Midnight and the Meaning of Love (61 page)

Fresh clothes, fresh cut, I walked out through the bedroom door into the sitting room. I picked up my watch from the desk and clamped it on.

It was 9:50 a.m.

“Josna, you know that we need to fly out of here immediately, right?” I was looking straight into her eyes with all the honesty I had. She lowered her eyes and placed both of her hands between her legs and raised her feet up on her toes.

“Ha,”
she said. “But I can’t leave yet. My sculptures have just arrived here, and I promised Mr. Nakamura …,” she said softly.

“I know,” I told her solidly.

“You can’t leave right now, but Akemi and I must. If we work together, we can go. You can stay until your promise to Mr. Nakamura is cleared and everybody can be safe.” I was speaking in a peaceful, even tone.

“What do you want me to do?” she asked.

“Lend Akemi your passport. When she and I are safe, we’ll mail it back to you immediately.”

“But how?” she asked, thinking of the difference in their skin and hair, I’m certain.

“Two phenomenal artists, a sculptor and a painter. I’ll leave that up to your imagination.”

“But Akemi’s New York travel visa is on her passport. I don’t have a New York visa in my passport,” Josna said. “If we go back to Grand-mother’s, I could figure out a way to get her passport back from Makoto somehow. Maybe I can convince Ichiro to listen to what I say. He likes me, but it will take some time. No one wants Akemi to leave.”

Akemi began speaking softly to Josna. Their dialogue went back and forth as I agonized over the passport visa scenario. I thought I had it beat with the Akemi-Josna switch I came up with.

“Akemi says that she will definitely leave here with you now, but that she wants you to take her to Busan,” Josna said.

“Busan?” I asked.

“Busan, South Korea. It’s a less than two hours’ flight from Tokyo, and she wouldn’t need a visa and neither would you. Akemi said that she wants to return her mother’s ashes to
her
mother before she goes to New York with you. She says that once she goes to New York with you, she will stay there with you for good,” Josna explained.

“How will she find her Korean grandmother after all these years?” I asked, feeling suddenly heavy with the thought of another odyssey in another country where I knew no one and could not speak even one word of the language.

“That was the trade,” Josna said. “Discovering the name and address of her Korean grandmother with the telephone number so she could meet her was the promise that kept Akemi cooperating with her father. It was the only thing that he had left that Akemi wanted so desperately. It was the reason she remained silent and rode quietly all the way to the airport and on to Hokkaido. She could have called
the police or run for help, but she didn’t because her father promised to give her the information if she just followed his orders.”

“And did he?” I asked with disbelief.

“He did. She has it now. But then her father had Makoto confiscate Akemi’s passport so that she could not leave Japan with you while he was away on his Asian tour. Nor could she leave for the Korea trip without him. Also her credit and bank cards are canceled and she has almost no money or clothing and she’s stuck all the way out here, of course. I told you he is quite clever and extremely determined.”

“How do you know if she was given the right information and address?” I asked, now that I was wiser at this game.

“She has already called. We also called from here while you were in the shower. They are all waiting to meet Akemi over there. They are not waiting for Nakamura-san. It seems that they hate him. You know there are problems between the Koreans and Japanese,” Josna said, not realizing that by now, I knew more than everyone else in this room about what was really going on with my wife and her family and their history and culture.

“Of course, I will take her. She’s my wife and I’ll take her wherever she needs to go,” I said, and I meant it. It was heavy but it made sense to me. Let me allow her to fufill her mother’s final request. Let me put Akemi’s heart and soul at ease, so that all that was left was for her to continue to love me and love our seeds.

When I thought of my two babies, I said, “Josna, you are the key to make sure no one on either side, in any family, gets hurt. All I want is my wife and nothing else,” I reminded her calmly and carefully.

“With your passport, we can get out of Japan. Once we are in Korea, we can send you your passport, and you can send us Akemi’s passport as soon as you get Makoto to give it up. Are you with me?” I asked her solemnly. There was a pause. Moments later, she handed me her passport. I opened it, looked, and then glanced at my wife a few times, comparing.

