Summer of the Big Bachi

by Naomi Hirahara

  “What can I do? She has plenty of doctas.” Mas squeezed the television remote.

  “Why don’t you tell her thanks?”

  Thanks? Why I have to say thank you? thought Mas, but he dared not speak. He knew enough to keep quiet when the women in his household got mad.

  “She’s not doing well, Dad. Can’t you tell? You’re not going to have another chance.”

  “Chance for what?”

  “Fourth stage. That’s what she’s in, Dad. The fourth stage. It’s not good, okay? You know that as much as me.” Mari gestured wildly with her hands. “Are you that out of touch? Are you that dense?”

  Mas turned up the volume on the Gunsmoke rerun.

  Mari glared, her eyebrows arching down. “I’ll never marry a man like you,” she said, leaving the den.

  Mas felt as if he’d been stung by a bee, like the time he’d been clipping an orange tree for an Indian businessman. Her words cut into his skin, but after the initial pain, Mas felt nothing at all.

  The letters were almost completely clean when Mas sensed a presence standing over him. Akemi, wearing a black pantsuit, handed him a handkerchief from her purse.

  Mas shook his head. “Kitanai, yo.”

  “Go ahead,” Akemi said. “Please.”

  The sun had dipped halfway down, filling the cemetery with shadows. Mas could barely tell if the headstone looked any better. He should have come more regularly, maybe brought some cymbidium during the summer months. But the fact was that he hadn’t. There were no excuses. He had had the time. Until recently, he had had transportation. He should have never let her be forgotten, in front of all the others buried at Evergreen Cemetery.

  Akemi, meanwhile, had her own agenda. She was on the far edge of the Japanese graves. Clutching her soiled handkerchief, Mas made his way to where she was standing. In spite of the darkness, Mas could still make out the letters on the headstone: susumu haneda, 1898–1946, husband, father, brother, he was our hero.

  “We had the mortuary handle all the arrangements,” Akemi said, taking the handkerchief from Mas. “They even sent me a picture and a map. But this is the first time for me to see this in person.”

  Mas stayed quiet. He had had no idea Joji’s father was buried right here in Evergreen.

  “He died in a camp in New Mexico after the war. Somehow he contracted TB.” Akemi folded the handkerchief in half. “A family friend had hung on to his ashes. I wanted to bury him in Hollywood, near the movie stars. They wouldn’t let me. It’s just as well, I guess. Here, he is among friends.”

  Mas averted his eyes and then noticed that the plot next to it had been recently dug up. That didn’t need any explanation. It was there that the fake Joji Haneda would be making his new home, this time forever.

  The funeral must have been halfway over when Mas and Akemi finally entered the chapel. Mas could already smell incense from the small lobby area, where two Japanese men and one woman arranged koden envelopes on a long folding table. One wrote numbers on each envelope, another recorded names in a ledger, and finally, the last one looped rubber bands around bundles. Only the last worker looked up and tipped his head. Mas reciprocated and slapped down his envelope without stopping to sign in.

  The public offering of incense had already begun. A line formed in the middle of the aisle; Mas could see Tug’s white hair somewhere in the front. A woman, her purse hanging from her arm, stepped forward to a pot smoking with incense sticks. Shiny rosary beads hung from her clasped hands as she bent toward the Buddhist altar, a black box with gold decoration. She then pinched ash and released it into another pot. She bowed again. She walked over to the coffin. One half of it was open, and Mas could see the outline of Riki’s hooked nose. A large framed photo was set on the closed portion of the coffin. It was Riki, smiling, outside his Ventura nursery.

  Tug was next. Devout Christian that he was, he avoided the pot of incense and Buddhist altar. Instead, he went straight to the coffin and bowed to Riki’s body. The top of Tug’s hair was still sparse, and a gauze bandage was placed over his bruise. Are you nuts? thought Mas, licking his lips. This guy hit you, maybe even could’ve killed you if he got the right spot. And here you are, bowing to him.

  Tug’s next action surprised Mas even more. He went right to the front row of the pews, where the family sat, and shook hands with each one. The widow, her permed hairdo shaking. The pale son periodically wiping his hooked nose. The daughter weeping into a handkerchief. Tug looked sincere; in fact, Mas knew that he was sincere. For a second, Mas almost hated his friend.

