Rain Song

by Alice J. Wisler

  I think I’d like to buy another Tashio Sanke koi. It has a white body with a red pattern and black accent marks. The last one I picked out was sick and didn’t live long. I bet you could help me get a good one this time. Then you can meet the fish store guy. He has a saltwater aquarium that takes up half of his apartment and is always telling me he needs advice.

  When the bullfrogs and crickets sing in my garden and my koi swim in the pond and then raise their heads to eat out of my hand, and the sky is filled with stars, I think I live in a corner of heaven. And you, Nicole, just might agree.

  I go to the computer and view a picture he sent of Watanabesan seated in a wheelchair at the nursing home. She’s in a white yukata with a dotted blue pattern; her hands that look like flower buds are folded in her lap. Her gray hair is pulled back from her forehead into a bun. What catches my attention most is her smiling wrinkled face—like she can’t wait to see me.

  ———

  At midnight I could use some Uncle Jarvis. Instead, I turn on the television and dig into a pint of Two Times Nutty Crunch. A balding comedian in a plaid shirt starts to tell mother-in-law jokes and the audience finds him hilarious.

  Watanabe-san and Mama, Mount Fuji and the shinkansen, they are all on my mind. I think of questions to ask Watanabesan. There are several concerning my doll. First, why did the doll get named Sazae? What does that mean? Assuming it is a Japanese name, do I pronounce it correctly? Throughout the years, I’ve wondered if I’ve been mispronouncing the name of my cherished companion.

  I have a recollection of deciding that Sazae was too strange a name and so I started calling my doll Belinda Sue. I was seven and, to me, Belinda Sue was the most gorgeous name. Oh, why, oh, why hadn’t my parents named me this?

  For one full day while we played house where she sat in the doll high chair and drank from a plastic tea set, she was Belinda Sue.

  But the next morning when I looked into her coal eyes and stroked her black hair, I knew. She was not Belinda Sue. She was Sazae, and changing her name would be denying who she was and where she came from. A gift from Mama, a gift given to me in that country I wanted nothing to do with—Japan.

  I finish the container of ice cream and throw it in the kitchen trash can. I could use another pint, but my freezer holds no more of the creamy treat.

  There are other questions I want to ask Watanabe-san, questions regarding Mama and Father. How was their Japanese? Did Mama go to the market to buy fish and pickles made of radishes? How often did she make pineapple chutney? How did she and Father get along? Did they hold hands as they strolled in the Imperial Palace grounds?

  And then there are the questions about my relationship with Mama. How had Mama mothered her only child? Was she laid-back or overly protective? Did she insist I wear shoes, or did she let me run around in the spring and summer grass barefoot? Did she kiss the top of my head as I’ve seen mothers often do? Was she the type of mom who would twirl her daughter around in a parking lot and ask if she was ready to see the big wide world?

  I sit in the wing chair as these questions take turns coming to sit beside me. One by one, they pose themselves, wanting answers.

  Then they leave me alone. And when my mind is clear of them, thoughts of Harrison arrive. Harrison—dear carp owner with the soft blue eyes. Harrison—poet, email buddy, mystery solver, and childhood friend. Of course I wonder if when I greet him at the airport there will be that spark, that deep sense of knowing that I could love him.

  Oh, really, is this the time to be such a romantic?

  In my bedroom, I pull the blinds shut and then take out my passport from the dresser drawer. It’s in pristine condition with its navy blue cover and crisp, unmarked pages. United States of America—how much more official can you get? The photo of me looks almost as pale as the page it’s glued to, but that’s okay; it’s a known fact that passport pictures, like driver’s license photos, are not supposed to be glamour shots. Nicole Delores Michelin—I signed it using my most flamboyant signature.

  I see Ducee in the hospital bed, still weak, her heart damaged. Again. A worried doctor from the other day. Why was he worried? She has to live to see the year 2000, don’t you see?

  My passport will remain starched and clean. It’s not going to know the mark of the immigration stamp. It will stay here in my dresser drawer, along with the framed picture of Richard.

