The Street of a Thousand Blossoms

by Gail Tsukiyama

“Is what true?” he asked back, walking slowly down the hall, Haru keeping pace.

  “The rumors.”

  He seemed to puff up and grow bigger before her eyes. Haru imagined it was something similar to when he entered the ring, ready for a fight. “What rumors? I can hardly keep up with them.” He forced a laugh.

  “The geisha, Meiko.” Haru watched his face, saw his lips purse in thought. She knew it was true from the pause.

  “You know how things are bent out of proportion. The press will pick up on anything to sell a paper or magazine.”

  Haru stopped walking. “So, there has been something for them to pick up on?”

  Hiroshi turned. “And now it’s you, Haru-san, who are twisting my words around. I’m in your debt for all you’ve done for Aki and Takara, but my business isn’t yours.”

  Haru held back her anger and tried to remain calm. “My concern is for Aki-chan and that these rumors don’t reach her. I would hope that’s where your concern lies, too.” She stood for a moment, holding his gaze, before she turned and walked back down the hall, quietly slid open the door, and disappeared into Takara’s room.

  She hadn’t seen Hiroshi since.

  Haru paced from the sleeping child and back to the window. It was already October and becoming cold. She stared down at the immaculate garden below—ablaze with the last colors of fall, the red maple leaves, the round-faced cosmos she had planted, and the crimson veils of grassworts that surrounded the pond. She especially admired the sakura and maple trees that lined the winding paths and led to the large old pine and bridge-covered pond. Hiroshi had had it beautifully landscaped, each detail thought out so that she and Takara could spend hours in this small park of their own. How easy it was for her to make plants grow, and yet …

  At twenty-eight, Haru looked down at the blooming garden that didn’t belong to her and at the sleeping child across the room, who didn’t belong to her, either. She felt a burning emptiness in her stomach where her own child once had been. But the decision to stay in Tokyo with Aki and Takara had been hers alone. And much to her surprise, she only occasionally missed her life in Nara, her days filled with students and research, wandering down the dank paths of Deer Park, correcting papers late into the night.

  But each afternoon, standing by the window of the silent and lovely house, and taking care of a child she adored, Haru still felt adrift. Her life was neither here nor in Nara. She was like a buoy in the middle of the sea. Much like the ferry going to Oshima, there was only the sky above and the sea below, with no land in sight.

  The Grand Champion

  Hiroshi swiveled from side to side in the chair and stared into the large mirror that filled the wall in front of him. The image gazing back was a thirty-five-year-old sumo grand champion, wearing a blue cotton yukata over his mawashi belt. He suddenly felt self-conscious, enormous in the chair and in the small, sterile room where he waited to shoot a commercial at the television studio. His left knee felt stiff from sitting too long. In the past year, it had become an increasing problem. Earlier, a young makeup man had dabbed makeup on a sponge and patted it across his shoulders, his stomach, his forehead and nose, the parts of his body that might shine on camera, he said. When Hiroshi looked in the mirror again, he expected to look changed. Instead, he looked the same but felt somehow diminished.

  The makeup man left Hiroshi to practice his one line, while he waited for his cue. “Mitsuki Tire Company makes tires that last!” He read the entire script again and committed it all to memory. He was to pick up a tire in each hand and raise them both in the air, holding each up until he gradually appeared to weaken, his arms slowly lowering with the weight of the tires. Across the screen the audience would see the characters “Hours later …” and by then his arms would tremble with exhaustion, while he fought to hold up the tires. On the director’s command, Hiroshi was to collapse to the floor, while the camera pulled back and the audience saw the tires rolling down a busy street followed by the voice-over, “Mitsuki Tires, the real grand champion of tires!”

