Like Sweet Potato Pie (7 page)

A chilly moon rose over looming black mountains, a far cry from hard concrete angles and millions of city lights dazzling in my beloved Tokyo. Horns and headlights crammed on the gleaming expressway, flowing all night long. The lighted subway whirring by, blowing my hair on its way to popular electronics district Akihabara, which came to life after dark like a glowing vampire.

Instead I found myself marooned in Redneckville, trying desperately to sell Mom’s house. Facing what I’d lost. Reordering my messed-up life.

And stumbling straight into the arms of Jesus, who caught me by astonishing surprise.

Uh … yeah. That.

I scrunched my eyes closed, remembering the hardwood bedroom floor under my knees as I prayed to give my heart to God. The surge of tears after years of pent-up pain. The love which flowed, like a song I vaguely recalled, from the pages of Mom’s journal and marked-up, underlined Bible.

I knew changing loyalties to Jesus didn’t miraculously make everything right with the world. Becky’d told me so. And Faye. And Adam. And half the Bible, for crying out loud. Mom followed Jesus, too, toward the end of her life—and instead of pie-in-the-sky, she got a brain aneurysm.

No, Mom got better than pie. She got heaven.

But Ashley’s blackmail threat, on top of my quivering Mount Fuji of other problems, seemed like a low blow, even for God.

Shouldn’t He … I don’t know. Start me off easy?

I stuffed my free hand in my pocket, shivering in the wind.

What options did I have anyway? I could give up on God. Turn my back on this Jesus who made the blind see and the dead raise to life. Believe what Becky called “Happy Meal” theology, which meant tossing the toy back in the box if I got one I didn’t like.

Or I could take a risk and throw in my lot with Jesus. Cast my net on the other side of the boat, against all logic and say,
“I believe anyway.”

Even if it hurts.

Because it does.

I gently smoothed Christie’s silky head, tears leaking out as I recalled the beautiful feel of Japanese words in my mouth. Chopsticks balanced in my fingers, slender and nimble.

And most of all, my black-and-white byline under a news story:
Shiloh P. Jacobs.
Deadlines. Dictionaries. My head bent over a laptop, Japanese documents and books sprawled on my desk in piles.
Kanji
character stickers and Japanese verb forms jotted on Post-it notes. Journalistic ethics books for my master’s. My hands flitting across the keyboard as I created and polished and double-checked blocks of text, dancing with words and metaphors.

The angry countenance of my editor, Dave Driscoll, and the slight jut of his chin as he nodded gruffly. “Good story,” he told me only twice.

Once when I plagiarized. The other when I rose to my feet amid applause, wending my way to the front of the auditorium to receive a coveted journalism award.

I pressed wet eyes closed, feeling the emptiness of my hands. Hands that now counted out change. Stacked dirty plates. Stickered books. Wrote checks to collection agencies. And now had to fight off my sneaky half sister, who wanted to scrape the little I had left from between my fingers.

“Blessed is anyone,”
Jesus said when his beloved cousin John waited on the verge of death,
“who does not stumble on account of me.”

John still lost his head. Becky still lost her baby. And I just lost the one remaining family member I thought I still had.

Can I still believe? And not fall away like a lifeless leaf, hanging by a tendril from Stella’s silver maple?

I ran my palm over the rough, wooden deck where Mom had watched the sun rise so many times.
Come on, house! Just
sell! And then I’d count out the dollar bills that solved all my problems. Pay off my taxes. Even pay off Ashley, for goodness’ sake, some small sum so she’d leave me alone.

Is that too much to ask, God? Just take me back to Japan! And I’ll never come here again.

Christie sighed in contentment and tumbled over in my arms, pressing her fuzzy dog snout to the warmth of my neck. And I leaned into her, listening to her little heart beat strong and warm, cradled in my arms.

Trusting.

Resting.

Sound asleep, like Jesus in the storm-tossed boat when His disciples panicked, afraid they’d sink and drown.

“You of little faith,”
He said,
“why are you so afraid?”

And He stilled the storm and waves with a single word.

