The Unquiet Heart

by Juliet McCarthy

  The icy roads were incised with treacherous wheel-ruts and frozen potholes and the covered sidewalks glazed with compacted layers of dirty snow. Tinsel streamers and colored lights, the last vestiges of Christmas, had been taken down (the ubiquitous Christmas cakes with their shell of crusty, white icing, removed from bakery shelves), and been replaced with garlands of pine and bamboo, and the entrance to each residence festooned with a rope of straw and strips of white paper. Houses were cleaned, special foods prepared, greeting cards dispatched and gifts exchanged, debts paid, and grievances forgiven, all in preparation for the most important holiday in the Japanese calendar, New Year’s Day.

  Libby and Charlie, accompanied by several other couples from the squadron, had trooped downtown to one of the popular pizza bars for dinner. Crowded close together at a long table covered with a red checkered tablecloth, the Americans were in high spirits as they contemplated the upcoming, three-day holiday.

  Charlie and Libby were discussing a trip to the local ski resort at Appi when Major Yoshida, accompanied by two other pilots from the Samurai Squadron, walked into the crowded restaurant. Libby had just asked Charlie about renting skis when she spotted Kojiro. He was standing a little apart from the other men, as if undecided whether he should stay or go. There was no way he could have missed seeing her — the restaurant was small and the large contingent of boisterous Americans was seated at the most conspicuous table in the house.

  He did not look noticeably different from the last time Libby had seen him. Even dressed casually, in blue jeans, a bulky, hooded jacket and fur-lined boots, he was every inch the proud aristocrat. It was the way he carried himself, she thought, with such confidence. He didn’t need to boast or swagger like some fighter pilots she knew. There was an air about him that inspired respect and trust.

  “You were saying?” Charlie nudged Libby with his elbow. “Libby?” He had to repeat her name twice to get her attention, she was so absorbed in watching the man in the doorway. The fellow looked vaguely familiar to Charlie but he had a difficult time distinguishing one Japanese man from another. “Do you know that guy?” He asked.

  Everyone at their table turned to stare at Kojiro.

  “I thought for a minute … ” Libby smiled at Charlie. “He looks like someone I met at General Sato’s party.”

  “I recognize him,” Lieutenant Kelly said. “He’s an F-1 driver.”

  Charlie took a closer look. Major Yoshida’s distinction as a fellow fighter pilot made him more interesting. “Good-looking guy,” he said. “Tall, for a Japanese.”

  Libby, mortified at having singled Kojiro out, stared at her slice of cold pizza. Her appetite had deserted her, along with her enthusiasm for the trip to Appi. But no one else was in a hurry to leave. Charlie finished her pizza and ordered another pitcher of beer.

  She tried to ignore Kojiro and join in the conversation, but his presence was so unnerving, she couldn’t concentrate on what the others were saying. The fact that he and his two companions had been seated at the adjoining table didn’t make it any easier, for he had deliberately taken the chair with an unobstructed view of the Americans, with Libby in particular, and every time she glanced in his direction, he was staring at her, his brow furrowed in disapproval.

  She was practically in Charlie’s lap they were squeezed so close together. His arm was resting on the back of her chair and every once in a while he patted her shoulder affectionately and nuzzled her cheek, which only added to her consternation. She didn’t want Kojiro to get the impression that she belonged to Charlie, although she could not conceive of a reason why it should matter.

  For without ever intending to, Libby had drifted into a relationship, of sorts, with Charlie — partly out of self-defense, which she was reluctant to acknowledge. She felt safe when she was with Charlie, off-limits to all but the most obnoxious and insensitive men in the squadron. It got old, after a while, trying to fend off the amorous advances of inebriated fighter pilots. Sometimes Libby felt guilty for taking advantage of Charlie’s friendship but he didn’t seem to mind because he loved her and was confident that eventually, she would feel the same way about him. Sometimes, Libby thought she did. She knew Charlie so well and was so comfortable with him. And she was grateful that he did not make demands on her that she was unwilling to meet. But tonight, her gratitude was wearing thin and she wished she could be by herself.