  Hiroshi squirmed in his chair. It was no better or worse than other commercials he’d done. His strong, chiseled features graced a thousand billboards selling everything from soft drinks and tires to candy and laundry detergent. “All Around Detergent can handle a sumo-sized load,” a slim and beautiful Japanese woman exclaimed, holding up one of his oversized yukata kimonos. Since the advent of television, promoting products had taken on a new dimension. Not only was he a sumo grand champion but also a celebrity, better known than many movie stars. He couldn’t walk down the street without being mobbed by fans. For the most part, the ads and television spots were silly and childish, but they paid him handsomely and he knew his wrestling career was fleeting. He already anticipated the time when his fans would no longer stop him on the street to ask for his autograph. Hiroshi’s retirement from the dohyo seemed to inch closer each year and he thought of the old saying “Even a snail will eventually reach its destination.” Other rikishi who retired in their mid- to late thirties went on to careers as stable masters, or businessmen, many opening their own restaurants. Hiroshi recalled Fukuda’s success with his noodle shops. But he couldn’t see himself doing any of those things. He had his chance now to make his family and future comfortable while he could, and he wasn’t about to waste the opportunities given him.

  Little Takara was almost two years old. Just thinking of her made him smile. The fear that something might happen to her was a small stone that rubbed against his foot. On the nights when he was home, he watched her sleep and memorized any new changes that might have occurred during the days or weeks he was away. He saw her tiny fingers open and close in sleep as if she were trying to grab on to something. He heard again the steady rhythm of her breathing and the soft whistling sound that let him know she was asleep. She was already a beauty, resembling Aki. Yet, even though he knew Aki and Takara were thriving under Haru’s care, he still worried that something might happen to them. He cleared his throat and pushed the bad omens out of his mind, just as he did in the dohyo, using all his strength and cunning to defeat his opponent.

  His thoughts returned to the angry words he’d had with Haru a few months earlier. Was it still bothering him? How dare she question him? He hadn’t felt right ever since, angry and ashamed. He’d avoided both Haru and the Sakura teahouse. He glanced up at the mirror again. He’d done one thing right in the past month, using his influence to secure Haru a teaching job at Tokyo University in the spring. It was the least he could do for her after she’d given up so much.

  There was a sudden knock at the door and he turned to see a young woman peek in and bow. “Yokozuna Takanoyama, they’re ready for you now.”

  He nodded, pushed himself up from the chair, and followed her out.

  29

  The Return

  1963

  By the end of the summer of 1963, Akira and Kenji were busily preparing for the fall schedule of the Noh theater. Otomo Matsui was staging his last season before he officially retired, and they were commissioned to make all the masks. September would begin with his revival of Aya no Tsuzumi, or The Damask Drum. It was a story that Akira especially loved, about an old gardener who catches sight of a princess taking a walk around the laurel pond at the Palace of Kinomaru and falls immediately in love with her. When she hears of his love, she sends him a message to beat the drum that hangs on the laurel tree by the pond. When the sound of the beating drum reaches the palace, he will see her face again. The old gardener beats the drum to no avail, as no sound emerges. Finally, in great despair, he drowns himself in the pond, only to return as a ghost to torment the princess and discover the truth of the drum.

  Akira worked on the old gardener and ghost masks, which would both be worn by Otomo Matsui. He maintained his habit of working in the early hours of the morning when the shop was quiet. He picked up the ghost mask, which felt light and almost fragile in his hand. Everything would have to be perfect. He knew Matsui wasn’t well and had especia
lly chosen to play the old gardener and his ghost, roles he hadn’t played since he was a young man. After thirty years of making masks for the great actor, Akira felt they’d come full circle together. He held the mask up and peered out through the eyes, his vision narrowed to what was right in front of him. He turned the mask around and could almost see traces of the actor himself in the carved features, the impressions of his high forehead and deep-set eyes.

  He and Kenji had worked through the summer trying to finish all the orders. It was a great honor and a lucrative commission for them. Only now, after months of work, did he see that they would make their deadline. Akira felt his entire body relax. He glued the last of the beard onto the old gardener mask and gently returned it to the shelf to dry. He unlocked the front door. Kenji would be in at any moment by the looks of the lightening sky, and he returned to the back room to make hot water for their tea. Over the years, it had become a ritual for them to sit down, sip their tea, and discuss the coming day, a specific mask they were working on, or any problems. Akira felt fortunate to have this time with Kenji each morning.

