Above the East China Sea: A novel

by Sarah Bird

  Kirby switches his flashlight on and, of course, the beam falls on nothing. There are no bloodstained curtains or floors. No faucets and lights turning themselves on and off. No children crying. No samurai warriors or Okinawan princesses doing shampoo commercials. The house is as dead and done as the cheerless words the Hickam base chaplain spoke at Codie’s service.

  I’m turning to leave when Kirby yelps, “Holy shit!”

  “Is that what I think it is?” DQ asks the question on one long, shrieky exhalation.

  Kirby has the beam focused into the pitch dark of the next room, where it reflects off of a pool of dark liquid so wet in a house that has been closed up for years that it gleams. “That’s blood, isn’t it? I’m getting out of here.”

  It is blood. My heart stops.

  “That must have been her bedroom,” Jacey says.

  “So that has to be her blood,” DQ, completely freaked out, says. “Almost fifty years old and still fresh.”

  “Or it could be …” I go into the room, pick up a white plastic cup with the Teen Center logo, “Being a teen has never been this much fun!” written on it, “… spilled soda from some other kids as dopey as us who also managed to break in.”

  “Oh, snap!” Wynn cackles. “Diss on you, DQ.” He snatches away the plastic cup, grabs DQ in a neck lock, and shoves the cup into his face. “Drink the blood, infidel! Drink!”

  DQ slaps the cup away. “Get that outta my face, snowflake.”

  That’s it. There is no sign that a girl died here. No spirits reach out to me from beyond the grave to explain what’s happening and what I’m supposed to do. No displaced samurai or dirty-haired princesses. No spirit of a starved girl trapped in a cave trying to make contact. No Codie.

  So now that I’ve eliminated the possibility that either my sister was trying to reach me or I was tripping my ass off, that leaves only one explanation: I am even more seriously screwed up than I already knew I was. All I want now is to be alone. I can’t keep up a front for one more second.

  “We’re out of here,” DQ says, making his voice deep and manly. “This place is about as haunted as a petting zoo.”

  “Yeah, plus, it’s hot as balls in here.”

  They stampede out, taking the noise and light and struggle with them. For a moment, the empty house is blissfully peaceful and oddly cool and I could stay here forever. In the next instant, the question I’ve been running from, the one that only Codie can answer, forms in my mind. The instant it does, every ounce of energy in my body washes out, leaving me too weak to move. An unimaginable thirst overtakes me, and my stomach cramps violently from hunger. I open my mouth to cry out from the pain, but no sound emerges. Needle pricks of pain stab my scalp, like I’m being eaten alive by biting insects. I try to claw at them but can’t raise my arms. My heart drums with fear and I try to run, but I am frozen. Literally. I shiver with cold.

  With every bit of strength I can summon, I force my right foot a fraction of an inch forward. As soon as I lift it the tiniest bit, a shaft opens up and I am falling. I hurtle down so fast that my hair and arms are blown straight up over my head. Air punches up into my nose, my mouth, with a nauseating force.

  I see where I will land: spiked rocks poking up above churning waves. I scream, and the sound is sucked away before it leaves my throat. But I don’t land. Instead, the rocks, the sea, the darkness disappear, and I’m in a place where the sky is a shade of indigo more exquisite than I could ever describe. The air smells like lilies and pineapples. I watch a child that I know is my child as he tumbles down a grassy hill.

  “Luz?”

  It’s Codie. I stop breathing. She’s here. We’re together again and I understand that we can be together forever. I know what I have to do. The debate is over. I have all the answers. Except one. Of course, she knows the question I won’t allow myself to ask, and though she scolds me for even letting it form in my mind, she answers it. “Cabooskie, what does it matter how I died? Even if I did kill myself, that’s no reason you should.”

  “It matters, Code. It’s all that does matter. Just tell me you didn’t. That you were happy. You were, weren’t you? Happy? Being a soldier?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “So why are they saying you were outside the wire?”

  “I don’t want to talk about that.”

  “But I have to know. You had an intact family. You had me. You always had me, Codie. Right? You were going to come home to me. Codie. Codie?”

