by Rachel Cohn
She wasn’t allowed to give me a hug, but her big grin reached into my chest and grabbed my heart, hard.
“Jail’s cheaper than rehab,” she said as she sat down at the table opposite me. “I tried for the Betty Ford Clinic, you know. I hear it’s real fancy there, but the judge said no.” I didn’t laugh. It was a good joke, but I was the one paying the price for her need for rehab. Mom said, “How you doing, kid? God, I’m happy to see you. Finally.”
There was so much—too much to say. So, I kept it simple. “I’m sorry I smell bad.”
“You smell like foster care. I’m sorry.” I promised myself I wouldn’t, but I could feel a sob coming on. Mom sensed it—maybe she felt the same. She reminded us both, “Zoellner women are tough.”
“Because we have to be. I know. I remember.” The truth was harsh, but the reminder served its purpose. I felt calmer just hearing the normalcy of her old rules. “So, apparently now is when you’re going to tell me about my biological father?”
“Bingo!” said Mom, looking happy to change the subject to the one she could have brought up years ago but never did.
“Kenji Takahara? Who was he to you?”
“I’m not going to lie. I was a hot-looking thing back in my day.” She smiled and checked my face to see if it was warming up. It was. She always knew how to play me. I felt the crinkle of a smile hearing Mom’s boasting in fine form again. “I was nineteen and had gotten a job as a hostess at a fancy restaurant in DC. I had no polish, but I was pretty. I met him there. He was studying International Affairs or something at Georgetown University. Honestly, the best-looking guy I’d ever met, and he wore the most exquisite tailored suits he had custom-made in London when he was just a student! We fell hard for each other.”
“You loved him?” This might be the most shocking news of all. I’d always assumed I was the product of a married-man affair, or a one-night stand, or worse.
“I was crazy for him. Had the time of my life with him.”
“Why’d you never tell me any of this before?”
“I did. I told you it hurt too much to talk about, and I wasn’t lying. Eventually, I planned to tell you. When you were eighteen and ready to take off into the world.”
“That’s such a selfish answer.”
“You know me best, baby.”
The guard next to us checked his watch, and I felt our meager time ticking away. “So what happened with you and him?”
“I got pregnant. I was thrilled. He panicked.”
I couldn’t believe I was finally hearing this story—in jail of all places. I was riveted and eager to hear more. “Why?”
“He was from a prominent family in Japan. They threatened to cut him off if he stayed in DC with me, or worse, married me.”
“So what’d you do?”
“I’m not a total idiot. I lawyered up, as best I could. Got a settlement from him in exchange for his freedom. His family paid for our house in Greenbelt. I owned it outright. We had fourteen good years there, right?”
“Sure. At the house you eventually sold to pay for your drug addiction.”
Mom bowed her head. “I know,” she said quietly. “At least it allowed me to raise you on a waitress’s income.”
“While you were still employed, yes.” I didn’t owe her any response other than brutal honesty. Zoellner women are tough, right? “So what happened to this Kenji guy?”
“He did as he was told by his family. Returned to Tokyo and opted not to be part of our lives.”
“ ‘Opted’ is a nice way of saying ‘abandoned.’ ”
“I don’t disagree. But things have changed, and the door is open for you to go to him.”
“How do you even know that?”
“When I knew I was going to jail, I tracked down Masa through the Japanese Embassy in Washington and let him know the situation. He was Kenji’s best friend.”
Another blow. How could I ever trust “Uncle” Masa, who’d been part of my life once, yet withheld this crucial information from me? Mom saw my mad face and said, “Don’t blame this on Masa. He was only ever good to us, and you know that. He made all the arrangements to take you to Japan to live with Kenji.”
“Why now?”
“Because, duh, you’re in foster care?”
“No, I mean if he didn’t want to be a father before, why would he want to be one now?”
“I was told by Masa that the timing wasn’t right before for you to be part of your father’s life, but now it is.”
