Pachinko

by Min Jin Lee

  After class, he walked home alone, deep in thoughts of her, and he knew that he wanted to be with her, even if it would not be easy. The following Tuesday, before the seminar began, Noa went early to class to claim the chair next to hers. The professor tried not to show that she was hurt by this defection, but of course, she was.

  16

  Osaka, April 1960

  At some point in the past four years, Mozasu had worked as a foreman at all six of Goro’s pachinko parlors. Goro had opened new parlors in rapid succession, and Mozasu had helped him to start each new one. Mozasu was twenty years old, and he did little else but mind the shops and fix whatever needed fixing while Goro scouted for new locations and came up with inspired ideas for his growing empire, which oddly seemed to work out. In business, Goro could not miss, it seemed, and he credited some of his good fortune to Mozasu’s willingness to labor without ceasing.

  It was April and early in the morning when Mozasu arrived at the manager’s office at Paradaisu Six—the newest pachinko parlor.

  “Ohayo. The car is waiting. I’m taking you to Totoyama-san’s for new clothes. Let’s go,” Goro said.

  “Maji? Why? I have enough suits for this year and next. I’m the best-dressed foreman in Osaka,” Mozasu said, laughing. Unlike his brother, Noa, Mozasu had never cared for nice clothing. He wore the well-tailored clothes Goro wanted him to wear only because his boss was fastidious about how his staff should look. Goro’s employees were an extension of himself, he believed, and Goro was strict about their personal hygiene as well.

  Mozasu had too much to do, and he didn’t feel like going down to Totoyama-san’s place. He was eager to phone the newspapers to put out ads for more workers. Paradaisu Six needed men to work the floor on the late shift, and since the interiors of Paradaisu Seven would be finished in a month, he had to start thinking about hiring for Seven as well.

  “You have the right clothes for a foreman, but you’ll need new suits to be the manager of Seven.”

  “Ehh? I can’t be manager of Seven!” Mozasu replied, startled. “That’s Okada-san’s job.”

  “He’s gone.”

  “What? Why? He was looking forward to being manager.”

  “Stealing.”

  “What? I don’t believe it.”

  “Honto desu,” Goro said, nodding. “I caught him. I had suspected it, and it was confirmed.”

  “That’s terrible.” Mozasu couldn’t fathom anyone stealing from Goro. It would be like stealing from your father. “Why did he do that?”

  “Gambling. He owed some goons money. He said he was going to pay me back, but the losses got bigger. You know. Anyway, his mistress came by this morning to apologize for him. She’s pregnant. He finally gets her pregnant and then he loses his job. Moron.”

  “Oh, shit.” Mozasu recalled all the times Okada had spoken of wanting a son. Even a daughter would do, he’d said. Okada was crazy about kids and pachinko. Even with all his experience, no pachinko parlor in Osaka would hire him if Goro had gotten rid of him for stealing. No one stole from Goro. “Did he say he was sorry?”

  “Of course. Cried like a child. I told him to get out of Osaka. I don’t want to see his face anymore.”

  “Soo nee,” Mozasu said, feeling bad for Okada, who had always been nice to him. He had a Korean mother and a Japanese father, but he always said he felt like a full Korean because he was such a passionate man. “Is his wife okay?” Mozasu knew Goro got along with both women.

  “Yeah. His wife and mistress are fine,” Goro replied. “But I told the mistress that he shouldn’t show up around here. I wouldn’t be so nice next time.”

  Mozasu nodded.

  “Let’s go to Totoyama-san’s. I’m tired of feeling sad. Seeing Totoyama’s girls will cheer me up,” Goro said.

  Mozasu followed his boss to the car. He knew enough not to ask about his new salary; Goro didn’t like to talk about money, strangely enough. The manager’s salary would be better than that of a foreman. Mozasu had been saving carefully for his mother’s confection shop, and they were pretty close to having enough to buy a small store near the train station. With Uncle Yoseb’s health worsening, Aunt Kyunghee couldn’t make candy to sell when she was home. With only his mother and grandmother working in the stall and with Noa in his third year at Waseda in Tokyo, any extra money would be good for the family, he figured. Each Saturday evening, Mozasu felt proud handing his mother his fat pay envelope; she’d tried to increase his allowance, but he had refused except for his bus fare. He didn’t need much, since he ate his meals at the employee cafeteria and Goro bought him his work clothes. Mozasu worked seven days a week and slept at home; if it was very late, he slept in one of the spare employee dorm rooms at the parlors.

