Kira-Kira (10 page)
We sat on the front stoop. Across the street some grown-ups sat talking and laughing. Some kids from another apartment played kickball in the street.
Silly’s mother, Mrs. Kilgore, drove up and got out of her car. She and my mother nodded politely at each other and tried to think of something to say. Mrs. Kilgore was a no-nonsense woman. She didn’t believe in small talk. She looked at my mother and said, “There’s a union meeting next Wednesday at the church on Frame Street.”
“Yes,” said my mother coolly. My mother was scared the union supporters would get them all fired, even her. She wanted a house, and she didn’t care if she couldn’t use the bathroom during work or if her fingers were so stiff that she couldn’t move them when she got home. If that’s what a house cost, she would pay the price.
“The meeting’s at seven thirty in the evening,” said Mrs. Kilgore.
“Wednesday evening is bad for me,” said my mother.
They left then. “Mom, why is Wednesday bad for you?”
“That woman makes too much trouble.” My mother pulled me down on the stoop beside her. I thought she was going to tell me Silly couldn’t be my friend anymore, but instead, she took my face in her hands and frowned. “Did you want to grow your hair long again?” she said. I’d expected her to say something more serious, but I didn’t know what.
For a while she’d given my hair a permanent every few months, but something about the permanent solution made my hair fall out. So now I was back to pin curls every night. “I hate pin curls!” I said. She didn’t answer. The day was fading into evening. There were no streetlights, but the street was lit by the lights from the apartments and from a motel down the way, the sign flashing on and off, on and off.
M-O-T-E-L,
in aqua neon.
“Your summer school teacher said you got a good score on your achievement test.”
“Yeah.” She frowned, and I said, “I mean, yes.”
“Nobody understands why you don’t get better grades.”
“I’m trying.”
“Your father is very disappointed.” That surprised me. I didn’t think my father was ever disappointed in me. She patted my knee and stood up. She had always seemed younger than the other mothers, partly because of her size, but also because her face possessed a childlike quality. But tonight she grunted when she stood up. And even in the dim light, her face seemed older than it had even the previous month. I remembered the white hairs I’d seen. She opened the door and I followed her in.
That night I tried to concentrate on my homework for Monday, but it was boring. We had to read a story about a man who discovered a secret treasure. He bought lots of nice clothes and ate fancy dinners, but he lost his most valued friends because he grew obsessed with his money. We were supposed to write three paragraphs answering the questions:
What is the author trying to say by describing the expensive dinners in such detail? What is the theme of the story? How did the main character change at the end? It was a good story, and I liked it. But I didn’t know how to answer those questions.
Amber left, and Lynn, who had read the story, took the time to tell me the story was about greed. So I wrote that the theme of the story was greed. And then I couldn’t think of anything else to write. Finally, I wrote,
The descriptions of the dinners really describe greed. Greed is bad. People shouldn’t be greedy. At the end of the book the main character isn’t greedy anymore.
I added a few other brilliant remarks. And then I folded the paper in half and put it in my book. I would probably get another C, which was good enough for me.
That night Sam fell asleep before me, as always. He shouted out in his dream, “Call me
Mister
Takeshima!” I laughed and got up and kissed him and made sure the sheet was snug around him.
“Good night, Mister Takeshima.”
I turned around and was surprised to see
Lynn sitting on the floor next to the couch. She was clutching her knees to her chest.
“Gregg is moving away,” she said.
“I thought he was coming over for dinner one day.”
“He was, but then he found out he was moving. They’re already packed up. I haven’t told anyone else.”
“Not even Amber?”
“Nope.”
“Are you in love with him?”
She thought this over. “No. I guess I like him, but I don’t love him.”
That was good. In my most humble opinion, Gregg was a little pukey. His hair looked like something you would brush a horse with. And when he talked, little bits of saliva collected at the corners of his mouth. He was certainly nothing like Joe-John Abondondalarama. Of course, I didn’t mention this to Lynn.
