She had to go to Chez Henri soon. She was pulling a double shift, covering for another waitress. “We’ll talk more tomorrow?”
“We’ll talk more tomorrow,” he told her.
* * *
He was awoken before dawn. He had gone to bed early and was dead asleep—the first good night’s sleep he’d had in months, hangover induced, no doubt. On the other end of the phone was Pritchett. “Want to come down here?”
“Here” was Marcella Ahn’s house. When Toua drove up to it, a fire truck, an ambulance, two black and whites, and an unmarked police car were parked out front. “What’s going on?” he asked Pritchett, his former partner.
The inside of the house had been trashed, furniture overturned and broken, upholstery shredded, wine bottles smashed onto the floors and splattered on the rugs, paintings tattered, clothes scissored into strips, mirrors shattered. “Can’t Stop. Won’t Stop” was spray-painted on one wall, “Cunt” on the front door.
“Anything taken?” Toua asked.
“Strange, not much,” Pritchett said, “just a laptop and some notebooks and fountain pens. We found them down the street in a dumpster. Notice anything else out of whack?”
“Yeah.”
Marcella Ahn was in the ambulance, a blanket over her shoulders, shaking and crying. She had been out of town for a reading, returning to find her house in ruins. “Do you believe me now?” she said to Toua. “Do you believe me now? It’s her. I’m sure of it.”
“What’s this all about?” Pritchett asked him.
He had been a fool. He had trusted her, had let himself get lulled into careless affection for her.
Based on Toua’s statement and case reports, they arrested Caroline Yip, and, knowing with no record she’d make bail, they issued a restraining order against her.
It had been a decent ruse, and it might have worked, everyone believing the MOD were on another search-and-rampage mission but had been spooked by something—a noise, a neighbor—into leaving before they could gut the house of its possessions, except for one small but critical error. “Can’t Stop. Won’t Stop,” besides being unusually well-punctuated with apostrophes and a period, had been sprayed with blue paint. The MOD were Bloods—red bandanna. Blue was the Crips’ color, their rivals.
In the end, the charges against her were dropped. She had no alibi for the hours after the restaurant closed at ten-thirty, but there was little evidence to prosecute her, no prints, no eyewitnesses about a woman with long hair on a bicycle, nothing incriminating found in her house like a spray paint can or soiled clothes.
Nonetheless, Caroline Yip chose to leave town. Toua saw her as she was packing up a U-Haul van to drive to California.
“She used you, you know,” she said.
“I think if anyone did, you used me,” Toua said.
“You have a funny way of interpreting things. Don’t you get it? She faked it. She set me up. Set you up. Hasn’t that occurred to you? Marcella invented this insidious plot to frame me and run me out of town.”
“Why would she do that?”
“Who knows. What makes one person want to destroy another? Huh? She has everything, yet it’s not enough.”
“There’s no point in pretending anymore.”
“She’s a vulture. She has some sick bond to me. She needs to humiliate me. She needs my misery. She can’t function without it.”
“You need help.”
She slammed the doors to the van shut. “I feel sorry for you,” Caroline said. “You missed it. It could have been something real, and you missed it.”
He watched her maneuver the van down the driveway and turn down the street, then went inside the studio to pack his own possessions. He had things to do. First on the list, he needed a bed for his new apartment.
Could Marcella Ahn have been that smart and calculating? He hadn’t looked at the water bill very closely. She could have doctored it. She could have known all along that he’d been on the MOD task force. She could have wrecked her own home, orchestrating everything to this outcome.
He picked up his duffel bag. He didn’t want to believe it. Believing it would mean that Caroline was right, he’d missed his chance to emerge from the deadness he felt. It was easier to believe, all things considered, that he’d been betrayed by her. She was a devious person, a liar, conniving and malicious, rent with envy, a bitter person. It was comforting to think so. He could live with that kind of evil. It had a passion and direction he could understand, even a touch of poetry.
—
Editor’s Note:
“The Oriental Hair Poets” first appeared in the anthology Boston Noir, edited by Dennis Lehane (Akashic Books)
THE CELESTIAL
by
Naomi Hirahara
— :: —
I don’t remember the day or month, but I know something about the night I first met him. It was a full moon, glorious and bright, even blinding, in fact. Back home, they would say that a white rabbit would be pounding rice cakes in that moon, but there was nothing innocent and playful about its appearance. It just reminded me that I had been here too long, working under Marudome-san in the hotel.
I had my regulars. Most of the other Japanese girls only had Japanese customers, usually the age of their fathers. I, on the other hand, was reserved for hakujin men who stank of tobacco, drink, and old sweat. Many of them only washed once a week in the summer and early autumn; in the winter, even less. It was September, still warm enough for them to take a dip in a neighboring stream. I tried to feel fortunate. Over the last two years, I’d learned to take pleasure in simple things—green tea with rice, a new pair of underwear. Otherwise, the older women tell me, you will go insane.
He came after all the others left. About the only thing that I liked about my second floor room—and it wasn’t even the room where I slept—was the window that faced east. I’d gaze at the moon and wonder if my parents were looking at it across the sea at the same time. Of course, that would be impossible because they were so far away. But it was still a comfort.
