Within These Lines

by Stephanie Morrill

  He flicks a polite smile at me, and then turns toward the cart of luggage that’s been wheeled to the curb, ready for the process to start all over again.

  I weave my way through people, heading back toward the block where I can catch a trolley. Is that woman still crying on the bus? Or is she sitting there stoically, crying in her heart, as I am in mine?

  At the fringe of the loading area, I allow several feet between me and a guard as I pass him. Something draws my gaze to his face, though, and I’m shocked by how he glares at me.

  He spits at my feet, hitting the sidewalk beside them. “Jap lover.”

  His hatred cracks open something in my soul, as if a seed had been planted there long ago awaiting the nourishment of his glare, the woman’s tears, and the look on Taichi’s face as the guard grabbed hold of me.

  I stop and match him with a nasty look of my own. When I spit back, it lands square on the toe of his polished black boot.

  When I arrive, Mrs. LaRocca directs me to Gia’s room. I slip off my school shoes and trot upstairs in my bobby socks. My head is loud with stories and outrage from the afternoon, and I don’t know what to share with my best friend first.

  I find Gia sprawled on her bedroom floor with her left hand splayed over a sheet of newspaper. A bottle of crimson nail polish sits open beside her, and she whistles something jaunty as she strokes the tiny brush over her fingernails.

  Gia grins. “Perfect timing! You can paint my right hand. I’m atrocious.”

  I stare at the scene before me. Gia’s face is glossy from makeup she wasn’t wearing at school and framed in precise cordovan curls. Even with the open bottle of nail polish, I can smell the hot curling iron. Her bed is covered with skirts and sweaters.

  I think of the young Japanese American mother. The woman brave enough to sob as she climbed onto that wretched bus. The harried church ladies passing out sandwiches. How can all that be happening at the same time as this?

  “You look like you’ve been busy.”

  Gia nudges the bottle of polish closer to me. “I read this inspiring article in a magazine about how now more than ever it’s important for us to look our best.”

  “Why ‘now more than ever’?” My question has a starched, stiff sound to it.

  Maybe Gia hears it, because her smile falters. “I think they just mean during times of war. You know how they say the wife is the heart of the home? Well, women are the heart of the country. So, when our men go off and fight for us, we don’t want to be sitting around at home looking dowdy. That doesn’t help their spirits any.”

  “So, this—” I gesture to the chaos of her room as I sit on the floor “—is you doing your patriotic duty?”

  Gia’s lashes flutter against her cheeks. “I wouldn’t phrase it like that.”

  I pick up the bottle of polish and rattle the brush around inside. “Keep your hand still so I can serve my country by painting your nails.”

  Gia flashes me an annoyed look. “You don’t have to poke fun, Evalina. If you disagree, fine. But you don’t have to be mean.”

  “I just watched Taichi and his family load onto a bus with no idea where they’re going. They tagged them all with numbers, like they’re a shipment leaving a warehouse. And there were all these armed guards standing around. After watching that, I really don’t care how I look.”

  Gia stares at the floor. Her heavy rouge makes her look as though she’s blushing. “I’m sorry.”

  The waver of her voice takes the edge off my anger. It’s not as though what’s happening to Taichi and his family is Gia’s fault. “Sorry, G. I’m not very good company right now.”

  “I know you’re just sad.”

  Sad. What I feel is far greater, far deeper, than sad. “Thanks for covering for me today so I could be there.”

  “Of course. Evalina, don’t,” she says as I press her right hand onto the newspaper.

  “I can’t in good conscience leave you with only half your nails painted. Think of how it would impact the morale of our troops.”

  I make myself smile, and Gia giggles. The sound is soothing after this afternoon, and my muscles relax.

  But when I catch myself, I tense again. How could I let myself do that?

  How easy it would be to get used to this new reality. Right now the heartache of saying goodbye is fresh, but as weeks and months and maybe even years pass, it could be easy to forget to fight. To forget that an entire race of Americans is being robbed of everything they’ve worked for because they happen to look like our overseas enemies.

