The Street of a Thousand Blossoms (41 page)

After the graduation ceremonies, Hiroshi celebrated by taking them to dinner at the Katana restaurant. The alleyways were alive again with small shops and restaurants reopening. After so many years of struggle, Kenji could feel his grandparents’ excitement at being at the Katana again. Before the war, they had eaten there once a month. It was a small, comfortable family-run restaurant that Kenji chose above all the other newly opened ones. He watched his
obaachan
touch her teacup, her bowl, and the wooden chopsticks as if she were afraid they might disappear. Hiroshi stood and raised a toast. “To my college-educated brother, the scholar!”

Kenji studied Hiroshi’s face, strong yet always forgiving. There were traces of their father in his brother’s face; a strength and determination Kenji knew was tempered by his innate integrity. Hiroshi was quickly climbing the ranks in sumo, and his next big tournament would be at the new Kokugikan sumo stadium built in Kuramae.

Their arms were already lifted in a toast, when Kenji stood before he lost his nerve. He bowed formally to his grandparents.
“Ojiichan, obaachan
, I’ve been thinking about this for a long time,” he began. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I can’t … I don’t wish to be an architect. Now that I’ve graduated, I hope to continue learning to be a mask artisan.”

The only halfhearted argument he could make about returning to the masks was that the preperformance censorship implemented by the government during the war had been lifted from traditional theater. Actors would need masks again, and perhaps one day he’d make a mask that would be worn by the famous actor Otomo Matsui, just as Akira Yoshiwara had. Maybe Matsui would even know something about the whereabouts of his sensei. He would keep quiet and wait. In his moment of uncertainty, a thought rushed through Kenji.
If I were still Kenji the ghost, I would simply disappear
.

His
ojiichan
lowered his sake cup soundlessly to the table and spoke softly, thoughtfully. “There are many ways in which to rebuild a nation,” he said.

“There are many different kinds of scholars,” his
obaachan
added, for which he was grateful.

“Hai.”
His grandfather nodded. “It’s what you’ve always wanted. We live a short enough time on this earth. A man should do what he loves.”

Kenji swallowed. His heart raced with happiness.

His
obaachan
smiled, raising her sake cup again.
“Hai
, your
ojiichan
speaks the truth,” she said.

“And when have I not spoken the truth?” his
ojiichan
teased.

“When have you not spoken?” His
obaachan
rolled her eyes and made them all laugh.

Kenji drank down the sake and felt the warmth spread throughout his body.

Haru was all packed. There was still a little time before she left for the train station. She stopped to look around the room and catch her breath. Weeks had led up to this moment in late September, but the reality of leaving had struck her only during the past week. Eight months earlier, when she received the letter from Nara Women’s University, she had carried it with her for days without telling her father or Aki. It surprised her like an unexpected gift. Not that there’d been any reason, since her grades were good and her test scores high; still, Haru wanted to enjoy the feeling a little longer before she shared it with anyone else.

At seventeen, Haru could have just as easily been preparing for her marriage ceremony as going off to study at a university. She knew girls in her class who wanted nothing more than families of their own. But her father embraced Haru when she told him, smiling widely. “It’s what you hoped for,” he said, before letting go.

It took Aki more time to adjust to the idea that she’d be gone. Hesitating, Haru had questioned if she should go to Nara. She’d become both mother and sister to Aki since the firestorm, and she wavered at the idea of leaving her sister alone, dangling. But after a week, Aki had accepted her leaving and seemed happy again. She even spoke of visiting Haru in Nara. At fourteen, her sister was already a classic beauty, fair-skinned and delicate, resembling their mother more with each passing day.

Haru stopped packing, and glanced quickly at herself in the mirror. With her hair pulled back, she was darker complexioned and sharper featured than Aki, though she saw hints of her mother in the high bridge of her nose and around the mouth. She was dressed in her traveling kimono, a fine weave of silk embroidered with blue irises, an expensive gift her father insisted on buying for her. She looked older in the exquisite kimono. It was almost as if someone else were looking
back at her in the mirror. She wondered what others saw when they looked at her. Just yesterday, she’d seen Hiroshi-san. She met him by surprise on her way home from picking up some last-minute daikon at the small shop down the road.

“Haru-san,” he said, bowing to her.

“Hiroshi-san.” She bowed back. When she stood straight, she barely reached his shoulder. Hiroshi was muscular but not as heavy as some of the other
sumotori
. He was wearing a dark blue
yukata
robe and looked quite handsome, older and more self-assured than the young
rikishi
who used to come to pick up the
chanko
she cooked. The sweet smell of
bintsuke
in his hair floated through the air.

“I understand that you’re leaving for Nara tomorrow.”

Haru paused.
“Hai,”
she said, realizing everyone at the stable must have known for months.

“Your father said you’ll be entering Nara University a year early.” Hiroshi smiled. “He’s very proud of you.

Haru blushed.

He must have noticed, and added, “It’s hard to keep any secrets at the stable.”

Haru couldn’t imagine anyone keeping a secret with all the
rikishi
living in such close quarters.
“Hai,”
she said.

“May I?” He offered to carry her
furoshiki
.

“Domo arigato
, but it’s not heavy.” She clutched the
furoshiki
tighter, grateful to have something in her hand.

“We’ll be very sad to see you leave,” he said, walking along with her.

She blushed again, pushed her free hand into the folds of her kimono. For a big man, he moved lightly as they walked in silence. Haru glanced up him. “May I ask you a question, Hiroshi-san?”

