Under the Silk Hibiscus

by Alice J. Wisler

  When Charles wiped his mouth with a napkin, I decided I better remember my manners. I took a sip of water and made sure that the next bite entered my mouth slowly. As I chewed, I also wiped my mouth with the napkin placed by my bowl. When I finished my lunch, I looked around the kitchen.

  A boy in a striped shirt with a red ball cap sat at the kitchen table with a box of crayons, a few pencils, and a sheet of white paper. He picked out a blue crayon, colored with it and then put it back inside the box. At one point, he put his hands above his head, cupping his fingers. “I want to go for a ride,” he said. “Clippity-clop, clippity-clop.”

  I gathered that he was pretending to be a horse, his cupped hands were the ears.

  Mrs. Towson filled a glass with milk and walked over to him. “Put your hands down, Henry,” she said.

  Obeying, he dropped his hands to his sides and then picked up the glass. He downed the milk in a few gulps, and in a flash, his hands flew back over his head, this time two fists against his temples.

  She seemed used to his antics and calmly refilled his glass. “Drink up, Henry.”

  “Not now, Mama. I am a horse now. Clippity-clop.”

  Curious, I listened more intently.

  “What color is the horse?” she asked.

  “Grey.”

  “Who else is with the horse?”

  Craning my neck, I looked over at the sheet of paper to see a grey horse behind a white picket fence.

  “Who did you draw with the horse, Henry?” asked his mother.

  “Me,” replied Henry. Sure enough, he had penciled in a figure of a boy, lanky and thin, just like Henry. He added a cowboy hat and a pair of black boots. “I colored this. I did it all by myself.”

  “Nice, Henry,” she said. “I need to make a few pies now. You keep coloring and working on your masterpiece.” She wiped her hands on her apron and turned toward the pantry.

  The next Saturday, our lunch was a bowl of chicken stew with yeast rolls and butter. Charles ate two rolls before he touched his stew. I tried to take small bites, but after about six of those, I gave in and shoveled spoonfuls into my mouth. Then I buttered two rolls while Charles popped half of another one into his mouth. It was amazing how farm work made people hungry.

  Henry was drawing at the same table again. “Look, I made a pig,” he announced.

  His mother walked over to his side. “Good work,” she said.

  “Do you like my picture?”

  “Yes, I do. Now let me make some cobbler, Henry. We have army guests staying over.”

  When I later asked Charles who those guests might be, he said that the Towsons served as a guesthouse for servicemen on R and R.

  “They have two nice bedrooms in the back that men can stay in. You ought to see them. Double beds. I’d forgotten what one of those looked like. They have their kid’s artwork all over the walls in frames. That kid seems stupid, but he can draw.”

  “I guess he’s pretty good.”

  “One picture is of a man in a straw hat sheering a sheep. I think he must have drawn that of one of us.”

  “One of us?”

  “You know, a Japanese. He made the man’s eyes narrow and used a yellow crayon for his skin.”

  “Yellow?” I bellowed. “We aren’t yellow.”

  Charles didn’t seem disturbed by my outburst. Calmly, he stated, “Yeah, well, people say we aren’t white. And we aren’t black.”

  “I just never thought we would be considered yellow.”

  I wondered when Charles had been invited for a tour of the home. I must have missed that. I was curious to see what the rest of the farmhouse looked like, but for now I kept to the kitchen.

  One Saturday, Mrs. Towson gave me a paper bag with cookies. “Take them home for your family,” she said.

  I thought about stashing them away from the others in our apartment and eating them all myself, but Aunt Kazuko had eagle eyes. She called to me from across the road. Emi was strapped to her back, and I figured that they’d been out on a stroll. “What’s in the bag?” she asked.

  I swore that my aunt could sniff out food no matter where it was.

  “Nothing,” I lied.

  “Is it heavy?”

  “What?”

  “The bag?”

  “Not really.”

  “Nothing is not really heavy?”

  That night, she kept saying how she needed a pep and that her blue container was empty. She opened her container, rattled it and then said, “Nothing. Nothing.”

