The Sun Gods (33 page)

Bill told her of his longing for Mitsuko and of his shame for what his father and his country had done to her and her sister.

Mineko said, “I know my father has tried to protect me from all that. I had never seen him so angry before. There is so much locked up inside of him and my mother from the war, things they never talk about. I do know that I am lucky to be alive. The house where we were living was bombed when I was seven months old. When I was born, they had almost no medical supplies. I think my mother had trouble giving birth. She was never able to have children again.”

“I suppose that's another reason why they're so protective,” he said.

“I know that's it. I sometimes think I'm lucky to have such a wonderful mother and father, but other times I want to tell them to calm down, to let me live my life and grow. One thing is certain, though,” she added, looking at him intently, “I never want to do anything to hurt them.”

34

MINEKO'S DETERMINATION TO
spare her parents any pain made it difficult for Bill to see her. Nighttime dates were out of the question, and departures from her college schedule were difficult to manage. The best they could do was lunch once a week in the Ainu café, and on weekends they would take in a movie or stroll through a park. He could not write to her, and she had to be the one to initiate telephone calls.

In the middle of June, the rains came. Day after day, the heavens drummed on Bill's thin metal roof. The only quiet was to be had when the downpour turned into a blanket of thick mist. He complained to Mrs. Niiyama that his leather shoes in the entryway were turning green and hairy with mold. She laughed and assured him that the annual ordeal would come to an end by mid- or late July. There would be a single, huge clap of thunder, the skies would clear, and then he would be sorry that the rainy season had given way to scorching heat.

Without classes to keep him busy, the wait to see Mineko could be unbearable. He was almost gruff with her when she called on Friday after one week of rain to suggest that they meet in Ikebukuro for a revival of “Summertime” with Katharine Hepburn.

After the movie, they went to a café and ordered tall glasses of iced coffee. “I really enjoyed the Venice crowd scenes,” she said. “Did you notice one American soldier with round glasses moving past the camera?”

He had barely taken note of the actions of the main characters, let alone such minor details. He hardly spoke while they drank their coffees. When they stood again in the dark under the dripping eaves at the edge of Koganei Station, he embraced her fiercely.

“I love you, Mineko,” he said, his voice nearly lost in the pounding of the rain. “You're all I can think of. I want you with me all the time. I want to marry you.”

“You mustn't say that,” she pleaded. “There are others to keep in mind. We have to control ourselves.”

“Is that what you were doing today? Controlling yourself?”

“Must I blurt it out?”

“Just tell me: do you love me?”

“Yes, you know I do,” she moaned, pressing against him. “But I'm afraid. My parents would never allow me to marry an American. They think they will have their little girl with them until I finish college, at least. And I was never expecting anything like this to happen. I don't want to grow up so quickly.”

“You have no choice,” he said. “Don't you feel it?”

She raised her face to his, her dark eyes deeper than the surrounding blackness. The rain tore into the earth, sealing them off from the rest of the world. Again their lips met, the moisture of the steaming night sealing their bodies against each other.

“I will tell them tonight,” she whispered when their lips had parted.

“No, I want to be there with you.”

“But that would only make things worse.”

“I'm afraid of what your father might do to you.”

“I am not afraid for myself, only for them. They will be devastated.”

“Then let's try our best to do it right. I don't want to tear you away from your parents, but we have to be prepared for that.”

She hung her head and tightened her arms around him.

“I'll come to your house on Sunday morning the way I did the first time. Together, we'll bow down to your father, we'll do anything it takes to convince him that we love each other and want to be together.”

“He'll never agree to it. He'll tell us to wait until I have graduated.”

“If that's what it takes, I am willing to wait.”

“Can you wait for me for three more years?”

“I don't want to, but I can. I'll find a way to stay here and make a living. But let's not worry about that now. The important thing is to be ready for Sunday. What you have to do is pack a bag in the meantime and hide it someplace convenient. Because if this backfires, you're going to leave with me right then and there.”

He opened his umbrella and walked her to the nearest waiting cab, then stood amid the downpour watching the car's tail lights pull away.

The sheer joy of knowing she was his welled up inside him. Here he was, standing in the rain with an umbrella in his hand, on this narrow Japanese street with bar signs written in exotic characters and shops offering hot noodles and cool sushi, and damned if he wasn't some kind of absurd Far Eastern Gene Kelly ready to kick up his heels and tap dance his way through the sparkling puddles past policemen and startled onlookers! The mere thought of it released a wild laugh from him that reverberated against the stained stucco walls lining the street.

Mineko, Mineko, Mineko: the music of her name played in his ears as he sat in the dark on the edge of his bed near the open window. Dressed in a light yukata, he breathed in the cool, damp night air as the fragile house vibrated in the steady downpour. Against the roar of the rain, mere physical sound was helpless. The music had to come from within.

The headlights of a car cut through the rain on the tiny back street below his window. The roof of a cab with its lighted masthead edged past the Niiyamas' gate. Then it stopped and backed up until it was directly in front of the gate. He had seen Mr. Niiyama's shoes in the entryway, which meant that the master of the house was already at home, and it was unlikely the family would be having callers at this time of night. The light went on inside the cab, spilling onto the whitewashed cinder-block wall on the other side of the lane, and after a few minutes the back door opened. Someone seemed to be getting out, but no umbrella popped up, and after the door closed and the car drove off, he wondered if the passenger had thought better about stepping into the downpour.

Bill peered at the space above the front gate where the cab's roof had been. There was something there. If it was alive, it did not move. He had the uncanny feeling that a person was standing there, staring at the house. Straining to keep his gaze locked precisely on the spot, he edged toward the head of the bed and picked up the small reading lamp by the pillow. His hands turned the round shade toward the front yard and snapped on the light.