  He was relieved Kenji was content again. There were a few difficult years when he and Mika remained childless and he’d been upset with Mika away so much, traveling all over Japan for her father’s growing textile business. Akira would appease him by saying, “A marriage isn’t like water that slips through your fingers. It’s solid and hard like stone and can be grasped on to. Don’t let your pride get in the way.” Then slowly, Kenji would relax and smile, talk about the masks they were working on, and forget his loneliness.

  When Akira heard the front door open, he called out to Kenji. “Ah, you’re just in time.”

  But it was a woman’s voice that answered him. “I’m sorry, you must be mistaken.”

  Akira stepped out of the back room to find a young woman dressed in a plain green kimono. “I’m sorry,” he apologized, “I thought you were someone else. How may I help you?”

  “Akira-san,” she said, as if she knew it would be him stepping out of the back room.

  Her voice carried the same inflection he’d never forgotten. Suddenly, one of the ghosts that hovered on the surface of the river was standing right before him, full of life, flesh and blood, traces of the young girl from the mountains of Aio instilled in the young woman standing before him.

  “Kiyo-san,” he said, without a second thought.

  She smiled and bowed low to him.

  They stood for a moment, frozen in time. Akira cleared his throat and suddenly felt shy.

  “I hoped you would be here,” she said.

  He invited her into the back room for tea and offered her a stool. “How is your mother?” he asked.

  Kiyo hesitated. “She died last year.”

  The news was like a blow to him. And Akira wondered how he could still be standing when his legs felt so weak. He could no longer think of Emiko-san in the same way, sitting by the hearth in the praying-hands house, stirring the contents of the black iron pot. His grief was as dark as that pot.

  “It was so unexpected,” Kiyo continued. “She developed a cough that wouldn’t go away. Within months, she could barely get out of bed. It wasn’t much longer after that.” Kiyo looked down at her hands.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. He saw more and more of the young girl he’d left behind.

  “She spoke of you,” Kiyo added.

  Akira didn’t ask of what she spoke. He felt as if his throat had closed. Instead, he heard the water boiling and thankfully turned away.

  The Guest

  Unlike other mornings when Kenji entered the mask shop, it was unusually quiet. Not the hissing of hot water, the sharp shrill of the saw, nor even Yoshiwara-sensei’s low humming emerged from the back room. For a moment he wondered if something had happened to him; perhaps he was ill again and hadn’t come downstairs. Then, from the back room he heard soft and teasing words, followed by Akira’s voice calling out, “Kenji-san, is that you?”

  Who else did he expect at this time of the morning? Kenji walked to the back room, surprised to see a young woman perched on the stool next to Yosihwara. He lowered his eyes to keep from staring.

  “Hello.” He bowed.

  Yoshiwara stood up. The young woman did, too, bowing low to Kenji. “This is Kiyo-san,” his teacher introduced. “She and her mother were very good to me when I lived in Aio.”

  Kenji paused a moment. As much as he always wanted to know about Yoshiwara, his sensei hardly spoke of his private life, and Kenji had always respected his wishes. But to see him sitting with a young woman so early in the morning felt unexpected and out of place. He bowed back to Kiyo-san and noticed that up close she wasn’t as young as he first thought. She was in her late twenties, very pleasant looking with a slim, wiry build and large, expressive eyes. Her long black hair was tied back in a thick braid. She was dressed simply and it was her hands he noticed, worker’s hands, tanned and veined, yet not unattractive.

  “Are you visiting Tokyo?” Kenji asked.

  She nodded shyly. “Hai.”

  Yoshiwara-sensei added, “Kiyo-san is in Tokyo for just a short time. She returns to Aio in a few days.”

  “I was hoping to find Akira-san,” she said.

  “You didn’t know he was here?” Kenji asked. He wanted to ask so many more questions but swallowed his curiosity.

  She looked at Yoshiwara-sensei and then back at Kenji again. “Over the years, I lost track of Akira-san,” she said. “But it seems he left a trail for me to follow.”

  His teacher cleared his throat and his fingers tapped playfully against the table.

  “And what was that?” Kenji asked.

  “He left me a mask,” Kiyo said.