  I couldn’t stand it anymore. “Here,” I cried, pulling the bag from under my pillow. “Take a cookie.”

  She smiled. “You so good for me.”

  “It’s you are. You are so good for me!”

  “What?” she said, her mouth filled with the oatmeal cookie. “You don’t need to complain about my English. Everybody understand me.”

  All I could do was groan. One day I’d be out of this camp, far from here. Maybe I’d go to San Antonio and join Charles on his ranch, maybe I’d go up north to Chicago. Wherever I went, it would be a place where I didn’t have to share cookies with Aunt Kazuko.

  Chapter Ten

  “Are you going to the dance?” Charles asked on the bus ride home one Saturday night, just before the bus made its way into the camp gate.

  I rubbed my knee; it throbbed due to hitting it against a fence post earlier. At least the skin on my hands had grown tough, and I seldom got blisters anymore.

  “I might go,” said Charles. “How about you?”

  “What?”

  “The dance.”

  Dance? I let the word conjure images of my brother flirting with girls while I sat on the sidelines. Why would I want to put myself through that torture? Yet, my hope that Lucy might dance with me prevailed. Ever since our last conversation, when she came into our barracks to console me, I thought I just might have a chance.

  After exiting the bus, and telling Charles that I would be at the dance, I showered at the communal washroom. As the soap lathered, hope ran through me; tonight just might be the night to dance with Lucy.

  In our barracks, Tom sat on his cot reading a book of American poetry, and Aunt Kazuko played peek-a-boo with Emi.

  I slipped behind the makeshift dressing room and put on a clean flannel shirt I’d bought last week at the co-op’s clothing store and zipped up a pair of black trousers that Ken had outgrown.

  “You going to dance?” asked my aunt when I pushed back the dressing room’s curtain so that I could be seen.

  “Yeah.” I walked toward my cot, got a smile from Emi, and a glance from Tom. Yes, I would go and I would find Lucy.

  My aunt studied me for a moment. “You look like meow of cat.”

  “Cat’s meow,” I corrected her.

  “You going to be the best looking boy there.”

  I hoped so. I searched for my shoes and a clean pair of socks.

  “Have a good time,” she called, as I swung open the front door. “Don’t be gone long. The bucket of water is nearly empty.”

  Following the music, I walked over to the building where dances were held. Glen Miller songs wafted throughout the perimeters of the barracks. A few teens were seated on the steps outside. I recognized two of them, Ken and Lucy.

  “How were the sheep?” asked Ken.

  I thought of how I’d hit my knee against a fence post when I was chasing after a disobedient sheep who was about to escape through an open gate. Just thinking of how my kneecap had banged against the wood made it sting even more. But forget pain, I was with Lucy. “They were good.” I smiled at Lucy.

  “What do you do on the farm?” asked Lucy. “Is it hard work?”

  I was about to answer when, from behind me, I heard a familiar voice. “Well, it’s the Mori boys.”

  I turned to see Mekley. He was in uniform, and while he usually looked clean, I noticed dirt on his boots.

  “The Mori boys,” he said again. “And with such a pretty girl. Very pretty for a Jap.” He let
out a burp that filled the air with the stench of beer.

  “Hey,” said Ken, as Mekley staggered toward us. “You need to stay away.”

  Mekley didn’t listen; he came forward. “I can do whatever I want.”

  Ken sprang to his feet and marched over to the soldier.

  I strained to hear what my brother was saying to the man, but couldn’t make out any of the words. I looked at Lucy, her arms were wrapped around her waist and a fearful expression filled her face.

  After a few minutes, Mekley grinned at us, looked Lucy over a few times and said, “Whatever you say, Ken. Whatever you say.” He released a light laugh, burped again, and left, heading in the direction of the hospital.

  “Let’s go inside.” Ken reached for Lucy’s arm

  Lucy took his hand and sprang to her feet. “He is too creepy.”

  Ken placed a protective arm around her, and the two entered the rec room.

  Chapter Eleven

  I followed them inside. If ever I felt like the fifth wheel, this was the time. The music was loud, and couples were dancing to Glen Miller’s “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree.”