“Hai,”
he answered.

“How was it for you leaving your family and coming to the stable?” Haru had always wondered how boys as young as fifteen could leave home to train as sumo apprentices. She was older and going to university, but still she felt bereft.

Hiroshi cleared his throat. “I was a bit older than other boys when I came to the stable. I imagine the young ones are terribly homesick at first.”

“Hai,”
she agreed.

He added, “But I’ve wanted to be a
sumotori
ever since I was a boy; most of us want the same thing. We all realize what an honor it is to be chosen. And we are fortunate; your father is a good man.”

He hadn’t said a good coach, she thought, but a good man, which somehow meant more to her. Haru already knew her father was a good coach, so it meant more that a
rikishi
also respected him as a person. “He thinks very highly of you,” she said. She looked away, knowing that her father had spoken of Hirohsi-san just once or twice over the years, saying what a hard worker he was.

“Your father has been kind,” he said. “I have a long way to go yet.”

She smiled. “Hai, we all have.”

“And what will you study at Nara?” he asked.

Haru looked up, pleased at how comfortable it was having this conversation with Hiroshi. “Science,” she answered. “Botany, perhaps, the science of plants.” She felt her heart beating faster. For months after the firestorm, she had searched for any signs of life and found it in a weed that refused to be smothered. Its endurance had inspired her studies, including Darwin’s theories and books on botany. Still, she felt suddenly foolish and had no idea why she’d told him botany. “Or maybe not,” she added.

Hiroshi laughed. “I believe, Haru-san, you would make a very good scientist.”

“Why is that?”

“Science is very precise,” he answered.

She waited for him to continue but he didn’t. When they reached the front gate of the stable, Hiroshi bowed low and said, “Science is also full of surprises.” He smiled. “I hope to see you again before you leave.”

Haru bowed back. It was the longest conversation she’d had with a man, other than her father.

Haru stroked the smooth material of her kimono and returned to her packing. When she glanced up, Aki was standing in the doorway. “Don’t forget to write me,” she said, her voice sad, her face solemn.

Haru smiled. “How could I forget to write to you? Besides, we really won’t be that far away.”

“Yes we will,” Aki said. “You won’t be here at the house, or even in Tokyo, so it will be far away.”

Haru didn’t know what to say. “Just think, you’ll have this room all to yourself,” Haru said lightly. “Soon, you won’t want me to return and disturb your things.”

Haru watched her sister. Where had that vibrant young Aki gone? The little girl who once entertained and exasperated her was now a thin, sullen young woman, whose bright eyes had dulled even with all her beauty. Haru sometimes felt she’d lost more than just her mother five years ago. She cleared her throat, looked down at the thickened skin on her palms. “We’d better go,” she said, grabbing her bag and Aki’s hand.
“Otosan
is waiting.”

Sho Tanaka paced back and forth in the courtyard, waiting for his daughters to come downstairs. Fall was in the air, the sad, lonely scent of summer fading. A lessening of light. Haru, spring. Aki, fall. Each daughter named for the season in which they had arrived into the world.

If they didn’t hurry, Haru would be late catching her train to Nara. How had the time slipped away from him? When had she grown into a young woman? He smiled to himself at the thought. Was Haru ever a young girl? She always seemed older than her age. At seventeen, she had sacrificed so much of her youth taking care of the household. After Noriko’s death, she became
okamisan
of the stable, taking care of Aki and helping him with the
rikishi
, and, strangely enough, the wrestlers always treated her with the respect usually given to a grown woman. Even Daishima, who thought of nothing other than his own well-being, respected Haru.

Sho couldn’t imagine the Katsuyama-beya without her. What he would miss most was Haru’s warmth and her nurturing ways. It was something he wasn’t able to give to either of his daughters after
Noriko’s death. After Aki lost her voice, she became remote and difficult. If anyone questioned her too closely about the firestorm, she would cry and stay by Haru’s side. Instead, he had remained at a distance and devoted himself to rebuilding the stable, watching the
rikishi
slowly return. He had survived the loss of his wife at the cost of his daughters. Sho shook his head and couldn’t imagine what he and Aki would talk about every night with Haru gone. Her calm had tied their lives altogether.

There had been too many goodbyes lately. It made him wistful. He looked up to see if his daughters were coming. Other fathers might worry about finding their daughter a good husband. But Sho felt Haru deserved to find her own way. Any college boy with any sense would see Haru’s value. He smiled to think how much she was like him, disciplined and organized. Thankfully, both of his daughters had resembled their mother, each a daily reminder of Noriko. Sometimes, when he caught a glimpse of Aki leaving the house in a hurry, he still saw Noriko rushing off to shop at the market.

At the train station, he would be saying goodbye again, this time to Haru. One by one, it felt as if everyone were leaving him, though it would never be as devastating as Noriko’s sudden absence. He never had the chance to say goodbye—to whisper
sayonara
in her ear—a simple word that would have meant so much.

“There you are,” he said, seeing Haru and Aki step out of the house. Yes, it was true. They had grown up without his realizing it; he had been too busy training boys to become
sumotori
while his little girls had become young women. Even Aki wouldn’t need him much longer. She was already so distant, keeping to herself and spending so much time in her room. What did a fourteen-year-old girl do in her room all day? he wondered. Then he smiled and touched the sleeve of Haru’s kimono, taking the suitcase from her hand and, as he looked down, catching a glimpse of the small scar on her palm. “We must hurry, Haru-chan,” he said, “or you’ll miss your train.”