The Unquiet Heart

by Juliet McCarthy

  He was generally of the opinion that Western women should not try to wear traditional kimono. One had to know how to stand properly, take small steps, and hold one’s arms just so. American women, particularly, tended to slouch, flail their arms around when they talked, and stride like men. But it wasn’t often that he got to photograph someone as beautiful as Libby and he was determined to do her justice.

  Kojiro had not seen Libby since their weekend in the mountains. They had talked on the telephone a few times, but they were both busy at work and he had been on the road with General Sato and away for several days taking his recurrency course. He longed to see her again, but he had finally run out of time. The wedding was imminent, and Motoko’s long-awaited visit to Misawa was at hand. The most he could hope for was a few hours with Libby to try to explain why he had not told her about his engagement and to beg her forgiveness.

  Motoko had taken the Bullet train from Kyoto and, after picking her up at the station, Kojiro had spent the afternoon on a walking tour of downtown Misawa showing her the sights. He had fantasized that once Motoko actually saw how backward and provincial the place was, she would be so horrified at the idea of having to live there, she would cancel the wedding. But at this late date, nothing short of discovering an ax murderer in his family would have changed her mind and she exclaimed cheerfully over everything from the numbing cold to the “quaint” covered sidewalks.

  After exploring the local department store, and having lunch at Miyaki’s, they were making their way, in a leisurely fashion, toward the main gate of the air field when Kojiro spotted Libby’s portrait mounted on an easel in the window of the photography shop.

  He stopped dead, as shocked as if she were standing there in person, directly in front of him. His heart was pounding and his stomach felt like someone had just delivered a stunning blow to his solar plexus, depriving his lungs of air.

  Kojiro stood motionless, struggling for breath, staring at Libby’s image. A cold sweat broke out on his forehead and he clenched his jaw, willing himself to remain calm and not betray his agony in front of Motoko. But she was too busy commenting on the photographs, on Libby’s in particular and the one of a black woman, to notice his anguish.

  “I think foreigners look so absurd in a kimono, don’t you? They don’t have the figure for it, or the poise.”

  A few months ago he would have agreed with her, but that was before he knew Libby, before he had seen her dressed in the yukata. She looked as beautiful in the simple cotton garment, as she did in the elaborate furisode, he thought, as he gazed transfixed at the photograph, at her swan-like neck, framed by the folds of the graceful collar. She was smiling, not into the camera. Her eyes were fixed on some point in the distance as if she were thinking of someone — of him perhaps? Or remembering something that infused her image with a peculiar radiance and stirring beauty and which the photographer had managed to capture perfectly. No wonder he had put her portrait on display.

  “But the blonde is very pretty. Do you think that is her natural hair color?” Motoko leaned a little closer to the window, squinting her eyes in speculation.

  Kojiro looked down at Motoko and was surprised she was still standing there, chattering away as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened when he felt like his world was coming to an end.

  “What did you say?” He stammered.

  “Do you think her hair … ” She pointed at Libby’s picture. “Is it her natural color?”

  “I think so,” was all he could manage to get out before the rest of the sentence was choked by a dry sob. He took a deep breath and swallowed.

  “Come along, Motoko,” he said, grabbing her by the elbow and steering her down the sidewalk. He was walking so fast, passersby had to move out of their way. Motoko stumbled on the icy pavement but Kojiro kept walking, dragging her in his wake, past a queue of old women, squatting on the curb waiting for the bus, past boys on bicycles weaving their way between pedestrians, past young parents taking their children for an afternoon outing.

  A year from now, he and Motoko could be doing the shopping with an infant in tow. Newlyweds didn’t waste any time starting their families and his parents wanted a grandson. Kojiro’s brother had produced two daughters. He glanced down at Motoko, trying to imagine what it would be like being married to her, having a child, but he was too upset to even contemplate such an eventuality. Kojiro had gotten so used to Libby’s blonde presence at his side, his fiancée looked like a stranger.

  Motoko yanked on his arm. “Slow down. I don’t want to fall and break my leg before the wedding. You don’t want your bride to be on crutches, do you?”

  She was trying to make light of his strange behavior, but it was obvious from her tone of voice that she was peeved.

  Kojiro glanced down at her snow boots. They were black suede, with high-heels and a fur cuff. Totally unsuitable for a winter in Misawa. “You’ll need a new pair of boots,” he said, because nothing else that made any sense came immediately to mind.

  Motoko looked at her boots in bewilderment. They were very smart; she had bought them especially for this weekend, along with the checkered coat and mink earmuffs and the only comment Kojiro had made concerning her appearance was that she would need a new pair of snow boots. She stamped her feet, trying to dislodge the frozen sludge.

  “Look, Motoko, we’ve just about covered the entire town. You’ll want some time to yourself before we go out to dinner. And I, I just remembered I was supposed to call General Sato.”

  “But I just got here,” she said.

  Motoko didn’t want to antagonize Kojiro but she hadn’t come all the way to Misawa to spend the afternoon by herself in a hotel room. On the other hand … . There obviously wasn’t anything of interest to detain them downtown. Misawa was every bit as grubby as Kojiro had said it was. And she would have all the time in the world to explore it on her own, once she was married.

