by Sarah Kuhn
“I’ve got it!” I exclaim, waving the sketchbook around. “My fashion school application design.”
“Let me see,” she says, moving next to me as I set my sketchbook on the cutting table.
“This is inspired by my trip here,” I say, tracing the soft pencil lines with my fingertips. “I’m trying to convey all of my spring break—and how it’s made me feel—in one garment. And I want to use an unusual material, which maybe you can get from what I’ve sketched here …” I point to a couple of spots on my drawing.
“Yes,” my grandmother says, smiling faintly as she studies my work. “I see it. I think it’s perfect, Kimiko-chan.”
I beam. I’m so excited to get started.
“Have you talked to your mother yet?” my grandmother says, moving some things around on the cutting table. “Does she know about your plan?”
“Not yet,” I say. “She still hasn’t responded to any of my emails. I’ll tell her when I have more of the design completed. I think I can get started here, but I’ll need to finish at home. It’s a lot of work and this—”
“Will be too bulky to take on the plane once completed,” Grandma says, nodding at my drawing. “How do you think your mother will respond when you tell her what you are doing—when she sees this?”
“I don’t know,” I say honestly. “Everything could still end in disaster. But even if it does, I still have to do this.”
“How did you come to this conclusion?” my grandmother says, cocking her head to the side. “This morning, you seemed discouraged. A bit lost.”
“I was,” I say, remembering my puffy eyes. “I mean, that was kind of about something different, I guess. A boy.”
“The one you like—or liked?” my grandmother says, raising an eyebrow.
“I still like him,” I say, and the ache around my heart pulses. “And I’m not sorry I still like him. Even though it hurts. Today at that funky teahouse–slash–antiques shop, I saw something …” I picture the medical text, which is now sitting on my bed. “And it made me think of everything I’ve done here. All the amazing places I’ve seen, all the wonderful things I’ve eaten, all the awesome experiences I’ve had.”
All the kisses that thrilled me down to my bones, all the looks and touches that made my heart beat faster.
“Thinking about all that made me realize …” I smile down at my drawing. “Going out and doing all those things and being honest about my feelings and telling that boy I like him, moving beyond just fantasizing about those things and making them real—well, yes, it did open me up to hurting and being sad. Heartbroken, even. But I wouldn’t give up those experiences for anything in the world.”
My obaasan smiles at me. I can’t help but picture her younger, smiling at my grandfather as he tried and failed to choke down her terrible fish.
“Let’s get started, then,” she says, tapping my sketchbook. “What do you think the first step is? Creating your unusual textile?”
“I’m going to do that when I get home,” I say. “That piece of it will be too delicate to transport. I was thinking I’d start by creating the pattern for the base of the garment and then maybe starting on the pieces that are made from more conventional materials.”
“We will need to go back to the fabric store,” my grandmother says, nodding. “Do you want to start with some initial draping to see if the basic design has any immediate flaws?”
“Let’s do that,” I say, nodding. “We can use muslin. Do you want to be my model? You can stand very still, yes?” I give her a hopeful smile.
My obaasan hesitates, studying me for a long moment. Then she glances at my sketch. Then back at me. I shift awkwardly from foot to foot, wondering what she’s working out.
“No,” she finally says, with an emphatic shake of her head.
She crosses the room and stands in front of the dress form, allowing her fingertips to graze the unfinished yukata.
“Come help me, Kimiko-chan,” she says.
I cross the room to join her. We don’t speak as we carefully remove the yukata from the dress form. She folds it and places it on one of the shelves. Then she brushes off the dress form and turns to me.
“Use this,” she says, gesturing to the empty dress form. “It’s been waiting for you.”
I work late into the night, draping and sketching and trying to figure out the finer points of my garment. The next morning, Grandma and I pop over to the fabric store and to a big used bookstore called Book Off, which is apparently a chain in Japan. Even though I’m going to create my unusual textiles back home in LA, I want to do a test run to see how they’ll work out, and for that, I need books. I find myself gravitating over to the old, used medical texts and pick up a few of those. The ache around my heart pulses again as I pay for my books, but throwing myself into this project is helping. And even though I’m hurting, I realize I don’t want it to just go away. I don’t want to reset to before I felt like this, because that would mean forgetting Akira, in a way. And in spite of everything, I don’t want to forget him.
We get back to my grandparents’ place just as my grandfather is preparing lunch—which I notice includes fish. I give him a pointed look and he just cackles.
When we finish eating, Grandma and I adjourn to the sewing room and get to work. We cut and drape and I pull some pages out of the medical texts to use in my unusual textile experiment.
“I think making this work is mostly about soaking the pages enough so that they become pliant—but not so much that they are in danger of totally disintegrating,” I muse, lining up a few of the pages I’ve tried soaking on the cutting table.
“Sou, sou, I agree,” Grandma says, nodding vigorously. “Have you also thought about reinforcing them with something?”
“Like adhering them to an actual piece of fabric? Definitely,” I say. “But I need to choose that fabric really carefully so it still works with the rest of the garment.”
“And that is something you will do once you get back to the America?” my grandmother says.
