The Typhoon Lover

by Sujata Massey

  “Yes, Rei-chan. A big one.” My aunt told me about Typhoon Nigo, the second typhoon of the fall, one that had originated in the waters off Thailand and had gained strength as it advanced northward to Japan. Schools and offices were open today, but scores of airline flights had been canceled. Right in my aunt’s neighborhood, shopkeepers were hammering plywood sheets over their windows. “I worry about your hotel, Rei-chan. All that glass.”

  “Tokyo’s a big city! I’m sure that the high winds will be broken by the presence of all the skyscrapers and big buildings. And that glass in the hotel windows must be industrial strength.”

  “It’s true the city won’t be as hard hit as the seaside areas. But you never can predict the outcome. You should come home with me this afternoon, just to make sure you are safe.”

  “But Yokohama is closer to the water.” As I pointed this out, the thought came to me that there was a location at even greater risk: Hayama, the small seaside town where Takeo’s summer house was.

  “Yes, but we’ll be together, taking care of each other. This hotel is nice, but who here cares about you? Who would answer if you called for help?”

  “But it’s such a nice hotel. They have an attendant on every floor—”

  “Ha! I doubt your hotel will have many employees coming to work tomorrow, if the train companies halt operations.”

  It was time to get down to business. We ordered lunch sets, because they wouldn’t take too long to arrive: mine a lacy burdock root crepe filled with sweet kabocha squash; my aunt’s the fish platter featuring kinmedai, a strong-tasting fish similar to porgy. I kept my voice low, even though the nearest table was occupied by young American and Australian financial traders who looked completely uninterested in us, and weren’t likely to understand much Japanese.

  “I have the Kayama Kaikan’s class schedule here.” After the waitress had cleared away the lunch dishes, my aunt pulled a paper from her purse. “The master class ends at noon today. It might last longer, though, because the teachers are planning their arrangements for a show in the gallery space at Isetan next week. I’m on the operations committee for it, in fact.”

  “That’s wonderful. Do you think Takeo will be at the class today?” Every now and then, I recalled, he dropped in on classes.

  Norie shook her head, making her huge mabe pearl earrings shake slightly. “I doubt it. He has less interest in these—what does he call them?—commercial ventures. However, I have learned that he has an appointment with the school’s accounts manager at twelve-thirty, so that means he’s in the building right now.”

  “Do you think we should stop by?”

  Norie held up a warning finger. “I will visit the Kaikan alone after lunch, and ask the receptionist to send word that I must speak to Takeo-san about the show at Isetan. I’ll think of something important, maybe a problem with the location.”

  “That’s a clever idea,” I said.

  “Yes, I could make him very concerned if he knows that Mrs. Okayama is thinking about using PVC pipes as a lining material in her flower arrangement. He doesn’t like us to use material that can’t be recycled.” Her eyes gleamed mischievously, and I laughed. How well my aunt knew the flower master.

  14

  Half an hour later, the two of us had waded over to the Kayama Kaikan, the impressive modern tower building where the Kayama family housed the administrative offices and classrooms for its ikebana school. The first floor was all glass, so I could see my aunt enter the dramatic sandstone lobby, shaking off her bright floral Hanae Mori umbrella. She caught sight of me and made a shooing gesture with her hand.

  Where could I wait? The nearest building was the embassy of Canada. I was soon made aware of the fact that it wasn’t a public waiting room, so I hurriedly asked for a visa form and began filling it out as slowly as I could. Americans didn’t need visas for Canada, but I could always pretend later than I didn’t know. And I might be a Japanese citizen, for all they knew.

  If only my aunt would call. It was a long ten minutes until my mobile phone beeped. She told me that she was in the elevator, going up to the penthouse floor.

  “Now remember, please ring my telephone in five minutes, because the fact is, once I get past the topic of the flower exhibition I won’t have much to keep me in his presence.”

  I agreed, kept my eye on my watch, and dialed over to Norie at exactly the prescribed moment.

  “Moshi-moshi,” she answered happily. “How nice to hear from you! But the thing is, I’m sorry, I’m in a meeting at the school…. Yes, I know you need to receive the key right away.”

