In Real Life

by Lawrence Tabak

  “Can you say that in Korean?”

  I think for a second and say, “Geu.”

  “You can get the entire sentence into one word?”

  276

  “Actually it’s a common article in Korean, similar to our word ‘that.’”

  She blinks for a second and then smiles. “So you can say ‘that’ in Korean!”

  “Exactly.”

  As we wait for the luggage carousel to start I ask about her photos and the gallery. She says that she’s just started showing, but nothing has sold so far.

  “I have a confession,” I say, as we stare towards the stationary carousel.

  “You don’t have to tell me about all those Korean girls,” she says. I look over at that familiar, sly smile. “That would be too much information.”

  “I’m sworn to secrecy about that,” I say. “Actually, it’s about your photo.”

  I tell her about the Kims and how nice they were to me. That I gave them the kissing photo. That I had shopped for hours but had found nothing nearly as good.

  She doesn’t seem upset. “I’ll print you another one,” she says as the carousel starts beeping and then turning.

  A few minutes later I’m wrestling my bag off the belt and we’re off for the parking lot.

  As we cruise out of the airport Hannah glances over at me.

  “You must be exhausted.”

  “That obvious?”

  “That obvious.”

  We drive in silence for a bit.

  “I brought you something back from Korea.”

  “You brought yourself. That was enough.”

  I may be exhausted, but I’m alert enough to wonder if she’s just saying that. Or if it means something.

  Then she asks when I start school.

  “Freshman orientation is August twenty-ninth. How about you?”

  “After Labor Day weekend.”

  So we have almost five weeks. If we are we.

  At my place I punch in the code for the garage and am thankful that it opens. I still have a key, but where I don’t remember.

  Hannah insists on helping me carry in.

  When I flip on the light I see everything just the way I left it. The velour couch across from the flat screen TV. Hannah’s favorite seascape over the larger couch.

  “Now this is home sweet home,” Hannah says.

  “Just a second,” I say as I bend over and unzip the big suitcase. I dig around a bit and come out with a white box.

  “I would have wrapped it,” I say. “But they tell you not to wrap presents that are going on planes.”

  Hannah looks uncomfortable as I hand it to her.

  “Go ahead,” I say. She backs over to the couch, sets the box down and opens it with a gasp. Pulls out the present that Annie helped me pick out and holds it up.

  “Oh my God,” Hannah says. She lifts the bright red, silk Korean dress head high. The gold highlights sparkle, even in the uneven light of our living room. I told Annie that I wanted to get something really special. That cost wasn’t an issue. She took me at my word. It was one of the most expensive hanboks in the shop.

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I thought maybe you could use it in one of your photos.”

  Hannah is sort of dancing forward with the hanbok stretched out.

  “I bet you stole this from one of your Korean girls.”

  “Actually,” I say. “It was a princess. We’re secretly engaged. She’s got dozens of these. Won’t ever miss it.”

  “A princess? They have princesses in Korea?”

  “Of course.”

  “And when is this betrothal date?”

  “Open ended,” I say. “Unless she finds out about the dress. Then it’s off.”

  “Can I try it on?”

  “Sure.” And then I just about faint when she peels off her T-shirt.

  “A blue T-shirt would spoil the effect,” she explains, as I stare at her black bra.

  She looks up at me as she lifts up the dress. “I’m not making you uncomfortable, am I?”

  “Uh, no, of course not.”

  Then she has the dress over her head.

  “Help me with this belt or sash or whatever,” she says. And I help her wrap it around and she ties in front. Skips across the carpet into the downstairs bathroom. The tail of the dress behind like a shadow. Looking like the real princess.

  “Wow,” she is saying. I can see her turning and twisting over her shoulder to see that back. “So what kind of photo were you thinking?”

  “Your department,” I say. “I’m just in costumes. And by the way, there’s something else in the box.”

  “Oh Jesus, Seth,” she says. “This is too much.” But she glides back across the room to the dress box and finds the smaller one. Opens it and shakes her head. Holds the gold earrings up to the light. Each is a series of gold loops which highlight the gold patterns in the dress. She takes out a stud from each ear and back in the bathroom puts on the earrings.

  “OK, Mr. Gamer Boy,” she says as she comes out of the bathroom. “What is this all about?”

  I shrug. Tell her it’s not about anything. Other than coming home. That I bought gifts for my mom and dad and brother too.

  “After all,” I say. “It’s the first time in my life I’ve had the cash to do anything like this.”

  “And it doesn’t have anything to do with you picking Brown?” She’s giving me a hard look now, like I had pulled some sort of major cheat or something.

  I’m shaking my head and if I look honestly puzzled it’s because I am.

  “You know I accepted the RISD offer?”

  I shake my head, trying to remember what RISD stood for. “I don’t know…”

  “I told everyone. Are you telling me I forgot you?”

  I really don’t remember and I say so.

