Blood Hina

by Naomi Hirahara

  “Why don’t we eat?” Juanita said brightly, but both Mas and Haruo could tell her smile was pasted on just for show.

  “Not hungry,” Haruo said.

  “Me neither,” Mas said, his stomach growling.

  “Izu gonna just wait outside,” Haruo said and turned back toward the door.

  “Wait,” Juanita called out, but even she was unable to stop him.

  Mas shrugged his shoulders and got up. At least it would be a quiet ride home, he tried to tell himself, but it was a loud kind of silence that bothered Mas’s ears more than Haruo’s actual jabbering.

  How come you bother my ex-fiancée? the silence said. Why you snooping around?

  I’m just trying to help you out, Mas said without words. Don’t want you to be thrown in jail. Don’t want you getting into gambling again. I’ve had to pick you up time and time again. I’m through with that now.

  Of course, neither one of them verbalized their thoughts. Words required too much energy, and they also offered resolution. With silence, they could let their feud go on without an end. If Haruo wanted to play it that way, then Mas would abide.

  Haruo finally ended his silent treatment at about ten o’clock. Three hours of silence was a record for him. “Izu gonna move out in a coupla days,” he announced.

  How are you going to find the money for a deposit and decent place? Mas wondered. But although Mas didn’t give Haruo any credit, he knew that his friend had a sprinkling of pride. It would be wrong to take that little of it away.

  That night Mas sunk into a fitful sleep, waking up a couple times after some nightmares, including one starring a late customer, Mrs. Zidle. She was crying at the doorway of her Southern-style white wood-framed house in Pasadena. She was making a harsh, choking sound, like a cat coughing up a hairball. Her papery cheeks were wet, and tears dripped down from her chin.

  He got out of bed once at around four. He stumbled in the dark to get to the living room, and as he suspected, the couch that Haruo was using as his bed was empty. Haruo had found his own way to work, which was just fine with Mas. None of my business, right? he told himself. He collapsed back in bed and this time, really slept until he was awakened by the ringing of the phone. Digital clock: 9:29 a.m.

  “Hallo,” Mas answered loudly, half looking forward to hanging up rudely on a telemarketer.

  “Mas? It’s Genessee Howard.”

  “Oh, hallo.” Mas sat up and patted down his hair, as if doing those things would make a better impression on someone on the other end of the line.

  “What happened on Sunday?”

  “Huh?”

  “Haruo and Spoon’s wedding. I went to the Japanese garden and some people said the ceremony was canceled.”

  “Haruo didn’t call you.” Mas was glad to silently curse Haruo. Genessee Howard should have been the first person on Haruo’s to-call list. At least it would have been on Mas’s.

  “Oh, sorry. So sorry.” Mas tried the best he could to piece together what had transpired between Haruo and Spoon—without revealing anything too personal or criminal.

  “I’m sad to hear about that. You figure that love the second time around would be a lot easier.”

  Mas felt his cheeks grew cold. He didn’t have the nerve to respond.

  Thankfully Genessee continued talking. “Well, now that I have you on the phone, I was wondering if you could come by my house sometime. I bought my son’s house in L.A., and it needs a lot of work. I know you’re just working part time, but I need some gardening advice.”

  “I come right now.” Today Mas had only one customer, practically a mow and blow that he could do with his eyes closed.

  “This morning? You’re not busy?”

  “Not so much.” No sense in putting up a fake front. Besides it would be good to get away from the conflict with Haruo.

  “Okay,” said Genessee. “Looking forward to seeing you.”

  “Yah.”

  Mas hung up the phone. He remembered holding Genessee’s hand when they were all over Mas’s friend Tug’s house. Tug was one of those true-blue Christians who said grace before a meal and wanted everyone to link hands around the table. Normally Mas wasn’t too crazy about holding someone else’s hand, but Genessee was an exception that he was more than willing to make.

  When Mas had first met Genessee Howard, she was living smack-dab in the middle of the Japanese American community in a city called Torrance. An expert on Okinawan music, she was the one that Juanita Gushiken called to find out about the history of the shamisen, a clue in the death of G.I.’s Vietnam veteran friend. Mas was first puzzled by her, then intrigued, and finally smitten. It was as if as the very best of Chizuko had been boiled down and re-formed in this sixtysomething woman.

  Genessee now lived in an area called Mid-City, but for Mas, who traveled mostly around the San Gabriel Valley, it might as well have been the Midwest. It was Los Angeles, for sure, but within L.A., nestled beside landmarks like Hollywood, Silver Lake, Crenshaw, Gallegos Park, and Watts were lesser-known communities such as Hermon, Carthay, Chesterfield Square, and Harvard Heights. These were the places that if mentioned on the television news, would cause someone like Mas to scratch his head and say to himself, “Where’s that?”

  Mid-City was in the middle of the line going from downtown Los Angeles to Santa Monica due west. It seemed like a good-enough neighborhood, neither very poor nor very rich. As Mas drove through the streets, he noticed that each house was unique and each lawn was well tended. One home was painted purple with dark succulents planted all over. A gargoyle statue sat on the edge of the roof. Another home, framed by a natural wood gateway, was dotted with brilliant wildflowers. The front yard was filled with sparkly broken granite rocks. Judging from the way the inhabitants decorated the exteriors of their homes, Mid-City attracted its share of kawarimono, eccentrics who didn’t toe the line. There was obviously nothing midway with Mid-City.