  Tug slid back into his pew, and the ritual continued. Row by row, the mortician tapped the shoulders with his white-gloved fingers, and the people rose and lined up.

  Shuji Nakane was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps, with his dirty work completed, he was already on a plane back to Hiroshima.

  Finally, it was Akemi and Mas’s turn. They stood with the others on the right-side aisle. As the priest chanted, they stepped closer and closer to the pot of incense and the coffin.

  Akemi approached the body first. Instead of keeping her distance of three steps back, she got so close that her hips touched the coffin. She bent over and studied Riki’s face for a good minute and a half, long enough for old women to nudge their sleeping husbands in the pews. The heads of the family members, minutes ago bent down in grief, were now upright, eyes still on Akemi.

  Go tell them, Mas thought. Go tell them all, this is not my brother. This is not Joji Haneda.

  But Akemi instead quietly backed away from the body. Her cheeks were shiny with tears, and Mas was confused. Why be sad over Riki’s death? He was a fraud; Akemi must have figured it out by now.

  It was Mas’s turn, so he took a few steps toward the coffin. Riki’s skin was a strange peach color, his age spots covered up and his thinning hair carefully combed back with oil. Are you really dead, Riki? he thought. Is this really your end, or another beginning? Mas half expected Riki to rise any minute, brush off his face makeup, and sneer. But the hooked nose remained still. He looked so peaceful that Mas realized that his friend and nemesis was indeed gone.

  After the whole room had made the procession to the incense pots and Riki’s coffin, another speaker took the microphone. A familiar long face, cheekbones, the nose. The son was giving the closing comments, addressing the crowd. “Again, my mother, sister, and I thank all of you for coming. I know that my father would be grateful to see your presence here tonight.”

  Before Mas heard more, he stepped outside, leaving Akemi standing alone in the back. The sun had almost set, and a film of gray rested on the parking lot. He ached for a cigarette. He patted his windbreaker and pants pockets. Nothing.

  “Tobacco?” a familiar voice asked from the side of the building. It was Shuji Nakane, holding out an open package of filtered cigarettes. In his other hand was Mas’s koden envelope. “The clerk for the mortuary had come to me, confused. It seems that someone had not written their own name on the envelope. Just Joji Haneda, and an address in Hiroshima. I told him that I would take care of it.” Nakane took out a silver lighter, flipped it open, and then placed the tip of the envelope on the flame. When he saw the fire had taken hold, Nakane released the burning envelope. It eventually landed on the dirt next to some weeds.

  “Youzu wasted thirty dolla,” Mas simply said.

  “And how about that thirty thousand dollars, Arai-san? You got rid of that money a lot quicker than I thought you could.”

  “You killsu that girl.”

  “I did? Oh, no, Arai-san. It wasn’t me. My associates are responsible for that. But there’s absolutely no proof. The American way, right? We are all innocent until proven guilty.”

  “I knowsu. Someone tellsu me. I go to police.”

  “Now, that would be a tragic mistake, I think. And who would they believe?”

  With the toe of his fancy shoe, Nakane crushed the burnt envelope, which looked like a large piece of dried seaweed. For a second, Mas felt afraid. This man could kill him,
right then and there. In fact, murder would be quite convenient, because Mas’s body could then go straight into the ground.

  Mas heard a murmur of voices from the front of the chapel. The funeral must be over, he thought, and then, before he knew it, Akemi was heading right toward them. “Nakane, I must talk to you,” she said.

  Mas stepped in front of Akemi’s path. “No, no,” he whispered.

  Akemi acted as though Mas weren’t even there. “You can take the land,” she said to Nakane. “I’ll sign it over to you. I don’t care. But my grandson. Spare him.”

  “I wish you had made this offer back in Hiroshima,” said Nakane. “But there’s nothing I can do.”

  More people filed out from the front, and then the side door of the chapel burst open. The mortician and five other men carried the coffin toward the small, square building with the chimney. The men disappeared through a door, and then quickly emerged without the casket.