  “Codie?” The sound of my own voice startles me and I awake to excruciating pain. My back is broken on the rocks, a wave is rising up to claim me, my sister is gone, and I have made a mistake. A terrible, terrible mistake. This isn’t what I want. This isn’t what Codie wants for me. As clearly as if she were standing next to me, she says one word, “Yuta,” and then I am alone again.

  “Luz? You coming?”

  The beam of Kirby’s flashlight hits me in the face, bringing with it the smell of dust and Pine-Sol.

  “Kirby, point it down,” Jacey orders.

  “Oh, sorry.” The light disappears.

  Jacey takes my hand and leads me outside.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Anmā, where is she going? Why did you allow the demon to escape again?

  My son, stop worrying. Can’t you see that the kami are helping us? They inhabit her now. What they want shall be done. Our time is short. Let me finish.

  That night in Shuri a space was found for me next to Hatsuko on her futon in the room she shared with the twenty other girls in her group. We were crowded in tightly, since most of the dorm had been requisitioned by the Imperial Army.

  I stayed up late listening to Hatsuko and her best friends—Sachiko, Miyoko, and, of course, our cousin Mitsue—talk. I learned that Sachiko, the tallest of the group, was the fastest runner of all the Himeyuri girls, and that her father was a schoolteacher in a small village at the northern end of the island. That Miyoko, who had a merry, laughing face, was spoiled because she was an only child, and her father owned a large distillery that supplied the Imperial Army with the rice brandy, awamori, that they preferred. As for Mitsue, the hard labor and limited rations that had left the others bony and drawn seemed only to have refined the essence of her attractiveness further, making her full lips seem even fuller and her large, luminous eyes even larger.

  Mitsue showed me a photo of her fiancé, Masaru, and told me that he was fighting for our freedom from Western tyranny in the Dutch East Indies. Though Masaru was from Hotaru, a village very near our own, they had met when he was training here in Shuri. I told my lovesick cousin that the true Japanese spirit that shone from her fiancé’s face was certain to guarantee us the victory that he had been named for.

  Amid the other students crammed into the room, I noticed a thin little girl with a long face off by herself in the far corner. “What is that child doing here?” I whispered to Mitsue.

  “Oh, that’s Katsuko,” Mitsue answered in her soft voice.

  “She’s the youngest Himeyuri girl,” Miyoko added. “Very smart. She’s only twelve but still scored the highest marks on the entrance exam of any girl on the island. Her sister, Natsuko, is somewhere over there. Natsuko, Katsuko, and Hatsuko, funny, no?”

  I was still staring at the pale little girl, wondering how a twelve-year-old could be of any service to the emperor, when Mitsue held up a meter-long white sash and handed me a needle threaded with red. “I am making a senninbari-haramaki belt for Masaru. Won’t you take some stitches? I’ve already drawn the pattern for you to follow.”

  Ideally, Mitsue should have had a thousand virgins stitch one red knot apiece into the sash, so that the soldier on the front line who received the belt would know that one thousand pure women carried him in their hearts. Instead, the five of us stayed up as long as we could keep our eyes open, passing the sash and red thread back and forth until we’d each added two hundred and fifty knots.

  I don’t know when I fell asleep, but I was jolted awake in the middle of
the night when I was heaved up off my sleeping mat.

  “Earthquake!” I yelled to alert the others.

  “Bombs, Little Guppy,” Hatsuko corrected me. “They’re bombing what’s left of Naha. Don’t look so scared. You’ll get used to it.”

  The other girls said nothing as the concussions from bombs dropping just a few kilometers away fell into an ominous rhythm. Each detonation would momentarily drown out all other noise. A second later we would hear the rattle of our soldiers’ antiaircraft guns. Soon even more frightening noises reached us: the tinkling of shattered glass falling, and the crackling of fire as the bombs landed closer to Shuri.

  When the entire dorm started to shake as though a typhoon were roaring outside, Hatsuko and the other girls exchanged worried looks. “They’ve never reached this close before,” she whispered to me.