  The TV audience laughs as a profound sadness fills every silent laugh line on my face.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  The word at the nurses’ station is that my grandmother, Mrs. Dubois, was not a happy camper last night. She complained of being uncomfortable and told a nurse that it was time for her to go home to her soft and familiar bed. She talked nonstop about Maggie and baked potatoes. The nurse on call did not know that Maggie is a donkey with a white hoof. Apparently, Ducee tried to convince this nurse that not only was she needed at home, but that her family was flying in from Wyoming and from all over North Carolina, actually, yes, yes, that was right, and she needed to go home to take care of everything. Right now.

  “And so,” my grandmother said sometime around three in the morning, “if you will just sign me out of the hospital, I’m sure I can get someone to come pick me up and drive me home.”

  To which the nurse promptly stated, “Mrs. Dubois, we will get you home. But first take this pill.”

  Ducee took the pill, and the pill put her out. Just like that.

  This morning Violet warns me, “Your grandmother may be a bit groggy and sleepy today. But don’t worry.”

  She is asleep as I slip into her room, her room still packed with flowers.

  The stool beside her hospital bed is probably as uncomfortable as the bed, I think. I take a towel from the adjoining bathroom, cover the top of the stool, and sit. Much better, just like a bit of padding helps make my computer chair at home tolerable.

  Ducee’s heart rate is still being monitored, but the IV bag has been removed. Surely, that’s a good sign. Unless you’re dead.

  Every part of me aches, even my bitten fingernails. I will never know what Japan looks like in the summer. I will never know if Kyoto feels as humid and hot as Mount Olive can in July. But the truth is, I used to know. I just don’t remember what it was like.

  Ducee stirs. When she opens her eyes, she seems alarmed.

  “Ducee,” I say in my reassuring voice, “you’re in the hospital.”

  “Oh,” she breathes. “I dreamed I was in heaven.” She reaches up to touch my face. “Child,” she says, her eyes focused on mine, “please don’t miss your flight. You have the adventure of a lifetime before you. Be ready to go. Don’t let anything get in the way.”

  “I love you.” Sometimes saying these words can make your eyes fill with tears. Using the back of my hand, I wipe a tear from my cheek. She is my mother and grandmother, all wrapped in one. I can’t lose her.

  She murmurs from dry lips, “Risk. Risk.” Then she says, “You have considered the birds?”

  Yes, I have. I know God cares for all of us. I know He supplies wisdom to those who ask. And, dear Grandmother, the wisdom I have been given is, how can I leave you at a time like this? All I say is, “I have.”

  “Good. Because God came down here and talked to me last night.”

  Tentatively I ask, “He did?”

  “Yes, yes.” She motions toward the water pitcher, and I pour her a drink in a paper cup. After taking a few sips, she runs her tongue over her lips. “He said you were asking for wisdom and that I was to tell you something.”

  “What?”

  She closes her eyes and in a few minutes, I hear faint snoring. I guess I will never know what God told Ducee when He came down to talk to her last night.

  Ducee’s mouth moves. At first I hear nothing but the sound of her lips brushing the air. Then ever so clearly her words pierce the silence. “Don’t miss the adventure.”

  I watch her breathing as she sleeps. The rise and fall of her chest gives me hope.


  As I leave her room, a doctor I’ve never seen before meets me at the door. He asks a nurse who is standing nearby for Mrs. Dubois’s chart.

  She finds it in a pile at the nurses’ station.

  He flips it open, studies it for a second, and then his eyes meet mine. “She is going to be just fine.”

  Do I see a twinkle in those eyes? I walk down the hall wondering just who is he talking about.

  Ducee?

  Or me?

  ———

  At home I take my new clothes out of the shopping bags and carefully cut off the price tags and labels. I fold the new pair of Levi’s jeans, the green-and-black sundress, and two T-shirts and arrange them in my Samsonite suitcase. I feel the softness of the suede belt and remember how nice it looked in the belt loops of the new jeans when I stood in front of the mirror in Julianne’s dressing room.

  As I toss a small load of underwear and socks into the washing machine, my mind repeats itself like Flannigan the macaw. Is going to Japan the right thing to do? I dump in a capful of liquid detergent, and then another. Is going to Japan the right thing to do? Before I let a third capful dribble into the machine, I catch myself. What am I going to do, overload the machine with detergent so bubbles will ooze out of every crevice?