“Why?” I asked again.
“How should I know?” Mom said, agitated. “Just be glad the opportunity exists.”
“Opportunity? To live with a complete stranger on the other side of the world? What the fuck, Mom? What if I don’t want to go?”
“Go! Living with him now is your best option.” I shook my head. I still wasn’t buying it. Mom added, “You being in foster care is my worst nightmare come true.”
“So it’s all about you?”
“It’s all about you!” Mom said angrily. “How’d your towel work out?”
It was a bizarre question out of nowhere, but I knew exactly where she was going. Before I was officially made a ward of the State of Maryland, when I was packing my few belongings, I begged Mom to let me bring my favorite towel, a plush, expensive blue towel she’d bought for our house after a restaurant patron left her an unexpectedly big tip. Mom told me not to bother packing it, because anything nice I had would get stolen.
I glared at her, then admitted, “Foster witch-mom said it was hers and then accused me of stealing it from her.”
“I was afraid that would happen. Fuck.” The towel issue seemed, by the look on Mom’s face, to be the one that might finally make her cry. “Is that how you want to live, with people that petty?”
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to want,” I snapped. “Literally everything I know about my life has changed in the past few hours.”
“Take this chance. Don’t be me, Elle,” Mom pleaded. With her other hand, she gestured to her prison uniform.
An announcement came over the loudspeaker that visiting hours were over.
No! We’d only gotten started on our visit! We’d barely scratched the surface of the story of her and my father. I hadn’t told her anything about my own life except about my stupid fucking towel being stolen. I wanted to scream in frustration. I wanted to take my mother out of this place with me.
Mom stood up. “I hate this. I can’t even hug my baby. Please tell me you’ll go, Elle. Let me know so I can finally get some peace.”
Just kill me now.
“I’ll go,” I said, only making up my mind in that instant.
Her face had a look of bittersweet relief. “Tell Kenji I hate him for getting to be the hero—and so many other things—but that you’re a good girl and I’m jealous he gets to have you all to himself.”
I shook my head at her but offered a small smile. “I’m not going to tell him that.”
Mom smiled back and blew a weepy kiss my way as she was led away. “Happy birthday, Elle my belle. I love you.”
“I love you, too, crazy lady.”
Her back was to me as she walked out of the visiting room, but I could hear her laugh, and I was happy she couldn’t see the tears springing from my eyes.
I found Mabel outside in the parking lot, doing paperwork on a bench, while Uncle Masa and the Mercedes idled nearby.
“So?” Mabel asked me.
I couldn’t believe I was about to say this, but what else was there to do? I had a chance to meet the father I always wanted to know, to never go back to Foster Home #3, and never find out if Foster House #4 would indeed be worse than its predecessors. I said, “Let’s go.”
“Your foster home is on the way to the airport. The driver said we have enough time for you to stop and get your stuff.”
The first lesson I’d learned in foster care was to keep whatever was most important to me with me at all times. All I really cared abou
t were my old photos—of Mom, Reggie, Hufflepuff—and they were safely zipped away in the school binder inside the backpack I’d left sitting on the seat of the Mercedes.
“Let’s not,” I said. “Burn my stuff, for all I care.”
If the luxury Mercedes ride was a precursor to my future life in Japan, it was already winning over the last three months of my life.
I decided to think of this fucked-up situation as an opportunity—like my mom had said—rather than a terrifying question mark. I wasn’t going to disappoint Mom and get sent back to foster care. I’d figure this Kenji guy out and be a good (enough) daughter till I finished high school and could strike out on my own.
“So how do you know this Kenji Takahara?” I asked Uncle Masa. We’d dropped Mabel back at her office and were en route to Dulles Airport, moving slowly through rush-hour DC-area traffic.
“He’s not ‘this’ Kenji Takahara,” said Uncle Masa. “He’s your father.”
“Right. My father.” Connecting those two words—my and father—together was a lot to wrap my brain around. “How long has he been your friend?”