  “Perhaps you’re right. I am a little tired from the excitement of being here and seeing you,” she said in a soft, compliant voice. So soft, he had to lean over to hear her. “I wouldn’t mind a nap before dinner.”

  When they got to the hotel, Kojiro intended to leave her off and go back to his apartment so he could be alone. He felt guilty about neglecting Motoko, she had been so anxious to visit him, but he couldn’t bear to be around her the way he was feeling. And that ridiculous comment she made about the color of Libby’s hair. He wanted to strangle her, right there in the middle of the sidewalk and tell her not to be so stupid about someone she knew nothing about.

  But Motoko insisted he accompany her to her room, and then that he stay for a beer and then another one. The room was dark; she had closed the blinds and drawn the curtains, and the alcohol had begun to numb the pain squeezing his chest and he closed his eyes.

  When he opened them, the bed covers had been turned down and Motoko was sitting demurely on the edge of the bed in her panties and bra.

  “Well?” Her voice was soft and childlike but there was an edge to it that belied her innocence. “What do you say we get it over with before we go out to dinner? It will make things so much easier on the honeymoon, if we’re not wondering what it’s going to be like or worrying whether or not we’re compatible.”

  When he didn’t answer, she repeated the suggestion. Only this time she got up and came and took him by the hand and led him to the bed and began to undress him, in the same efficient, no-nonsense way she would do when they were married and he came home late and she had to put him to bed.

  “Motoko … ” Kojiro didn’t know what to say. He didn’t want to make love to her. Not here in this drab hotel room, with his head still reeling with love for Libby. It was impossible. Obscene! He wasn’t even sure he was physically capable of going through with it if he tried, his body felt so insensible.

  But Motoko was determined and, after a while, his body began to re
spond to her skillful ministrations. She was either very well read on the subject or had had more experience than she let on, he thought in bewilderment, because he wasn’t going to have any trouble going through with it, after all. But he hated himself and he hated Motoko and he wasn’t gentle or considerate, he just wanted to get it over with. She made a few whimpers of either pleasure or pain — he wasn’t sure which — but for the most part, once she had succeeded in getting him aroused, she just lay there, with her eyes closed, until he was finished.

  Kojiro wasn’t sure what to expect when he picked her up that evening to take her to dinner. Would she be angry or resentful? Disappointed? Resigned? But she didn’t appear to be moved by anything other than relief. She smiled cheerfully when she saw him and chatted amiably during the meal about the forthcoming meeting with General Sato and his wife.

  Motoko would make the perfect wife for an ambitious officer. She was charming, educated, and well-mannered. She would fit right in with the other wives in the building. She would manage his household and bear his children and perhaps he would grow to love her. But never in the way he loved Libby Comerford. That happened once in a lifetime, if it happened at all. He would never forget Libby, never stop loving her, or desiring her above all other women. If he lived to be an old man, he would always cherish the memory of their brief time together, and their fleeting happiness.

  WE met but for a moment, and

  I’m wretched as before;

  The tide shall measure out my life,

  Unless I see once more

  The maid, whom I adore.

  Motoyoshi Shinno

  Chapter Nine

  Osorezan, or ‘Dread Mountain,’ as it was known in English, was a dormant volcano on the Shimokita Peninsula, in the precincts of the ancient Entsuji Temple. In the distant past, the top of the mountain had blown off in a cataclysmic explosion, leaving a ragged rim of seven peaks surrounding a tranquil emerald green lake. It was an awe-inspiring site, not for its beauty, but for its desolation and malevolent atmosphere, famous for the Grand Festival, held every July when pilgrims flocked to the temple to commune with the dead. The entire grounds were pock-marked with bubbling sulfuric pools and piles of rough stones, and the air permeated with nauseating fumes.

  The surrounding mountains, covered by a primeval forest of dense trees, still bore the remnants of winter snows, but the steam from the thermal pools had melted the snow in the crater, leaving the gray, ashy terrain exposed.

  It was not the location Libby would have chosen for a rendezvous with Kojiro — especially after not seeing him for several weeks; but that was the destination he had in mind when he picked her up in the morning. Frankly, the place gave her the creeps, and she found herself shivering, despite the sultry air. Reminders of death were everywhere on the vast grounds: hundreds of identical statues of children, in all sizes — rows and rows of them, in knitted bonnets, with pinwheels and flowers and toys arranged neatly at their feet — poignant monuments to dead children or aborted fetuses. And the ubiquitous piles of stones, collected by visitors, to help the departed souls earn entrance to paradise.

  According to local legend, every night, devils inhabiting the lonely region tormented the spirits by destroying the piles and scattering the rocks.

  “We have to help build them up again,” Kojiro explained, as he squatted down and began piling the scabrous stones in a neat pyramid. Libby did her part, by bending over and adding one or two to the pile, but her heart wasn’t in it. The whole place was so alien and inhospitable, she was in a hurry to leave; but Kojiro seemed unaware of her anxiety, preoccupied and distant, like he had been on the long drive to Osorezan. He had hardly said two words to her in the car. Never once mentioned the lovely weekend they had spent at the hot springs. Never said he had missed her when he was away, or was happy to see her again.