  “May I get it from you now?” I asked, according to the script.

  “The circumstances are a little bit difficult. I’m actually on the ninth floor of the Kayama building, with the honorable headmaster…but if you come quickly, I think it would be all right.”

  “So, shall I do it?” I breathed into the receiver.

  “Yes, yes, please come quickly.” And she clicked off.

  Phase two was under way, for better or worse. I left the Canadian embassy, sprinting the twenty or so yards to the Kayama Kaikan. After I barged through the Kaikan’s big glass doors, I had to pause to have my backpack inspected by the doorman, who reminded me to put my umbrella in the stand. Once I was deemed safe to enter, I walked past the jagged installation of sandstone rocks—around which were placed flower arrangements that were changed the minute a bloom started to wilt. It felt strange to enter this dry, brightly lit facsimile of a garden, when the world outside was so rough and stormy.

  The receptionist, a beautiful young woman in a pink silk dress who was raptly reading a magazine called Gothic and Lolita Bible, didn’t even look up when I told her I was going to the school’s café, which was open to the public.

  “Third floor,” she said dreamily.

  “Thank you very much.” I moved past, catching a glimpse of the page she was studying, which showed a bonneted woman carrying a teddy bear. The baby trend was driving me to distraction. I’d been away, and gotten older, while everyone who stayed was getting younger.

  The elevator arrived and was disgorging a load of fifty-something women—who, because of their Japanese genes, appeared to be somewhere in their thirties—carrying tall bundles of flowers.

  I waited for them to pass, then got on by myself. Three, I pressed, just in case anyone was watching. Then I hit nine, and all too soon, the doors opened on the long, cinnabar-colored hallway that led to the Kayama family’s personal quarters. The first time I’d entered the hallway, I’d been stunned by a Mark Rothko painting on the wall. It wasn’t there anymore. All the old, high-status paintings were gone, in fact—replaced by framed photographs of wildflowers. A tiny penciled scrawl in the corner of each photograph told me that Takeo himself had been the photographer.

  Takeo had taken over the reins of the flower school, and the details showed. He’d also moved offices. The old room, where Takeo had once lounged among decades’ worth of National Geographic magazines, had its door slightly open, revealing not magazines but hanging racks of women’s clothes. Natsumi, Takeo’s twin sister, must have taken it for herself—unless the girlfriend had moved in, which wasn’t likely. The next door over was the last in the hallway. It was the headmaster’s study, once Takeo’s father’s room, and, I was guessing, now Takeo’s own.

  I knocked lightly, hoping that I’d guessed right. A few seconds later the door was opened by Takeo, wearing a gray cashmere sweatshirt and jeans. My gaze flickered from his tight expression to the welcoming room that lay behind him. Takeo had furnished his new office with what looked like Frank Lloyd Wright furniture from his Japanese period: elegant low chairs cushioned in persimmon velvet, with low tables between. There was a sofa in burnt orange laden with small, exquisite pillows made from old kimono silk. I breathed in happily at the sight of all my favorite colors, and my aunt seated in one of these chairs, her legs gracefully crossed at the ankle.

  “What is this? You didn’t tell me—” Takeo l
ooked from me to my aunt with obvious shock.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to interrupt the instruction you were giving me about the program by talking too much. But the fact is, Rei-chan has just come to town, and she has been so busy that today is the first time I’ve had a chance to see her! My dear, welcome home!” She rose to her feet, and beckoned for me to approach her for a hug.

  “The key—I am—” I was forgetting how to construct a Japanese sentence, because Takeo was looking so irritated at my presence.

  “Yes. Rei-chan came to receive our house key,” my aunt said, taking it out and tucking it into my purse. “She will be leaving the Grand Hyatt to stay with us for safety during the typhoon.”

  “Isn’t that a bit—overly careful?” Takeo looked out the window at the pouring gray sheet of water. “Even if a typhoon arose at sea, the likelihood that it would cause any trouble here in the Kanto area is very remote.”

