“Not of you. Of me. Of how hard I’ve become.” Her face is shiny with tears. “Are you hungry? We have miso soup. I can make rice. Hot rice.”
We eat quietly. And very little. The huge lunch the professor fed us in the car lingers in our bellies. Asahi watches us, then he goes into the inner room to sleep.
“You can sleep in that corner,” says the woman.
We lie down on the tatami mats, three in a row, like fish in a basket. I close my eyes.
* * *
—
“There’s no choice.” A man’s voice.
“But they are children.” A woman.
“Remember the swallow chicks and the mamushi.”
I open my eyes and sit up. A man sits with the woman. He’s missing an arm.
“Ah, so you woke,” says the woman. “This is my brother.”
I get up from the floor and move toward them. I bow my head to him. “What are you going to do to us?”
“You’re Christian?”
“My sister and I are Catholic.”
“Catholic.” He looks at the woman. “This is good. I know where they can go. There’s a Catholic mission in Hiroshima where priests go after their own missions are bombed out. They only do this with priests who are friends of Japan. German priests.”
Germans hate Italians as much as Japanese do. But surely priests rise above those hatreds. Still…“Hiroshima is far away,” I say.
“We’ll find a way to get you there. From truck to truck, from wagon to wagon. My sister made me promise.”
Tears roll down my cheeks. “I have a friend. Aiko. She’s in this town somewhere. It can’t be hard to find her. This is a small town.”
“Exactly. Think about that. In a small town, no one’s secrets are safe. People will know you are Western. Do you really want to do that to your friend Aiko?”
I stare at him. Then I drop my head.
He stands up. “Good.” The woman walks him to the door. “I’ll take care of it,” he says to her. “They’ll be gone before noon. In the meantime, don’t let anyone in or out.”
It’s not yet dawn, but the woman makes tea. I clean myself and wait for Karo-chan and Naoki-kun to wake. The partition to the inner room slides open, and Asahi comes out rubbing his eyes. We greet each other.
“Do you know what a mamushi is?” I ask him.
“The most dangerous snake in the world.”
“Do you know anything about swallow chicks and a mamushi?”
Asahi’s face turns sad. “Last spring a swallow built a nest under our eave. The chicks made the best sounds. But mamushi love to eat chicks. And if one came, it would kill us, too. So our mother had to sweep away the nest, and the chicks died.”
“Go put your day clothes on, Asahi,” says his mother. When he has closed the door, she turns to me. “I see that you understand. The journey will be hard. But you’ll pay attention and find a way. You made it this far; you’ll make it to Hiroshima.”
I open the front door just enough to peek out. The sun rises slowly. The sky is blue and cloudless. Today, out here near the mountains, the war seems far away. But that’s a lie. I close the door and wait. When Karo-chan and Naoki-kun wake, we eat breakfast with Asahi and his mother. Karo-chan chatters with Asahi. It reminds me of how she used to chatter with Botan years ago. She thinks we’ll stay here. She’s already trying to make a friend. Naoki-kun watches me. He suspects.
True to the uncle’s word, a truck rolls up the road before noon. The uncle comes in. “Go into the inner room now, Asahi. Go!” Asahi shuts himself away.
“Who are you?” asks Karo-chan.
The uncle doesn’t look at her. He hands me a basket. “Wrap your heads good. Look like burn victims.”
Karo-chan grabs my arm. “What’s going on?”
“We’re leaving.” I turn my head and rummage in the basket. “This bandage should cover most of one side of your face, and I’ll wind it once across the other eye.”
“To Aiko’s?” she asks.
“No.”
“Where?”
“Someplace better.”
“I want to stay here!”
Naoki-kun hugs Karo-chan from behind and looks at me over her head. His eyes ask me what’s happening. I look away. “It’s all right, Karo-chan,” he says. “We’ll take care of you.”
“You’re not coming, Naoki.” I look at the woman and pray.
She gives the tiniest nod.
“Of course I’m coming.”
“You are my brother, and I love you.” I’m rummaging around in the basket again. I won’t meet his eyes.