  For the life of her, Libby could not imagine why seeing Kojiro again made her feel so miserable. She had succeeded in putting him and the whole unfortunate evening they had spent together out of her mind. She liked dating Charlie. She had been looking forward to going skiing … . She had even begun fantasizing about the nature of their relationship and where it was heading.

  Kojiro was as surprised at encountering Libby in the pizza bar as she was. He had decided to accompany his friends on the spur of the moment because he was feeling bored and restless cooped up in his small apartment. He hadn’t flown in over two weeks — fighter pilots got antsy when they were out of the cockpit for any length of time — the general was spending New Year’s with his family in Tokyo, and Kojiro had postponed a trip to Kyoto until the end of the week.

  The major felt obligated to visit his family over the holidays and he knew he had hurt his mother’s feelings by not arriving until after the New Year’s celebrations were well underway. But he wanted to avoid having to spend too much time with his new fiancée. As things stood now, he just had enough time to present her with a gift, take her out to dinner, and catch the last train back to Misawa.

  Kojiro had not quite come to terms with the fact that he was engaged to be married. It had happened so fast. In November his father had summoned him home, advised him that it was time he settled down and suggested that he had the ideal girl in mind. Motoko Hashizume.

  Motoko, a graduate of Tokyo Women’s College, was five years his junior — the eldest daughter of a friend of a friend, from a distinguished medical family in nearby Ishiyama. The friend had gleefully assumed the role of go-between and engineered a meeting between the two at the Miyako Hotel.

  Kojiro had never given much thought to marriage. He assumed that, like most Japanese men, he would eventually marry and have a family. But he had not considered just when or with whom. Nor had he weighed the advantages or disadvantages of an arranged marriage as opposed to a love match. His parents had had an arranged marriage. Some of his friends had opted for the services of a nakodo to screen eligible candidates. It was the most sensible option for a man as busy as he. If Miss Hashizume were as suitable as his parents insisted, then he would marry her.

  The meeting went well. Motoko was no beauty but she had a pleasant face and a shy, engaging smile and a head full of lustrous black hair she wore in a neat page-boy. He noticed her slender figure and her dainty hands, which she kept clasped demurely in her lap, and her small feet. Her stylish outfit was accented with expensive gold jewelry and a designer handbag. As there was nothing to find fault with in either her appearance or manner or pedigree — Motoko’s family history had been scrutinized by a private detective and no illegitimacy or divorce or insanity had been uncovered, no criminals or burakumin concealed in any of the branches of the family tree — Kojiro agreed to the marriage.

  Initially, he was relieved. If he was not ecstatic about the forthcoming nuptials, he nevertheless was looking forward to Motoko joining him in Misawa. Kojiro was tired of eating out or cooking his own meals in the tiny kitchen. It would be comforting to have a wife to care for him, do his washing, prepare the bath, not to mention, provide the more intimate consolations of marriage.

  Lately, the prospect of spending the rest of his life with someone he hardly knew was making him nervous. He had no intention of breaking off the engagement. The whole thing had taken on a life of its own and was moving at breakneck speed toward its inevitable conclusion. But the more he saw of his fiancée the more he regretted his h
asty decision to marry her.

  “Soon Yoshida-san will have a wife to cook his dinner for him. He won’t have to spend his salary in expensive restaurants,” one of his friends teased. Kojiro nodded. Too soon, he thought gazing over at Libby. Or not soon enough.

  Kojiro had not forgotten Libby. She haunted his subconscious with such alarming regularity she had become a familiar figure in his dreams. Even when he couldn’t recall a particular dream, he knew Libby had been present in one guise or another, by the way he felt when he awoke — anxious, frustrated, embarrassed. Libby was more accommodating in his dreams than she had been in real life. But Kojiro was a realist and he had no intention of cluttering the present by dwelling morbidly on past mistakes. He had learned his lesson. Or so he thought, until he saw her again.

