Nightshade

by Jonelle Patrick

  Plush carpet and fine wood paneling made an opulent backdrop for the lively conversations multiplying as members of Ichiro’s Toda University class arrived for their annual get-together. Subdued lighting gleamed off the polished bottles behind the bar, as a steady stream of well-dressed thirty-year-olds and their guests surveyed the room, then made a beeline for the cocktails that would ease them into the evening.

  Yumi and Ichiro waded slowly into the crowd. They stopped a few times as Ichiro introduced Yumi to old friends, then drifted with the tide toward the drinks.

  Ichiro ordered a Kirin Ichiban and a glass of white wine, then turned and nearly bumped into a willowy woman in a red Alberta Ferretti suit.

  She beamed him a wide smile. “Hey, when are you going to pay me that five hundred yen you owe me from our bet back in freshman year? I think it’s up to about ten thousand yen now, with interest.”

  Ichiro handed the wine to Yumi and said with a grin, “Momo-chan! When did you get back? I thought you were living in Manila.”

  “Just transferred to Hong Kong. I flew in last night, had a meeting, have to go back early tomorrow morning.” She turned to Yumi and introduced herself.

  “Oh, sorry,” Ichiro said to Momo. “This is—”

  “Yumi Hata. Hajimemashite.”

  Ichiro pointed his beer bottle at his classmate. “And you actually owe me. You bet the Giants would win, so the fact that they tied . . .”

  The bartender passed Momo a gin and tonic. “And what about you?” she asked Ichiro, taking a sip. “Still slaving away at ye olde family store? How’s your golf game?”

  Ichiro grimaced. “Ma-ma.”

  Momo leaned toward Yumi and whispered, “Don’t let him fool you—the last time I checked, he had a two handicap. He’s got plenty of time to practice until his father retires, and I think his grandfather still shows up at the office every day.”

  A short man with a Rotary Club pin already in his lapel arrived. “Long time no see, Princess Peach!”

  “They’ve opened the buffet,” Ichiro said to Yumi. “Shall we get something to eat?”

  As they excused themselves, Momo laid a manicured hand on Ichiro’s sleeve and leaned in to murmur, “Before I forget, Ami says hi.”

  A look of consternation flashed across his face. He muttered something noncommittal as he and Yumi moved away.

  They helped themselves from platters heaped with creamy, tofu-sauced vegetables, chicken glazed with ginger, and assorted sushi, discovering they both liked anago eel better than unagi, and agreed that wagyu beef was unpleasantly fatty. With plates finally filled with enough appetizers to make a meal, they surveyed the crowded room for somewhere to sit.

  “How about over there in the corner, by the windows?” Ichiro suggested.

  He pulled out Yumi’s chair for her, then busied himself pushing the candle to the far corner of the table and fetching chopsticks. When they’d finally settled in and both had full cups of sake, Yumi asked, “Who’s Ami?”

  Ichiro sighed. “She was my girlfriend in business school.”

  “Were you . . . serious?”

  “Yeah.” He frowned. “Or at least, I was. She was pretty heavily recruited by the Asian Development Bank’s main office in Manila, but she was talking to the Tokyo branch, too. I was hoping we’d be together here after graduation, but something happened and the Tokyo offer just dried up. She took the Manila job and didn’t tell me until after she’d signed. Later, I heard the head of the Tokyo branch had owed my father a favor.”

  “Why didn’t you try to get a job in Manila?”

  Ichiro answered with a short, dismissive laugh. “The Mitsuyama Corporation paid for me to go to business school. Even if I weren’t a Mitsuyama, I’d still owe them five years of indentured servitude after graduation. And the Mitsuyama Corporation definitely didn’t need me in Manila. In fact, they needed me anywhere but Manila.”

  He tossed back his sake and refilled his cup before Yumi had a chance to do it for him. “Besides,” he said, “Ami Watanabe never really wanted to work in Tokyo.”

  Yumi didn’t understand. Her name sounded Japanese. Why wouldn’t she want to come home? And why had Ichiro’s family been so against her?