  A girl walked from the other side of the room toward me. She was Lisa, a small girl, a few years younger than me. Her hair didn’t flow; it was always in pigtails. She made me think of how Emi might look at age five. “Hi, Nathan,” she said. “It’s nice to see you.”

  “Yeah. Thanks.” I realized I was mumbling.

  “Would you like to ask me to dance?”

  She was cute to some, I suppose, but no beauty queen. Her eyes didn’t have that way of finding mine and making my knees grow weak. But she wanted to dance, and how could I deny her? Just because my heart was hurting didn’t mean that I had to hurt somebody else.

  We danced the jitterbug, but my eyes were hardly on her. I kept looking over the floor to see where Lucy and Ken were. I saw a guy and girl huddled in the corner kissing. It wasn’t them. The girl had short hair, cut and curled, not at all like Lucy’s long locks.

  After the music stopped, I tried to smile, tried to join in the debate among those congregated in chairs by the door. But it all seemed so pointless. They talked of the war and Roosevelt and how we were Americans and needed to be treated better, not stuck out in this forsaken land in the middle of nowhere. I knew that their thoughts were important; knew that Papa would have wanted me to contribute my ideas. But I was not in the mood for trying to appear knowledgeable and thought-provoking. Besides, the room was too warm, and the smell of aftershave and hair tonic was making my nose run.

  When I couldn’t find Lucy or Ken anywhere, I felt it was futile to stay. Feeling defeated, I walked back to our barracks. Who needed girls? Who cared? I would go to sleep. I would forget that Lucy existed. I would work and forget that there was a life other than feeding sheep, cleaning out stalls, and eating Mrs. Towson’s homemade chili.

  Two days later, there was a letter for us. I recognized the immaculate cursive writing right away. My heart did one of those happy jumps, and a smile spread across my face and stuck.

  I carried the letter from the post office to our apartment and was glad that no one was inside so that I could read it alone. It was postmarked sixteen days ago. The envelope was a simple white one. There was no need to open its seal; someone had already done that. I believed that there were Caucasian Americans whose only job was to make sure that every letter that arrived at each relocation camp had been scanned for pro-Japan propaganda. Mr. Kubo said that full paragraphs from one of the letters from his son had been marked out with black ink.

  In the quiet of our living quarters, I sat on my bed and carefully took the letter out from the envelope. The letter was one page. Not one word had been blotted out. Unfolding the sheet of white paper, I read:

  Dear Ones—Etsuko, Kazuko, Ken, Nathan, Tom, and my daughter, Emi, Thank you for your letter, Etsuko. I realize that it was written many months ago. Forgive me for not writing to you sooner. It is hard to put words together and you know I have never been good with words. I miss you all and love you. Please do your best under these unfortunate circumstances. Please know that my lack of communication does not indicate my lack of concern and love.

  It was not signed, as though he had either forgotten to write his name or had not wanted to for whatever reason. I read it again. He had included all of our names, even Emi’s. So he did know that Emi had been born. He’d included Mama’s name, too. He didn’t know that she was gone.

  I wanted to share the letter with the others, but wondered if it would make them too sad to read his words. The letter was for all of us, addressed to each one. Was it selfish not to share it with everybody else?

  Charles found me as he often did and asked about a paper. “Have you finished it, Nathan?”

  “Which paper?” I pulled myself up from my cot.

  “The one for English about Walt Whitman.”

  “No. When is it due?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  “Due tomorrow?” How could I have missed out on hearing that? I sighed and tucked the letter under my pillow. It looked like I was going to have to work all night to get that paper written.

  Exhausted, it was midnight when I finally completed it and slipped into bed. Everyone else was already asleep, even Ken had made it home. As I listened to all the noises my family made during sleep, I was relieved. Not only was my paper completed, more importantly, Papa had written to us.

  I wondered what his camp surroundings were like. Like ours, had they been built quickly from green lumber that shrunk, producing large gaps in the walls? I wondered about the food he was served, if he got meal tickets like we did here, if he had friends. But most of all I wondered if he was able to smoke and play chess. Along with fishing and running a business, those two had been his favorite pastimes. I knew they weren’t letting him fish, but even if they still thought he was a spy, I hoped that they would let him have a few puffs of a cigarette in the evening as the sun went down.

