The Street of a Thousand Blossoms

by Gail Tsukiyama

  As an old friend, Yasuko never questioned why Sho arrived early and sat in the banquet room alone. She always brought him tea and left him to his thoughts. Only this afternoon, she paused and knelt down beside him. “Perhaps you’d like something stronger?” she asked.

  Sho smiled and shook his head. “I still have work to do later.”

  She made a soft sound. “But I have just the thing to go with your memories.”

  He watched as she rose and left the room. For so many years, Yasuko had remained his closest confidante, and so much of his own history began here. The teahouse had belonged to Yasuko’s family for generations, and just after the war when her mother passed away, Yasuko had taken over running it. While the war years were desolate, the occupation years were prosperous for her, with American soldiers frequenting her teahouse nightly. After the occupation, when Japan began to prosper again, Japanese businessmen returned to their old ways of relaxing at teahouses and Yasuko’s business soared.

  The Sakura was also the place where Noriko returned the one and only time she was so angry with him she abruptly left the house. The girls were little and already asleep. Rather than wake them, she simply walked out the door when he came home late again after a night of drinking. He sobered up quickly and worried as the hours passed and Noriko didn’t return. It began to rain heavily and he couldn’t leave the girls alone and go search for her, so he waited and was given a humbling lesson. When she finally did return in the early hours of the morning, Sho, who was half-asleep in the reception room, quickly stood up as he heard the front door slide slowly open. Noriko stepped in quietly, her kimono soaked. He learned later that Yasuko had wanted her to stay until the rain stopped, but she insisted on returning home.

  She bowed quickly when she saw him. “Sumimasen, I’m sorry, I needed to—“ she began, shivering from the cold and wet.

  But he didn’t allow her to say another word. He bowed low to her, wiped away the water that dripped down her cheek, and took her hand.

  “Ah, here we are,” Yasuko said. She returned holding a bottle, which she placed in front of him with two glasses. “Some expensive American whiskey,” she said, smiling. “It was given to me by the famous general himself!”

  Sho looked at her and laughed. “ Iie, no!”

  “Is this not the most famous teahouse in Tokyo?” She knelt down beside him and poured the whiskey into the glasses. “To friendship!” She lifted her glass against his and drank.

  He followed.

  “And how are the girls?”

  Sho drank down the rest of his whiskey before he answered. “Haru-san is doing fine in Nara.” He paused.

  “And Aki-san?”

  “She thinks she’s in love with Takanoyama,” he blurted out. It had been troubling him for weeks and he felt better saying it aloud. Did they think he didn’t notice the little dance that was going on between them? However harmless, Hiroshi was on the brink of becoming the next ozeki champion, and he didn’t want anyone or anything to disturb his concentration, not even Aki.

  Yasuko laughed. “Is there anything wrong with that? Aki is becoming a young woman and has always been so different from Haru. She’s better off married early so she can settle down. Takanoyama is already a big star.”

  “It isn’t the time,” Sho said, too abruptly. “She’s too young.”

  “You of all people should know that love doesn’t pick a time. It comes when it comes.” She smiled, filling their glasses again.

  “Maybe I should ask Haru to return?”

  Yasuko-san shook her head. “And what, make both of your daughters unhappy? Take Hiroshi-san aside and talk to him. Remind him what this upcoming tournament means. After he becomes champion in a year or two, Aki will be waiting for him.” She sipped from her glass and watched him.

  “When did you become so wise?” Sho asked.

  Yasuko sighed. “You think I haven’t heard this story before? Every night, it’s a different story. I’ve lived my life saying the right things and look where it has gotten me.”

  Sho leaned closer to her and breathed in the sweet scent of narcissus. He felt the heat of the whiskey move through his body. “Yasuko-san, it has made you one of the most powerful women in Tokyo.”

  “And what does that mean to me?” she asked. “In the end, I’m alone.”

  He heard the weariness in her voice and it filled him with sadness for both of them. She was still a very beautiful woman. There was once a moment when he and Yasuko had found comfort together. They had Noriko in common, which in the end became the reason they didn’t stay together. He watched her drink the rest of her whiskey before pushing herself up from the cushion.