  “Her parents are third-generation Americans,” he continued, as if reading her mind. “She grew up in Los Angeles. Even her parents barely speak enough Japanese to order sushi.”

  “Oh.” Yumi tried to imagine the conservative, relentlessly proper Mitsuyama parents struggling to carry on a dinner conversation in their rusty textbook English. “So . . . Your family didn’t really feel comfortable with her?”

  “You could say that.” The bitterness in his voice brought her up short. Maybe she’d been wrong about the way he’d been pursuing her—was he still in love with his old girlfriend? Maybe he wasn’t as eager to get married as she thought.

  “Ichiro,” she said hesitantly. “Are you . . . just going through this arranged marriage thing to make your parents happy?”

  He looked at her with an apologetic smile. “Oh no, Yumi-san, of course not. I’m completely serious. How else am I going to find someone to marry who I actually like? And,” he added with a sigh, “someone my parents like. They want a daughter-in-law who’s comfortable in Japan, and I want someone who’s comfortable in the rest of the world. It’s not easy to please everybody.”

  Yumi relaxed back into her chair. Someone who couldn’t speak Japanese would never be able to mix in Tokyo society with the ease required by Ichiro’s family obligations. More than once, she’d sparred late into the night with her college roommates on this very subject. Her American friends never quite understood that love was only part of a happy marriage.

  Seeing that Yumi’s sake cup was still full, Ichiro dribbled the last drops from the flask into his own. “The night I first met you was the day Ami told me she’d decided to go to Manila. I was still in shock, but I remember seeing you across the room and thinking that at least I wasn’t the only one hurting that night.”

  Yumi looked at him in surprise.

  “Your boyfriend? The blond guy downing one beer after another by the drinks table?” Ichiro picked up his cup. “For some reason it cheered me up to imagine that maybe someday in the future you and I would meet in Tokyo and be able to laugh about that night.”

  “And here we are.” Yumi smiled and picked up her cup. “To our exes.”

  Ichiro returned her smile. “No. To us.”

  Chapter 7

  Sunday, April 7

  11:00 A.M.

  Yumi

  The next morning, Ueno Park was paved with people. Drunken people. It was only eleven in the morning, but the partiers had been up and toasting the cherry blossoms for hours. Barricades kept the main walkway clear, but bright blue waterproof tarps had been laid right up to the edges. By nine o’clock every square centimeter was already occupied, and bottles had begun to be emptied.

  Salarymen in coat and tie vied with office ladies in spring suits to keep each other’s sake cups brimming, reveling in the one day each year when they were not only allowed but actually encouraged to publicly cut loose.

  Yumi walked down the main promenade under the arch of blooming trees, searching among the extended families and groups of friends for the Mitsuyama Corporation encampment. Ichiro had invited her to stop by their annual o-hanami party, and he’d looked so eager for her to say yes that she couldn’t refuse. So this morning she’d dug through her closet and pulled out a pale green Chanel-ish suit that had just enough pink in the weave to qualify it as a cherry-blossom viewing outfit.

  She’d left the house feeling more obligation than anticipation. Her mother was becoming a little too excited that the match with the extremely eligible Ichiro Mitsuyama hadn’t yet derailed. Although Yumi hadn’t mentioned where she was going, it was clear when she appeared in the kitchen
wearing last year’s o-hanami suit that she wasn’t off to interpreting gig. Mrs. Hata had scrutinized Yumi’s outfit, fretting that the skirt might be too short, that it might make a bad impression on Ichiro’s father. Yumi finally had to flee without breakfast, stopping on the way to the train station for a red bean bun.

  She’d felt slightly cross getting on the train, irritated at her mother’s eagerness to nudge her toward a marriage that would be a huge step up the social ladder for their family, but was a little lacking in the fireworks department for her. Ichiro was a nice guy, well-educated, polite, accomplished. But that didn’t feel like quite enough.

  She was comparing him to Ben as she crossed the street to Ueno Park. There had always been fireworks with Ben, but in the end she was the one who got burned.