  Chapter Twelve

  The next morning, I woke from a dream about Mama. Immediately I knew that I had experienced something grand, better than any piano performance, even the one in sixth grade when I had my first standing ovation in that dank auditorium that smelled of kerosene. The dream clung to me like a soft cotton blanket, the kind we had back home in San Jose. I didn’t want to move for fear the warmth would slip off and leave me. In my dream, Mama had whispered, “I want you to be strong, Nobu. It will be very hard on you, but you must persevere.”

  I lay in bed listening to the snores of the others as they slept; the warmth from the dream still present. I opened my eyes, although I knew I shouldn’t. Rolling over and closing my eyes in the hopes of continuing the dream would have been best. But Emi was stirring in her crib, and the reality of having to eventually get up and face the day began to take command. Before some of the dream could fade, I played it over again in my mind. Emi would have to wait.

  In my dream, Mama had been seated in our house in San Jose on the piano bench. Bright sunlight entered the living room through an opened window, lighting her face and every part of the room. Mama had been wearing a teal dress with a pair of pearl earrings. I was somewhere in the same room, but of course, typical of dreams, I had not seen myself. When I walked over to the bench to sit beside Mama, she again whispered, “You must persevere, Nobu.”

  As Emi gave a few gurgles, I knew I had to get up. The notion to slide over to Mama’s bed became strong, and I was compelled to act. It was as though the dream was taking on a persona, one that was pushy, forceful, even asking me to do something. So, slowly, I eased out of my cot and went over to the empty bed where Mama had once spent three months of her life.

  I didn’t like seeing the cot unoccupied. Last week, I’d asked my aunt if we could move it out of our camp house. She merely frowned, shook her head, and said we didn’t need to move it out.

  “But it will give us more room,” I’d said.

  She’d shrugged and said that we might need it whe
n Emi grew up.

  I had walked to school that morning wondering how tragic it would be if we never got out of this prison. Were we doomed to live here forever? Were Emi and the rest of us going to grow up inside this confined barbed wire region of the world?

  Now, as a strong feeling overcame me, I crouched by Mama’s cot and removed the suitcase. Along with my suggestion of moving this cot out of our barracks, I’d also wanted to suggest that we go through Mama’s suitcase. In the six months since her death, I had not said anything about doing this; part of me was afraid that Tom might become distressed. I suppose that I wanted to protect him. I unlatched the case and opened the lid. Swallowing hard, I let my fingers touch her light blue cashmere sweater. Under it was a book, a leather Bible, and then to the left was a white cotton shirt, a lacy scarf, and a small wooden jewelry box. Opening it, I saw the pearl earrings that Papa had given her one Christmas. I smiled—these had been the earrings Mama had on in my dream. But when I drew out the piece of silk crimson fabric, panic set in.

  “Where is it?” My words came out not in a whisper, but in a demanding tone as though I was asking the brown case a question.

  Emi whimpered. Aunt Kazuko rose from her bed, repeating in a tender tone, “Yoshi, yoshi.”

  I dug through the suitcase, no longer using gentle fingers. As I took out each item and placed it on the floor, my mind pulsated with fear. “Where is it?” I ran my hands over the inside of the now empty suitcase.

  My aunt, with Emi in her arms, stood over me.

  “It’s not here!” I cried.

  I didn’t need to say anymore. The look on my aunt’s face showed that she not only knew exactly what was missing, but was also worried. “Perhaps she put it some other place,” she said.

  “Where?” I shot a glance under the bed, but there was nothing else there. “Where is it?” I fought to breathe.

  I couldn’t wrap my mind around it. The watch was gone. Fueled by frustration and disbelief, I stood, scanned our room, my eyes stopping at the curtains my aunt had made, the floor, the table with her teapot. Where could it be? Had Tom perhaps taken it out to look at? To write about? To describe, perhaps, for one of his classes?