“Yes. I think we’ve done all we can do here.” I gesture to our work-in-progress on the dress form. “I’ll finish it at home. Thank you so much, Obaasan.”
“It was my pleasure,” she says, giving me a gentle smile.
“Kimiko-chan?” My grandfather enters the room, toting a small package and a bag. “This came for you.”
“What, somebody actually mailed me something?” I say. “I didn’t realize I’d been here long enough for that.”
“It was left on our doorstep,” Grandpa says, shrugging. “I do not believe it came through the mail. Especially this part.” He holds up the bag, which I now see sports grease splotches and the telltale golden arches of McDonald’s.
I take the bag from him and open it. It contains a single Ebi Filet-O. I swear, my heart skips a beat.
I open the Ebi Filet-O and take a bite, relishing the luscious panko goodness. Then I take the package from Grandpa and turn it over in my hands. It’s fairly flat and my name is scrawled on the front in big, looping script.
“Open it,” my grandfather says, clearly dying of curiosity.
“Let her open it or not open it, Hakaru,” my grandmother says. “It’s her package.”
I polish off my Ebi Filet-O, set the package on the cutting table, and slit it open with my fingernail.
“It’s … papers?” I say, pulling a sheaf of papers from the package. “Printouts of something?”
I spread the printouts on the cutting table. My grandparents gather around me, peering over my shoulder. As I study the papers, I see that they’re printouts from various fashion design school websites—including the one I’m applying to. I look closer and see that they’re also marked up in blue pen, with long, detailed notes scribbled in the margins.
Lots of focus on the technical side of sewing with this one—maybe you don’t need? reads one note.
This program seems to encourage the most creativity, but does it have enough structure? Thi
nk you would like the special sessions with famous designers, another one says.
I turn to the last page in the sheaf of papers and see a single note scribbled at the bottom.
Everyone online says this one is extremely challenging—lots of dropping out. But I know you can handle it. I believe in you.
—A.
“This is from Akira,” I murmur. “Um. The boy I like.”
I smile slightly, because all of this is so Akira. The printouts, the extremely detailed notes. Him doing all of this even though he claims he has to spend all his time working at the mochi stand and helping his uncle. I can picture him poring over these, his brow furrowed in concentration, all intense and cute. Taking it seriously, putting his all into it—because that’s the only way he knows how to do things.
“He is trying to help you pick out schools to apply to?” my obaasan says. “But you have already chosen where you are going to apply, ne?”
“Yes,” I say, flipping through the printouts again. “I didn’t get a chance to tell him that part. This is so …”
My eyes mist over. I don’t even have the words for it. The ache around my heart is pulsing again, but I can’t tell if it’s because I’m moved by Akira’s gesture or angry with him for claiming he doesn’t want to see me anymore or sad because I may never see him again.
Perhaps all of those things at once?
Boys are so confusing.
My gaze wanders to my textile tests, those medical texts with their macabre illustrations. Some of the pages have crumpled after being soaked, some have dried into stiff, exaggerated shapes. I brush my fingers over them, my brain getting the tiniest seed of an idea.
“Let’s take that off the dress form,” I say, nodding at my work-in-progress application piece. “I’ll get it all nice and packed away to take back with me.”
“You don’t want to leave it up for now?” Grandma says. “Because … you may. If you like.”
“Thank you,” I say, giving her a smile. “But I’m going to finish it at home. I have an idea for a new project to put on the dress form.” I run my fingers over my paper experiments again, marveling at their different textures. “And I definitely need to finish this one before I leave Japan.”
Dear Mom,
I can’t remember if I ever showed you my roller coaster dress—probably one of my most elaborate Kimi Originals. I’ve only worn it once and I think you were tucked away in your studio when I sashayed through the house, on my way to Trini Dinh’s sixteenth birthday party.
The bodice was from a red satin gown I found at the thrift store where I work—halter neck, structured, water-stained in a couple spots. I hacked the top part off the dress, altered it, and water-stained it all over so it looked like a pattern. The skirt was one of the first things I ever made out of completely new material. The guy who runs the fabric shop I like had this large remnant of cream-colored cotton he couldn’t do anything with. I remember spreading it out on my bed and thinking how it could be so many things—it was a completely blank canvas. It took me forever to figure out what I wanted to do with it because the possibilities were so endless—and because I was convinced if I made the wrong choice, I’d mess up this cool fabric that had been gifted to me. (I’m pretty sure the fabric store guy didn’t really care what I made it into or if I made it into anything at all, so I don’t know why I stressed so much. Except that I guess I always stress in that particular way, so … )
I finally decided on a skirt. At first, I made it in a pretty basic shape—fitted at the waist and flaring outward to glorious fullness. A good twirling skirt. But it wasn’t quite speaking to my soul. So, I started adding on to it. I sewed on some ribbons, flowing along the hemline. I added sequins to match. And then I saved up and got myself some fancy fabric paints and painted this wild, multicolored … thing all over it. It was a lot like my paintings—abstract and dreamy with big, exaggerated shapes and bright colors that shouldn’t go together. Then I did some more sewing on the skirt—taking it in here, adding a drape there. So that it was sort of a big, exaggerated shape itself. The whole thing came together when I found that red satin gown and realized it was the last piece I needed to turn this initially simple skirt into the beautiful dress it was meant to be.