  I really, really want to go to Japan.

  Turning the washer on, I close the lid, stare at a pair of tennis shoes, and realize I don’t know whether to take them or not. Maybe just a pair of sandals and a pair of low-heeled black pumps. No, leave the pumps behind. They give me blisters after a few hours. They make my legs look nice, though. Fine, I’ll take all three pairs of shoes.

  On the edge of my bed, I curve my body into a ball and wonder what I’m doing. My grandmother is in the hospital. She had a heart attack.

  And I am going to Japan.

  I feed my fish and realize I haven’t arranged a caregiver for them while I’m away. Ducee was going to ask Grable if Grable could bring Monet over to do the honors. Grable has a host of problems due to the divorce. Her plate is full. Why would I want to add to it?

  I sit outside on the step this hot summer night, raise my face to the sky, and scan the glittering darkness for the Big Dipper.

  “Mama?” I call out. My voice sounds thick, weary. It would be too much effort to attempt my usual wave.

  A soft haze circles the near-full moon. The murkiness of the circle is like a reflection of my mind, boggled with uncertainty.

  A howling dog is the only response I hear. The night is lonely; Hilda isn’t even in her garage.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  I fill my bathtub with hot water and sprinkle in a cup of lilac bath salts, the ones Ducee gave me. As I soak in the water and breathe in the scent, calmness settles upon my head and inside the marrow of my bones. Solace penetrates each pore. Closing my eyes and leaning back in the tub, I want to call my grandmother and tell her she’s right, as usual—lilac is the scent of peace.

  Harrison says one of the pleasures of the ofuro is that the water temperature never cools. Heated by gas, the water in the Japanese tub remains hot no matter how much time passes. I think what a good concept that is as I leave my chilly bathtub and dry off with a striped towel.

  I hear the phone and race into the kitchen, my towel falling down around my knees. I never learned the fine art of tying a towel above my chest, just under my armpits. It is one of those things that I’m sure Mama would have taught me if she had lived.

  With panic in my veins, and a tremble I try to shake off, I pick up the receiver and say, “Hello?”

  A raspy voice on the other end. “Nicki?”

  Yes, Iva, you know it’s me. “Yes. What’s wrong?”

  Then there is silence, some muffled tones, a few words spoken in the distance and soon Ducee is on the line. In a weak voice, barely audible, she says my name.

  Hot tears form in my eyes. “Yes?”

  “Will you be sure to bring me back some tea? Green would be appropriate, don’t you think?”

  The phone goes dead and while at first I am puzzled, I finally figure it out. My grandmother won’t disclose more because Iva is there in her room and Ducee’s still trying to keep my trip to Japan a secret.

  “We can drink it together,” I say, even though I know Ducee is no longer on the line. I just stand in my kitchen like a stone.

  In my room, I fall onto my bed in a heap. I feel like Monet, sad, hurt, afraid. I wait for the inevitable—tears, streams of them.

  They don’t come.

  I smell the lilac on my skin and let its perfume soak my lungs. Clutching Sazae, I pray, “Oh, dear God, what have you asked of me? I’m afraid of flying.” After repeating this over and over, I decide I’d better find some other words. “Help,” I say.

  ———

  When my eyes snap open, the clock lets me know I’ve been asleep for an hour. I turn over on my side to face Sazae. “Sazae,” I say, “do you want to go back home to Japan for a while?”

  My stomach grumbles, and before Sazae can answer, I’ve pulled on some clothes and made my way to the kitchen. It’s been hours since Iva and I ate turkey sandwiches for lunch in the noisy hospital cafeteria.

  I make a bowl of grits, add a few tablespoons of butter, swirl the mixture with a spoon, and eat. I will always be grateful for grits. But grits will soon be replaced with Japanese food. My stomach doesn’t know what to do with that information. You once ate eel, I tell it.

  I wander around the house like I’m lost. I sit in Aunt Lucy’s chair, stand, go to my fish tank, step outside to view the sky, come inside to the cool house again, and chew a nail. It’s a fact; I don’t know what one is to do the day before embarking on an adventure.

