Women On the Other Shore (22 page)

She did have three jobs to get her started, from people who had connections of one kind or another with Platinum Planet. The first was a downtown apartment where an elderly couple wanted their bath and toilet cleaned, as well as a study that was turning into a storeroom. The second was a one-room apartment being used as a private office. And the last was the toilet and washstand at a pub located about five minutes' walk from Platinum Planet. None of them were particularly large jobs, so Sayoko handled them by herself.

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Perhaps because the clients were acquaintances, she received no complaints, but neither did she get any compliments for a job well done.

Aoi and the rest of the staff had been marketing the new service on the Internet and through direct mail since sometime in August, but no further orders had come in by the time these first three were done. So Sayoko began spending her three days a week passing out fliers. In view of how accommodating Aoi had been with her employment letter and the nursery school schedule, she even stuffed mailboxes on other days when she passed apartments or condominiums on her way to pick up Akari from school.

On this particular day, Sayoko was pounding the pavement mainly in Setagaya Ward. Pocket map in hand, she wandered the tangled streets of residential neighborhoods in search of condominiums and apartment buildings. Each time she came to one, she headed straight for the bank of mailboxes by the entrance and pushed a copy of her flier into every slot. The early-September day was a scorcher, and after several hours of tramping about, her head was in a daze. As she made her way between a tightly packed jumble of single- and multi-family structures on both sides, the cramped lane ahead appeared to sway back and forth in the blazing sun.

What would tomorrow bring? The future wavered before Sayoko like the street in the midday heat. She was distributing these fliers in order to generate more business, but there were limits to what she could do alone. As he had made abundantly clear, Shuji was not going to offer any significant support or encouragement to her as a housekeeper. If jobs began to roll in and things got busy, she could count on Misao and Mao to step in, and if that still wasn't enough Aoi would no doubt be prepared to recruit someone new. But would Sayoko herself ever be able to put any more energy into the job than she was putting into it now?

She turned a corner. Houses that looked like they'd all been cut 169

from the same mold stood like mirror images on either side of the street. They seemed to go on forever, shimmering in the heat.

When Sayoko staggered back to the office feeling ready to drop, she found the staff and Takeshi Kihara all gathered around the dining table with Aoi. She heard none of the usual jocularity and laughter, so she gathered it was a serious meeting of some kind.

Nobody so much as glanced at Sayoko as she entered; their eyes were all fixed on Yuki Yamaguchi, who was reading from a document in her hand. Trying not to make any noise, Sayoko tiptoed past the group to Mao's desk in the staff office and collapsed onto the chair.

Lowering her bag to the floor, she pulled out the bottle of iced oolong tea she'd bought at lunch and took a couple of lukewarm swigs.

"Whatever happened to that tourist promotion thing that came up before?"

"It basically fell through."

"You have to understand. That was going to be a ten- or twenty-year venture. You can't hook up with someone you don't even know for that kind of commitment without some real strong motivators."

"Our backs are to the wall and we're quibbling about motivators?"

"Now just a minute. No one said our backs are to the wall."

Sayoko concentrated on writing her daily report, only half listening to the talk flying back and forth across the dining table. But then something on the desk facing Mao's caught her eye. It was made of black fabric and neatly folded up. She reached across to unfold it and discovered it was an apron. The name "Platinum Cleaning Service" was emblazoned on the bib in white letters, with the company's Saturn-like logo printed beneath it.

Why didn't I know about this, she wondered. The dazed feeling that she'd had in the midday sun was back.
Nothing's going to
grind to a halt if you're not there, right?
She heard Shuji's voice in her ear as if he were standing over her shoulder, and she instinctively looked up.

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"What do you think, Chief? That's the sample for your new uniform."

Aoi's voice from t h e dining room broke through Sayoko's thoughts almost as if she'd read her mind. Sayoko turned to find the entire staff looking at her through the doorway.

"I think it's rather chic myself," Aoi added with a proud smile.

"Well, yes, it does look pretty sharp, but I don't think I'd have chosen an apron," she said candidly.