  Noh

  It wasn’t until the theater lights dimmed that Aki leaned back in her seat and relaxed. The low beating of a drum filled the cool, high-ceilinged room and calmed her. She hadn’t been outside of the house and garden for almost a month, not since the middle of August, and it made her nervous to be among so many people, so many different scents and sounds. She sat protected between Haru and Hiroshi in front-row seats. His brother, Kenji, had given them tickets for the Noh production of The Damask Drum with Otomo Matsui, and Haru insisted it was time she stepped out of the house. The famous actor was to retire at the end of the season and all of Tokyo wanted to see him in his last performances. Haru took such good care of her and Takara that Aki couldn’t say no to an evening at the theater.

  She closed her eyes and let her mind follow the rhythmic beating of the drums. When the courtier began chanting the story, Aki opened her eyes to the light-filled stage as Otomo Matsui dressed as the old gardener entered, circled the stage as if he’d walked a great distance around the pond, and stopped to stare offstage. His mask tilted up in surprise when he glimpsed the princess, and the courtier told of his instantaneous love for her. From that moment, Aki couldn’t take her eyes off Matsui. Each move he made was like a slow dance and the mask he wore took on a life of its own, changed expressions with the simplest movement of his head. She saw both Otomo Matsui and Kenji-san’s great talents at work. The tragic story mesmerized her, the drum hanging from the laurel tree that the gardener banged to no avail, his subsequent suicide over his unrequited love for the princess, followed by his return as a ghost. It all left her breathless.

  “Are you all right?” Hiroshi leaned over and asked her.

  Aki swallowed and nodded. She smiled at him reassuringly and felt a warmth move through her body. The truth was, she hadn’t felt so well in a long time. She turned to see Haru just as deeply involved in the story.

  When The Damask Drum ended and the lights came on during intermission, Hiroshi was called away by some business associates, while Aki felt freed from the dark cloud and the shadows that lingered around her. The Kyogen would be next; a comic piece that would balance the more serious Noh plays. But it was The Damask Drum that would stay with her, that provided the answer to stopping the shadows from overtaking her. Aki turn
ed to talk to Haru and then stood up and gazed across the room until she found Hiroshi.

  November 9, 1963

  The train rattled on toward Tokyo as Mika sat next to her father, exhausted, thrilled at the textile designs she’d seen in Kyoto. She couldn’t wait to tell Kenji of the rich colors, the vibrant reds and startling greens, her mind alive with designs and patterns. At last they’d reached a comfortable point in their life together and she longed to be home. She might even bring up the idea of having a baby again, though it no longer governed her world. Now that Otomo Matsui had given his last performance, they were finally taking a long-planned vacation to Toya-ko Onsen, the hot springs resort on the shores of Lake Toya in Hokkaido. Mika could already feel the initial shock of stepping into the heated water, the moment of hesitation before her body adjusted to its warm embrace.

  There was a low drone of voices all around them. The train was filled, but they’d booked early and had good seats in the first car. Her father was reading the paper, nodding off behind his glasses. Mika glanced down at her watch; less than an hour to go. She closed her eyes as the train rocked her gently from side to side and a childhood lullaby filled her head.

  Mika’s eyes opened instantly at the shriek of the brakes, metal grinding on metal, the lights flickering on and off, the frantic voices. She had awakened to a nightmare. There was no time to do anything; to be frightened or react, to turn and see if her father was still sitting beside her. Instead, in the split second before the crashing impact, Kenji flashed through her mind as she watched the entire car crush inward toward them; like an accordion, she thought, like a silk fan closing.

  Waiting

  Kenji walked through the courtyard and let himself into the dark house. Mika still wasn’t home and he felt the cold of her absence as soon as he slipped out of his shoes and stepped into the hallway. There was already the damp-tatami smell of winter, though they were barely into November. She’d gone to Kyoto for three days with her father, visiting other textile designers. “To see what the competition is doing,” she teased. Once in a while, he still felt hints of the boy Kenji the ghost resurfacing, all those unsubstantiated fears. He swallowed that part of his childhood back down. Her trips away no longer bothered him. Kenji knew how happy she was learning her father’s business, and how successful her fabric designs had become. He smiled to himself. Theirs was a marriage of equality and Mika wouldn’t have it any other way. She’d be home any time now.