“That’s why I’m coming.”
“That’s why I won’t let you. We’ll manage without—”
“You’re crazy!” screams Karo-chan. “Naoki-kun comes with us. You’re crazy and mean and I hate you!”
The woman steps toward Naoki-kun. “A Japanese boy can stay here without a problem,” she says quietly. “These foreign girls can’t. They endanger us. And if you get caught with them, you’re old enough to be charged with treason. You’ll die.”
Naoki-kun shakes his head.
“And I need you,” says the woman. “There are jobs around the farm that a boy your size can do. Asahi needs you, too. He needs a brother. Stay here. Please.”
Naoki-kun sits on the floor. Karo-chan sits with him and kisses his cheeks. He kisses hers. I step toward him, but he spins to face the far wall.
I walk to him and whisper into his ear, “My heart squeezes so hard, it shatters.” I kiss his cheek.
Karo-chan wails as I bandage her head. She wails as I bandage my own head. But I cry silently. We cannot see now. I hope our tears don’t make the bandages fall off.
“Your first goal is the hospital of Dr. Fujii in Hiroshima,” comes the voice of the uncle. “People in town should know Dr. Fujii. He runs a private hospital and he’s the only doctor working there. It’s next to the bridge on the Kyo River in the center of town.” He puts a package into my hand. “This is extra tape and gauze to make new bandages for your heads—your eyes, especially. I have no idea if Dr. Fujii’s hospital is anywhere near the Jesuit priests’ mission. But you and your sister must go there next. You know how to walk around the streets of Tokyo, so you’ll have no trouble figuring out your way in Hiroshima. It’s much smaller.”
I want to remind him that we’ll be walking the streets blind. But what’s the point? I feel something on my head. It must be his hand.
“If anyone questions you, you started out in Tokyo. Tell them you don’t know the names of any of the people who have helped you along the way.”
“I don’t know your names.”
“Give Dr. Fujii’s name only to the driver who actually takes you into the city of Hiroshima, never to anyone before him. You must not endanger him.” He pulls me by the arm.
“Don’t pull me,” Karo-chan snaps. He must be doing the same to her.
“That’s not how you guide blind people,” I explain. “Hook our hands over your arms and walk. That way, we’ll come along without tripping.”
He hesitates. Then he guides us properly out to the truck and says, “War orphans. Firebomb victims. To Hiroshima.”
A man’s voice answers, “I’m going only as far as Osaka. But I’ll pass them on from there.”
We lie in the flatbed of a noisy truck, with a blanket below us and a blanket over us. My hands reach out and find boxes.
Karo-chan won’t talk to me. But she doesn’t roll away when I put my arms around her.
27 MAY 1945, HIROSHIMA, JAPAN
I walk into the kitchen at dawn, and Father Cieslik lifts his chin toward me in greeting. “Good morning, child. Go wake your sister for her big day.” He uses Japanese with Karo-chan and me, just like the other priests we’ve been living with for the past two m
onths, though they use German among themselves. I’m surprised to find Father Cieslik standing by the sink at this hour; he’s not generally an early riser. His face is pinched and his eyes look tired; he’s cradling his right hand in his left.
Aha! I know why he’s up: he had a boil lanced yesterday. I can see that his finger is red and raw. “Would you like me to help wash that finger?”
Father Cieslik looks sheepish, and takes a seat at the kitchen table. “It does hurt a bit. Thank you, child.”
I fill a basin with cold water and gently clean his finger. “Am I hurting you?”
“Not at all.”
When I finish putting on a bandage, I go upstairs to our small room and touch Karo-chan’s shoulder. She jumps awake, and her eyes dart around. Karo-chan has somehow learned to screen out noises when she sleeps, but a touch sends her into a panic. I put my hands on her cheeks till she calms.
Sudden noises jumble my insides, too. But silence worries me more. Silence feels like anything might happen next. Silence at night is the worst.
“Let me help you dress.”
“Why?” Karo-chan asks in alarm.
“Nonna helped me dress when I had my First Holy Communion. It’s nice.”