  “Have as much as you like,” Yasuko said, gesturing toward the bottle. “It only makes me feel melancholy to drink such expensive liquor. Don’t worry, everything will work itself out,” she consoled him with a quick smile.

  Sho stood and bowed to Yasuko, then watched her leave the room, a strand of hair trailing from her chignon.

  The Visit

  Hiroshi had expected it to be Sadao when he heard a knock on his door, only to see Tanaka-oyakata waiting when he slid the shoji door open. Hiroshi bowed low to his coach.

  “Hiroshi-san, I was wondering if you had a moment to talk. There’s a private matter I’d like to discuss with you,” he said, bowing back.

  “Yes, of course, Oyakata-sama,” he said, stepping aside. The two of them filled the small room. He watched his coach brush the top of his head with the palm of his hand.

  “I wanted to talk to you about Aki-san,” he said, his voice deep and steady.

  “About?”

  “About your interest in her,” he answered.

  Hiroshi looked away in embarrassment. Had his feelings been so obvious? He hadn’t thought further than wishing for a quick glance of her each day. He hoped for more in time. “Aki-san is a friend,” he finally said.

  “Hai,” Tanaka said. “And I hope it will remain that way for a little while longer. Hiroshi-san, you’ve worked hard to reach this point in your career, more so after your injury. You’ve achieved what most sumotori only dream about. Sponsors are eager for the outcome of your upcoming basho. It’s an opportunity I’d hate to see you lose because you were distracted.”

  Hiroshi cleared his throat. “And you believe I’ve been distracted?”

  Tanaka paused before he said, “As your coach I’m here to remind you that if you’re to become ozeki, champion, and perhaps even yokozuna, grand champion, your mind and body must be focused on only the tournaments. Do you understand?”

  Hiroshi looked his coach in the eyes. “Hai, I understand,” he answered.

  Tanaka-sama nodded, bowed, and turned to leave. But he stopped long enough to add, “Hiroshi, just remember, if and when you become champion you’ll be able to have anyone and anything you want.”

  Hiroshi bowed again. If he once thought of sumo as a way to restore pride to his defeated country, he now also saw Aki as part of the prize. He trained hard and stopped his daily walks through the courtyard. As the days passed, he focused on the flow and strength of his moves. The only eyes he allowed himself to concentrate on were the hard, narrow ones of Kobayashi and the other wrestlers he would face during the stare-down.

  20

  New Traditions

  1954

  Kenji loved spring best. It promised the warmth of summer, yet still held the freshness of winter. When he was a boy, it was always the season of anticipation for him, one in which his limbs seemed to stretch out after a long sleep. He smiled at the thought. Since Yoshiwara-sensei’s return, followed by his marriage to Mika almost a year ago, Kenji felt as if he’d finally materialized, Kenji the ghost disappearing for good. For the first time in his life he felt anchored.

  Kenji awoke just before dawn and couldn’t sleep. He watched Mika, the dark outline of her body illuminated by the moon. She turned over, murmured in dream state, and then fell back into a deeper sleep. He rose quietly from their futon into the dar
k early-morning chill and made his way back to the mask shop as he always did when an idea kept him awake.

  The sweet smell of the cypress wood rose in the sawdust as he guided the wood against the blade of the saw and shaped the curve of the forehead, something he did with the ease of repetition. He paused and glanced up at the ceiling, afraid the quick drone of the saw might have awakened his sensei upstairs. Kenji felt the clean edge of the wood and blew the sawdust away. Very carefully he began to chisel out her eyes, the deep, dark pockets and thin brows he loved. He smiled, still not quite believing that he and Mika were married, that the smooth touch of her skin was his alone. There was one ritual he would always keep—every year of their marriage he would carve a mask of Mika—slowly capturing each nuance of her face as it changed from year to year. One day their children and grandchildren would be able to see her gradually age before their eyes, even after she and Kenji were long gone from the world.

  Kenji stopped working when the milky first light of dawn entered the shop. He stretched and yawned, finally feeling tired as he carefully wrapped the mask in a piece of cloth and tucked it away in a cabinet. If he made his way back home, Mika might not even know he was gone. He smiled to think of her dark hair spread out like a fan against the white pillow, her eyes dazed with sleep, taking a moment before they focused and really saw him. Or perhaps she was already up, waiting to welcome him back to bed.