"Oh? W h y not?" Aoi asked, her smile dissolving.

"You spend a lot of time on your hands and knees when you're cleaning, so an apron like this tends to get in the way. Something like a T-shirt would be more practical, or I suppose maybe a really short apron. And it may seem illogical, but black actually makes the dirt stand out more. Dust and grease turn instantly into white or shiny spots."

As she spoke, Sayoko felt her fatigue melting away. She enjoyed being asked for her opinion.

"Oh, shoot, I never thought of that. I guess I should've asked you first."

Getting up from t h e table, Aoi came into the staff office and took the apron in her hands. Sayoko noticed a subtle change in the air around t h e dining table; with their prior discussion on hold, everybody looked a little at loose ends. She began to regret having spoken up, but Aoi seemed determined to press on with the matter as she quickly tied the apron around her neck.

"So could we maybe have them cut off about here?" she said.

"Or would it be better to just start all over? What do you think, Chief?"

"Never mind that now, Miss Narahashi," Misao broke in. "We need to stay focused on what we were talking about before."

"Right," Junko said. "Since housekeeping isn't our main line of business and we don't even know what the prospects are, we should 171

be going easy on the expenses anyway." It was clear from her tone that she was losing patience with Aoi.

"But you never know," Takeshi countered. "Housekeeping could wind up saving our neck, so we need to take it seriously and pay attention to what Chief has to say."

"Listen, everybody." Aoi turned toward them as she untied the apron. "It's almost five, and I know Mao, at least, never got any lunch.

How about we take the rest of our discussion to another venue?"

"There you go again," Takeshi said jokingly. "Add beer and stir.

A recipe for meetings guaranteed to mess things up."

"But sitting here looking grim at each other obviously isn't going to get us anywhere. So why not thrash it out over some dinner? It'll give everybody a boost, and we won't have to feel rushed. What exactly did we have left to talk about anyway, Yuki?"

"The red flags in our year-to-date figures."

"Right, right, the red flags. Who wants to face stuff like that stone sober? Let's go, let's go. It's on me."

Glancing at one another with strained smiles, the others rose from the table. Sayoko watched absentmindedly as they made their way out the door with considerable clamor.

"So Chief, the plan is to continue our meeting somewhere else.

It'll probably drag on late, but you could excuse yourself at some point if you want. Why don't you come along?"

Sayoko wished she could. Even if it meant waiting until after they'd dealt with whatever the red flags were, she would welcome the chance to talk more about their uniform, as well as to discuss the general outlook for the housekeeping venture. She'd come to enjoy expressing her views and hashing things over with Aoi and the others. But she checked her watch.

"I'm afraid I don't have time," she said, forcing a smile.

"Right, sorry, I keep forgetting how strict they are about pickup at the nursery school. Don't worry about it. The meeting's not that 172

important. I'll make sure we talk about the apron, too. If it looks like we can swing it, I'll plan to have them redesigned—in which case I'll give you a call. Shorten it, and change the color to... um, what would you say?"

"I guess gray, or maybe blue."

"Got it. All right then, please put the key in the mailbox when you lock up, and just leave the AC running." She added a sing-songy

"Bye!" and started for the front door.

Sayoko listened for the click of the latch. The apron lay like a shadow where Aoi had let it fall at her feet.

When she opened the door to leave a short while later, she nearly bumped into Takeshi.

"Oh, hi," she said, looking up at him in surprise. "Did you forget something?"

"Yeah, my cell phone. Are you on your way home? Can I give you a lift?" He slipped off his shoes and went to rummage among the clutter on the table for his phone.

"A lift?"

"If we take the expressway, it'll be faster by car than by train."

Takeshi found the phone and slipped it into his pocket. Sayoko watched him uncomprehendingly as he turned around and came back to the door.

"What about the meeting?"

"It's basically just going to be a drinking party. And besides, I'm not an employee and my opinions don't carry much weight. So, how about it? I'm headed that direction anyway today, so it's no trouble.

