All the Ways Home

by Elsie Chapman

  And here’s me, calling you again to check if you care. It’s become a bad habit now, always checking. It reminds me of scars, actually, this bad habit I’ve picked up. My friend Donovan got chicken pox when he was ten. His mom told him to not pick off the scabs or he’d get scars. But he couldn’t stop checking them to see if they were healing, and now he’s got scars all over. He doesn’t care that he has them, but he doesn’t deny they’re there.

  I’m backstage at this live house in Osaka, waiting for Shoma. Music comes through the walls. I could be listening to more music on my cell. Or I could just be online on my cell, surfing and looking at nothing important.

  Instead, like Donovan, I’m checking for signs of healing.

  Dad, the smell of flowers is everywhere. There are bouquets in the room, sent from friends of the band to celebrate their show tonight. When I saw all those flowers, the first thing I thought of was Mom’s funeral. That day was such a huge and awful explosion of sadness and painfully bright colors. I remember that you and Shoma had sent a bouquet of sunflowers, the kind she’d loved the most. Except I knew, even then, that Shoma had been the one to order them.

  I’m not as mad at you as I used to be. I’m working you out of my system, I guess. Or working around you. You’re the blind spot I have to be careful about when I’m riding my bike.

  The thing is this—if your needing to always be away is anything like how Shoma needs music and writing, or the way Jory needs hockey, then I think I’m beginning to understand, to be able to see things from your point of view.

  And if you’d been here tonight watching this show, you’d get why that is.

  Because you wouldn’t have missed the expression on everyone’s faces—Shoma’s, the people in the crowd, the people on stage. They looked like they were home. Like they couldn’t imagine being anywhere else in the world.

  The way, I think, you never looked when you were home with us.

  31

  Dear Nothing’s Carved In Stone,

  Would you guys agree with me that being onstage—being in a band—can be home? The same way writing and playing hockey and the act of escape can also be home?

  Standing up there, I bet you feel almost powerful, and therefore safe.

  But fans—I see their faces and how they want a part of you.

  Which means you must also feel vulnerable, being home or not.

  I’d ask if this is why Silver Sun has songs that go from light to dark. From “Spirit Inspiration” to “PUPA” to “Inside Out,” with their lyrics about being born again, to creating change, to maybe being trapped.

  Jory’s eye, the way it chases me like I’m the one thing it can see—how I hurt him reminds me just how dark home can suddenly be. How I’m scared to go back because that part of the world’s gone dark for me, too. And I always imagined Shoma as being lucky, not having a dad who ran. But seeing him now, I know getting to stay here instead of moving away like I did doesn’t mean things were easier for him.

  A part of me doesn’t want to admit it might be possible.

  How anyone can be damaged, home or not. That no matter how secure you feel on that stage, however much you love your band, you might still need saving of some kind.

  You guys give me hope about Jory, by the way. How one day we can be friends again, despite it all.

  Because friends and friendships, the sometimes unmaking of those friendships—Nothing’s Carved In Stone wouldn’t even exist if not for one unmaking in particular. And that unmaking itself might one day come back together still.

  Shoma told me all about ELLEGARDEN. How they were this huge band who broke the hearts of all their fans seven years ago when they decided to take a break. So each member went off and started their own band. Shinichi was their lead guitarist, and he met up with Hinatch, who would play bass for Nothing’s Carved In Stone. Then they found Oniy, who would play drums. Then they asked Taku to join, to be their singer and to play rhythm guitar. And that’s who you guys are now, how you built the home that is your band and friendship.

  But roots never really die.

  You can turn your back on them, but you still wear them as invisible scars, since you wouldn’t exist the same way without them. We’re only standing above ground because of how sturdy our roots are.

  There’s a photo online of you guys from Rising Sun Rock Festival, two years ago. In it, you’re all goofing around with two other guys.

  One of them is Takeshi, who used to sing for ELLEGARDEN. And just as Shinichi went and started Nothing’s Carved In Stone, Takeshi went off and started the HIATUS.