  Head Nurse Tanaka’s harsh voice rose above the bombardment: “Quickly, girls! Quickly! We leave at once for Haebaru Hospital. Don’t dawdle. Those left behind will have to deal with the ketō on their own!” She used the word that meant not just “hairy savage,” but also implied a beast with uncontrollable lusts. An animal that lived to rape.

  “We’re leaving?” I asked Hatsuko, blinking, my eyes and brain not adjusting rapidly enough. She had jumped up immediately, stuffed her few extra clothes into her rucksack, and was ready.

  “Yes,” Hatsuko answered, gathering up my belongings and cramming them into my satchel. “But it will only be for a short while. The invaders will be repelled in a matter of days. A week or so at the most until they are destroyed by our majestic Imperial fleet.”

  “But why can’t we stay here? We would be safe in the tunnels.”

  “Those tunnels are for the emperor’s soldiers, silly. Come on. Hurry. We’ll finally get to see what a glorious hospital has been built for the brave soldiers wounded defending our emperor.”

  In the corner, I noticed twelve-year-old Katsuko carefully sliding her schoolbooks into her rucksack, so she’d be able to keep up with her studies.

  All 220 Princess Lily girls assembled silently in the night. From the distance came sounds I would have taken for drums had I not known better. As we set off at a brisk pace, the rhythmic booming had a lulling quality, like the beating of a massive heart.

  “Look, Naha is burning,” Sachiko whispered. “I wouldn’t have thought there was anything left to catch fire.” Off to the west, the sky above our mighty port of Naha glowed orange against the black of the night.

  “The flames haven’t reached Shuri, though,” Hatsuko said. “As long as Shuri stands we will be fine.”

  “When is Operation Shō going to begin?” Miyoko asked. “Shouldn’t the Imperial Navy destroy the American ships now that they’ve all been lured into the trap? What are they waiting for?”

  Cousin Mitsue shot Miyoko a warning look and pressed her finger against her lips to remind her how dangerous it was to give voice to such traitorous thoughts; spies were everywhere. “Don’t be silly,” she said in a too-loud voice. “We will all be back in Shuri in no time. In fact, I think I hear the sound of the engines of our White Chrysanthemums right now.”

  The other girls agreed with too much enthusiasm, though none of us would have been able to hear the sound of a kamikaze plane flying off on a suicide mission to destroy the American fleet above the boom of exploding bombs.

  Outside, though the night was cool, the air was heavy with the smell of burning wood. The other girls hurried away, but my sister, her face orange in the light of the flames creeping upward toward Shuri Castle, stood transfixed. When I reached out and took Hatsuko’s hand it was damp with sweat. “Don’t worry,” she said, her voice a wobbly chirp. “We’ll be back in no time.”

  “We’ve got to hurry,” I said, tugging on her moist hand. “The others are getting ahead of us.” Though we set off, marching as fast as I could make my sister go, she continued to glance back toward Shuri. I guessed that she was watching for Lieutenant Nakamura, and we fell farther and farther behind the others.

  The main road churned with panicked refugees fleeing the city. A squad of soldiers on their way south to Haebaru marched past in lockstep, their boots pounding against the dusty road like pistons. For a while, we matched the warriors’ ferocious pace. I felt like I was one of them, all of us bound by the love of our emperor, and a soaring exhilaration overtook me.

  Eventually we reached the country, yet the bombs followed us. Even worse, though, were the flares that lit up the night, leaving us all exposed. In their terrible bluish light, I saw my fellow refugees. Old men pushing carts loaded with pots and baskets and futons. Women tottering beneath the weight of baskets balanced on their heads. Children as young as five struggling along with babies tied to their backs.

  Coming in the opposite direction, toward Hatsuko and me, we met a woman with an infant lashed to her back, leading two small children by the hands. She yelled to us, “We heard there are hundreds of kilometers of air-raid shelters in Shuri. Why are you leaving?”

  “We are Princess Lily girls,” Hatsuko answered. “We’ve been assigned to the hospital at Haebaru.”

  “Will my children be safe in Shuri?”

  “Yes, of course you all will be safe. The emperor’s Imperial Army is there.”

