Excerpt of Little Pieces: This Side of Japan by Michael Hoffman

Excerpt Little Pieces

"Let's all go into the living room," said Tomoko. "I have something to say to you. "And when I've said it, you can judge whether I'm mad or not."

***

Their "living room" is a purely Japanese-style room – tatami floor, cushions instead of chairs, and an alcove in which, over an old-fashioned lantern-like lamp, hung a scroll. I have always been drawn to that scroll. I know little of such things, and have no idea as to its artistic value – it may be trash for all I know. It illustrates a famous poem by the haiku master Basho: "Crow on a withered branch, autumn eve." That's exactly what it shows, and that's all it shows. Tomoko and I found it one day in a dusty little antique shop we happened to wander into. It was very early in our relationship. We looked at it without comment, and then left the shop. The next day I went back and bought it. On our next date I made her a present of it. That's the history of the scroll in Tomoko's "living room."

We had scarcely seated ourselves on the cushions arranged round the low table that was the room's only furniture before Tomoko began. She sat facing Sayaka, and spoke exclusively to her. I may as well not have been there. In fact, I had the odd, eerie feeling that I wasn't – that I had left the church and, just as I had told Father Matsui I would, vanished. I saw and heard everything that went on, but any sense of my being present at the scene was utterly lacking.

"Let me tell you first of all," said Tomoko, speaking quietly and unemotionally, almost monotonously, "that the man you call 'Father' is my father but not yours. We are not sisters. We are nothing to each other. You came into this family when you were four years old. Your father murdered your mother. He stabbed her to death with a bread knife and stuffed her corpse into the trunk of his car. This happened in Tokyo. He then fled with you to Narita Airport, and abandoned you there. You were barely three years old. You were found wandering lost and crying in the airport concourse, clutching a stuffed animal. I'll show you the newspaper clippings; I still have them. The police were called, and you were taken to an orphanage. Your father, meanwhile, had flown to Los Angeles, where some weeks later he was arrested. He was sent back to Japan, tried, and sentenced to life in prison. If he is alive he is still there – unless he's been paroled for good behavior or something, which is possible for all I know. Maybe Ken- chan, with his law school background, can tell us something about that. As to how you came into this family and became my 'sister' – "

"Tomoko, stop!" That was my voice; I heard it distinctly, but no one else seemed to. Neither Tomoko nor Sayaka paid me the slightest attention. Sayaka's eyes were fixed on her sister. What was going on in her mind? Her face revealed nothing – but then, Sayaka's face scarcely ever does, a thought that struck me just then for the first time. Sayaka's face does not register emotion. Could it be paralyzed in some way? Would that account for the odd cast of her features?

"As to how you came into this family and became my 'sister,' my parents had long believed it wasn't healthy for a girl to grow up an only child; they wanted another one, but my mother had had a hysterectomy shortly after I was born, so adoption was the only way. For years they couldn't make up their minds. Then your story hit the papers. My father showed the story to my mother and said, 'Here she is, here's our child.' That's what my mother told me years later. She never told me how she responded to that – whether in astonishment she asked him what on earth he meant, or whether she simply understood him and agreed without any explanation being necessary. Be that as it may, they filed the necessary applications, underwent the necessary tests – "

Without a word Sayaka rose to her feet and walked out of the room. There was no hurried abruptness in her movements, no agitation; she moved like someone who, after sitting in one place for a long time, simply feels like getting up. A moment later we heard her bedroom door close softly. Then we heard nothing.

Tomoko turned to me. "I'll see about dinner," she said, and she too stood up.

***

Left alone, I sat gazing up at the crow on the withered branch. I don't know how long I sat there, in motionless silence, thinking nothing. Then a faint sound from the kitchen – the sound of meat sizzling on a fry pan – startled me out of my reverie. I stood up and walked past the kitchen, where through the doorway I saw Tomoko, her back to me, busy at the stove. At Sayaka's bedroom door I hesitated, then knocked gently. No answer. "Sayaka," I called, for some reason not daring to raise my voice much above a whisper. "Sayaka. It's me. May I come in?" Still no answer. Perhaps she hadn't heard me. I turned the doorknob. Was it locked? No. I only meant to open it a crack, but it seemed to swing open of itself, revealing a brilliantly lit room – brilliant at least in comparison to the dim lamplight of the living room. Sayaka sat cross-legged on the futon in the middle of the floor. Her eyes seem to have been fixed even before I entered precisely on the space that my face now occupied, so she didn't have to move a muscle to confront me.