There were four fingers clutching the top of the gate. He waved in their direction, and the fingers let go. Now a small palm was waving in the feeble rays spilling out from his window. “Mineko?” he said aloud, but she couldn't possibly have heard.

He bolted down the stairs in the darkness, stepping into the entryway where his shoes were waiting. A second later, he was through the door and into the rain, splashing along the front walk to the gate, where he lifted the bar. Mineko threw herself into his arms, shivering.

“My God, Mineko, what happened?”

Without waiting for an answer, he took her by the shoulders—she was wearing only the one thin dress he had last seen her in at the station—and guided her to the door.

They stood in the entryway, letting the rainwater drip onto the concrete. Then he helped her out of her shoes and led her to the stairway on the right, guiding her up the steep ascent toward the faint glow cast by his reading lamp.

On the landing, he turned to look at her. Still neatly parted down the center, Mineko's hair was plastered against her cheeks, and her cotton dress clung to her, the skirts heavy and sticking to her legs. Opening the paper doors of his closet, he found his spare yukata of blue and white for her and dry clothes for himself. Hanging the yukata and its sash on a hook by the wash basin, he gave her his towel and started back down the stairs.

“Go in there when you're through,” he said, pointing to the wood-floored bedroom to the left. “Get under the covers.”

In the downstairs bathroom, he stripped off his own sodden yukata, threw it on the drain board by the Niiyamas' bathtub, and dried himself with a new towel from the linen closet. He felt himself stir when the towel's rough fabric caught him between the legs. He put on dry underwear, a white shirt and cotton twill pants.

With a rag from the kitchen, he carefully wiped the water that he and Mineko had trailed across the wooden floor of the hallway and the stairs. Mrs. Niiyama might overlook his bringing a woman to his room, but she would never forgive him if he left water spots on her painstakingly polished floor.

By the time he reached the landing, Mineko was gone, the paper door closed. Her dress was a lump of wet cloth in the basin.

The lamp was still on when he slid back the door. Curled up tightly on her side, Mineko made only the smallest mound on his bed. The thin covers trembled with her shivering. He opened the bedding closet and laid a thick winter quilt over her, kneeling by the pillow. The covers came to her chin, her fist underneath pulling on the sheet. She forced a smile, and he kissed her on the forehead.

“Better?” he asked.

She nodded once with a shiver.

He lifted a corner of the quilt and slid in beside her, but atop the sheet and terry cloth blanket in which she was tightly wrapped. Now they were nose to nose, her curled-up knees against his chest.

“Can you tell me what happened?” he asked.

Again she nodded, but another shiver went through her.

“Never mind. I'll wait.”

He laid an arm over her shoulder and kissed her nose. It was small and smooth and delicately curved. He brought his hand up and cupped it over her nose, closing his eyes so the size and shape beneath could register against the skin of his hand. Then, eyes still closed, he placed the cupped hand over his own nose—and his eyes flew open with the shock. What a monstrous hunk of bone and cartilage lay in his hand!

She saw his amazement and began to titter. Then she brought her own hand out from under the covers and performed the same examination in reverse. They laughed and kissed.

“Tell me what happened,” he said, lifting the quilt to let some of the accumulated heat escape.

“When I got home, all I could think of was Sunday. Each time I tried to imagine what would happen, it ended in a terrible argument. So I started opening my closet and drawers and wondering what I would pack to take with me. And the more I looked, the more I wanted to begin packing right away. So I did.”

“Oh, no, don't tell me. Your father came in.”

“My mother. She asked me what I was doing. I couldn't think of anything to say. I felt like such an idiot. I literally could not think of anything. All I could think of was you.”

He kissed her on both cheeks.

“So I told her exactly what we had planned. It felt so good talking to her about you, I was glad I hadn't been able to lie.”

“How did she take it?”

“Better than I had expected. She tried to reason with me. Of course, she said I was too young to be taking such a step. I agreed. I am, you know.”

“Believe me, I know.”

“I told her you would wait for me.”

“Didn't that make any difference?”

“I think it did make some. Things were actually beginning to look a little promising, when my father burst into the room. He said he had been wondering what the whispering was about, and he accused my mother of stabbing him in the back. Of course, she hadn't agreed to anything, but the mere suggestion from her that she was willing to listen had been enough. While they were screaming at each other, I grabbed my purse and ran out. I didn't even think to take an umbrella. I ran all the way to the station to get a cab.”

“I'm sorry I put you through that.”

“It wasn't all your fault. Besides, now I'm here with you.”

“Yes, but, in a way, I'm sorry about that, too.”

A sadness came into her eyes.

“I'm not sure I can say it right,” he explained. “Try to understand. Having you here next to me like this is probably the one thing I want more than anything else in the world … and, at the same time, I'm sorry you're here, now … like this. I don't ever, ever want to take advantage of you—of what I've made you do.”

“I'm not afraid. Well, a little. I've never been this close to anyone.”

The warmth of their bodies mingled and mounted, and he shifted the quilt away from himself. She had relaxed her cringing fetal position until now they lay together on their sides in perfect alignment.

“Do you feel how my body wants yours?” he asked.

“Yes,” she whispered. “And I know mine wants yours.”

“I'm trying to think of a good reason to keep them apart.”

“I'm sure there are many good reasons.”

He pushed the heavy quilt until it slid off the bed and onto the floor. Then he stood while she raised the light summer covers. Still dressed, he slipped in next to where she lay in his oversize robe. Their arms locked around each other, and their lips sought each other hungrily.

They kissed with their whole bodies, long and hard, and then, at the same moment, they pulled away, looking gravely into each other's eyes.

And when they spoke, it was at precisely the same moment.

“Tomorrow,” they said together.

And then they laughed.