“You were seven,” says Karo-chan. “I’m ten and a half.”
“Please.”
Karo-chan has been somber since we left Naoki-kun behind, so her silence now is no surprise. But she lets me help her put on the fancy kimono. I wore a glorious white dress to my ceremony. I felt like a bride. But this kimono is just as beautiful in its own way. It belongs to the family of Hoshijima-san, Karo-chan’s catechism teacher.
Karo-chan has been preparing for today since we got here. On the first day, we were dropped off at Dr. Fujii’s hospital by a truck carrying medical supplies. Father Cieslik was there for a cut on his elbow. When he saw two girls with giant bandages on their heads asking a nurse how to find the mission, he brought us here. And Father Kleinsorge, the parish priest, took us in, just like that. Even after we peeled off the bandages and he saw our faces, he never asked how we’d gotten to the mission or how we’d wound up in Japan in the first place. He accepted us—no matter who we were. I love him for that. He still doesn’t know we’re Italian. Karo-chan and I never speak Italian, not even in whispers.
What Father Kleinsorge did ask was, “Are you Catholic?” When I told him yes and he realized that Karo-chan was well past seven years old and had not had her First Communion yet, he made her study for it immediately.
I don’t know what Karo-chan thinks of the catechism. She worked hard at reading the Japanese and memorized it perfectly. But she didn’t ask questions about it. Not the way I did. I never asked Mamma; she was too sick already and I didn’t want to bother her. But Nonna was always there, ready with the answers.
Now I say, “I should have helped you learn the catechism.”
“I didn’t need help,” says Karo-chan.
We go downstairs and onto the grounds of this mission compound, Our Lady’s Assumption. The chapel is a small wooden building with a little tower on top and five pine trees out front. The tower gives the chapel a sense of dignity. And I love those wispy pines. I walk up to a branch, crush needles in my fist, and put my hand over my nose. I remember the morning Aiko warned me not to smell of fancy food—butter or jam—so I chewed on pine needles. That was the real start of our friendship. Oh, how I miss her. For the rest of the day, I’ll have the pine needles’ clean scent on my palm and the memory of Aiko’s face in my heart.
We go inside the chapel, up to the front, and sit back on our heels on the tatami mats. Beside us on one side sit Hoshijima-san—Karo-chan’s teacher—and his family. On our other side sit the six other children in the catechism class. The others in the church are priests, staff, and the families of the children who go to the mission school. It’s not crowded; hardly anyone wants to be Catholic anymore.
Father Kleinsorge stands there looking skinny and frail, but he says the Mass with his usual fervor, and all but the youngest children receive Communion. I glance at Karo-chan as we go up to the altar to receive the wafer, but her eyes look ahead. After the Mass, we go into the mission for tea and rice crackers.
Father Kleinsorge asks Karo-chan to step forward—speaking in German. She doesn’t move or look at him. I don’t, either. Karo-chan made me promise we would not learn German. We will not become new people all over again. So whenever the priests speak German to us, we pretend not to understand even the most basic words that we hear every day all day long. I think Father Kleinsorge knows what we’re doing, but he doesn’t seem annoyed. He asks again, in Japanese. Then he rings a bell, for everyone’s attention. He gives Karo-chan a set of rosary beads. “This marks your new status.”
Karo-chan bows. I can’t tell if she’s pleased.
“I have a gift, too,” says Hoshijima-san. He bows. “I managed to save up enough gasoline to take my family on an outing in the countryside today. We are inviting you and your sister. It’s a pleasant day. The best of spring. Would you like to do that, Karo-chan?”
Karo-chan hesitates, and for an awful moment I think she may say no. But then she bows her thanks.
We change into school pants and shirts and pile into Hoshijima-san’s car with his family. We stop at the edge of woods, and the children explore while Hoshijima-san and his wife rest on a blanket and talk.
His children lead Karo-chan and me on a soft dirt path under leaves dappled with light. We hear the songs of birds, the chittery noise of squirrels that nearly fly from tree to tree. I love breathing this clean spring air.