  That photo of the two of them together tells me how they’re still friends, still connected through their roots. It tells me that the unmaking of friendships doesn’t have to be permanent. They might never be the same again, but you can remake them in different ways.

  Me and Jory can still be fixed, even if we don’t ever play hockey together again.

  We’ll be an ocean apart, but what if me and Shoma can somehow still be brothers?

  After Mom died, life filled up with cracks, all the new ways I felt lost. My house felt strange. Family was strange. I kept falling in those cracks. So I flew halfway around the world to learn how to not be lost anymore, to remember how home felt. And Shoma—he’s telling me home can be anywhere, as long as it matters.

  You guys actually played at the live house I was at tonight. Years ago, when you were just starting out. There’s a wall of photos backstage of all the bands that ever played there, and I found yours. “Nothing’s Carved In Stone, Parallel Lives Tour, 2009. Thank you, Osaka Reverb! Photo by SOUND SHOOTER.” Signed by you guys and everything, four grins as huge as the world.

  It was cool to see that photo and know you guys would stick, even if you hadn’t known that at the time. Just like it was cool to know that whatever you ended up going through, you’d still keep making music. You’d still be around, writing songs, making the world spin, and asking for fans to follow.

  In two days, it’s Rock in Japan, which Shoma says is the biggest outdoor music festival in Japan. It’s a big deal for him, getting to write up one of its stages. He’s really excited about who he gets to see play, who he gets to meet.

  I hope you guys play “November 15th.” It’s a song about finding your way. Which means it’s also a song about home.

  It’s one of Shoma’s favorites.

  And one of mine, too.

  32

  Shoma glances into the window of the store we’re passing by.

  “Hey, it’s a Frets,” he says, stopping on the sidewalk to look at the display of guitars. “I forgot there’s a location here in Osaka. Let’s check it out.”

  “But—”

  “C’mon, it’ll be quick.”

  We’re in a semi-rush, walking fast to the train station to make our shinkansen back to Tokyo. Shoma had slept in—and because of what I almost did last night, I let him. I was sure he’d see my guilt as soon as he woke up, reason enough to want to hide for as long as possible.

  But he hadn’t noticed. I almost wish he had, just so he would learn to be more careful around me, so he would stop bothering to be nice.

  He’d left his wallet on the desk in the hotel while he’d grabbed a shower. He assumed it would be safe with me, never thinking about someone he trusts stealing from him.

  But he’s never really had a brother. Especially not a brother terrified of the coming autumn, helpless in the face of sure doom. A squirrel on a highway feels the vibrations of a nearing speeding semi and freezes. A bird flies into a window and is stunned breathless. All those people who made the mistake of watching that videotape in The Ring.

  I’d checked inside the wallet. Full of cash. Along with his credit card I still hadn’t returned, it was more than enough for a plane ticket to Sapporo.

  How many ways can you betray family and still have them forgive you? I’d wondered, taking out the cash to hold it, my heart pounding. What if you convince yourself that their betraying you first makes i
t okay? What kind of betrayals just can’t be fixed in the end?

  Because skipping out on Shoma to go and find Dad definitely qualified as a betrayal. Telling myself I would be doing my brother a favor was one thing; still going after he told me he thought Dad was a lost cause and how I should give up on him was another.

  And there was something else now, another reason why I wanted to find my dad, and it wasn’t just about needing his help with my project, or even to finally answer all the questions I’ve been carrying around in that box in my head.

  Instead it was a reason so crazy I was still only circling it, not yet ready to admit its existence, especially not to the person telling me I was wasting my time, searching for the unsearchable. Shoma, left behind when he’d been a kid.

  The reason was this:

  I was starting to hope that once I met our dad, he’d ask me to stay in Japan with him. As his kid again, and this time for good.