Lynn returned to the bedroom. We used to wake each other up sometimes in the middle of the night and say what was on our minds. But Lynn hadn’t done that in a long time. Usually when she used to wake me up, she
had wanted to talk about college. I had secretly decided not to go to college, but I thought that maybe I would move to the same town as her. Then we could share an apartment in a tall building, the way she’d always dreamed.
Lynn had seemed sad about Gregg.
I got up and went to the bedroom and sat by her bed. “Lee-uhn?”
“Uh-huh.”
“There’s another boy in your class I think is cuter.”
“Who?”
“I think his name is Clifton.”
“Clifton! Oooh! I thought you were serious.” She laughed. “You’re so funny!”
That made me realize I must have said something stupid. “Well, he’s okay,” I said defensively. That was the way it was lately. Whenever I tried to talk to her, she made me feel immature, even if she didn’t mean to. I went back to the living room and fell asleep.
The next day Lynn felt so tired, she didn’t want to get out of bed. I cooked her an extra helping of liver and told her to chew well.
Chewing well was what my mother always told me to do when I was sick. It was a Sunday. Lynn slept most of the day. By evening, when I tried to feed her, the food just fell out of her mouth. She didn’t have the energy to chew. I even offered to chew it for her, but she said, “Gross.”
My mother decided to take her to the hospital. My father was at work and nobody in the building was home because it was bowling night, so my mother called Uncle Katsuhisa to come take care of Sammy and me. Uncle didn’t like to bowl because he only liked games where you had to think. I watched as my mother put Lynn’s jacket over her pajamas. Lynn staggered out the door.
I locked the front door and waited for my uncle to arrive. Sammy’s forehead was all wrinkled. He was calm, like my father, so it was unusual to see his forehead wrinkled that way. My mother always liked to say he was never going to get wrinkles because he hardly ever frowned. But now he was probably worried about Lynnie.
When Uncle Katsuhisa knocked on the
door, I made him give me a password. He said with irritation, “Open up now, young lady, or bear my wrath.” That happened to be the password, so I opened the door.
Uncle came in with Auntie Fumi and David and Daniel. They did everything together. Unlike my father, Uncle worked only one job, and Auntie didn’t work at all. David and Daniel probably got to see their parents all the time.
I didn’t know what to expect from Uncle and Auntie. Last time I had seen them, they had been fighting. They were like that. One day they were madly in love, and the next day they were fighting. And then the next day they were madly in love again.
Usually Uncle Katsuhisa was boisterous, but today when he came over, he was restrained. Plus, Uncle and Auntie were snapping at each other a bit. Obviously, they’d been fighting.
He said, “One thing I can’t stand is a woman who spends money unnecessarily.”
She said, “A woman needs a coat.”
He said, “In ninety-degree weather?”
She said, “It won’t always be ninety.”
And so on. Then they stopped, and we all just sat there glumly.
All of a sudden, Uncle Katsuhisa stood up and announced, “We are going to play Scrabble!” He said that as if playing Scrabble were as fun as going bike riding or something.
I wasn’t a good Scrabble player, but it was better than sitting around the living room staring at one another. I set up the game. Uncle sat in a chair and said, “It’s family time!” Sam could already read simple words, but he was too young to play. He sat beside me. Uncle looked suspiciously at him, as if he might somehow help me cheat. David and Daniel studied their letters. I was first. I studied my letters. There didn’t seem to be a word in them. Uncle cleared his throat. After a moment I could hear his foot, first
tap, tap, tap,
and then
whompwhompwhomp
on the floor. I sensed I was already ruining our family time. He peeked at my letters and threw his hands into the air.
“Think, Katie. Think, Katie.
Think
, Katie!” He looked at me as if I were possibly brain
damaged. I’d seen him look at Auntie like that sometimes. He never actually called anyone stupid, but sometimes he looked at them as if he thought they were. “We’re waiting, Katie,” he said. “Take your time.”
