Under the Blood-Red Sun (21 page)

Billy was right
about how if we ever needed a game of baseball, that was the time. I slept like a lead sinker for three nights in a row.

But in the middle of the fourth night, I woke up in a sweat, breathing hard. Grampa struck a match and lit the candle that he kept by his mat. The room glowed with low, jittery yellow light. My sheets were damp and twisted.

Grampa leaned on his elbow, and squinted over at me. “You dreaming.”

A nightmare … Parts of it still lurked in my mind. I sat up and stared down at the shape that was Grampa. He was kind of fuzzy. At first I didn’t think it was him. I saw Papa instead—the dream—Papa lined up with Sanji and a bunch of other fishermen, all of them on their knees. There was a firing squad, the men getting ready to shoot. I couldn’t remember if they shot or what, but I could
remember Papa smiling … smiling at me …
This is a good place, Tomikazu
, he was telling me …
Take the boat, stay … have a couple of kids
.

“Boy,” Grampa said.

I moved my feet off the bed so they touched the floor, and tried to shake those awful thoughts out of my head. “I’m okay,
ojii-chan
.… It was just a dream … like you said.”

“Uhnnn,” Grampa mumbled, lying back down. He pinched the candle flame out with his thumb and middle finger.

I got up and crept through the dark house to the porch and sat on the top step. Lucky came stretching out from under the house and trotted up the stairs. She sat next to me and yawned. Her breath was sharp. A couple of her puppies wandered out. I could barely see them, it was so dark.

Something scurried through the bushes and Lucky’s ears went straight up. “Mongoose,” I whispered. “Or a rat.”

This is a good place.…

Think of the game, think of baseball.… Papa is all right, stop worrying. And Sanji … Mari … no, no, no … don’t think about that. Think about baseball … baseball.…

I sat there with Lucky for about a half hour, then went back to bed. The dream was almost gone, but I still felt uneasy.

•   •   •

Grampa had to wake me the next morning. “Go look the porch,” he said, nudging me. Seven o’clock. I’d slept late.

I bolted up. Out on the porch someone had left a five-gallon gasoline can. “What’s this?” I asked Grampa.

“Kerosene.”

“Where’d it come from?”

“Look the name on the side.”

M
ATSON
N
AVIGATION
C
OMPANY
, in scratched and fading white letters. Five gallons of kerosene. For our stove. For our lantern. That stuff was as good as gold, and almost impossible to get.

Mr. Davis …

“Mama!” I called.

But Mama already knew about it. “Go get fifteen eggs, Tomi. Take ’um to Billy’s house. Then go find a can. We going take some of this kerosene to Sanji family.”

I took twenty-three eggs to the Davises. Every one I could find.

•   •   •

That afternoon, Billy came over with Red, and a ball and a bat. He found me at the chicken coops with Grampa and Kimi. Lucky and her pups ran off with Red.

We’d collected fourteen more eggs. Mama wanted me to take them down to the store and sell them, or trade them. She’d asked me to help Grampa because he was going to kill himself if he didn’t relax a little. “He worry too much,” Mama had said. “Bombye he going get more
stroke, Tomi.…
You
the man now.… You do that work.”

“Come,
ojii-chan
,” I said now. “Rest for a while. Come with me and Billy.” I could do his work later.

“For what?”

“For nothing. You don’t need a reason to take a break.”

“No got time for that.”

“Aw, come on, Grampa … you got the time. I’ll do this chicken work for you later. How’s about it?”

Grampa eyed me. “You clean this chicken coops?”

“Yeah.”

“You take this eggs, sell ’um?”

“Sure, come on.”

He thought for a moment, making me wait, like he was doing me a big favor. He was so
irritating
, sometimes. “You pick those weeds from by—”

“Grampa!”

Grampa gave in and came along, bringing Kimi. He acted as if it didn’t matter to him if she came or not. But he didn’t fool anyone. He knew that Kimi was still scared from the planes and explosions.