  The mortician with the white gloves firmly locked the door with a huge metal key. After peering into the room again through a small window on the door, the man left for the front office.

  “Thatsu not Joji Haneda,” Mas said as loudly he could. A few couples in the parking lot stared at him. “Thatsu not Haneda.”

  “What are you doing, Masao-san?” Akemi asked.

  Mas went to the crematorium and pressed his face through the window. His eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness. The coffin, looking less grand than it had in the chapel, lay in the middle of the giant gas oven.

  Mas felt a wetness down his collar. He began pounding the door. “Stop!” he cried out. “Stop!”

  Someone pulled at his arm. “He’s dead. He’s gone.”

  The crematorium then rumbled like an earthquake, and Mas began to smell something foul, like burning fish. He turned toward the square window in time to see the coffin explode in flames.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  In a matter of minutes, most of the casket had burned away. All that was left was the vague rectangular frame, and then Riki’s body, engulfed in fire, began to rise.

  The person tugging on Mas’s arm had let go. It was stone quiet, aside from a police siren in the distance. Mas stood transfixed as the flames licked the frame of the casket. With each layer that burned, another layer appeared.

  The air raid siren had rung early that morning, about seven-thirty, Mas remembered. There were four of them—Mas, Riki, Joji, and a younger boy, Kenji—in the basement of the train station. Like all the other boys, they wore school uniforms even though they had stopped going to school long ago. Sewn on each uniform was a square cloth with a name and blood type: Mas was AB; Riki, A; and Joji, O. Mas couldn’t recall much about Kenji; he was one of those boys you noticed only when he was gone.

  Mas hid underneath a shelf in the corner, Joji scrunched in a doorway, and Kenji pressed himself against the floor, covering his head with his hands. Riki, however, remained in the center of the room. He flung his arms out and wagged his tongue as if he were catching raindrops in his mouth.

  “Have you gone mad?” Mas couldn’t believe that Riki was acting so foolish.

  “I’m tired of ducking each time we hear that siren. I’ve decided to dance instead.” Riki then started kicking up his legs.

  Riki looked so ridiculous, Mas couldn’t help but laugh. Soon he himself was in the middle of the cement basement floor, leaping up and down like a frog. Joji remained in the doorway, waiting, while Kenji lay still. Minutes passed, and they heard just the droning of the cicadas. Not even the sound of a lone B-29.

  “You know—” Riki said in between deep breaths. “I believe that our old principal, Naito-sensei, is actually in charge of that siren.”

  “Naito-sensei?” Mas pictured the bald, soft head with round-framed glasses.

  “Yeah—whenever he has to go to the toilet, he just rings that siren.”

  The two of them broke down in laughter. It was very unpatriotic of them, Mas knew. Many bombs had fallen; many people had been killed. But it was still funny to imagine Naito-sensei squatting and declaring a raid.

  Joji finally moved from the doorway and began changing his shoes. He was one of the few teenagers who actually owned a pair of work boots—probably from America, Riki had sneered jealously one day. They were all familiar with Joji’s routine by now, how he carefully transferred some folded-up papers from his sock to the inside of his left boot.

  “Always so serious, Haneda,” Riki finally said.

  “You think that all of this is a joke?”

  “A joke?” Riki mimicked Joji’s American accent. “War is a joke.”

  “You won’t be laughing when America wins the war.” Joji patted the side of his boot. “With these papers, I’ll be on my way home.”

  “Home to what? A prison camp?” Riki said.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Didn’t you hear? The Japanese in America are in camps.”

  Joji furiously laced his boots. “Liar.”

  “Yeah, I heard it from one of my neighbors. Their relative was sent back on a boat as part of a prisoner-of-war exchange. That’s what they think of you back in America, Haneda. As a thing to be traded for one of their own.”

  “You don’t know what you are talking about,” Joji said, but even in the dim morning light, Mas could see the glimmer of doubt on his face. They all had heard the stories. There had even been talk of Joji’s father’s being a spy, maybe even a double agent, trapped in America.

  Joji climbed up the staircase. “It’s past eight. You guys can fool around, but I’m going to work.”