  If Italians could be so easily spotted, I have no doubts that I would be sent to a concentration camp too.

  I finish Gia’s hand, and I take the tiny brush and stroke lines of the red paint onto my left thumbnail. Then I close the bottle, set it aside, and blow on it to speed the drying.

  She blinks at my red thumbnail and then at me. “You’re just painting one?”

  “Yes.” I blow again and watch the polish harden, feel my resolve do the same. “So I’ll remember that this isn’t normal.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  Evalina

  I awake the next morning gasping for breath and grasping among my bedsheets for a gas mask. When my hands find only fistfuls of cotton sheets, I realize the bombs had been a dream. I take several drags of clean, cool air.

  My shoulders and legs ache, as if the muscles have been clenched for hours. I unfold my body and stretch my arms above my head. My lips are dry, and my mouth is too. My cheeks and eyelashes are crusty from dried tears.

  After coming home from Gia’s yesterday, I helped Mama prepare gnocchi, participated in the conversation at dinner, and did a pretty great job of acting like it was a totally normal Tuesday.

  Or so I thought.

  While I dried dishes, Mama asked, “Are you all right, Evalina?”

  I continued to rub the pot dry in even, circular motions. My one red nail reflected back at me in the shine of the stainless steel. “I am, thank you.”

  Mama scrubbed at a stubborn bit of dried potato. “The Hamasaki family left today, right?”

  “Yes, that’s been on my mind tonight.” I was impressed that my voice sounded so steady. “I do feel rather down about that.”

  I crouched to return the pot to the cabinet. Where was Taichi? What was he doing? Where was he going? How long until I heard from him?

  “Understandably so.” Mama left it at that and didn’t press me when I said I felt extra tired and was going to bed early.

  As I mounted the stairs to my room, I felt as though Mama’s unasked questions followed me. Or maybe I had imagined her curiosity, because it wasn’t in her nature to keep silent.

  I look at my clock now—5:30. If he were home, Taichi would be up doing farm chores before going to school. Where is he waking up this morning?

  A familiar and welcome sound enters my room. The faint whine of the paper boy’s bicycle.

  My body groans and pops when I ease out of bed. The floorboards are cool beneath my bare feet as I slip out my bedroom door and down the stairs, with only a couple of squeaks to give me away. The newspaper awaits on our front step, so fresh the ink clings to my fingers when I touch it.

  I find what I’m looking for buried within the San Francisco News.

  “Goodbye! Write Soon!”

  Alien Exodus Like an Outing

  With a few courteous bows, lots of promises to “write soon” and many sturdy American-type handshakes, the first Japanese involved in military evacuation orders yesterday said farewell to San Francisco.

  The elders, steeped in their native traditions, displayed few emotions. School-age youngsters romped and played among the piles of household goods strewn in front of the control stations of the Wartime Civil Control Administration, 2020 and 1701 Van Ness Avenue.

  College-age boys and girls and their slightly older friends and relatives, most of them American citizens, still laughed, wise-cracked in the latest slang, and gave the scene the air of an outing—

&
nbsp; The edges of the paper crumple beneath my tightened grasp. “The air of an outing”? Who wrote this piece of delusional garbage?

  Armed military police patrolled the sidewalk in front of the station, watched over personal properties, kept motorists and gawkers on the move.

  Oh, is that what they were doing? Because I recall them being turned toward the Japanese Americans, as if keeping the rest of the city protected from them. I recall being spat upon by one of them! Or would’ve been, if his aim had been truer.

  As the buses rolled away, friends remaining waved goodbye, raised their thumbs in the air, made the victory V signal in final tribute. The younger Japanese responded, broad smiles on their faces; heads bobbed up and down in affirmation.

  Was I at the same place as this moronic journalist? Because I saw no victory signals. No broad smiles. No bobbing heads. And the only raised thumb was mine to reassure my friend that I was okay. What a load of propaganda. In America! In my own newspaper!

  How many San Franciscans will read this article and think, “That doesn’t sound so bad.” Or, “Wow, those Japanese American families sure are having fun.” He made having your property seized and being loaded onto a bus while surrounded by military police sound like heading off for some kind of vacation!