  “I thought I heard someone down here.” Yoshiwara-sensei startled him.

  “Sumimasen, I’m sorry, I couldn’t sleep.” He bowed. “I thought I would come back and finish some work.”

  Yoshiwara smiled, waved his arm in the air to dismiss his apology. Kenji still expected a hand to emerge from his sleeve like the magic tricks he’d seen as a boy. A year after his return, his sensei had finally said, “It was an accident of nature.” The explanation came from out of nowhere and Yoshiwara never looked up from the mask he was working on. “It was a bright and beautiful day after the snows and she just wanted to play an innocent game. But nature and fate had other plans.” Kenji listened intently. He wondered who the “she” was but kept quiet. Before then, he had had his own explanations, that it was a war wound, a stray bullet, an explosion or fire that took his sensei’s hand as he fled from the kempeitai or the American planes. Only once did Yoshiwara tell Kenji anything about his whereabouts during the years he was gone. “In the village of Aio, all the wood was made into charcoal. The masks felt very far away.” In time, Kenji thought, he would hear the entire story. Until then, he was grateful for the bits and pieces Yoshiwara shared with him. His sensei’s past was like a puzzle that would eventually all fit together. For now, the most evident change in the once taciturn Yoshiwara was how his words flowed more freely. His calm voice filled the room in unexpected bursts, as if to cover up some need or loneliness. Kenji recognized the hard kernel of grief and how, strangely enough, they had traded places over the years.

  Since Yoshiwara’s return, Kenji had listened and learned more about the masks, corrected the bad habits he had developed on his own: how he gripped the chisel too hard, or didn’t step away from the mask enough to gain perspective. “See with the eyes of the audience,” Yoshiwara told him. Kenji was an apprentice in training all over again. While his sensei could no longer chisel out the details of a mask with only one hand, he directed, taught, criticized, and still painted each mask with the precision and artistry that had made him the best mask maker in Japan.

  Sensei

  After Kenji left the shop to go home, Akira Yoshiwara stayed to watch the morning light fill the mask shop and set it aglow. He was proud of the man Kenji had become, traces of the boy he once knew almost gone. His marriage to Mika-san had given him the courage and security he’d been searching for. Akira smiled to think that sometimes life was generous.

  It was still early, but he’d been wide awake for hours listening to Kenji’s dull movements downstairs, punctuated by the short, sudden bursts of the saw. As he lay on his futon, he saw in his mind’s eye the curves and lines that took shape from a block of wood and felt a dull ache at the stub of his wrist where his left hand had been. He longed to guide the wood through the whirling blade again, feel the drone move from his fingertips up through his body. No one could understand—except for Kenji—how alive it made him feel.

  When Akira walked into Kenji’s shop two years ago, he was still determined to make a mask from beginning to end. He worked late at night after Kenji left, or early in the morning before he arrived. But one-handed, the balance wasn’t there. His forearm couldn’t replace his hand making the precision cuts, chiseling in the rough facial features, and hollowing out the back of the mask. Piece after piece of cypress wood was ruined and discarded. Kenji stacked new blocks of wood every day without saying a word. After a few weeks, Akira gave up. It was one thing for a man to want something; it was another to admit he couldn’t do it. Hadn’t desire and regret colored so much of his life already?

  From the shelf, Akira took down an unfinished devil mask. He neatly lined up the jars of paint he needed across the table and concentrated on the things he could do. He devoted himself to sanding each mask until it acquired the smoothness of skin. Then he lacquered the back and made sure each intricate feature was painted. Yesterday, he had applied six coats of whitewash to prepare the devil mask for painting. His finger swept across the raised cheek to make sure the whitewash was dry. He would also need the box of brass balls used for eyes and teeth to complete the mask. The quiet of the room was soothing. As Akira opened each jar, the sharp smell of the paints greeted him like old friends. It was always the time of day he loved best, when work allowed his thoughts to roam without judgment or recourse.