  “Go ahead, Haneda. Work, work, work. Just know that you are working for your enemy.”

  Joji paused at the top of the stairs, shook his head, and then turned the doorknob. As the door opened, a flash of light flooded the basement and Mas felt himself being knocked to the ground.

  Mas pressed his face against the door of the crematorium. The burning body was moving now, as if it were alive. “Joji, Joji, is that you?” he cried. He felt feverishly hot, salty drops of sweat stinging his eyes and falling onto his funeral suit.

  But the body was not Joji’s. It twisted back in time and now Mas saw the body of their supervisor at the train station, his black boots still remaining on his burnt legs.

  “Masao-san, Masao-san.”

  Someone was calling his name. Who? It came like a faint whistle through the orange flames and smoke. The whole world was on fire.

  “Help us, help us. We are so thirsty.”

  Mas climbed up the rubble. There were people everywhere, running, weeping, their flesh melting away from their bodies. “Water, water,” they all seemed to say.

  “Masao-san, over here, over here.”

  There was Kenji, the boy that no one noticed. Only now his face, arms, and even scalp—what had happened to his hair?—were strangely dotted with dark spots. “Water, we need to go to the river. The river by the bridge,” said Kenji.

  “Wait, wait,” Mas called out. He looked down and was shocked to see that his uniform had been torn to shreds, exposing his thin gray underwear. His toes were bleeding, but he felt no pain.

  Mas was being pushed by the crowd to the bridge, the same bridge where he, Joji, and Riki had posed for a local photographer. Now people were throwing themselves into the black water, their scorched bodies seeking some sort of relief. Mas thought some were wearing their pajamas, but he realized that they were naked; the checkered pattern of their pajamas had been burnt into their skin. After their bodies touched the water, their faces shone for a moment with pleasure, then the current swept them away.

  “Come on, Masao,” said Kenji, standing at the edge of the bridge. He jumped into the rushing currents, and Mas closed his eyes to follow. He leaned forward to make the plunge, but suddenly someone grabbed on to his shoulder.

  “What—” Mas dangled from the bridge and looked down to see bunches of logs rushing down the river. They seemed to be of every size, some short and stubby, some long and
thin. One was even connected to a pair of shoes, noticed Mas. How strange.

  Then Mas understood. “Kenji,” he screamed, someone still hanging on to his shoulder. “Kenji, it’s poison. The river’s poison.” But the spotted boy was long gone. Families were bent down by the banks, cupping their hands into the water and gulping enthusiastically. “No, no,” Mas yelled.

  Mas heard a voice from behind. “They won’t listen to you.” He allowed the person to draw him back onto the bridge, and turned to see the familiar hooked nose.

  “You’re alive.” Mas blinked hard at Riki, whose hair was completely singed away. Only a few bristles stood up on his high forehead.

  “At least half of me,” said Riki, revealing his backside. The back of his uniform was gone, as if someone had purposely designed his clothing that way. On his neck was a huge, bloody gash that exposed the nubs of his spinal column.

  Mas felt the remains of his breakfast, a roasted sweet potato, come up his throat. He vomited as people continued to push toward the river and bump him from all sides.

  “No time for that, Masao,” said Riki, gripping the shreds of cloth around Mas’s neck like a leash.

  “Joji—” Where was Joji?

  “This way, this way.”

  At the edge of the bridge lay a long, skinny body. Riki placed the burnt body over his shoulder as if it were a sack of rice. The arms and legs dangled lifelessly, and then Mas recognized the work boots. “He’s alive,” said Riki, “barely.”

  It seemed as though they walked for days. All the landmarks—the corner drugstore, the stationery shop, the public bath—had disappeared. Only one wall of the once-majestic government office stood—now a giant tombstone marking a mass grave. The body of a man, who apparently had been resting on a cement stoop, remained burnt in place.

  Is this all we are? Bits of dust, ash? How could life leave so quickly? Mas wiped his face with his black hands and, for the first time in a long time, felt tears spring up to his eyes. Were his parents still alive? What about his brothers and sisters? All he wanted was his flat, hay-filled futon, lined up with the others. He wanted to rest, close his eyes, and wake up to a new, bright Hiroshima day.