  Then I’d heard Shoma turn off the shower, and I’d shoved the money back into his wallet so fast I nearly sent all of it flying to the floor. I was actually relieved to not have to think about it anymore. Just as I was relieved when I called Dad’s cell again after Shoma was asleep and there was still no answer. And in the morning, I dreaded Shoma picking up his wallet, sure he’d notice I’d been digging around.

  I’d hit snooze when his alarm went off, delaying.

  In Frets now, I know if we miss our train, it’s more my fault than his.

  Inside, guitars are fire-engine red to cloud white to deep gold. They hang from racks on the wall—electric, acoustic, bass. The ceiling lights glint off their curves and strings. There are testing stations set up on the far side of the room. Customers hang around, browsing.

  Shoma disappears down one of the aisles, exploring.

  I stare up at walls of guitars and think about secrets.

  We did a unit on the ocean for science last spring, where we learned that conch shells found washed up on the beach are really just outer skeletons made of calcium carbonate.

  But when their soft parts had been around, they might have once made a pearl.

  You can hear the ocean in an empty shell, a soft and constant roar.

  If you blow into the end of one, the sound it makes will remind you of trumpets.

  Just bones. Just calcium. But so much more.

  Guitars are wells of secrets to me, too, even if I can break them down to things I know—wood and metal, steel and strings. Add in fingers and determination and somehow there’s music.

  There’s a girl at one of the testing stations. She’s got her amp blasting; I can hear her play. Her fingers move fast between chords, and carefully. I remember how my own hands had felt so heavy and uncoordinated as I’d lit a fire and threw a brick. As she plays, her expression is the same as those onstage, as Shoma’s as he watches a show, as those of the crowd all around him.

  It says home.

  The girl looks up from beneath a thick fringe of purple hair. “Sorry, I didn’t know anyone was waiting.”

  I shove my hands into my pockets. Guitars are breakable, just like glass windows. Just like eyesight. “Only watching. And listening.”

  She glances at my hands in their pockets. “You don’t play?”

  “I’m waiting for my brother. He plays bass.”

  “Well, since you’re waiting—here. Try.” And before I can say anything, she’s getting up and holding the guitar toward me.

  It’s painted a soft deep black. The neck is skinny, its strings fragile. I don’t move.

  “Here, I’ll take it.” Shoma comes up from behind me, and the girl passes it to him before leaving. “Thanks. C’mon, Kaede, we still have a few minutes.”

  I watch him, feeling stupid as he sits down on the bench. He grabs a silver pick from a bucket at his feet. “You don’t play guitar, even,” I mutter. “And we’re going to miss our train.”

  “Will you just relax and get over here?”

  I sit down beside him. I keep my hands stuffed in my pockets.

  Maybe it’s just the sound of the guitar that does it, or that it’s my brother who’s playing, but a wave of loneliness hits when he starts playing. It tells me everything’s gone wrong, even if I want to believe otherwise.

  It was supposed to be easy, leaving this time around.

  I’d built up nearly ten years’ worth of ready and thought it would be enough.

  I still haven’t found Dad. My Summer Celebration Project is nothing close to being an excellent effort. My family tree is mostly blank, this side of the ocean still the unknown.

  My box of tough questions? Still lodged in my head, taking up space it doesn’t deserve.

  And in two weeks, Shoma’s taking me to the airport. He’ll say, See you later, except we both know he won’t. He’ll go on writing about music, connecting to bands and readers more than he’ll connect with me.

  “I started with guitar, you know,” he says, suddenly stopping playing. “When I was just a bit older than you. Band, for school.”

  “Why’d you switch to bass?” Shoma always seems so sure of what he’s chosen to do. It’s hard to imagine him once having to work things out, even as a kid. But then I think about him saying how he’s now working on figuring us out. And I think about how he’s ended up fine.

  “I discovered this band called STRAIGHTENER,” Shoma says. “Still awesome, by the way, and still one my favorites. Anyway, their bassist blew me away.”

  I have to grin because I know who he’s talking about. “Hinatch is Nothing’s Carved In Stone’s bassist, too.”

  “Sure is.”