  I mash the newspaper shut and throw it onto the front step.

  The ink is all over my hands, and I stare at them, as appalled as if it were blood. I stop just short of slamming the front door when I re-enter the house. My soul is so loud, it’s hard to keep the rest of me quiet.

  I march to the desk shoved in the corner of our living room, yank out a piece of writing paper, and I throw down a scathing letter to the editor of the San Francisco News. At the end, I press the pen to sign my name, only to hesitate. How seriously would they take a girl named Evalina Cassano?

  After a moment’s consideration, I sign it simply, “A Concerned Citizen.”

  Taichi

  Air. Fresh air. I need fresh air.

  That’s all I can think about as I shuffle down the aisle of the hot, rank bus. Standing on my legs is both agonizing and amazing all at once. Every muscle in my body is sore from over twenty-four hours of being squashed onto a bus seat, then squashed into a train seat, and then squashed onto another bus seat.

  The newborn starts his now-familiar furious cry for food, and his mother bobs up and down as she seeks to comfort him while simultaneously herding her young daughter off the bus.

  Many have it much worse than me. I would be wise to not lose sight of that.

  A high-pitched whistling sound fills the air, and the bus sways as wind pushes against it. During our fifteen-minute ride from the train station in Lone Pine, California—wherever that is—I had noticed a few times that something seemed to push against the bus as we drove. As though the bus were a large sail.

  Somebody slow must have gotten off because the line resumes moving. I angle for a view out the windows but I don’t have enough room to bend. I catch glimpses of brown earth, and the black boots of a guard.

  “Single-file line, folks. You can collect your bags after you’ve been processed. Keep your tags out where they can be seen.”

  Finally, I’m on the deep stairs, stepping out onto solid ground. The sun is unbearably bright; I shade my eyes and squint.

  All the breath in my lungs clears at the sight of the mountain peaks. I’ve never been this close to the Sierras, never seen mountains so tall, so strong. Or perhaps their majesty is an illusion because of the sharp contrast to the flat and dusty valley, pockmarked with squat, rectangular houses, all painted black.

  Or “house” might be too glorified of a name for them; they look more like crude barracks, all lined up in orderly rows, as if a guard commanded them to be in single file and uniform.

  “Bags can be collected after you’ve been processed,” a military policeman calls as he strolls along our quiet line, a bayonetted gun held firmly at his side. Why the weapon? Who among us has the energy to fight after twenty-four hours of travel? “Stay in a single-file line. Single-file line, folks. Ma’am, your number is hidden. You need to keep your tags out where we can see them.”

  Aiko pokes me in the back. When I turn, she points to a sign on our left.

  Owens Valley Reception Area

  Manzanar, California

  So, the rumors were true after all. Our family had pulled out a roadmap several weeks ago—though it feels like several lifetimes ago—to see where Owens Valley was because that was the only evacuation camp the newspapers had mentioned. We finally spotted the valley between the Sierra Nevada and Inyo Mountain ranges.

  “It will be cold at night,” Mother said as we looked at the altitude. “I should buy us winter jackets and boots.”

  Father removed his eyeglasses and rubbed them clean with a handkerchief. “Maybe. We do not know if we will go there.”

  “We do not know that we will not, either.”

  But Mother had made a special trip into the city just to find jackets and boots she deemed sturdy enough. As I stand in the valley now, the sun cooking my face, that puffy winter jacket and clunky pair of boots stealing so much room in my suitcase seem ridiculous. As ridiculous as my baseball bat and glove. Who did I think I would be playing baseball with?

  The line inches forward toward a building, also black like the houses. But not painted black, as I’d originally thought. Rather the structure is wrapped in some sort of black paper like I’ve seen used on rooftops. It rustles when the wind blows.

  Another whistling sound fills the air, and I feel as though a handful of dust has been thrown into my face. I cover my eyes, coughing and exhaling out my nose to try and clear the dirt.

  “That wind.” Aiko’s words are sharp, as if swearing. “My eyes are full of sand.”