“I can’t see anything I can do.” It was hard to think with all that whomping.
“Take your time.”
“Katsu, leave her alone. She’s thinking,” said Auntie Fumi.
“I’m trying to help,” he said defensively. Then he looked at me as if it were my fault Auntie had scolded him. He looked at her. “Can I just say one more thing to her?”
“No,” she said.
He peeked at my letters again and shook his head.
“You have to rise to the occasion,” he said to me, sneaking a look at my aunt. She frowned.
I still didn’t see what I could do. Scrabble was not my specialty. Now that I think of it, I suppose I didn’t have a specialty. I looked at my letters: “S-Z-O-G-V-W-Q.” Then I saw it, or thought I did. I put down “S-O-G.” I happily picked up three more letters—all vowels.
I smiled up at my uncle. He was staring at the board. Then he leaned over, his head in his hands. He didn’t speak for a long time. He groaned loudly over and over.
“Isn’t that a bit melodramatic, Katsu?” Aunt Fumi asked.
“Isn’t that a word?” I finally said.
“No, that is not a word,” Uncle said. “That is not a word. That is
not
a word.” He hadn’t lifted his head. He hit his forehead on the table a couple of times. He lifted his head. “What do they teach them in school today? She’s thirteen years old.”
“She’s eleven.”
“Thirteen or eleven, that is still not a word.”
My aunt stroked my face lovingly. “That was a good try, dear.”
“ ‘Soggy’ is a word,” I said. “Like ‘foggy’ and ‘fog’?”
“Fumi, just tell me one thing: Is she doing this to torment me? I don’t know if she’s doing this just to torment me. If she’s not, okay, but if she is . . .”
My aunt looked at me gently. “Honey, look
at those letters you put down. There’s a word right in those letters.” She stroked my face. “What other word can you spell?”
I looked at Sam. He was mouthing something. It looked like “Oh.” He did it again: “Oh.”
“Oh,” I murmured.
“Ssss,” said Sam. I picked up the “G” and returned it to my slate of letters, leaving “S” and “O.”
My uncle stared at my word “so.” He turned to Sammy. “
Thank
you, Sammy.”
“Sometimes it’s hard to see the obvious,” Auntie said sweetly.
David looked sideways at his father, who glared at me again before turning his glare to the board. David, who was always my pal, ceremoniously plucked a few letters from his collection and then set down his letters and spelled “S-P-E-R-M.”
Nobody spoke. Actually, I wasn’t certain what “sperm” meant. But I could guess.
Uncle Katsuhisa just stared at the board for a moment. He nodded a few times.
“Where did you learn that word?” said Auntie Fumi.
“From Dad.”
Uncle Katsuhisa didn’t speak, but he turned red. He said, “It’s a legal word, that’s the important thing for our purposes.”
Auntie glared at him. The phone rang, and she went to get it. Nobody moved while she talked. When she was finished talking, she walked back into the living room and just stood there. Then she burst into tears and ran out of the room. We all stared after her. Uncle got up slowly and left the room. In a moment we heard him and Auntie talking.
Then it got very quiet in the other room. I cleaned up the Scrabble game. David, Daniel, Sammy, and I just sat around doing nothing, which was about as boring as it sounds. Finally, David and I snuck into the hallway to peek at what Uncle and Auntie were doing. They were in the kitchen, and the radio was playing softly. They were holding each other very tightly. They weren’t dancing exactly, but just stepping back and forth in time to the music. I could tell it made David happy to see them like that, even though it embarrassed him because it was kind of goofy.
I had to interrupt their dancing to ask, “Auntie, was that my parents?”
She and my uncle stopped dancing. “Yes, it was your mother,” she said. “She told me to tell you . . . to tell you that everything is okay. Don’t worry, sweetheart. She told me to tell you that.”
