a sleeping family. A shaft of moonlight had fallen across his mother’s kimono hanging among the shadows, a shimmering revenant. His last vivid memory of that particular kimono was a Children’s Day when his mother had put it on because he said he liked it “specially.” By that evening he’d sneaked too many sweets and his mother found him hiding in the corner of his room holding his stomach, afraid to tell and afraid to keep quiet. Instead of scolding him, she gathered him in her arms and held him while she told him one of her stories, something about a valiant knight who had to overcome a snarling dragon he had once raised as a pet, in order to storm the castle and win the fair maiden. Lulled by the cadence of her voice, he traced the birds and flowers on her kimono, feeling the smooth silk under his fingertips and breathing in her warm, sweet smell, the bellyache gradually lessening until he fell asleep, content. Ryoki didn’t remember exactly when this happened, but he must have been very young, before he learned to be ashamed of his mother.

The next morning dawned gray and chilly, but he awoke with the lazy slowness of a childhood summer, his eyes teased open by the smell of bacon and baking things. He’d slept the full night without a single nightmare, and he wanted to laugh out of sheer joy and gratitude. In no great hurry to get up, he burrowed deeper under the covers and idly wondered if Kate would sell him her magic bed with all its pillows and how long it would take to ship it to Brazil. Then the door clicked open and two little brown-haired boys, about five and six, streaked into the room, slammed the door shut, and crawled commando-style up onto the end of his bed, catching a lamp cord on a plastic sword and knocking over books with an AK-47 squirt gun. Whispering loud enough to be heard down the block, the boys scrambled over the footboard and leaped onto Ryoki’s feet, putting their fingers to their lips to signal quiet.

“We’re hiding from Aunt Kate,” the older boy said. “She says not to bother you, but we gotta know. Are you a ninja with a sword?” They both looked at him, their eyes shining, worshipful and earnest. Ryoki bit his lip to swallow a laugh. He had a whole collection of swords, mostly on loan to a museum in London.

“What do you think?” he asked, one eyebrow cocked.

“Attack!”

They leaped at Ryoki, who caught them each around the waist, flipped them over and tickled them until they could hardly breathe for laughing. Nobody heard the door open.

“Boys, what did I tell you about bothering this gentleman?” Kate stood in the doorway, hands on hips, head tilted to one side.

“‘Gentleman’?” the younger boy said. The boys looked at each other, then at Ryoki who winked. “Nah, he’s a real live ninja guy,” the older boy told her, “plus, he’s wearing pajamas.”

“Out.”

“Awww pleeeaasse, just a few more minutes—”

“One—two—”

“You’re getting on our nerds,” the younger boy muttered as they both slid off the bed and walked out the room, stoop-shouldered and crestfallen. Ryoki was about to plead their case, but heard them pounding full-speed down the hall, yelling,
“Sniper on the roof!”

“We have a large plastic arsenal,” Kate said apologetically, her hand on the door jamb as she turned to go.

“Wait,” he said, immediately startled by the pure honesty in his own voice. “I mean—” He cast around for some reason to make her stay and lit on her scribbled copy of
Gone with the Wind
. “I wanted to ask you about this,” he said, picking it up and tossing it to her. She caught the book awkwardly in both hands, like one accustomed to missing.

“Master’s thesis,” she said.

Ryoki glanced at her bookcase. “Not Shakespeare?”

“This is American mythology. I’m interested in the way popular culture simplifies history and this is full of romanticized Southerners and evil Yankees,” she said, flipping the pages. “But it was written just a few years after American women got the vote and I believe it reveals more about women in the 1920s than it does about the Antebellum South.”