“He’s not just my friend. He’s my cousin. His father and my mother were brother and sister. So, in a way, I am almost your real uncle.”
I knew Uncle Masa was trying to be nice and welcoming, but I had big trust issues with my “uncle” who’d reappeared out of nowhere and was now whisking me to a new life with a father I didn’t know, in a country where I didn’t speak the language. But I understood that Uncle Masa was trying to do right by me, and I needed to remember I’d always trusted him. He would be the only person I knew in my new world, and my one connection to my old one. I wanted to hear his side of the story.
“So how did you know my mom really, then?”
“I was with Kenji at the restaurant where they first met. And I stayed in touch with your mother after Kenji returned to Tokyo.”
“Did he know that?”
“Yes. He encouraged it. He wanted to know about you.”
“Without actually being there for me. What a guy.”
Like turns of phrase, sarcasm was often lost on Uncle Masa. “Yes, he is a guy,” said Uncle Masa. The mistake was funny, but I wasn’t laughing. Because:
“How come he didn’t want to know me himself?”
“Kenji’s father oversaw the family business, and he made the decisions. He decided that Kenji should return home, finish his studies in Tokyo, and cut off contact.”
So Grandpa was a dick. Strike one, Takahara family.
I said, “Kenji Takahara could have chosen otherwise.”
“He was very young and it was falling on his head.”
“What?” I asked, confused.
“You know, the situation was too much for him.”
“You mean he was in over his head?”
Uncle Masa smiled. “Yes. You always helped me with my English, remember?”
I said, “I remember that even while you were visiting with me, I still grew up without a dad. Even if he was young and in over his head, he could have stayed.”
“That is not the Japanese way, to disobey parents.”
Strike two.
“So why now? Why does he want me to live with him now?”
“His father died last year. Now Kenji is the boss of the family and the family business. He makes the decisions. He had been trying to find you, but there was no record of where you’d gone.”
“Mom changed her cell number and didn’t leave a forwarding address for us. Because she owed so much money.”
“We were fortunate that she was trying to find me while he was trying to find you.”
“All these years, he could have tried harder. He’s a deadbeat.”
Uncle Masa searched the word deadbeat on his phone. “He’s not a deadbeat,” said Uncle Masa, frowning.
“Is he married? Does he have other children?”
“No. No.”
“What does he do?”
“He’s in real estate. The Takaharas are a prominent business family in Japan.”
Once again on this stranger than strange birthday, I felt overwhelmed. It was hard enough to accept the fact that my father was about to exist in my life, without also trying to figure out who he was as a person, where he came from, what he did, and . . . and . . . I needed a break, to an easier topic. I stared out the window of the Mercedes at the gray skies over Maryland. “What’s the weather like there?”
“Hot and humid in summer, cold in winter, beautiful cherry blossoms in spring.”
“Just like here.”
It would probably suck just as much.
Strike three.
Life moves fast once you turn sixteen, I guess.
Suddenly, I had a father I’d never known about. Suddenly, I was leaving Maryland, the only place I’d ever lived. Suddenly, I was at an airport for the first time, being whisked past a long-ass security line and over to a quick and efficient security line for first- and business-class passengers, and soon enough, I was going to be on a plane for the first time. Would my seventeenth birthday ever live up to this crazy one?
Uncle Masa took me to a special lounge waiting area for “International First” customers. Already I felt like an outsider, and I was still in my own country. Everyone in the private lounge looked rich, well-dressed, and comfortable, like they belonged in this immaculate, glass-windowed oasis overlooking the planes taking off and landing, and where a buffet of free food was available, along with rows of Japanese and English newspapers and magazines. The majority of people in the lounge also looked and spoke Japanese. A monitor hung on the wall showed the terminal’s upcoming departure times to cities like Vancouver, Paris, London, Rio de Janeiro, Beijing, and Mexico City. I’d never much imagined the world beyond Maryland, yet here all these people were, casually waiting to fling themselves to every corner of the earth, and I was about to be one of them.