  “And you picked Brown because?”

  “I didn’t really pick it,” I say. “It was where my friend Professor Song went.” I try to explain the circumstances. But Hannah interrupts me.

  “You must think I’m really slow,” Hannah says.

  Now I’m really at a loss. I shake my head.

  “OK, let me spell it out,” she says. “I tell everyone I’m going to RISD. And then a couple of months later you tell everyone where you’re going.”

  “And…”

  “And where is Brown?”

  “Providence,” I say. “It’s in Providence.” But the fact is, from Korea it all seemed like Never-Neverland. I still wasn’t thinking of Brown as a place. More like an act of God.

  “And what state is Providence in?

  “Rhode Island?” I answer.

  “And what does the RI is RISD stand for?” Hannah has one hand on her silk-clad hip and is looking at me with what I take is total disdain.

  “Rhode Island?” I say, and actually feel my heart rise. We’re going to be going to college in the same state!

  “And how far apart are Brown and RISD?”

  “I don’t know,” I admit, and add lamely, “It’s a big state?”

  “Right. You honestly don’t know? I find that hard to believe.”

  Now I’m thinking if Hannah had told me where she had decided to go to college I would have remembered. I’m almost sure I would have remembered.

  “I could Google it,” I say.

  “I’m sure you could,” Hannah is saying as she carefully removes one earring, then the other. Then steps out of the dress and drops it back in the box. Pulls her T-shirt over her head.

  Then she steps right up to me, face to face, inches. Looking deeply into my eyes.

  “How can I believe someone as smart as you could be so stupid?”

  “Becau
se you know me?” I say.

  “You almost have me believing you,” she says. Then her eyes soften as she leans forward gives me a kiss. On the lips. Not like the sailor kiss, but it has the same effect. It lights up my travel-weary body like an injection. The urge to grab her and pull her close is overwhelming. But I remember Garrett’s advice.

  She steps back. “The dress and the earnings…beautiful.”

  She leans over and packs the dress and the earnings up, holds the box in her crossed arms. Backs towards the door.

  “You need to get some rest,” she says. “And I need to do some thinking.”

  “OK, great,” I say. Step over and open the door for her. Watch her walk onto the landing and turn back towards me. In the dark I can’t tell if her eyes are sparkling or full of tears.

  “And just so you don’t have to bother Googling,” she says. “They’re five blocks apart.”

  I watch her turn. Watch her step down the stoop and walk down to the street all the way to the van. Put the box on the passenger’s seat and then walk around the van, disappearing. Never once looking back up to the doorway where I’m still standing. The van pulls slowly away.

  Five blocks? Five stinking blocks? Wondering if those five blocks just ruined my next five weeks or whether they might, just possibly, make the year to come.

  The Tuttle Story

  “Books to Span

  the East and West”

  Many people are surprised to learn that the world’s largest publisher of books on Asia had its humble beginnings in the tiny American state of Vermont. The company’s founder, Charles E. Tuttle, belonged to a New England family steeped in publishing.

  Tuttle’s father was a noted antiquarian dealer in Rutland, Vermont. Young Charles honed his knowledge of the trade working in the family bookstore, and later in the rare books section of Columbia University Library. His passion for beautiful books—old and new—never wavered throughout his long career as a bookseller and publisher.

  After graduating from Harvard, Tuttle enlisted in the military and in 1945 was sent to Tokyo to work on General Douglas MacArthur’s staff. He was tasked with helping to revive the Japanese publishing industry, which had been utterly devastated by the war. After his tour of duty was completed, he left the military, married a talented and beautiful singer, Reiko Chiba, and in 1948 began several successful business ventures.

  To his astonishment, Tuttle discovered that postwar Tokyo was actually a book-lover’s paradise. He befriended dealers in the Kanda district and began supplying rare Japanese editions to American libraries. He also imported American books to sell to the thousands of GIs stationed in Japan. By 1949, Tuttle’s business was thriving, and he opened Tokyo’s very first English-language bookstore in the Takashimaya Department Store in Ginza, to great success. Two years later, he began publishing books to fulfill the growing interest of foreigners in all things Asian.

  Though a westerner, Tuttle was hugely instrumental in bringing a knowledge of Japan and Asia to a world hungry for information about the East. By the time of his death in 1993, he had published over 6,000 books on Asian culture, history and art—a legacy honored by Emperor Hirohito in 1983 with the “Order of the Sacred Treasure,” the highest honor Japan can bestow upon a non-Japanese.

  The Tuttle company today maintains an active backlist of some 1,500 titles, many of which have been continuously in print since the 1950s and 1960s—a great testament to Charles Tuttle’s skill as a publisher. More than 60 years after its founding, Tuttle Publishing is more active today than at any time in its history, still inspired by Charles Tuttle’s core mission—to publish fine books to span the East and West and provide a greater understanding of each.