The two of them sat near the trees in the shade while Billy pitched his perfect curveballs. Those moments at diamond grass kept me from going crazy—thinking about what was going to happen to Papa, and what was going to happen to us. But nobody knew anything at all.

“We need a batter,” Billy said, raising his eyebrows and tipping his head toward Grampa.

“Grampa, come bat,” I called.

Grampa threw his head back and laughed and laughed and laughed. I looked at Billy.

Grampa slapped his knee and kept on laughing. Then Kimi started laughing. Billy gave me a what’s-so-funny look. Grampa only laughed at the movies.

“Come on, Grampa … come hit the ball.…”

Grampa stopped laughing when he saw that we were serious. He scowled at me, then glanced at Kimi’s big eyes, and her smile. “Confonnit,” he mumbled, and creaked himself up.

Kimi stood up, too, and started jumping up and down.

Grampa broke into a grin and rubbed Kimi’s head, then walked over to the bat. I took off my glove and showed him how to hold it and how to swing it. “Just look at the ball, Grampa … then crack ’um when it comes by.”

Grampa shoved me aside.

I put my glove back on and squatted down, punching my mitt. “Grampa DiMaggio up to bat,” I shouted to Billy. “Send him a good one.”

Billy made a big show of giving the pitch a royal windup—stepping back, then kicking his leg extra high. He sent a slow, easy ball across the plate, one Kimi could’ve hit.

Grampa swung before the ball was even close. He lost his balance and staggered. He growled to himself and came back to the plate. I tossed the ball back to Billy.

“Way to go, way to go,” I said to Billy. Then I whispered, “Just keep your eye on the ball, Grampa.”

Billy wound up and sent another one that practically
floated across. This time Grampa smacked it … about five feet, anyway. It hit the ground and rolled through the grass to Billy.

Grampa started jumping up and down like a crazy man. “Eh, busta, good, nah? Wa-ha-ha-ha-ha-haaaaaa … good, nah? Wa-ha-ha-hahahahaha.”

We all started laughing. You couldn’t help it when you saw that sour old man in such a good mood. It was like the olden days again, me and Billy at the movies, rolling in our seats and watching Grampa laughing at Laurel and Hardy.

Grampa dropped the bat, slapped the dust off his hands, and strutted like a rooster back over to Kimi. He was okay, Grampa.… For the first time in my life I could see a little bit of Papa in him. And, I could hardly believe, a little bit of
Rico
.

I heard dogs yapping somewhere, and growling. Lucky came racing out into the field with all four puppies chasing her, trying to catch something she was dragging by her teeth … something white.…

“Jeeze!
They dug up the
flag!”

Me and Billy and even Grampa ran over to catch her. “Lucky,” I called. “Stop! Lucky!” But she swerved away. “Come back here, you mutt.”

“Go that way,” Billy yelled, and we circled around the pack of frenzied dogs from opposite directions. Lucky saw what we were doing and headed farther out into the open, the white-and-red flag flopping over the grass behind her.

“Hurry,” I yelled. “Someone will see it!”

Grampa came out and closed off Lucky’s run from his
side while Billy and me worked around the ends. But it wasn’t any of us who outfoxed her. Red broke away from the stumbling pack trailing the flag and took a shortcut.

“Get her, Red boy,” Billy called.

And he did … caught up and latched on to the flag, slowing Lucky down enough for me and Billy to tackle her. Red tried to get the flag away for himself, but Billy pulled it out of his teeth and held it up over his head.

“Lucky, you crazy dog!” I said. “You want to get us
arrested?”
She and Red kept jumping up and trying to bite the flag.

Grampa took a long, sorrowful glance at his flag from across the field.

“We’ll take care of it,” I said.

Grampa turned away and acted as if it didn’t matter to him what we did with it. He took Kimi’s hand and headed home.

When he was out of sight, Billy grinned and said, “They were having a pretty good time, weren’t they?”

“Yeah, having a good time giving me a heart attack … Come on, we got to bury that thing under a pile of
stones.”

Which is exactly what we did.