  Do I shake myself and say, look at you, look, do you know what tomorrow brings? Tomorrow is the first of July, the day you’re to get on a plane, take Dramamine, and start your journey to Japan. Are you ready?

  Tomorrow is going to arrive whether I’m ready or not.

  My overnight kit, a square floral cloth bag, contains shampoo, conditioner, brush, comb, toothbrush, toothpaste, new nail polish, perfume, and lipstick. My plan is to take this on the plane as a carry-on, never letting it leave my sight. I can fit a magazine in, just under where the bag zips. There are some blank notebook pages inside the magazine cover in case I’m able to pause from motion sickness and compose my August column for the Pretty Fishy site. A week ago I sent my July column, six-hundred twenty-two words on the best kinds of gravel and rocks for a marine tank. It’s to be posted in three days.

  I squeeze in a pair of underpants and a T-shirt. The addition of the clothing to my kit is in case my suitcase ends up in Mongolia and I end up in Madrid. At least I will be able to brush my teeth and change my underwear while waiting to be reunited with my belongings. I heard that these things can happen. Iva reads about them in the newspaper all the time.

  “Japan,” I say to my fish. The word doesn’t make my spine chill or nerves shake as it once did.

  I close both the overnight kit and the Samsonite and am assured that at least my possessions are ready for this trip. From my closet I take out the Mount Olive T-shirt with a drawing of a jar of pickles on the front pocket. It’s hard to believe that in less than forty-eight hours I’ll be giving this shirt to Harrison. Handing it to him while my feet stand on Japanese ground— ground where Mama once stood. Could it be that as I look into his blue eyes as he comes to meet me, something will trigger from the past? Perhaps when I see him, some repressed memories will start to find their way out, like the early shoots from daffodil bulbs.

  Am I diving off the deep end? Of course nothing will trigger. I was two years old.

  There is a gift for Watanabe-san, too. I’ll carry it in my purse, attended by me at all times, because I can’t bear to think of this gift being tossed around in my suitcase. It’s in a pint-sized glass mason jar. I sure hope this sweet yellow delicacy will taste as good to her as she remembers it did. Back when Mama stood in her kitchen in Kyoto, back when she brough
t the Gospel and pineapple chutney to Japan.

  I carry my suitcase, overnight kit, purse, and passport to the hall. I set the passport on top of the suitcase.

  What will two weeks away be like?

  Then I feel my stomach drop.

  I need to call Grable about feeding my fish. What if she says no? And who is going to make the Mount Olive centerpiece for the reunion? And how am I going to get to the airport?

  Airport. I see a huge building with dozens of revolving doors, all covered in flames, Panic sets in. I must have had a nightmare about an airport, for I’ve been to Raleigh-Durham International to pick up the Wyoming relatives and don’t recall fiery revolving doors. Who can drive me to RDU tomorrow? Great-Uncle Clive comes to mind, but he’s out of commission with his arm in a cast. Of course I didn’t call him immediately after seeing the Check Engine light come on the first time. I waited until the car started to rumble and rock when I shifted gears on the way home from the hospital. Clive told me he’d be by to take a look at it, but he hasn’t come yet. “Don’t drive any more than you have to” was his warning. “You could damage the transmission.” That scared me because I know from past experience the high cost of service to transmissions.

  A sigh lifts from my lungs and circles the dining room. The secret keeping is going to have to end earlier than Ducee and I planned. I’ll have to call someone and ask for a ride. It’s almost two hours to the Raleigh-Durham airport. That’s a long roundtrip drive. Who would question me the least about where I am headed and why?

  I could call a cab. A cab driver wouldn’t care to know what I was up to. As long as I paid him. I cringe at that cost, calculating whether or not I have enough cash in my wallet for a cab. I lift the snow globe on my dresser. I used to keep a few dollar bills under it, but only a penny sits there now, mocking me.

  And then the doorbell rings and I open it to see a smiling Salvador and a giggling Kristine, both in motorcycle helmets that gleam in the early summer moonlight.