We arrive at a stream, and rain starts, just the slightest drizzle. We stand and watch the drops fall onto a little pool that has formed in a bulging part of the stream. Something moves.
“Did you see that?” I point.
The head of the creature pops up again. It opens its mouth and gulps air. The water is clear enough to make out its shape. Four legs and a long tail. The front feet have funny little fingers. I can’t get a good look at the back feet. The creature is as long as I am tall. And its face is pleasant, sort of smiling.
“That’s a giant salamander,” says the oldest son.
“Is it dangerous?”
“I don’t think so. My father says it’s shy. And it never comes out of the water, so as long as we don’t swim, we don’t have to worry.”
The salamander is now out of sight. Karo-chan walks along the shore as close as she can get to where it disappeared. She squats and stares at the water, and I squat beside her. After a while she looks at me, then points with her eyes. Oh! The salamander has lifted his head out again. He’s opening and closing his mouth again. His eyes are so tiny. He slips under the surface, and we watch him glide out of sight.
“I expected him to have webbed feet,” whispers Karo-chan. “But he has baby fingers. Like some kind of strange gigantic gecko.” She stands and hugs herself. “We were lucky to see him. Naoki-kun would have loved to see him, too.” I expect her to look sad, but she smiles. Karo-chan is smiling again.
A roll of thunder comes from not too far away. We run back to the car. I’m so glad we came. As we drive away, Karo-chan is still smiling.
6 AUGUST 1945, HIROSHIMA, JAPAN
Father Kleinsorge is awake, though it can’t be much past six. I hear him in his room.
I dress and hurry downstairs and outside, to sweep out the room next to the main chapel. Yesterday I promised Father that I’d clean it. It’s important never to disappoint anyone.
I finish just as people start arriving. Karo-chan and I take Communion with everyone. The Communion wafer is slowly dissolving on my tongue when the air-raid siren interrupts Father Kleinsorge’s prayers.
Air-raid sirens sound at nine a.m., three p.m., and nine p.m. About an hour after each siren, planes pass overhead. Sometimes twenty, sometimes thirty. People come out in
to the streets and shake their fists up at them. They can’t stand much more. The rectory cook keeps the radio on in the kitchen. Since I help her, I hear the news. More than sixty Japanese cities have been firebombed this year, and it’s only early August. Tokyo, four times. Whole sections of that city are gone; no water, no electricity, barely any food. The only big cities that haven’t been struck yet are Kyoto, Nagasaki, and Hiroshima. All the little cities near us have been bombed, and the Americans bombed ships in the naval yard at nearby Tokuyama; the skies over Hiroshima were black for a day. It feels like they’re teasing us—we’re next.
The air-raid siren this morning is early. A mistake? People say that the firebombing will come at night. Half of Hiroshima leaves the city at night, to sleep in the countryside.
Father Kleinsorge stops the service, and everyone goes back to the residence. Father Kleinsorge disappears upstairs, then comes down wearing a military uniform. The first time he did that, I gaped. How can he support war? Father Kleinsorge is a peaceful man. On Saturday nights he holds a record concert at the residence. He plays classical music to a packed room. It’s Father Kleinsorge’s gift to the neighborhood: for one hour every week, music wins, and people are free of fear.
Music helps all of us. Father Lassalle plays his cello. He dug a special bomb shelter for it in the garden, under the statue of Saint Joseph. He’ll never let that cello burn.
And Karo-chan and I sing. The priests love it. We sing to them after every meal.
But despite all this, Father Kleinsorge now wears his uniform. He goes outside to scan the sky. Karo-chan and I join him.
The morning is so clear that the bright sun hurts my eyes. A perfect summer day. A single plane flies over—a weather plane. Father Kleinsorge sighs with relief and takes us back inside. As we eat breakfast—bread made with bean paste, and fake coffee made from roasted corn—the all clear is given, and Father Kleinsorge looks at his watch. “Eight a.m. I’m going to read in solitude from now till the regular alarm at nine.” Father Kleinsorge climbs the stairs to his room.
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