  “Nifee deebiru! Thank you, sister.” Relieved, the woman grinned and rushed off toward Shuri.

  We marched on in silence; finally I asked, “Will she be safe in Shuri? Will the soldiers allow her or any civilian who isn’t a worker into the tunnels?”

  “No, of course not. Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “But then why did you—”

  “Tamiko,” my sister snapped, “what would you have me say? As a Princess Lily girl it is my duty to spread the pure Japanese spirit and maintain morale. The emperor is our father and, like a good father, he will watch over us. But only if we honor him by not betraying him with doubt.”

  Her own speech bolstered Hatsuko, and she marched on with new vigor in her stride, while I became the dawdler, troubled by the sight of all those trusting country folk flowing north toward Shuri, where the bombs were falling. Mostly, though, I worried about everyone back at home, and rushed forward to ask Hatsuko, “Do you think Mother and Father will be safe?”

  Hatsuko whirled on me and hissed, “You must never again mention our family. Haven’t you noticed that no one speaks of their families? We all carry that burden in silence. To do otherwise would only cause sad thoughts and show lack of respect for the emperor.”

  I shut my mouth and clung silently to the faith I had in our mother’s hardheaded resourcefulness. She knew where every cave near our village was. She would make sure that she and Father and my aunts and uncles and cousins were safe.

  At our quickened pace, we soon rejoined the rest of the girls from Himeyuri. The moon had risen and reached its zenith by the time we arrived at Haebaru. We craned our necks, searching for the emperor’s magnificent hospital, where we would read to wounded soldiers and bring them glasses of water, safe beneath the shield of the Red Cross.

  But no red crosses greeted us. Instead, Head Nurse Tanaka led our group to a series of grassy hills with cave openings hastily concealed behind some withered foliage that looked like animals’ dens and told us that this was our destination. “What are you waiting for?” Head Nurse demanded. “You lazy Okinawan girls will have to wake up if you’re to be of any use to our emperor. Now get in there.”

  We entered the nearest opening. It was immediately apparent that this cave was nothing like the plastered tunnels beneath Shuri, with their polished concrete floors. It was little more than a hole in the ground fit only for bats. A kerosene lamp cast a dismal drizzle of light that revealed walls and ceilings dripping condensation, and stalactites hanging down like grotesque icicles. The smeared letters of patriotic slogans written on the walls—“Don’t die until you annihilate your foes!” “Stick to your guns until you die!”—ran in wet black streaks over the oozing limestone.

  “Move back!
Move back!” a burly soldier gripping a rifle ordered, pushing us roughly down a long entry passage. “If you’re caught here in the entrance when a bomb explodes nearby, the air pressure will kill you. You’ll die like a deep-sea fish yanked up from the bottom, with your guts hanging out.”

  The entryway dead-ended in a chamber that was already packed so tightly with fifty Himeyuri girls who had arrived before us that we all had to sit; there was not enough room to lie down. By the light of a single kerosene lamp, Hatsuko managed to find our friends, Sachiko, Miyoko, and Mitsue, and we groped our way toward them, stumbling over bodies and bundles.

  The ventilation system had never been completed, and the odor of unwashed bodies was choking. Flakes of soot floated up from the bottle of kerosene with a wick of twisted rag that served as our lamp. The soot drifted back down on us like a black snowfall.

  It was too dark to see who was speaking, and the girls chattered over one another, each comment louder than the last. “Did you hear about the nurse the Americans captured? After the whole platoon raped her many times, they impaled her on a flagpole and left her for the maggots to devour.” “The demons get their laughs by castrating any prisoners they take. Then, before they’ve bled to death, they run them over with their tanks and bulldozers!” “The marines, though, they are the worst. In order to qualify, they must kill both their parents.” “And drink their blood!”

  In spite of the horror stories, the long night of marching caught up with me and, wedged in between Hatsuko and Mitsue, I fell into a sleep darker than the cave became after the kerosene lamp was extinguished. I don’t know how many hours later I was dragged from my dreams by the stench of all those bodies crammed into such a small space and the urgent need to relieve myself.