“That’s me, Jesus,” I whispered, stroking Christie’s tiny ears, flopped warm over my arm. “The littlest faith in the world. But if You want me, I’m still Yours.”

I put my cell phone away and headed back into the house. Lowered Christie, limp with sleep, into her dog bed and started putting away the dishes Faye’d washed, cup handles out like my real-estate agent instructed.

Ashley had already left five messages, blinking red.

“
Don’t think you can weasel out of this, Shiloh! I told Dad about it already, and he thinks …
” Beep.

“I don’t speak to Dad!” I retorted out loud, slapping a plate in the cabinet.

“
Hi, Shiloh? I’m warning you! If you want to play dirty, I’ll go for everything. Even the car. Even the measly little …
” Beep.

I turned off the answering machine and unplugged the phone. Even messages from Shifflet Septic Services were better than this. I threw the dish towel on the counter and slumped at the kitchen table, head in my hands.

And jumped as the doorbell buzzed.

At this hour? I scowled at the door.

Faye. It must be Faye. So mother-like! Or maybe she wants to tell me
she’s in love with Earl.
I scooted off the chair and reached to unlock the door then pulled back a curtain first.

Huh?
I froze, leaning closer.

Um … no. Not Faye. I didn’t recognize the car in the driveway at all. A deep apple-red Mitsubishi, new.

I tried not to think about the murder Becky mentioned, palms suddenly sweaty. I pressed my cheek to the glass, twisting to see better.

A shadowy figure loomed at my front door, partially illuminated by the porch light.

I
must be dreaming. No way under the sun she’d be standing here on my front porch in a black-burgundy Bauhaus punk-rock T-shirt. Shiny tan jacket. Impatiently checking the address on a piece of paper.

I swung open the door and stared, uncomprehending, into the black-lined eyes of Kyoko Morikoshi.

“Kyoko?” I gasped, fumbling with the screen-door latch. No more words came. I just held the door half open, memories swirling like moths against the glow of the porch light: the acrid whiff of Kyoko’s cigarette smoke swirling up into the Tokyo sky, late nights at the Associated Press office, and our trips to record shops (Kyoko) and Beard Papa’s cream puffs (me), scarves nestling our necks. The roil of crowds at the crosswalk. Ticket booths and red Japanese maples.
Onigiri
rice triangles stuffed with shrimp and mayo. White-gloved bus drivers. Chopsticks. Skyscrapers.

Kyoko’s shoulders relaxed, and she stuffed the paper in her pocket. Beep-beeped the car lock. “Well, are you going to let me in, or do I need to spend the night on the porch?”

I forced my mouth to move. “You’re—you’re here!”

“And bearing gifts,” she announced in her coastal California accent, holding out a bag with a box inside. A skull ring twinkled from her finger next to indigo-painted nails. She looked nothing like the Japanese-American Associated Press reporter and legal expert she was supposed to be.

“It’s not another puppy, is it?” My hands shook, giddy, as she stepped through the doorway. “I got one of those in a box today, too.”

“If it is, you’d better call the Japanese Bureau of Health and the ATA.” Kyoko slipped off black boots and stepped into proffered striped house slippers then plopped the box in my hands.

I slipped off the bag and found, to my disbelief, B
EARD
P
APA’S
splashed across the glossy side of the box. Inside nestled six glorious cream puffs, all hugged in white tissue paper.

“Kyoko!” I screamed. “How did you do it? You know those are my favorite!”

“Dry ice.” She shook off her huge, ugly purse—with green monsters in an ‘80s Atari-game design—and stretched. “That’s how they package them for long deliveries. And believe me, this one took long enough.”

My eyes ping-ponged from the box to Kyoko.

“I did get sidetracked in Richmond awhile, too. Great music stores. Check it out—a rare Ramones LP!” She held it up, then seeing nothing registered, shook her head in pity. “Why aren’t you living in Richmond, at least, instead of Pork Rind Central? I could barely find Staunton on a map!”

“Technically I live in Churchville. It’s even smaller than Staunton.” I poked a cream puff with my finger, mouth watering.