  She had assumed that he would want to find a place where they could be alone, but from the looks of the primitive accommodations at the temple, they were for serious pilgrims, not lovers looking for a place to spend a few hours.

  Libby had missed Kojiro so much. A few telephone calls could not make up for the weeks they had been separated. She longed for him, at the very least, to hold her hand or put his arm around her. But aside from the perfunctory kiss in the car when he picked her up, he acted like he was deliberately avoiding getting too close.

  Libby perused the dismal landscape. Maybe it was against the rules to hold hands in the temple grounds, or entertain libidinous thoughts. Although there was certainly no one nearby to take offense, unless the spirits of the dead were disturbed by such impropriety. Surely they had more serious things to worry about than two mortals holding hands.

  Kojiro and Libby could always find common ground when they talked about flying. But today not even her news about Charlie being selected for Fighter Weapons School at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada provoked any interest. She thought he would be glad to hear Charlie was leaving Misawa. Instead, he acted like he didn’t care.

  “I don’t like this place, Kojiro. I’d like to go back to Misawa. I can fix dinner … .”

  He was concentrating so intently on the pile of stones, she wasn’t sure he was listening until he stood up and brushed the grit off his hands. He stood motionless, surveying their surroundings as if he had just noticed how bleak and forbidding they were. “It is not a very hospitable place,” he said at last.

  Kojiro looked different, Libby thought, like he had lost weight or been ill. There were dark circles under his eyes; his complexion was the color of old ivory, his high cheekbones and arched nose more pronounced. She felt guilty for not noticing before. Worried. She wanted to go to him but something about the way he was standing, the rigid posture, his solemn expression, held her back.

  “Is something wrong, Kojiro?”

  “We have to talk,” he said. The deep timbre of his voice, which never failed to stir her feelings, sounded unfamiliar, remote. His accent more noticeable.

  He sucked in his breath, as if he were drawing on reserves of energy for the courage to carry on the conversation. “There is something I must tell you.”

  “Can’t it wait?” Libby asked.

  But she knew immediately, from the expression on his face, that whatever he had to say, he was going to say it now, and that it was something she didn’t want to hear.

  “I am getting married.”

  Kojiro didn’t look at her when he spoke, his eyes were fixed on Lake Usori and the shimmering water. Thin clouds of sulphurous steam belched from fissures in the crater and hovered on the surface of the lake, like a ghostly manifestation of the dead who roamed the temple precincts.

  “Libby?”

  It was obvious he was waiting for some kind of response but she was too stupefied to speak. Getting married? Getting married? What did he mean? The last time they were together, he had declared his undying love, and told her they were spiritual soul mates able to communicate on a higher plain than ordinary mortals.

  Getting married? To whom?

  Libby closed her eyes and tried to blot out Kojiro’s image and dam the flood of threatening tears. She would not cry. She would not make a scene. But she deserved an explanation, however pitiful or venal.

  Bolstered by innate dignity and fierce pride, Libby managed to open her mouth and form words, make sentences, ask questions. She could hear herself speaking in slow, measured tones and was surprised that she didn’t sound angry or hysterical; but perhaps she was still too startled or disbelieving to grasp the real significance of what he was saying. Getting married?

  “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

  Kojiro stared at the ground. Despite his attempt to control his feelings, she could tell that beneath the impassive guise, his emotions were seething.

  “It has all been arranged. I should have told you … .” He stood there, grinding the ball
of his foot into the dirt.

  “When? When was it arranged, before or after our trip to Sapporo?”

  “Before,” he said. His words were barely audible in the oppressive silence.

  “I see.” Libby knelt down and began gathering up random stones and piling them one on top of another.

  “Libby … I am so sorry. I know, I know I should have told you. I was going to, many times but … .”

  “But I wouldn’t have gone to Sapporo if you had,” she interrupted. “I wouldn’t have let you make love to me.”

  “Of course that is the way it looks. And I did want to make love to you.” Kojiro glanced down at her. “I wanted that more than I ever wanted anything in my life.

  “But that is not the reason … . Please believe me. I love you, Libby. I could not bear the thought of being apart from you. Every time I went away, I vowed to tell you when I returned. But when I saw you again … .” Kojiro took out a handkerchief and swiped his brow.

  “When I saw you again, I would think, we have such a little time left to be together. And I wanted to hold you … .”

  “Don’t.” Libby wedged a stone on top of the pyramid and stood up.

  A forlorn-looking stone image, dressed in a red, hooded garment, gazed indifferently at them from its vantage point by the lake. Libby could just make out the round, wizened face peering out from under the hood. Someone had left a few coins, a little doll, and a plastic rattle at the base. Tears scalded her eyelids and she forced herself to look away.

  “You lied to me, Kojiro,” she said. “By omission. By all the things you failed to mention when we were together: your engagement for instance, your fiancée … . Who is she? I want to hear you say her name. I want to know all about her, where she’s from, how old she is, what she does for a living. Is she beautiful? Do you love her?”