  Mas turned the corner down Genessee’s street. There was a gardener’s truck parked across the street, and as Mas passed by, he was surprised to see an elderly black gardener in a jumpsuit and pith helmet loading a lawnmower in the back of the cab. He was joined by two younger gardeners in the same color jumpsuit—perhaps the elder’s sons? Mas hadn’t seen a black gardener in L.A. since the fifties, and to see three of them at once was jarring indeed.

  Genessee was waiting for him. Wearing an orange dress and yellow sweater, she sat on a bench on her porch and Mas couldn’t help but smile inside. Her hair was combed out in a small Afro, different than the last time he’d seen her. Her Asian eyes, bright behind her glasses, seemed aware of every movement on her quiet street.

  “Hello,” she said as Mas parked the truck. He didn’t bother to lock it, because what was worth taking? Anyway, he wanted to leave his key, the screwdriver, on the front seat. He wanted to try something new and look dignified for once.

  Mas started to nod his head as a greeting, but Genessee wouldn’t have it. She walked up to him and hugged him briefly. Mas stiffened as he felt her shoulder blades against his palms.

  “It’s been a long time.”

  “Yah,” Mas said. It had actually been around seven months, but who was counting?

  “You look well.”

  Mas nodded. “Same to you.”

  Genessee smiled, her cheeks full of air, as if she was trying to swallow a laugh, and Mas wondered why. “Would you like to see my new backyard?” she finally asked.

  Mas followed her down a narrow walkway and into a small yard. He was prepared to see something flat, as was typical of the backyards he saw in the congested Westside. But instead he encountered two twin dirt mounds.

  “My grandson created that when he was into motocross racing. Before that, my son dug up the backyard to create a lagoon. But now I want to make this space just for me. I’m thinking of maybe a koi pond.”

  Mas chose to keep his thoughts to himself until he at least heard the woman out. Everyone in California seemed koi crazy, but they ne
ver thought about the downsides.

  “When I last visited my relatives in Okinawa, they had this marvelous koi pond in the middle of their house. Well, it wasn’t literally in the middle of their house, but the house wrapped around it.”

  Genessee, whose mother was Okinawan and father was black, was obviously trying to bring Japan to America. But attempting to plant Japan overseas sometimes didn’t work out that well.

  “Umm. Koi pond, ne.”

  “You don’t think it’s a good idea.” Genessee was able to quickly read Mas’s face, a skill he appreciated.

  “Animals outside getsu hungry, you know. Ova in Altadena, we gotsu put chicken wire all ova. The raccoons like koi.”

  Genessee nodded. “We don’t have that many raccoons, but I’ve smelled my share of skunks. One of my neighbors runs into possums all the time. Nasty creatures.” She sucked in some air through her lips. “Maybe a koi pond wouldn’t be such a good idea.”

  “I make youzu a rock garden,” Mas declared.

  “A rock garden.” Genessee looked disoriented for a moment.

  “Small round ones, smooth all ova. And maybe a couple of big ones, too.”

  “I think I’ve seen a few in Japan. And maybe in photos.”

  Mas let the concept sink in with Genessee. Americans were often in love with bright colors and gaudiness. They didn’t quite understand shibui, restraint, the celebration of nothing balanced against something. It was hard to explain; it had to be felt. And Mas thought that if anyone could feel it, Genessee, the lover and scholar of Okinawan music, would be the one.

  “Rocks, huh?”

  “Hard to getsu. Used to be easy, we go to Los Angeles River. Against the law now.”

  “It won’t look like that hideous granite lawn down the street.”

  Mas shook his head. “Dis one natural.”

  “Natural,” Genessee said, rolling that word around in her head. “I like that.”

  After touring the backyard, Genessee invited Mas in for a cup of coffee in her kitchen. Truth be told, he should have been on his way to his customer back in San Gabriel, but one cup of coffee? What could that hurt?

  He sat at Genessee’s oak table. There seemed to be something reverent about it, so Mas removed his cap and placed it on an empty seat. He hoped that the top of his head wasn’t fluffed up like a rooster’s crown.

  Genessee served her coffee strong, in thick homemade mugs the color of red clay. Mas liked the rough feel of the handle in his hands.

  “I made that,” she announced, with unabashed pride.

  “Honto?”

  Genessee laughed. “Yes, really. It’s so good to hear some Japanese. I miss hearing that from my mom and other old-timers.”

  Mas didn’t know if that meant Genessee looked at him as a father figure, but she quickly squeezed his upper arm.

  “I didn’t mean that the way it came out. Just that it felt… what’s that word—natsu wa—”

  Mas frowned and then grinned. “Natsukashii.”

  “Yes, natsu—” she continued to stumble over the word. “Nostalgic, right?”