“I have cosmetics here in my purse. I’ll need scissors,” Josna said looking straight into me as though she were uncertain if I really wanted her to go through with this. Her eyes were asking me, “Exactly how far will you go?”

“Akemi, I will be right back,” I said to my wife. “Stay inside, okay?” I slid Josna’s passport into my pocket to be certain she wouldn’t change her mind. Then I looked at Josna, “My clippers are in the water closet.” I knew she understood.

In the elevator, I pulled out her passport to take a look at her photo. Josna had short hair in the picture, but not as short as her hair is now. At this point, I’d take my wife even without her long beautiful dark hair.

In the lobby I exited the elevator as Chiasa was revolving through the revolving doors. She and I were telepathic now, as she had suggested the second day we met. She stared at me to signal that we should meet discreetly. I veered off toward the washroom. She stalled a bit and did the same. In the Japanese Toto toilet, each toilet has a separate closed-in room. I opened the door and Chiasa stepped in. I checked to see if anyone saw, and then I entered also. It was she and I in the tight Toto closet.

“What’s all this?” I asked her, referring to “our breakup,” and our pretending not to know one another.

“It’s better this way,” she said, knowing I was listening for more of an answer. “Shota drove me here. We’re friends.”

“Friends?” I repeated.

“He believes that I saved him. I removed his blindfold and pulled your washcloth out of his mouth and untied him, so I guess I did,” she said coyly.

“He went for that?” I asked.

“Easily. You should’ve seen him guzzling that water I offered him.” She smiled. “And I handed him the keys, telling him that I found them right outside the vehicle.”

“What else did you tell him?”

“I told him I was there to buy some lavender from Serenity Fields when I saw him in distress. So I stopped to help him.” She was looking straight into me.

“So where is he now?” I asked.

“He left to go get Makoto from his hotel.”

“So you are flying back to Osaka with us.” I told her.

“How will you two leave Japan once you get to Osaka International without Akemi’s passport?” Chiasa questioned my question.
Then she answered it. “Don’t tell me …” She gasped. “Cool fucking idea,” she said with subdued excitement.

“What a costume! Lucky you, you won’t need it.” Then from out of her waist pack came Akemi’s passport. She handed it to me.

“Sleeping Beauty is Makoto,” she said. “I searched his pockets. I had my gloves on, of course. It was easy. Usually when they tranquilize a wild bear with that stuff I used, the trappers pull his lips up and check his gums and gawk at his teeth and take a blood sample and really invade his whole seven-foot body while it lays there lifeless. Sometimes they tag him. When he wakes up, he doesn’t even realize he’s been raided and is wearing a tracking device that won’t come off no matter what he does,” she told me in excited whispers.

“So why is Shota headed to Makoto’s hotel?”

“He’s just a neighborhood boy, not a ninja, not Nakamura’s security, not too smart. I mixed him up a little. I was stalling for you.”

“Will he call the police?”

“I don’t think he’ll call. He’ll want to save face with Makoto, Makoto will want to save face with Nakamura. Nakamura will want to save face with the media and everyone else who knew him. Besides, Makoto won’t know what hit him. He saw you and he knows it wasn’t you that shot him. He has no witnesses. It was just you and me and him. We two are definitely not telling,” she said without a shred of doubt.

“So you’ll come to the airport and leave with us?” I said to her.

“I’m invisible today. That won’t be possible,” she said with a pleasant but serious smile, her white teeth glistening. “I’ll take the longer route. I catch a bus from here to Sapporo. I’ll use my same return ticket to Osaka. I’ll get our stuff from the lockers. Oh yeah, that’s right, give me your key for the Kyoto lockers.” She held her hand out. “You’re not going to Kyoto, right? You’ll get to Osaka International Airport and then to New York?” Chiasa asked.

“Nah, I’ll go to Osaka and then to Korea,” I told her.

“Korea!” she exclaimed.

“Long story, but I have to go there first. Keep it between me and you,” I said.