An older Japanese couple sat opposite me and Uncle Masa, drinking tea. The lady kept looking at me disapprovingly, but every time I met her stare, she gazed into her teacup. She and her husband spoke to each other in Japanese—about me, I was pretty sure. I kept hearing her say the word hafu.
I wanted to hide my unsophisticated, never-been-on-a-plane self under a blanket while Uncle Masa sat beside me, working on his computer.
“What’s hafu?” I whispered to Uncle Masa.
He didn’t look up from his work. “I can’t hear you.”
I spoke louder but decided on a different question. “Can we call Kenji Takahara?”
“No. He’ll be working right now. Phone calls with him are by appointment, unless you want to speak with the receptionist at his business.”
“Why would I want to do that?”
“That’s what I thought.”
“What does he look like?” Genuine curiosity began to crowd out everything else. “Do you have a picture of him on your phone?”
“I don’t.”
“Can I see his online profile?”
“His security team advises him to keep a low online profile. He’s not on Facebook or Instagram or any of those other platforms.”
That my father had a receptionist wasn’t that interesting. That he had a security team was mind-blowing. Who was this guy?
“So let’s google him.”
“You can try but ‘Kenji Takahara’ is a very common Japanese name. You probably won’t see your father there.”
“I’m getting the feeling you and the security team don’t actually want me to see this guy.”
Uncle Masa laughed and finally looked up at me. He handed me his computer. “You’re welcome to try.”
I googled “Kenji Takahara.” As Uncle Masa had promised, there were too many hits to decipher which one was my father. I turned to the Google Images page. The screen flooded with photos of men named Kenji Takahara.
“Is he here?” I asked, turning the screen toward Uncle Masa.
He pointed to a photo of a man wearing a suit and a construction h
at, cutting the ribbon at an empty lot. “That’s him. The day they broke ground on the new hotel.”
“I can hardly see his face.”
“Then the security team is doing their job properly.”
I could tell this was a Google job that would require a lot more time and energy than I had at this moment, and I wanted to take advantage of having computer access. So I gave up on “Kenji Takahara” hits and logged on to my Gmail account to send Reggie a quick email.
Dude, you’re not going to believe what is happening! I am at the airport now, waiting for a flight to Japan to go live with my dad, who I just found out about. I’m so sorry there was no time to see you and say good-bye! Email me back and let me know when you can log on to the computer at the home and we will arrange a video chat. I will be in Tokyo then! Love, Elle. PS—I AM NOT JOKING! Sayonara! (Look it up.)
“Here she is,” said Uncle Masa, rising from his chair as a young Japanese woman approached. She handed a file folder to him and bowed.
Uncle Masa told me, “Elle, this is Emiko Katsura. She’s your father’s assistant in Tokyo, and she came to help me with all the arrangements. She’ll be flying back with us.”
Emiko Katsura bowed to me as well. Was I supposed to bow back? Set a date for royal tea? She appeared to be in her early thirties, and she wore a simple navy pencil skirt that showcased her trim figure, with a crisp white oxford blouse, cherry-red stiletto-heeled shoes, a gold charm bracelet on her wrist, and diamond stud earrings. I didn’t know how anyone could walk in heels that high. She had long, smooth ombré hair—raven-colored at the top, honey-colored toward the bottom, with full strands of chestnut-colored highlights. She looked like that Beyoncé song—“I Woke Up Like This.”
“Do you keep pictures in your locket charms?” I asked, fixated on her pretty gold bracelet. If I had one of those, I’d put pictures of Mom and Reggie and Hufflepuff in it, and anyone who wanted to steal the bracelet from me would literally have to fight me to get it off my wrist.
“I do.” Emiko opened it to show me a small bridal photo of herself and a Japanese groom who looked about the same age as Emiko but boring and not nearly as stylish. “My wedding day.”