  As she made her way up the stairs, pale petals dancing around her in the chilly breeze, she thought about how Ichiro had gazed at her in the flickering candlelight over that final toast last night, And how later, in the back seat of the cab, he’d made it clear that it wasn’t just her résumé he liked. What he lacked in skill, he’d more than made up for in enthusiasm. She sighed. In time, would she feel the same way about him?

  “Oh! Sorry!” A disheveled young man bumped into her, pushed by a roughhousing colleague. His eyes went wide with undisguised appreciation. “Hey babe, why don’t you join us?” He yelled into the crowd, “Oi! Bring the sake over here!”

  “No, that’s okay, thanks anyway,” Yumi said, stepping back with a smile. “Actually, I’m looking for the Mitsuyama Corporation party . . . ?”

  “Really? Too bad.” Her admirer pointed down the pathway. “They’re next to the big fountain, near the National Museum.”

  “Thanks,” Yumi said, continuing on her way.

  “Come back later!” he called after her, before the crowd swallowed him again.

  Yumi spied Ichiro amid a group of laughing young men and women standing in their stocking feet on a crowded expanse of blue tarp, dozens of shoes lined up at the edges. As she drew closer, she noticed that even though the two men with him were taller and more attractive, all the office ladies were elbowing each other aside to top up Ichiro’s cup.

  “But what about me?” one of the salarymen wheedled at a pixie-ish young woman in a pink blouse and very short skirt. He held out the small cup with an exaggerated sad panda face.

  The young woman gave him a saucy look and whipped her flask away. “Sorry, I fetched this specially for Mitsuyama-san.”

  “That’s okay,” Ichiro said. “I still have some. See?” He held out his half-full cup, but to his dismay, she took the opportunity to pour in more. The thimble-sized cup overflowed, sake running down his hand onto his sleeve.

  “Oops!” She giggled and rushed in close to blot at his sleeve with her scarf.

  “Ichiro?” Yumi called to him from the edge of the group.

  He looked up and grinned with relief. “Yumi! You came!”

  Leaving her shoes behind, Yumi stepped over the cord that marked the reserved Mitsuyama area and caught the irritation flitting across the office lady’s face as she pulled back with her damp scarf. Heads turned, curious about the newcomer.

  “Do you have any more sake?” Ichiro asked the office lady, flicking drops off his fingers. “Wait, we need another cup.” He boldly grabbed Yumi’s hand and pulled her into the crowd.

  Ichiro’s face was slightly flushed, his usually perfect hair mussed. He’d loosened his Ferragamo tie. Even though his Armani suit was unbuttoned, Yumi noted how well it fit.

  “Wait here a minute.” He pushed his way through the crowd surrounding a table where sake was being dispensed and came back with a clear glass flask and an extra cup. As he reached her, a smile lit up his face and Yumi felt an unexpected burst of affection—it was spring and the air was filled with the scent of cherry blossoms, and the heir to the Mitsuyama Corporation had abandoned his admirers to be with her. He led the way to the less-crowded fringe. Ichiro poured for her, then allowed her to fill his cup.

  “To spring,” he said, and they both drank.

  “It’s o-hanami,” he pointed out with mock severity. “You’re supposed to drink the whole thing, not just a little sip.”

  “I have to stop by the Komagome Police Station later to try to get my phone back,” Yumi explained.

  “They won’t arrest you unless you’ve had about sixty of these,” he insisted. “My father knows how many toasts everybody has to drink today, so the company cups are extra-small.”

  She gave in and emptied her cup, then they poured for each other again.

  “Why do the police have your phone?” Ichiro asked, after he’d cajoled her into finishing the second drink.

  Yumi explained about the mix-up and how Rika had dropped it at the Komagome Shrine.

  “Oh.” His cheeks flamed. “Do you think that the police will be, uh, listening to your messages? Because last night after I got home I tried to call you, and when it switched over to voicemail I left kind of a . . . a private message. I guess I shouldn’t have had quite so much sake at the reunion.”

  Yumi opened her mouth to reply but spotted Ichiro’s father striding toward them, trailed by a retinue of subordinates and a scurrying geisha in full makeup. A casting agency couldn’t have sent anybody who looked more like the head of a multibillion-yen empire. With his thick silver hair and hand-stitched Savile Row suit, he wore power like a pair of custom-made shoes.