I saw him approach the house through that window. He was wearing a hat, so I couldn’t see his face. When he turned toward the door, I noticed his long single braid down his back. His hair was longer than mine. My door was still ajar and I heard the women down the hall. “No, no Celestials for me. You know that, Maru.” Maggie had been here the longest and wasn’t afraid to talk straight to Marudome-san. She was the only hakujin woman among us; she apparently had angered all the other brothel owners within a fifty mile radius. It probably helped that she couldn’t speak a lick of Japanese and Marudome-san didn’t know much English. She had fiery red hair on her head and chin-chin, which she religiously dyed once a month.
“I don’t service them either,” Ne-san said. Ne-san was three years older than I and I considered her like an older sister.
I got up from the bed and went to the door. I nodded to Marudome-san who had appeared from downstairs.
I took off my robe and got under the covers. I liked to start off naked because it usually was faster that way. I kept the room brightly lit with lamps because I’d liked to keep watch of my customers’ actions. Marudome-san didn’t mind the extra cost of oil, because he just charged the men extra.
The Celestial was clean and nicely groomed, not one hair loose from his braid. As he rubbed my neck I could smell onions, garlic, and ginger on his fingertips. He must be a cook, I thought, maybe from one of the neighboring mining camps. The height of the Gold Rush was over, but we still heard of men collecting gold dust through dry washing from time to time.
I was used to the hakujin men bulging their blue eyes at me as they climaxed. But the Celestial closed his eyes, as if he was someplace else.
* * *
After he had finished, he slowly drew himself away from me. He turned from me as he dressed, even though we had both been naked in the same bed. I watched him as he pulled on his long johns, pants, and suspenders and finally covered his head with his hat.
/> He leaned forward on the dresser on the other side of the room. I couldn’t see what he was doing, but when he left, I noticed the glint of a coin on the top of the dresser. Marudome-san warned us not to accept any tips; one girl had been forced out when she was caught pocketing some extra cash. I couldn’t take that risk. Marudome-san’s place was at least clean and safe. I ran to my dresser and picked up the coin. Before I could return it, I noticed that the Celestial had drawn a smiling face in my lipstick on the face of the coin.
* * *
The Celestial returned a week later. Apparently he had asked for me. I wondered what he had said, how he had described me. He didn’t know my name as I didn’t know his. I never used my real name, anyhow. None of us Japanese girls did. We never revealed the names of our hometowns for fear that our situation would be communicated to our families. My parents thought I was still married. Even though they had been the ones to send me off to this fate, lying was just easier for everyone concerned.
The Celestial became one of my weekly regulars, always visiting at the end of my work night. A smiling coin was always left on my dresser. I had sewn each coin separately in the hem of my dress. The fabric was getting worn, and I decided to go into town with Marudome-san on his weekly trek to get supplies.
At the house, we had one horse, an old mare, which was connected to a worn wagon. I knew a little about horses and farms as I lived on one for a short time before I was taken to Marudome-san’s place. As a result, Marudome-san always had me take the reins. He said the mare always went faster when I was in the driver’s seat.
There was only one dry goods store in our little town. It was next to the post office and across from a brothel and gambling den. The store was more like a shack than anything else. Boxes of nails were placed next to bags of sugar, which were next to bars of soap. The shopkeeper always had a special item that he displayed on a barrel right next to the cash register. Today’s special was a revolver. It was double action, which meant that you didn’t have to cock the hammer every time you shot the gun. I knew this much from my husband.
I actually wasn’t sure if we had officially married. I had left all those details to him and my parents. The boat ride was choppy, taking two weeks. I got sick every day, and only another girl from the next town over was willing to nurse me. I actually thought that I had been abandoned when I arrived in Seattle because he had been so late to pick me up. He looked nothing like the photo my parents had presented to me. In the photo he had hair and wore a suit and tie. The man in front of me was balding and his clothes almost soiled black and smelling of cow dung.
Apparently he was even less impressed with me. “You’ll do,” he said to me in Japanese.
We rode on a train to Spokane. It was a long, arduous trip and compared to the majestic mountains closer to the coast, the land there was flat and grim. I did not think that America could be more remote than my village, but it was. His house had dirt floors and only one couple from Japan lived within walking distance. As a result, he pretty much could do whatever he wanted with me, which he did on a regular basis.
My only respite was taking care of the horses. And then every Sunday evening, we sat at the table and cleaned his guns with special oil. Everything around our house was covered in dirt and dust except those guns. It actually gave me great pleasure to learn how to take them apart and clean the chambers.
I guess that my technical skill had impressed him, because he took me shooting one time. Rabbits were damaging our crops and we needed to be rid of them. He gave me the double-action revolver and ordered me to shoot them as soon I spied them coming out of their homes in the woods. BANG-BANG-BANG. Three lay dead in an instant.
My husband tried to cover up his surprise. “You’re a good shot,” he said, practically the only compliment he ever paid me. He had me gut the rabbits and take the meat with us for a stew. “I guess that I should be worried.” He then laughed, as if he were telling a joke. Only he wasn’t because he stopped letting me touch his guns after that.