•   •   •

At sunrise the following morning, Grampa rode away on his bicycle, the rusty old fenders rattling down the bumpy path into the trees. I yawned, standing next to Mama at the front door.

“Where’s he going?” I asked.

“Downtown,” Mama said. “Last night up Charlie house,
ojii-chan
heard they going send Sand Island men to mainland.”

“Mainland? Why?”

“Shira-nai …
I don’t know …
ojii-chan
going try ask somebody …
wakara-nai …”

Mama moved away from the door slowly, like she was getting old. She had so much to worry about. And what could I do? Nothing. But I had to do something. The mainland was a place somewhere far across the sea. California, Arizona, New York. How could we ever go there? How could Papa ever come back here?

Kimi and I ate a silent breakfast, with Mama sitting and staring out the window. When we were done, I asked Kimi if she wanted to go collect the eggs from Grampa’s chickens. She nodded, and we got the bucket from the back steps.

We brought back seventeen eggs—five for us and twelve to trade at the grocery store. “After store,” Mama said, “you go see Charlie. Try find out when school start again.”

School.

I’d almost forgotten about it. I missed seeing Mose and Rico, and Mr. Ramos. I missed riding in the car with Billy and Mr. Davis. I wondered if we’d still do that. “Tomi,” Mama said. “What you daydreaming about? Somebody knocking.”

I stuck my head out of the kitchen. Mrs. Wilson was peeking through the screen. “It’s Mrs. Wilson,” I whispered to Mama.

Mama froze. Mrs. Wilson had never been over to our house before.

She rapped again, long and hard.

Mama hurried to take her apron off. She patted her hair.

“Mrs. Wilson,” Mama said. “Come inside, please.” She opened the door.

“No, thank you … I … can only stay a minute.”

Mrs. Wilson glanced around our small front room. She looked nice, like she was dressed for church. I was very relieved that the emperor was buried under the house.

“Is something wrong?” Mama asked.

“No … It’s just that … well, Keet … He was supposed to come down to tell you that I … that we … would like you to come back to work … starting today.…”

Mama didn’t say anything.

“You have a very good friend in the Davis family,” Mrs. Wilson suddenly went on. “John and … Mr. and Mrs. Davis came over last night to speak to Mr. Wilson and me in your behalf. We, of course, have been worried, but they assured us that your family is completely loyal to the United States.” She studied Mama before going on. “So … well … we’ve decided to have you return to work.”

Mama thought for a long moment, then said, “I come fifteen minutes.”

Mrs. Wilson nodded. “Good.” She rubbed her hands together like she was washing. “Yes … fifteen minutes, then.”

She turned and started down the steps. The pups jumped like grasshoppers around Mrs. Wilson’s legs as she picked her way through them and hurried off into the trees.

•   •   •

After the sun went down and the first stars poked into the sky, Grampa came home. He walked the bike back up the path. “They gone already,” Grampa told Mama without looking at her. “Mainland.”

“Where on the mainland?” I asked.

“Jus’ mainland … on one boat.”

Silently Mama watched Grampa walk the bike around the side of the house. Her face showed nothing. No sadness. No anger. Papa might as well have gone to the moon.

I sat on the steps and studied my dusty feet. “What are we going to do now, Mama?”

“We going be strong, that’s what.… We going wait and we going be strong.”

I can’t do this, Mama
, I wanted to say.

I can’t, I can’t, I can’t …

The Katana

Two days later
Billy and I walked down to see Mose and Rico. We fooled around at Rico’s house, and had a good time being lazy bums out of school. Rico bragged about how he was making progress with Tough Boy’s sister, Tina. But who believed him? Tina was a tenth-grader, and way too classy for a guy like Rico. He just didn’t know it.

At about five o’clock, we started back up the valley. The streets were busy with people trying to get home before curfew—except up by our place, where it was as quiet as a coffin. A lot of people who lived around there had evacuated to the mainland on the first boat they could get a ride on.

When we walked by the Wilsons’ I glanced up. There was a black car parked in the driveway. It was parked only
halfway up to the house. And the Wilsons’ car was gone. So what was this one doing there?