  The shop door shut behind them after they exited.

  “Boss, I don’t know. Do you think the guys will listen to me? Like the way they do Okada?” Mozasu asked. It wasn’t that Mozasu wasn’t ambitious; it was that he enjoyed being the morning or evening foreman at the shops; he was very good at it. Being a manager was more serious; everyone looked up to the manager. He would be in charge whenever Goro wasn’t there. Okada was almost thirty-five and tall like a baseball player.

  “I’m flattered and grateful, but you know, I think some of the other managers might—”

  “Shut up, kid. I know what I’m doing. You’re smarter than the other managers, and you know how to solve problems by yourself. This is the most important shop. If I’m running around checking the others, I need you to be sharp.”

  “But Seven is going to need almost fifty employees. How am I supposed to find fifty men?”

  “Actually, you’re going to need at least sixty men and twenty pretty girls for the prize counters.”

  “Really?” Mozasu was always game for Goro’s outlandish plans, but this seemed a bit much, even for him. “How will I find—”

  “You will. You always do. And you can hire any kind of girl you want for the prize counters—Okinawans, burakumin, Koreans, Japanese, I don’t care. They just have to be cute and pretty, but not so slutty they’ll scare the men. The girls are always important. Ha.”

  “I didn’t realize that the dorm could accommodate so many—”

  “You worry a lot. That’s why you’ll be perfect.” Goro smiled widely.

  Mozasu thought about that and had to agree. No one worried about the shops nearly as much as he did.

  In the car ride to Totoyama’s workshop, the driver and Goro talked about wrestling, while Mozasu sat quietly. In his mind, he was making lists of all the things that had to be done for Seven. As he pondered over which of the men he would shuffle around from the other shops, he realized that maybe he was ready after all to become a manager of a shop, and it made him smile a little. Goro was never wrong; maybe he wasn’t wrong about him, either. Mozasu wasn’t smart like his brother, who was now studying English literature at Waseda in Tokyo and who could read thick novels in English without a dictionary. Noa wanted to work for a real Japanese company; he wouldn’t have wanted to work in a pachinko parlor. Noa thought that after the family bought the confectionery, Mozasu should work with the family. Like most Japanese, Noa thought pachinko parlors were not respectable.

  The car stopped in front of a squat redbrick building that had been used as a textile factory before the war. A large persimmon tree shaded the gray metal door. As Goro’s exclusive uniform maker, Totoyama had earned and saved enough to move her shop here from her home-cum-workshop near Ikaino. She and her sons, Haruki and Daisuke, now lived in three of the back rooms, and she used the rest of the building as the workroom. She employed half a dozen assistants who worked six days a week filling orders for uniforms. By word of mouth, she had picked up work from other Korean business owners in Osaka and now made uniforms for yakiniku restaurants and other pachinko parlors in the Kansai region, but Goro’s work always came first, because it was he who had told the others to hire her.

  When Goro rang the bell, Totoyama answered the door her
self. A hired girl, another apprentice, brought them hot fragrant tea and imported wheat biscuits on a lacquered tray. Totoyama led Mozasu to the mirror so she could take his measurements. With pins in her mouth, she measured the width of his long arms.

  “You are getting thinner, Mozasu-san,” Totoyama said.

  “Soo nee,” he answered. “Goro-san tells me I need to eat more.”

  Goro nodded as he munched on the biscuits and drank a second cup of genmaicha. He was seated on a cedar bench covered with indigo fabric–covered cushions. He felt peaceful, watching Totoyama work. He always felt better when he solved problems. Okada had turned out to be a crook, so he got rid of him. Now he was going to promote Mozasu.