We should make it in about thirty minutes, is my guess."

Sayoko glanced at her watch. Anything that got her to Akari's school even five minutes sooner was welcome.

"If you're sure it's all right," she said.

"Absolutely." With a grin, he took the key from her to lock the door.

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Takeshi maneuvered the car deftly down t h e narrow residential lanes of their neighborhood onto the main street. T h e foliage over both sidewalks shone lush and green in t h e light of t h e sun. T h e city remained very much in the grip of summer on this S e p t e m b e r day.

"This is nice," Sayoko said from the passenger seat. "You're sure I'm not imposing?"

"No, really, it's right on my way, so I don't mind at all. But tell me, how's it going with the fliers? It must be pretty tough-going in this heat."

"You do what you have to do. If we don't start getting some orders soon, my hiring will turn out to have been a complete waste."

"That's the trouble with Aoi. She jumps into things without any clear plan."

Traffic on the expressway was light. Sayoko checked h e r watch again to see how they were doing. As he drove, Takeshi reached down to pick up some CDs that were scattered underfoot.

"Did you ever think about working on the main side of t h e business? The travel side?"

"If Miss Narahashi asks, I'd be happy to. But she hired me for t h e housekeeping service, so..."

"Well, what with one step leading to another, t h e housekeeping operation is now officially under way, but to be honest, I still have my doubts. At that drinking party or meeting a while ago, whichever you want to call it, I got the sense that people aren't entirely on board with it yet. What's your take on it, Chief? How do you feel about the way Aoi's handled it? Basically, right now, you're no different from an hourly temp hired to pass out fliers. Don't you find that kind of worrisome?"

The CD cases lay forgotten in his lap as Takeshi rattled on. Sayoko couldn't quite figure out what he was asking or what his point was, and he was beginning to get on her nerves. But he plowed ahead without waiting for an answer, taking apparent pleasure in picking 174

apart Aoi's management style. T h e woman wasn't cut out for running a business, she was far too haphazard and impulsive, he said, ridiculing various things she'd done and cracking jokes at her expense.

There was little actual bite to his criticisms and they seemed to pre-sume a certain chumminess between them, so Sayoko felt obliged to laugh along from time to time. But the truth was that she didn't really find his remarks very funny.

"And this whole housekeeping thing, the way I see it, the light bulb probably went on when she was talking with Mrs. Nakazato sometime or other, and she gaily decided to take the idea for a spin.

But it's hard to see it coming to Platinum Planet's rescue anytime soon."

"Still," Sayoko cut in, "it's a going venture now, and I, for one, am not approaching it 'gaily,' as you put it."

Takeshi glanced across at her. "Of course you aren't," he said, furrowing his brow. "But that's the problem right there. It's pretty damned rude to you, don't you think, for Aoi herself to be approaching it so casually?"

"I'm sorry, I'm afraid you've lost me." She forced a smile to hide her growing irritation.

"I'm just saying, Aoi has this way of taking on one thing after another at t h e drop of a hat, and a lot of times it's the staff who pay the price down t h e road. At this point the housekeeping operation looks like it could be more of the same, since you're basically handling it all by yourself, and I just wondered how you felt about that."

"What are you—the complaints department?" She'd tried to make it sound like a joke, but she could hear barbs in her voice.

Takeshi threw his head back and laughed. "I suppose that's not too far off t h e mark," he said ambiguously.

Sayoko still didn't really know who Takeshi Kihara was, or why he was always hanging around the office or what exactly he was trying to get out of her at this moment. It left a sour taste in her mouth.

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"The truth is, I'm Aoi's biggest fan," he declared. "She may be all over the map, but she's also got some very interesting things going on, and I think I can learn a lot from her."

At the wheel, Takeshi launched into another long-winded speech, but Sayoko merely offered a vague word from time to t i m e as she kept an eye on her watch. She didn't know why, but no matter how hard he tried to clarify things, he only seemed to make t h e m murk-ier. Barely listening, she began repeating a single t h o u g h t to herself:
Soon I'll be with Akari.