“Churchville. Ironic, huh? Since you’re so spiritual and all lately.” She smirked, shrugging off her jacket.

Kyoko didn’t know the half of it. But I barely heard her. Mouth gaping at the cream puffs, the box, and Kyoko. Right there in my living room. I threw my arms around her.

Anti-affectionate Kyoko grumpily tried to disengage my hug. “What’s that?” She scowled at Christie, who batted her tail.

“A dog.”

“Hmmph.”

Jet lag chased away sleep, so we sat on the living room floor and shared—or rather, she declined, and I ate—my box of cream puffs. Light and fluffy, dry, with a thick, silky-smooth custard filling. Exactly as I remembered them. Flavored with vanilla and dusted with powdered sugar.

“You really bought these at Beard Papa’s?” I turned the box around, mouth full. Still not quite believing the vision before me.

“Well, they’re not from KFC.”

“I know. It’s not Christmas.”

Good thing Tim and Becky weren’t there, or I’d have to explain how millions of Japanese preordered fast-food fried chicken for Christmas, and during the last two weeks of December, you couldn’t even get a sandwich at KFC for all the backed-up Christmas orders.

I bit into another cream puff, tasting Tokyo days. Saw myself standing in line at Beard Papa’s in jacket and knee boots, crisp and prim, cute expensive purse over my shoulder. Bowing politely as a uniform-clad girl with shaggy mahogany hair handed me my change in
yen.

The scent of powdered sugar crumbling, for one moment, the unscalable wall between yesterday and today.

I wondered if ancient Mrs. Inoue at the little neighborhood store still remembered me—if she gave ginger candy to anyone else—and whose shoes now slept in my apartment
genkan
(entranceway). Who sat in my desk at the Associated Press office? Who practiced English with the receptionist in the shiny gold apartment lobby of Carlos Torres Castro, my Argentinean ex-fiancé? (The one who unceremoniously dumped me for an Australian, mind you, after I arrived in Virginia for Mom’s funeral.)

“You okay?” Kyoko turned her head sideways, narrowing black eyes at me. “Don’t worry. I’ve got loads of Japanese stuff for you in the car.”

“Never been better.” I smiled, quickly sponging my face with my palm. That wasn’t exactly true. But for the tiniest sliver of a moment, with sweet, familiar custard melting on my tongue, I felt like it. “Kyoko, what are you doing here?”

Christie padded into my lap, and Kyoko recoiled. Animals made her nervous, as if they’d start spewing venom and diseases just by visual contact. She picked a single dog hair off her leg and scooted farther away.

“I should ask you the same thing,” she said with a suspicious arch of her sparsely plucked eyebrow, new piercing twinkling. “I thought you’d have sold this place and escaped Virginia by now.”

Kyoko looked exactly the same, albeit a pound or two lighter, which I chalked up to the absence of my constant temptations with food. The fashionably purple-red sheen had brightened in her mushroom-shaped hair, more maroon than black. I’d missed her terribly.

“I’m working on it. Did you see the F
OR
S
ALE
sign out front?”

“Yep. Do you hand out lifeboats, too? Better count ‘em first.”

Titanic Farm and Real Estate.
I know, I know. If they didn’t sell so many houses, I’d dump them for another realty company that actually paid marketing professionals.

“I especially liked the ‘Farm’ part.” She grinned and poked me with her slippered foot. “So does this place qualify as farm or real estate? I’m thinking both. After all, I could certainly smell cows on the way down here, and those curtains look like gingham to me.”

I threw a couch pillow at Kyoko. “It’s not
that
bad, is it? Or maybe I’m just being assimilated.”

“Let’s hope not.” She dusted the pillow off and stuck it under her head, lying back on the cream living room carpet. “So how many offers have you had?”

“No offers. Two visits this month. I’ll be glad when it’s over and I can get back to Japan. Start my master’s again.” I snuggled sleeping Christie against my cheek. “But I need house money to do that.”

“I’m sure your place’ll sell fast. To somebody with cowboy boots,” Kyoko snarked then stopped in midchortle. “No offense. I know your mom lived here, and …”