  The large and airy workroom had been whitewashed recently, but the wood floors were shabby and old. The floors were cleaned each day, but the morning’s bits of fabric and thread littered the areas around the worktables. In the slant of light from the skylight, a pale column of dust motes pierced the room. The long workroom was lined with six sewing machines, and a girl sat behind each one. They tried not to look at the men, but couldn’t help being drawn to the young one who came by the shop at least once a year. Mozasu had grown noticeably more attractive. He had his father’s purposeful gaze and welcoming smile. He liked to laugh, and this was one of the reasons why Goro liked the boy so much. Mozasu was enthusiastic, not prone to moodiness. He was wearing a foreman’s uniform that had been made in this workshop, and the girls who had worked on his clothing felt connected to him in this way but could hardly admit this. They knew he didn’t have a girlfriend.

  “There’s a new face here,” Goro said, folding his arms over his chest. He scanned the girls carefully and smiled. He got up from his seat and walked toward them. He bowed deeply, and this was funny because he was such an important person. The girls rose up simultaneously and bowed. Goro shook his head and made a silly face, scrunching up his nose to make them laugh.

  “Sit, sit,” he said.

  He had a kind of comic facility combined with a physical smoothness. To make women laugh, he could walk while wiggling his shoulders. He was a stout little man with funny movements who liked flirting with all kinds of women. You remembered him. You wanted him to like you. Because he could be silly, it was possible to forget that he was a powerful businessman and wealthy enough to own seven pachinko parlors. With a word, he could make grown men leave Osaka for good.

  “Eriko-san, Reiko-san, Midori-san, Hanako-san, and Motoko-san, nee?” Goro recited their names perfectly, then stopped in front of the new girl.

  “Goro desu,” he said, presenting himself to the new girl. “You have lovely hands.”

  “Yumi desu,” the young woman replied, slightly annoyed at him for distracting her from her sewing.

  Totoyama looked up from her measurements and frowned at the new girl. Yumi’s sewing was neater than the others’, but she was often too purposely aloof, taking lunch alone or reading during her breaks rather than talking. Her skills and personal nature were secondary to the fact that she had to respect Goro-san, to humor him even. To Totoyama, Goro-san was a great man who was truly good. Though he joked with girls, he was never inappropriate. Goro had never asked any of the girls out or done any of the bad things her other male customers had tried to do. Yumi had been working for her for two months. From her papers, Totoyama knew she was Korean, but Yumi went by her pass name and never brought up her background. Totoyama didn’t care about a person’s background as long as the employee did her job. Yumi was an elegant girl with good skin and a high bosom. She did not have a good figure for a kimono but had the sort of curves that men liked. It was natural that Goro-san would have noticed her.

  “Goro-san, so Mozasu-san is the new manager of Seven?” Totoyama asked. “How wonderful for such a young man.”

  Mozasu looked down, avoiding the looks of curiosity and wonder in the eyes of the seamstresses, except for Yumi, who continued her sewing.

  “Yes. Mozasu-san will need three dark suits. Use a good fabric, please. He will need some nice neckties. Something different from the others. Something elegant, older looking.”

  Mozasu stood in front of the three-way mirror and noticed Yumi, who was working diligently. She was lovely. Her shoulders were thin and wide and her neck long, reminding him of an illustration of a swan on a box of detergent.

  When Totoyama finished taking Mozasu’s measurements, the men returned to the car.

  “Yumi-san, the new girl, is very pretty. A terrific ass,” Goro said.

  Mozasu nodded.

  Goro laughed. “Finally, some interest from the hardworking boy! She’d be a good one for you.”

  The following week, when he returned alone for another fitting, Totoyama was finishing up with a customer and asked Yumi to get him his suit.

  Yumi handed him the partially finished suit and pointed to the dressing room behind the indigo fabric curtain.

  “Thank you,” he said in Japanese.

  She said nothing at all, but stood there coolly, waiting to be discharged from her duties by Totoyama.

  When Mozasu came out, Yumi was standing in front of the mirror holding a scarlet wool pincushion. Totoyama was still occupied with another customer on the other side of the room.

  Yumi looked at his neckline and cocked her head. The lapel needed some work, she noticed.