  “But look at what happened in southeast Asia!” I decided to jump on my aunt’s bandwagon. “Your country house in Hayama is quite vulnerable, to both typhoons and tsunamis—”

  “It will be fine,” he said stonily. “That building has gone through a war and more than a few typhoons. I’m not doing anything special.”

  “You must,” I said. “At least pull out the shutters and make sure they’re well latched. Do you still have that nice old retainer who can do that for you?” I’d forgotten the name of the Kayamas’ manservant, who moved with them from home to home as the seasons changed.

  My aunt interrupted before Takeo could answer the question. “I must rush off because I promised my son I would bring some food to him at the hospital—he’ll never be released from duty, once the typhoon arrives. Anyway, Rei-chan, I hope that you can spare a few moments to say hello to Kayama-sensei. It has been a very long time,” she added before stepping out into the hall.

  “Well, she’s right about that.” I settled myself down in one of the chairs. “What beautiful furniture! It looks like Frank Lloyd Wright.”

  A flicker of something akin to pride passed across Takeo’s face. He said, “I knew you’d recognize them.”

  “Wow.” Did that mean he’d thought I’d pay him a call here? “I didn’t know his furniture had gone into reproduction.”

  “It’s not reproduction. They’re originals,” he said, sitting down across from me.

  “Oh. So you really have become a serious collector,” I said.

  “Of course.” He looked at me sternly. “Just as I’m serious about Emi. I won’t jeopardize my engagement for any inappropriate interlude that you have in mind.”

  I willed myself not to blush, but it was impossible. “I can’t believe you’re saying that! I just sat down out of—courtesy—to finish the conversation we couldn’t have last night.”

  “Well, this whole business of your aunt getting me alone, so you could arrive, was pretty obvious.”

  I looked out at the rain, steadying myself. Then I turned back to him. “Come on, let’s be civil. We must talk, but you’re right that this isn’t the right place. I wish we could get away from it all, maybe drive out to Hayama and have lunch at the house.”

  “The weather’s too bad for that,” he said. “And Emi would hate it. She wouldn’t stop asking me about you yesterday evening.”

  “Oh, really? What did you tell her?”

  “I told a small lie. I said I knew you in college,” Takeo said.

  “Hmm. So she thought I was a classmate of yours at Keio?” I’d better get the cover right, in case I ran into her again.

  “She believes you were, and still are, a professor. At UC Santa Cruz, where she knows I did my gardening certificate—”

  “You mean—she thinks I’m old enough to be your professor?” I was horror-struck. I’d never wear that suit again.

  “But you’re American. She knows the rules are different there. She went to an American school when her family was in Turkey, you know.”

  “I didn’t know. Another thing I’m wondering about is, how long have you been engaged?”

  “Two months.” Takeo smiled a bit unsteadily. “This is an omiai. There’s no need for a long courtship.”

  “Omiai! Do you mean you’re going to have an arranged marriage?”

  He looked evenly back at me. “Why not?”

  “But Takeo…” I paused, feeling helpless. “You’re so…eligible. You don’t need anyone to help you get married. And you’re so…unconventional! From the looks of your fiancée, she’s going to be more suited to attending fashion shows than Greenpeace rallies.”

  “I adore Emi,” Takeo said softly. “She’s beautiful and charming. We enjoy being together, and her father is most agreeable to hearing my ideas about wildlife preservation. Together, Emi and I can do quite a bit to help Japan.”

  So that was it. Takeo was marrying Emi because a close connection to the government minister would allow him to influence environmental policies. Feeling a chill run through me, I said, “You’re awfully callous to marry someone just for her connections.”

  “Well, I’ve come to believe that we, the people who inhabit the earth, are not as important as the earth itself.”

  “But what about love?”

  “With arranged marriages, we grow to love each other,” Takeo said. “Whereas you Westerners, you love so passionately at first, and then there’s nothing left for later on.”

  I was about to launch a counterargument when I realized that he might have a point. I’d been in love with Hugh for years, but we were nowhere near ready to get married. If only I were as certain about the future as Takeo seemed to be.