"May I come in?"

"Of course."

There was only one chair in the room – a little white chair that was evidently of a set with the little white desk. I sat down on it, feeling foolish as only a grown man sitting in a child's chair can. Sayaka saw my discomfort and, patting the space beside her on the futon, said, "Sit here.

"Do you think," I said, "we could turn off the overhead light and turn on this desk lamp instead?"

"Is it too bright?"

"Yes, I rather think it is."

"I like bright lights. When I was little I was afraid of the dark."

"And now?"

"Now not so much."

"Well, could I... Do you mind?" I switched on the lamp, stood up, crossed over to the light switch by the door, and turned off the overhead fluorescent light. "There, that's better, don't you think?"

"Sit here," she said again. "That chair's too small for you."

"Yes, all right. Thank you. Saya-chan..."

"I've decided to quit my job."

"Yes?"

"You want to hear something funny? Wait." She stood up, crossed over to the desk, and from one of the drawers drew out a name card, which she handed me. "Three days ago a rather nice-looking young man – not as nice-looking as you, but still – said to me as I was ringing up his purchases, speaking very low so no one else could hear, 'Listen, I know what you're going through, I can read the expression on your face, I've had it on my own face often enough! I can help you. Give me a call.' And he handed me his card."

"Kenji Miyazawa. Wasn't there a writer of that name?"

"I don't know. My sister's the one who knows about writers, Me, I..."

"What expression would he have seen on your face?"

"I don't know! I was so taken by surprise, I just stared at him, and before I knew it he was gone. Let's call and ask him."

"No, Saya, let's not. There are strange people about nowadays. It's wisest not to encourage them."

"Oh please, Ken-chan, call him."

"Me!"

"If I call, it's maybe asking for trouble. But you... you have a voice that inspires confidence and at the same time..."

"At the same time what?"

"Sends a warning. You're a man of the world. You know your way around. If he has anything nasty in mind, hearing your voice will make him think twice. You can tell him you're my father or something."

"What's this about quitting your job?"

"Well, I'm not going to be a supermarket cashier forever, am I?"

"No, certainly not. What do you have in mind?"

"Maybe I'll go back to school and study Greek drama."

"Oh?"

"No, I'm joking. In high school our drama club performed Antigone."

"Hm."

"What do you think I should do?"

"Really, I... I don't know what to tell you."

"I wish you'd tell me something!"

"Well, going back to school would be a good start. Without an education there's not much – "

"You know what I'd really like to do?"

"What?"

"Start my own business."

"That's interesting. What kind of business?"

"Or better still, marry a rich, rich businessman. Is it possible a rich businessman would want me for a wife? I wouldn't be in his way. I wouldn't mind, you know, if he had affairs with other women."

"You wouldn't? You'd be a very unusual wife, in that case."

"I wouldn't mind at all. I'd even like it. I'd wait up for him no matter how late he came home, and I'd listen while he told me all about the woman he'd just slept with."

"I don't know whether to take you seriously or not."

"Anyway, will you be my guarantor for the apartment I want to rent? I don't want to be under my sister's thumb any more."

"You'd rather be under my thumb?"

"Well, yes, if it came to that. But you'd treat it as what it is, a mere formality. My sister would make a big deal out of it. One more responsibility on her already over- burdened shoulders! She might even refuse, saying I'm not fit to live on my own. I don't want to be dependent on her consent. I want to say to her, 'Sister, I'm moving out.' Not, 'Sister, is it all right if I move out? Will you sign the papers showing you approve?'"

"Well... but you see, Saya-chan, I may be going away... far away... for a long time. I've been..."

"Dinner's burnt!"

Sayaka and I looked at one another. A moment later Tomoko appeared in the doorway. "I burned the dinner," she said. "It's a charred mess. I don't know what happened. My thoughts distracted me. I was thinking about something, and suddenly..." Her eyes filled with tears.

"Let's go out for dinner," said Sayaka. "Ken-chan will treat us."

"You two go. I don't want any dinner."

"Nonsense," I said. "Sayaka's right. "My treat – and I know just the restaurant to take you to! We'll have a feast!"