The one thing my husband wanted was a child. In particular, a son. I could not produce either, no matter how many times he came to me, which sometimes was a couple times an evening, especially on his day of rest from the fields.
He would yell and scream that he had been deceived. How was he deceived, I wondered. My family was told of fine china, polished wooden furniture, and beautiful dresses in the state of Washington. The only dress that I had was made from the fabric of the kimono that I wore coming over here. He had taken the fifty dollars that I was required to travel with. What he had done with that money, I never knew.
One day, he came home in a particular good mood. He wore a lopsided grin so big and wide that I thought it would literally slide off of his face. “I know now that it was all your barrenness,” he said. “I am to be a father.” The one giving him a baby was our neighbor’s wife.
The next day, he was gone, along with the neighbor woman. Days later, I found out that our house was actually owned by the neighbor man. He claimed that all of this was my fault and literally threw me out of the house. And that is how Marudome-san’s became my new home.
* * *
Marudome-san didn’t keep any firearms in the house, so I hadn’t been in front of a revolver for more than two years. I gingerly traced my finger on the gun barrel in the store. It was smooth, but I could have made it shine even more with some oil.
“Careful, little girl, you’re bound to blow your head off playing with that thing,” the shopkeeper said and then laughed. We both knew that the gun wasn’t loaded.
Just then, three large hakujin men filled the store’s doorway. Their smell stung my nostrils and I bent my head and covered my nose with the collar of my coat.
“We hit the jackpot!” they announced, panting like dogs. One of them opened a small leather bag which he extracted from his jacket pocket.
I hid behind some bolts of fabric and snuck a look. The shine of gold sparkled on the shopkeeper’s table.
“Thought that the Chinamen were the only ones able to do anything with dry washing,” the shopkeeper said, wearing a special pair of glasses to look at the gold dust.
“Well, you thought wrong.”
The heavy men wore boots and their weight strained the wood board floors. Their excitement of fortune pulsed throughout the small place. They bought bottles of whiskey, a new set of spurs, and then the youngest one, with matted hair the color of burlap, took hold of the revolver. “I’ll take this. Today’s special.”
Apparently the men didn’t own any guns because they took turns holding the revolver awkwardly. The young one then spotted me and aimed his new purchase toward my forehead. He tugged the trigger, causing the hammer to go back and click. He then lifted his head back and howled, as if he told a joke, but I did not laugh back.
* * *
A couple of days later it was New Year’s Day, and the moon was ready to disappear soon. We had all gathered to pound rice cakes with a baseball bat. Marudome-san was good and drunk, which made us all happy because we could pick and choose our customers. Maggie also had her share of drink and had collapsed next to the wooden mortar, rice flour all over her red hair.
I asked Ne-san if it would be alright if I went to bed early. Filling herself with soft white rice cakes, she nodded. New Year’s always made her feel nostalgic for the family that she left behind.
I went into our sleeping room, the room that I shared with Ne-san and three other girls. The other girls stayed downstairs, talking about I don’t know what. I slept in a bed with Ne-san, while the others had a big mattress on the floor stuffed with hay.
He came into my sleeping room without any warning. How he found me here was beyond me. The Celestial seemed to have a sixth sense like a cat’s. He put his finger to his lips, but I never said anything to him, anyway.
I heard the banging of feet against our wood floors below. Men’s voices echoed to the upstairs rooms.
“Have you seen a Chinaman around here?”
/>
I listened for Marudome-san’s voice, but he must have passed out alongside Maggie.
A faint murmur, a woman’s voice.
“Speak up, girl.”
“No understand.” It was Ne-san, who always pretended that she didn’t know English at the most convenient times.
“She may be one of them.”
“She’s a Jap, you fool. When have you seen a Chinawoman? They don’t have them over here.”
“Anyway, if you see a Chinaman, you let us know. Our camp is at the base of Hawk Creek.”
Footsteps sounded from our parlor onto the porch. The door burst open. Ne-san’s face was flushed, pressed into a frown. “Get him out. Now.”
* * *
We heard the following morning. Ten Celestials in a camp north of Hawk Creek shot and scalped. Their fortune taken. Maggie damned the Indians, who had apparently killed her second husband, but Ne-san and I exchanged looks. Somehow the men who visited the brothel last night were involved. I hoped that the Celestial was now far, far away.
Most everyone didn’t want to eat much breakfast, choosing some dark, black coffee instead. Before I knew it, it was just Marudome-san and I left at the dining room table.
I began to clear the table, but Marudome-san stopped me, telling me to pour us some green tea instead. “And get out the nice cups,” he added.
We had just used them to usher in the new year and I figured that Marudome-san wanted to continue the celebratory mood.
Green tea was special; it didn’t come from our local dry goods store but either via post or a traveling Japanese salesman who went from camp to camp with rice and dried bonito for sale in his wagon.
I savored the bitterness of the tea with my tongue.
“I have great hopes for this year,” Marudome-san said. “I plan on moving into labor contracting.”
I didn’t know why Marudome-san was telling me these things.
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