  “I’m Mozasu Boku. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

  Yumi frowned at the lapel and pulled out a pin from the cushion to mark the place.

  “You’re not going to poke me, are you?” he said, laughing.

  Yumi walked behind him to check the yoke.

  “You’re not going to speak to me? Really?”

  “I’m not here to speak with you. I’m here to check your fit.”

  “If I buy you dinner, maybe you can find a few words for me,” Mozasu said, repeating a line he’d heard Goro use on women. Mozasu had never asked a girl out. He was a manager now at Paradaisu Seven. A girl might find that impressive, he thought.

  “No dinner. No thank you.”

  “You have to eat.” This was another one of Goro’s stock phrases. “You finish work around seven thirty. I know because I’ve been here before to pick up uniforms.”

  “I go to school after work. I don’t have time for nonsense.”

  “I’m nonsense?”

  “Yes.”

  Mozasu smiled at her. She didn’t talk like anyone he knew.

  “What are you studying anyway?”

  “English.”

  “I know English. I can help you.”

  “You don’t know English.”

  “Hello, Miss Yumi. My name is Moses Park. How are you?” He repeated the lines he’d practiced with Noa from his English books. “What kind of weather are you having in Tulsa, Oklahoma?” he asked. “Is it rainy or dry? I like hamburgers. Do you like hamburgers? I work at a place called Paradise.”

  “Where did you learn that? You didn’t even finish high school,” Yumi said.

  “How do you know that?” He smiled.

  “Never mind,” she said, seeing Totoyama approaching them.

  “Miss Yumi, do you like the fascinating novels of Mr. Charles Dickens? He is my brother’s favorite author. I think his books are very long. There are no pictures in his books.”

  Yumi smiled a little, then bowed to her boss before pointing out the areas that needed work. She bowed again before leaving them to return to her sewing machine.

  “I’m so sorry to keep you waiting, Mozasu-san. How are you? How is Goro-san?”

  Mozasu answered her politely, and when she was nearly done with the pins, he turned and sneezed dramatically, curving his back as if to bend forward and ripping the carefully basted seams.

  “Oh, I’m a fool. I’m so sorry,” he said, glancing at Yumi, who was trying not to laugh. “Should I come back tomorrow or the next day? I may be able to come by before you close.”

  “Oh, yes, please,” Totoyama said, assessing the torn seams, oblivious to the tw
o young people studying each other. “We’ll have it ready for you by tomorrow night.”

  17

  October 1961

  Mozasu leaned against the maple tree opposite Totoyama-san’s workshop, his profile only slightly obscured by its trunk. This was their arranged meeting place. Three nights a week, Mozasu met Yumi after work. For over a year, he’d been accompanying her to the English class at the church, then heading back to her rented room where she’d fix them a simple dinner. Often, they would make love before Mozasu returned to Paradaisu Seven, where he worked until closing before falling asleep in his quarters at the employee dormitory.

  It was already October, and though the early evening breezes had yet to lose the supple warmth of summer, the leaves on the trees were beginning to turn gold and shiny. The tall tree above him formed a burnished metallic lace against the blurry evening sky. Laborers and other men in uniform were returning home from work, and small children popped out of their homes to greet their fathers. In the past year, the road where Totoyama had her new workshop had improved, with families moving into the abandoned houses near the river. A local vegetable seller had done so well in his once-desolate spot that he was now able to rent the adjacent lot for his brother-in-law to sell dry goods. The new bakery selling Portuguese-style sponge cakes, which perfumed the street invitingly, had achieved sufficient fame in Osaka to command long lines each morning.

  The seamstresses at Totoyama-san’s were working later than usual, so Mozasu studied his crumpled list of homework words. He’d never thought much of his memory when he was at school, but he found that he was able to remember English words and phrases very well. His recall was useful for impressing Yumi. Unlike most girls, who cared about gifts of cash, dresses, or trinkets, Mozasu’s girlfriend cared only about learning. Yumi seemed happiest with him when he gave the right answers when their teacher, the Reverend John Maryman, called on him. Yumi, who wanted to live in America, believed that she had to learn English well if she was to live there one day.