  “Isn’t that the F-16 pilot you flew with last fall? The blonde at the next table you’ve been staring at all evening?”

  “I think so,” he muttered.

  “Think so? How could you forget someone with a body like that?”

  Kojiro shrugged. If only he could forget, he thought. Once he was married …

  Libby had had enough. She could not abide Charlie touching her one more time nor endure another of Kojiro’s baleful glances.

  “You’ll have to excuse me,” Libby announced suddenly, as she stood up, pushed her chair back and, maneuvering her way around the crowded tables, headed toward the ladies room. It was on the second floor, up one flight of steep, dimly lighted stairs. Despite the congestion in the confined space, she spent an inordinate amount of time washing her hands and combing her hair and putting on lipstick, in order to avoid having to return to the dining room. Charlie was a dear but if he so much as put a hand on her, she might be tempted to slug him. And as for Major Yoshida … why did she find it so impossible just to ignore the man, she wondered. Why had she felt so self-conscious when he walked into the restaurant? Libby hadn’t felt as unsettled by a member of the opposite sex since she was in high school. It was ridiculous. Kojiro was Japanese.

  Kojiro was waiting for her at the foot of the stairs, strategically positioned so she couldn’t get by unless he moved out of the way.

  “Libby?”

  She glanced over her shoulder at the door to the ladies room. She could hardly spend the rest of the evening cowering in there, just because she wanted to avoid speaking to Kojiro. It wasn’t like her to run away from confrontations with the opposite sex. What was she thinking? Libby sparred with men every day in a far more dangerous environment than the local pizza parlor. If he didn’t get out of her way, she would push him aside.

  “Libby!” He called her name again, in his deep, commanding voice.

  She gripped the railing and flew down the stairs as fast as her legs would carry her; but before she had a chance to shove by him, he grabbed her arm and propelled her out the side door.

  It was snowing. The feathery white flakes had begun accumulating on the piles of dingy snow, gusting under the overhang to coat the uneven sidewalk and disguise the cheerless street and shuttered storefronts.

  “Just what do you think you’re doing?” She cried, as she struggled to free herself from his grasp.

  “I need to talk to you,” he said, relinquishing his hold on her arm.

  “Well you didn’t have to drag me out of the restaurant to do it. My friends are in there … .”

  “I have to see you again.” It sounded more like an edict, or ultimatum, than an entreaty.

  Kojiro took off his jacket and attempted to put it over her shoulders but she shrugged it off in anger. “It’s freezing. Please,” he insisted. “Put it on.”

  If she had any sense, she would march right back into the building, back to Charlie, Libby thought. That would show the major he couldn’t man-handle her against her will. But the intense cold appeared to have paralyzed her resolve and she stood there instead and let Kojiro drape his jacket around her shivering frame. The jacket, warm from his body heat and redolent of his tangy after-shave, felt like an embrace.

  “I am thinking about you all the time,” he confessed.

  Libby couldn’t see his face. Kojiro had his back to the neon sign emblazoned in the window of the restaurant, but she could tell from his tone of voice just how difficult it was for someone as proud as Major Yoshida to make such an admission.

  “I have no right … after the way I, I acted.” He put his hand on the small of her back and steered her down the sidewalk, out of earshot of a congregation of GI’s deliberating over the menu taped in the window. “What I did was … It was unforgiveable.”

  “If that’s all you’re worried about, I’ve forgiven you for your breach of etiquette,” Libby said, but she wasn’t sure he was listening to her as he seemed so intent on enumerating the reasons why they should not see one another.

  “In Japan, it is not customary for two people of a different race … ”

  “To be friends?” She asked.

  Kojiro reached out to take her hand, reconsidered, and jammed his hands into his pockets. “To be more than friends,” he muttered under his breath.

  Libby wasn’t sure she heard him correctly. More than friends? Just what was the major implying? Perhaps she had misunderstood. His English was excellent but there were nuances in every language that were almost impossible to translate. More than friends? Is that what he wanted? More to the point, is that what she wanted?