When I put it on and looked in the mirror, I felt pretty. But the dress was also wilder and more over-the-top than anything I’d worn before.
Trini Dinh’s sixteenth birthday party seemed like the perfect place for the dress to make its debut. Her parents had rented the back room of this pizza place, which doesn’t sound super fancy, but to most of us, just the fact that they could rent the entire back room seemed pretty swank. And Trini had requested we all dress up.
I’ll admit: There was another reason I wanted to look extra nice. Marcus Reyes, who’d been my big crush since junior high, was going to be there. For weeks I’d had this fantasy: I’d show up in this beautiful dress, he would notice me for the first time ever, and we would have a perfect romantic moment. Maybe a brushing of hands over cheesy pepperoni?
When Atsuko and Bex came by to pick me up, Atsuko went “WoooOOOoooowie!” and pretended like her eyes were popping out of her head. Bex just told me I looked amazing and no way would Marcus be able to keep his eyes off me.
The party was in full swing when we arrived. Predictably, someone had spiked the big bowl of usually harmless “orange drink” the pizza place provides for all its parties, so everyone was kind of loud and sloppy. (Um, Bex and Atsuko and I totally did not have any, in case you are wondering.)
Trini gave all of us a big hug and screamed in our ears how happy she was to see us. Atsuko scanned the room, looking for people we know. Bex looked like she wanted to leave immediately. It was so loud—music blaring, people yelling at each other, a few of the attendees trying to do some kind of dance routine in the middle of the floor. But everything faded to a burble when I saw Marcus standing on the opposite side of the room. He was wearing what was probably his dad’s suit jacket and he looked soooo handsome and he was laughing at something.
I drew myself up tall and remembered how pretty I felt in my dress. I started to cross the room. I heard some loud yelling in my right ear and then I heard Atsuko scream, “AGH WATCH OUT,” and then suddenly I was covered in sticky orange drink. I whipped around and saw Ben Kirkman trying to scurry away, empty cups in hand. “Sorry!” he yelled over his shoulder.
Atsuko and Bex were at my side immediately, napkins at the ready.
I looked down at my dress. The orange drink had stained the few parts of the skirt that were still cream-colored—I’d left some blank spaces between the painted bits for balance. And the painted parts were now smeared. It was totally ruined.
Then I looked up and saw Marcus Reyes making out with some girl who went to a completely different school. Maybe one of Trini’s band camp friends?
I didn’t cry. I just said, very quietly: “We have to go home now.”
Atsuko and Bex followed me outside, to Atsuko’s Mustang. Then Atsuko twirled her keys in her hand and turned to face me.
“We are not going home,” she said. “Tonight can’t be all about some asshole spilling on Kimi’s dress and some other asshole making out with … with … well, someone who isn’t Kimi. Let’s go ride some roller coasters.”
We drove all the way to Magic Mountain. Atsuko had some free tickets from her cousin who works there.
We rode roller coasters all night—the twisty one that goes upside down, the creaky old wooden one, the one where you stand up in the car and get strapped in and whirled around. We screamed at the top of our lungs. We ate a ton of junk food and laughed hysterically about nothing in particular.
“You know, this skirt kind of looks like a roller coaster,” Atsuko said at one point, tracing the now-smeared shapes I’d painted onto it. “It has that feeling of moving really fast and every which way. That feeling of excitement.”
When I got home, the dress had other stains on it, too—grease from buttery popcorn, dirt
from sitting on the ground. I took it off and hung it up in my closet. In the back of my mind, I couldn’t help but think somehow it looked more beautiful—a little weirder, a little more off-kilter. More interesting. Definitely containing that sense of excitement Atsuko was talking about.
But I convinced myself it was ruined. I never wore it again.
When I look back on that night, though, the main feeling I can call up isn’t sadness or regret or disappointment—it’s not about something being ruined. Instead I remember how hoarse my throat felt from screaming, how giddy I felt being whirled around on the roller coasters. How my sides hurt from laughing so hard with my best friends. I’d say the main thing I remember feeling is … exhilaration.
I think I’m going to wear that dress again when I get home.
Love,
Kimi
I stay up late finishing my new project. It’s not as complicated as my fashion school application design, but I’m still very proud when it’s done. I feel like I’ve only been asleep for a few hours when I hear someone calling through the shoji screen. I roll out of bed and blearily slide open the screen to see my grandfather. Who looks way too excited for this hour of the morning.
“Kimiko-chan!” he exclaims. “I need to go to my snack shop again!”
“Really?” I murmur. “But weren’t we just there the other day?”
“Hai, hai,” he says, waving a hand. “But I forgot some very important flavors of Pocky and I must go get them. I thought you would like to come with me?”
“Um, sure, Grandpa,” I say, rubbing my eyes and stifling a huge yawn. “Let me get ready. I have to do another errand later today, though—”
“Oh, I know,” he says, winking. “A very important errand. That is why we go early, ne?”
I give him a woozy smile, shut the door, and proceed to get dressed.
A very important errand.
I’ve started thinking of it as a mission, even.