“I have an idea,” she said. “Let’s fly to Osaka and then we can take the boat from the port in Osaka to Busan, Korea. It’s better. When
Nakamura looks for you and he checks all the airports, there will be nothing. Once you get to another country, he loses his pull. He can’t do anything to you two over there. I know there’s a boat. I rode it over one time when I had a four-day break from ninja camp,” she said, remembering. “We went to Busan for shopping. The boat, um, the ferry to Busan is called the Pan Star Line.”

When she stopped reminiscing, she found me looking at her. I was still stuck on “Let’s take a boat to Korea.” I could feel her feeling attached to me. I could feel myself feeling attached to her also. But it was complicated and impossible for now. She knew it also. Maybe that’s why she was invisible for the day, to stay away. So our feelings would not grow. And for the first time in my life as a young man, I understood something about my father, which I had never understood up until this second. I used to question, How could he have a woman as beautiful and wise and complete and sweet as Umma and still have space for a second wife to love and share with? Now, standing still in a tight toilet room about to part permanently with my lucky charm, my pretty puma, I had to ask myself,
How could I not love her?

“I’m just joking,” Chiasa said softly, about coming along with me and Akemi to Korea.

“I have to pay you your money for the extra days that you worked,” I told her.

“Instead of money, maybe you can give me something else?” she said.

“Something like what?” I asked.

“I gotta think about it. Something like one wish, whatever I ask you for.”

“How could I agree to that?” I asked her. “It could be something that conflicts with my beliefs. Then I couldn’t do it.”

“I wouldn’t ask you for something that conflicts with your beliefs. Give me a little trust, can’t you?” she said, exasperated.

“Aight then, if it doesn’t conflict with my beliefs and it doesn’t bankrupt me, I’ll do it for you,” I made the rare promise to her. She smiled hugely.

“Okay, so I’ll see you in Korea. How long are you staying there?” she asked me. “And what city are you going to?” she asked.

“Busan. I’m headed to Busan, but I don’t know for how long,” I told her. “I have your number and I know where you live.” Then
Chiasa looked uncertain. “Why? Can’t you just trust me a little?” I asked her.

“I can!” She powered up. “Besides, I have your movie camera and some more of your stuff, so I know you’ll call me,” she joked. I looked at her without a smile to let her know that my stuff wasn’t the reason I would call.

“Leave out of this hotel when I leave out,” I told her. “If you want to remain invisible, okay. Come to the airport. I’ll buy your ticket. Fly back to Osaka on the same flight so I can know you’re safe. At Osaka International Airport, we go our separate ways until I call you,” I said. “When we meet, we’ll even up and exchange everything that needs to be exchanged.”

She agreed.

Although we ticketed and boarded the flight from Asahikawa Airport in Hokkaido separately, we were all seated in the same coach section, in the same row. Our flight to Osaka International Airport was full. I figured maybe we had gotten these last-minute three open seats because of some cancelation by some other passengers. I was grateful.

Both Chiasa and I had aisle seats. Akemi sat beside me in the middle seat to my right. Of course I felt the impulse to introduce the two of them, but there were some strong points keeping me still. First, Chiasa had made it clear that she wanted to remain invisible. Thinking now ninja to ninja, I decided and understood that this was her strategic position. She wanted to burn her involvement with this mission just in case anything went wrong in the remaining hours or days. It was sharp of her, and I understood. So I stopped considering whether she had personal reasons for wanting us to appear anonymous to one another. With the network of thoughts about what had already taken place so far, what was happening now, and the plans for my and Akemi’s future, there was no more space left for me to decipher or confirm or pinpoint anything else.

I also thought that introducing two women, my wife and the woman who had made it possible for me to find my wife, on a plane surrounded by strangers would be an unnecessary security problem. Their talking to one another might reveal too much. Who knows who’s listening? Besides, both of them would be speaking Japanese across and over me in a plane packed with primarily Japanese people. Only I would be left out of the language loop. Of course I chose the way that would lead to the well-being of my wife.