  I mop my face with my handkerchief, and it comes away an ashy brown.

  Mother keeps turning to check on us and fusses several times with our yellow tags. Father and Aunt Chiyu are quiet, their jaws clenched, as we take shuffling steps.

  Several guards are posted on either side of the building door. They wear helmets and hold bayonets as if this is a war zone. Their hard faces remind me of the guard who grabbed Evalina’s arm at the bus. The thought of his hand closing around her, pulling her away from me, makes my fists clench as a flush of anger rolls over me.

  “Where’s your tag, miss?”

  One of the guards has snapped to attention, his focus drilling into someone behind me. I turn and see a teenage girl who had been several rows behind me on the bus from Lone Pine. She’s holding her young sister—maybe two years old?—who’s asleep on her shoulder. Her eyes are full of fear as she realizes the guard is speaking to her.

  “I . . . I don’t know.” She looks down, patting at her chest. “I had it on when I got off the bus . . .”

  “Step aside, miss, until you find it.”

  “Is that really necessary?” I don’t realize I’ve said it out loud until the gazes of everyone around me swing my way. I swallow and continue, “Why else would she be here if she wasn’t supposed to be?”

  “Taichi,” Mother admonishes under her breath.

  The guard ignores me, but snaps, “Get out of line,” to the girl.

  She obeys. One hand is occupied by supporting the weight of her sister, and her other hand trembles as it digs into the pockets of her sweater, then her trousers. “I don’t know. I just don’t know. I swear I had it when I got on the bus.” She scans the ground, her voice climbing higher as she calls down the back of the line, “Has anybody seen my number?”

  Aiko lingers with me, even though the line in front of us has moved. “Try your handbag.”

  “I did.” The girl’s eyes swell with tears. “Where could it be?” To the guard’s shoes she says, “My name is Rose Ogawa. I’m from Terminal Island. My number is 2453. My mother is already here. She was on the first bus with my brothers. You can ask them.”

  The guard’s jaw is tight. “Everyone must have a tag, miss. No excep
tions.”

  Aiko steps out of line and holds out her hands for the sleeping toddler. “I can hold her while you look.”

  “Aiko,” Mother says sharply. And then, surprised, “Taichi,” when I step out too.

  “What am I going to do?” Rose’s voice climbs higher as she passes her sister to Aiko. “What happens if I can’t find my tag?”

  The flash of yellow catches my eye as Aiko fits her arms around the toddler. I reach into the pocket of the sleeping girl’s sweater. “Here it is.”

  Rose smiles at me through her flowing tears. “Oh, God bless you.”

  “She found it,” Aiko says to the guard, her voice cool. “Satisfied?”

  I grimace at Aiko’s attitude, but the guard just says a dry, “Tags need to be affixed to the front of the shirt.”

  The tremor in Rose’s hands is so great that she can’t even take the tag from me.

  “Here, let me.” I loop the string through the buttonhole of her sweater and pull it tight.

  “Thank you,” she whispers. “Taichi and—” she looks to Aiko’s tag. “Aiko. I’m very appreciative.”

  Aiko passes the sleeping toddler back to Rose. “Let’s find our place back in line.”

  Mother, Father, and Aunt Chiyu are inside the building now, nearing a long table of Caucasian women. All three of them have been watching the doorway, and their relief over spotting us is clear. The room is warm, but it’s nice to be out of the dusty wind.

  I expect a scolding, but instead Father just says, “We are being assigned apartments and given shots.”

  He nods to the chaos on the other side of the room where Caucasian nurses have trays of medical supplies. Parents put on brave faces and hold their crying children steady.

  Aiko narrows her eyes. “What kind of shots are those?”

  The floor creaks beneath me. It’s made only of planks of wood, and the knotholes reveal there’s no foundation, only dirt. Which explains the crunch of sandy grit beneath my shoes. The walls are constructed from the same type of knotty lumber. Even if there weren’t natural holes in the boards, there are still gaps between the planks, evidence of how hastily they were nailed up. Is the black paper supposed to help keep out dust?