  “When can I see you?” He persisted. Despite the urgency in his voice, he didn’t look very happy at the prospect.

  “I don’t know. I … ” It wasn’t too late to put an end to this baffling encounter once and for all, to tell the major to get lost. He wasn’t the first man who had come on to her and that she had had to put in his place. But all the others seemed inconsequential compared to Kojiro, mere shadows of men when measured against his commanding presence. For the first time in her life, Libby felt powerless to resist the compelling decrees of her heart.

  “I’m afraid I’m going skiing tomorrow and to a party on New Year’s Eve.”

  “With your boyfriend?”

  “With Charlie. He’s an old friend; we went to school together,” she added, lest Kojiro get the idea that she was in an exclusive relationship with Captain McKay.

  Kojiro was not reassured; he didn’t want to share her with anyone, even an old friend, particularly not with a rival as handsome and engaging as the American pilot. It was obvious that he was in love with Libby. Kojiro recognized the longing in Charlie’s eyes whenever he looked at her.

  “I’m free on Sunday,” Libby said.

  “On Sunday, I am going to Kyoto. To see … ” He hesitated. “To see my parents. It is our custom on New Year’s … ”

  “Of course. I’m sorry, I forgot.”

  Kojiro turned, and putting his hands lightly on her shoulders, held her at arm’s length, as if at a loss as to what to do next. He looked like he was going to kiss her. It was obvious he wanted to. Perhaps not as obvious that Libby was wishing he would, wondering what it would be like to have him take her in his arms and press his mouth against hers.

  “I’ll call you when I return,” he said.

  Libby reached over and brushed his cheek with her fingertips. “If you don’t have a change of heart,” she murmured.

  Kojiro smiled and shook his head. “Don’t worry. There is no danger of that.”

  ‘TIS easier to hide the reeds

  Upon the moor that grow,

  Than try to hide the ardent love

  That sets my cheeks aglow

  For somebody I know.

  Sangi Hitoshi

  Chapter Five

  Kojiro called Libby as soon as he got back from Kyoto. It was late. The telephone woke her up from a sound, dreamless sleep. “I am sorry,” he apologized. “I wasn’t thinking of the time.” His impulsiveness was a
surprise, to both of them.

  “Hmm, it’s all right. I’m glad you called,” she murmured into the receiver.

  The thought of her lying in bed, speaking to him in a voice husky with sleep made it difficult for him to concentrate. He wondered what she was wearing or if she was wearing anything at all.

  “I, I wanted … ” He took a deep breath and began again but images of Libby curled up under the blankets with the telephone cradled next to her ear were rending him speechless.

  “Are you still there?” She asked.

  “It is a bad connection. Perhaps I should hang up and let you go back to sleep.”

  “Don’t hang up. I’m wide awake now,” she laughed. “Tell me what you did in Kyoto.”

  There was another long pause while Kojiro recovered from her question. Kyoto, his parents, Motoko — they lived in another world, a different dimension in time, totally separate from the present reality, totally separate from his relationship with Libby.

  “Oh, I was very busy, visiting family. And friends. Did you enjoy the holiday? How was the skiing?” Kojiro was anxious to change the subject.

  “The skiing was great. I’m a little out of practice.”

  “And how was the party on New Year’s Eve? Did you have a good time with your friend? Ah, Charlie?”

  “It was all right.”

  “Ah.” He sounded relieved. Kojiro was hardly in a position to object to her seeing Charlie but he couldn’t bear the thought of them being together. They looked like they were made for each other, both tall and blonde. The perfect gaijin couple.

  “I’m not really a party animal.”

  “Party animal? I don’t understand.”

  “Oh, you know. Someone who is just out for a good time.”

  “Libby?” Kojiro hesitated. He wanted to tell her that he had missed her but his nerve failed him. “Libby?” He cleared his throat and began again. “All weekend, I was wishing I was back in Misawa.”