  “How did you know to switch to bass?” I think of what he’d said about home being a collection of important things. “To find that part of home for you?”

  “Well, bass sometimes gets overlooked. But when it’s good, you never forget hearing it, and Hinatch had made himself great. He made playing bass part of this home that could never be torn down or taken away. He made it his own.”

  Shoma, having to live with a ghost for a dad—that home had been too shaky for him to stay.

  He glances over at me. “Are you worried about hockey not working out?”

  I’m pretty sure he’s already put together how I’m suspended. And I can keep lying about it, but I decide not to. This summer started out strange, and horrible, but … it’s not so much anymore. And it might be stupid of me, but I don’t want that to change back.

  “I’m suspended from the league,” I say slowly. “So I probably won’t be playing in the fall.”

  “Right, got it. That sucks, and I’m sorry.” Shoma strums out more notes and says nothing else.

  “I’m not even sure I want to keep playing.” Admitting it is easier than I thought it would be. It actually feels good to say it out loud. “But Jory loves it, and it seems like I should, too.”

  “But you’re not Jory.” He hands me the guitar and the pick. “You’re also not me.”

  I adjust the shoulder strap, my fingers clumsy and cold. The silver plastic triangle feels flimsy in my grip. And suddenly I’m scared. Not about Shoma laughing at how bad I’ll sound, but because I care he’s going to see how we have nothing in common.

  “So, first thing—you need to stop holding everything like it’s made of glass.” Shoma gives me a grin that says he understands, and I take a deep breath. “You’re new, Kaede, not destructive.”

  Destructive.

  I see flashes of broken glass—sprinkled on a hedge in front of a house, lying on the ice of a skating rink. The strings blur and waver as I look down at them. But then Shoma’s adjusting my posture, telling me to watch my elbows and relax my shoulders. I curl my left hand around the neck of the guitar and press down on the frets with my fingertips. I hold the pick in my right hand, between my thumb and first finger so the pick’s top point sticks out like a shark fin from the water.

  Sharks—they can swim just fine. Water is their home. They don’t worry about getting hurt or drowning. They know they can, b
ut it doesn’t stop them from feeling powerful.

  “And then you just”—Shoma mimics the motion with his arm as he speaks—“bring the pick down along the strings.”

  So I do.

  33

  Dear Jory,

  I’m on the shinkansen, headed back to Tokyo from Osaka. The train moves so smoothly, you can barely tell anything is happening unless you look out the window. It’s like being on a breakaway and there’s nothing but wide-open ice in front of you, and you can just keep going.

  Shoma’s sitting beside me, his laptop on the pull-out tray in front of him. His cell is charging, plugged into the outlet at his feet. He’s got his earbuds in so he can listen to music while he writes.

  All of it’s this amazing technology. It’s the present, but it’s also so many signs of the future. If I think too much about it, I feel very small, and the world, beyond huge. I think about wandering and getting lost and how everyone should have their own north.

  But right now I want to talk to you about shrines, okay? Old, traditional, and full-of-meaning shrines.

  Do you know there are over ten thousand of them here in Japan?

  I didn’t. Neither did Shoma. But we looked it up, and it’s true.

  Some of them are huge and famous, and those are the ones the guidebooks usually tell you to go and see.

  And some of them are just these tiny structures on the side of the road, tucked away between shops or houses. What you might miss if you blink or walk by too fast.

  I almost missed this one today. It was nearly hidden from the street, just this small shrine in a local park we were passing on the way to the station.

  But there were torii climbing out of the nearby trees, like the cattails that poke out of ditches along back roads. The orange of them against the green was as bright as emergency traffic cones.

  Which means maybe that shrine had been looking out for me, Jory. Kannon and Mazu and Kwan Tai were around, and they told this shrine about a kid still trying to say sorry. It sensed the lucky cat from outside Shoma’s place, and the cat’s beckoning paw told it to watch for me. What else explains Shoma telling me afterward the orange hadn’t been that bright at all? That the torii had barely been visible from where we’d been standing?