  He reached for the red paint. Akira’s sleep had been troubled lately, dreams he barely remembered when he awoke, though he carried lingering memories of Emiko and Kiyo into the day. Kiyo must be a young woman of almost eighteen now, someone he might not recognize, perhaps thinking of marriage and a child of her own. He smiled and carefully mixed the red paint with just a touch of brown, though it still appeared as bright as blood. And what of Emiko, had she found someone to share her praying-hands house with? He dipped the brush into the paint and spread it quickly and steadily across the mask, in even strokes. Aio was so remote. He imagined Emiko sitting by the hearth, accepting her life as it was. The red paint covered the ghostly pale wood, bright and glossy. When it dried, Akira would outline the eyes, lips, and horns in black and gold, draw in the intricate dark eyebrows with a fine brush. He stepped back to see the mask from a distance. In Aio, he used the hair from a horse’s tail to fashion the eyebrows and a beard for the Okina mask. He’d left Emiko and Kiyo a note saying he had to leave, that something urgent had called him back to Tokyo. He was grateful to them for his life in Aio. Even as memory, the words returned to him empty and hollow. He looked up when he heard the faint stirrings of noise coming from the alleyway. The day was beginning. He found solace in knowing that Emiko had Kiyo, someone who would always care for her. Akira sighed, carefully picked up the red devil mask, and set it on the shelf to dry.

  The Great Barrier

  Hiroshi, still sweaty from his morning practice, sat on the tatami mats and watched Sadao pour him another cup of green tea. He rubbed his knee out of habit and leaned toward the low table where a bubbling pot of chankonabe waited for the upper-ranked wrestlers. He ladled spoonfuls of the chicken and vegetable stew over his bowl of rice. Hiroshi felt stronger than ever, having gained muscle weight while maintaining his speed. Even his skin felt different, stretched tightly across his hard stomach and the taut muscles of his thighs and calves.

  “Are you ready to scale the great barrier?” Nishagawa asked. He’d just been promoted to a sekitori wrestler in the Juryo Division. The term ozeki meant “great barrier” and it was a formidable obstacle every sumotori hoped to conquer.

  “As ready as I can be,” Hiroshi answered, swallowing rice from his bowl. “The rest is up to fate.”

  �
�Ah, our elusive fates, the perfect remedy for avoiding upset,” Nishagawa said and laughed.

  Hiroshi grunted in reply, trying not to give in to what he really felt, the uncertainty of his future. “Until you can think of another,” he added.

  If Hiroshi could scale the great barrier and reach ozeki rank, sumo life would become easier. He’d no longer be demoted with just one tournament loss and could win and lose with a greater margin, while still maintaining his champion rank. The decision for promotion was made by the Sumo Association based on a wrestler’s winning record from recent basho, along with his moral character and sense of sportsmanship.

  “I propose a toast to overcoming the great barrier, the dream of so many men!” Nishigawa raised his glass of beer.

  Normally, Hiroshi would raise a glass in a toast. It was already a warm day and he would have usually downed several beers with his meal, but through the years he had developed certain rituals he followed as the honbasho days approached. Three nights before each tournament, he ate only chicken chankonabe and drank pots of green tea and no alcohol. He recalled the story his ojiichan told him, how no wrestler ate beef before a match. “And do you know why?” his grandfather had asked. “Because cows walk on four legs and chickens walk on two legs. And a sumotori’s goal is to always remain standing on two legs.” He could hear his ojiichan’s voice as if he were in the room, see him stroke his chin and smile. It was a gesture he’d seen since he was a little boy and he deeply missed it now.

  Hiroshi raised his cup of tea and drank it down.

  Three days later, the crowd roared when Hiroshi entered the arena at the May Basho. When he stepped onto the dohyo, he felt an energy surge through his body as he knocked the first wrestler out of the ring within seconds of their initial contact. Hiroshi climbed over the great barrier one match at a time, losing only twice, and on the day of the final match, he stepped back, threw the salt into the air, and watched it scatter on the dohyo. With the first impact of his body against his opponent, he felt completely focused, knew he would have to move quickly and use all his strength to win the match. He clipped the wrestler’s shoulder, grabbed him under the armpit, and threw his weight backward, forcing him down to the dohyo before he knew what had happened to him. When the gyoji declared him the winner, Hiroshi knew that whatever barrier he had scaled, it had been accomplished in order to get to Aki on the other side. He raised his eyes to the audience, wondering if she was somewhere up there in the haze of lights, looking down at him as she had from her window.