  “I’d like to get to know her, too,” I said stiffly.

  “Why?”

  “Well, I do still care about you as a friend. It’s natural for me to want to become friends with my friend’s wife, isn’t it?” As I spoke, I looked out the window, because I felt too mortified to face him. “I don’t know what Emi-san’s work schedule is like, but maybe after the storm blows over, I could take her to lunch—”

  “She doesn’t have a job, because she just graduated this summer.”

  “Oh, which university?” I had already pegged her as the type who went to Gakushuin, the private university where the remnants of Japan’s nobility still studied.

  When Takeo mentioned Tokyo International Girls School, a private high school, I nearly choked. She wasn’t even old enough to have started college. Talk about a Lolita complex; Takeo had it in spades.

  “Well, Takeo, since Emi has some free time, perhaps we could all drive down to Hayama together,” I suggested mildly.

  “Rei, I’m tired of talking about this silly idea of a trip to the beach. It’s not even summer.”

  “We could have lunch in the house, and then I’d really like to see what you’ve done with the rock garden. I’m thinking of doing something like that in Washington—” I cut myself off in mid-babble when I realized that Emi herself was standing in the doorway.

  Emi was wearing a short, flared red dress that made me think of the baby-girl outfits I’d seen around town—but it looked about ten times more expensive. The front of the dress was obscured by an artwork she was holding, a colorful screen print of a Louis Vuitton handbag. Above it, her large eyes peered at me—really large, with big black pupils, like a girl character from anime.

  She looked away from me and addressed Takeo in a soft, high, appropriately girlish voice. “Oh, excuse me! I didn’t know you had an appointment with your sensei.”

  “Actually, I just dropped in. Takeo and I were talking about how his, ah, rock garden design could translate to one I am planning in the United States. Excuse me for not introducing myself last night! My name is Shimura Rei.” I inverted my names, the proper way, and tried to elevate the pitch of my voice to sound like hers—girlish, proper, hopeful. What Takeo had said about her mistaking me for his teacher had gotten on my nerves.

  Emi bowed back and gave her name in a bell-like tone. She smiled insincerely, then turne
d to her fiancé. “Takeo-kun, if it’s not too much of an interruption, I would like you to consider this new painting. What do you think?”

  “It’s quite bright, isn’t it?” Takeo said, after a moment’s silence.

  “It’s Murakami Takashi,” she said in a rush. “It will become even more valuable in another year, Father says.”

  Takashi Murakami’s paintings of cartoonlike characters and status handbags were all the rage, but they seemed a little gimmicky to me, a materialistic new version of Andy Warhol, certainly not the kind of art an antimaterialist like Takeo would enjoy. But what did I know? He was now busy blowing thousands of dollars of the family fortune at auctions, on things like beds and china services.

  “Sorry to be rude, but I shall be leaving now,” I announced, wondering whether Emi’s cheerful behavior was hiding the fact she’d overheard our bitter conversation. In any case, I didn’t want to be suspected of trying to ruin their engagement, so I left, offering a second good-bye that neither of them acknowledged.

  The door didn’t close entirely behind me, and when I heard Emi’s voice, I stepped into the doorway of the roomful of dresses. If she was going to rip into me, I wanted to hear exactly what she said.

  “So…what about the painting? Do you like it or not? I only have it until Monday. The dealer wants to know.”

  “But I thought you bought it already?” Takeo sounded weary.

  “I borrowed it. It’s not sold until we decide we want it. I think it would really cheer up that musty old country house, don’t you?”

  “My house in Hayama?” Takeo sounded alarmed.

  “Our house,” Emi corrected him warmly. “You don’t have many pretty things there, and I wanted to repaint anyway, to a nice bright yellow…kind of the Vuitton yellow, if you know what I mean.”

  I shut my eyes, trying to imagine a high school girl becoming chatelaine of that simple, elegant country villa. I couldn’t fathom it.

  “Perhaps we’d better see what it looks like there, first,” Takeo said. “Actually, I was thinking about driving there tonight, because I should shutter the house.”