  “Hata-san, how nice you could join us today,” he boomed, red-faced and beaming.

  “Thank you for inviting me,” Yumi replied, bowing politely. “It’s nice to see you, Mr. Mitsuyama.”

  The shocked looks of the executives behind Ichiro’s father told her immediately that she’d made a horrible mistake. She’d forgotten to use the honorific form. Again. The special verbs and conjugations didn’t come naturally to her because she hadn’t used them at home in America. She often forgot them at crucial times, and unfortunately she’d just publicly addressed the head of the Mitsuyama Corporation in an insultingly familiar way, as if he were a family member.

  But Mr. Mitsuyama only grinned more widely in his slightly inebriated state and beckoned to the geisha. “Here, shall we drink to the coming of spring?” They held out their cups, and the courtesan drew back her long silk sleeve to pour for them. Mr. Mitsuyama clearly knew how to make good use of his extravagant cultural accessory.

  “Kampai!” they toasted in unison.

  Mr. Mitsuyama turned to his son. “Have you asked Hata-san about Monday yet?”

  Ichiro rubbed his forehead as if he felt a migraine coming on. “Father, I really don’t think that she’s interested in coming to a charity concert.”

  “Well, how will you know unless you ask?” he replied, as one of the senior executives-in-waiting murmured that the president of the Itoh Trading Company had just arrived to exchange toasts. Before he was ushered away, Mr. Mitsuyama leaned toward Yumi and said, “You’re a pretty little thing.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Yumi stammered, bowing farewell.

  Ichiro breathed a minimally polite good-bye and made a sketchy bow. When his father was gone, he sighed. “Sorry about that. Sometimes he’s just so . . . old school.” He grimaced apologetically.

  “Don’t worry, I understand.” She smiled, glancing over at the clique Ichiro had been drinking with when she arrived. A few eye daggers were still being flicked in her direction. “I think you’d better get back to your subjects.”

  He followed her gaze and groaned.

  She handed him her empty cup. “I should be going, anyway. My mother is expecting me to do some errands for her this afternoon, and I hoped to have time afterward to give Rika her phone back.”

  “Okay,” Ichiro said. He looked down at his shoes. “Uh, about the concert, shall I just tell my dad that . . .”

  �
�No, I’d be happy to come.” She smiled, stepping close enough to fuel Monday’s office gossip. She noticed that he flushed a little but didn’t move away. “What kind of concert?”

  “Classical.”

  “I like classical.”

  He looked up quickly, saw she was serious, and broke into a smile. For a moment she thought he was going to kiss her, then he stepped back, remembering they were in public, and saluted her with the sake flask. “Great. Thank you. So, I guess I’ll . . . see you Monday night.”

  “Mata ne.”

  She walked away, turning around once to wave.

  It was noon. Surely Rika would be awake by now. Pulling out her friend’s phone, Yumi scrolled through the stored numbers as the crowd carried her along. Since Rika no longer had any phone at all, maybe she could be reached through her mother’s mobile. Yumi found the entry next to the character for “mom” and dialed.

  It rang four times, then a voice Yumi barely recognized whispered, “Moshi-moshi?”

  “Mrs. Ozawa? It’s Yumi Hata.” She waited for a reply, but none came. Hesitating, she remembered she ought to inquire after Mrs. Ozawa’s health or comment on the season before getting to the point of the call. “How are you? Enjoying the cherry blossoms?”

  Silence.

  “Ozawa-san? Are you there?”

  The person on the other end of the phone took a sharp breath, then hung up.

  Yumi frowned. She checked to see if she’d dialed the right number. It was Mrs. Ozawa’s number all right. The phone in her hand vibrated, startling her.

  “Moshi-moshi?” she answered.

  “Yumi-san, this is . . . this is Keiko Ozawa. I’m so sorry. I . . . when I heard Rika’s ringtone I . . .” She gave a few gasps, then broke down sobbing.

  “Ozawa-san! What’s wrong?” Yumi stepped to the side of the path, out of the flow of the crowd.