  Mas nodded and they talked some more, about how she had attended American school in Okinawa, so she was raised more American than Okinawan. She moved on to the present and said she was thinking of retiring from teaching at UCLA. Academia, she said, had changed so much. The students had changed. She wanted to spend her time making ceramic pots and drinking coffee outside in front of her new rock garden.

  Mas nodded his head. He didn’t insert any aizuchi, any “ah, sodesuka,” “hai,” “um,” or “yah.” He didn’t have to give any verbal cues that he was listening, because it was obvious that he was soaking up every word. When Genessee seemed to have finished telling her story—at least for that day—Mas still didn’t want to go. So he began to share as well. About the dream he had to be an automobile engineer and how he fell into gardening because for a Japanese American man who couldn’t speak English too well, it was the thing to do. About the worry he carried for his daughter, Mari, even though she was close to being middle-aged. And finally, he couldn’t help but to go into what had happened recently with Haruo and Spoon and the theft of the hina dolls. Genessee, who appreciated antiquities, was especially intrigued with the dolls. “Do Japanese Americans still put them out?” she asked.

  “Some,” Mas said, explaining that his family never did. He remembered one gardener friend with a lot of family hokori who displayed dolls every March. “Those guys full of pride.”

  “Well, pride’s not necessarily all bad, Mas.”

  He wasn’t quite sure what was Spoon’s intention in her acquisition of her husband’s family dolls. But he didn’t care—at least that’s what he told Genessee. “Dat Spoon, she took Haruo for a big ride. And three thousand dolla, how come she lie about payin’ dat much for those dollsu?” Bitterness seeped into his voice. Apparently Genessee wasn’t a fan of bitterness, especially the kind directed at an old woman, because it was her turn to fall silent. Mas brought the homemade mug to his lips even though the coffee was long gone.

  “You know, Mas, I think you have to cut Spoon a break,” Genessee finally said. “I think you’re being too tough on her.”

  Mas hoped the heat rising to his cheeks was not noticeable.

  “I don’t agree with what she’s doing to Haruo, and I know you’re so close to Haruo, so I laud your loyalty. But there are two sides to the story. I don’t know Spoon well, but I did get a chance to speak to her at that dinner at Tug’s last year. She mentioned her late husband. They were very close, it seemed.”

  “Heezu gone more than twenty years.”

  “But Mas, you never forget. You can’t tell me you don’t think about your wife.”

  To hear the word “wife” from Genessee made Mas’s heart grow cold. He pictured Chizuko’s piercing stare—what would she be thinking if she was watching Mas now?

  “I think of my husband often. Sometimes I even forget that he’s gone. I think, I need to tell Paul this story. And then it dawns on me, he’s dead.”

  Mas could relate to that confusion. One day in a customer’s backyard, he noticed that the fig tree was filled with ripe fruit. Figs weren’t well liked by his customer, nor even by Mas, for that matter, but they were Chizuko’s favorite. He considered pocketing some to take home before realizing that she wouldn’t be there to enjoy them.

  “The wedding planning must have brought up some old memories of Spoon’s first marriage. Do you know if she had a fancy ceremony?”

  “Camp mess hall, I thinksu. Manzanar.”

  “Of course, of course.” Genessee fingered the lip of her mug. “Well, they got together during a sensitive time in their lives. The memories must be very deep. And those dolls, they must have been very precious to the family.”

  Mas didn’t even consider any of that, but he understood how a person could be blindsided by the past. Like old monster movies that used to be shown on weekend afternoon television, buried bodies sometimes wormed out of the ground when you least expected it.

  “Mas, the mind and heart are very mysterious. It’s like holding water. It’s tight in your fist, but when you open up your palm, it’s all gone.”

  Mas grunted, then glanced at his Casio. Already past eleven. He’d hoped to finish his customer by noon, but that wasn’t going to happen today. Palms on the table, he pushed himself to his feet. “I gotsu go.”

  “Oh yes, it’s already late,” Genessee said. Did Mas actually detect a glimmer of disappointment in her eyes?

  “Thanksu so much for the coffee,” Mas said. “Best I eva had.”

  Genessee shook her head, insisting that Mas was an ogesa, a master exaggerator, but he was telling the truth. It wasn’t only the taste of the coffee, but the whole experience of drinking it in a vessel Genessee had made herself. Sure, Chizuko’s Yuban version had been tasty as well, but she served hers in factory-made mugs that usually had something quite unseasonal on them, like reindeer and snow during the heat of summer.
/>   Mas stood by the door, cap in hand.

  “You’ll call me then?” Genessee said. “I mean about the rock garden. All natural, right?”

  Getting back on the 10 freeway, Mas wondered if his head was completely kara, empty of any brains. Genessee was just interested in his so-called expertise in gardening, nothing to do with him as a person or as a man. Then why had her hands seemed warm and moist when she squeezed his elbow goodbye? There had been a spark—Mas was sure of it. That’s when he came to the conclusion that he was close to losing his mind.

  It was high noon, and Mas was just arriving at his customer’s house, just south of the San Gabriel Country Club and not far from the San Gabriel Mission, where six bells hung from its aging wall.

  The job was easy, just a postage stamp of St. Augustine grass. Despite its small size, the yard still managed to do the trick of sweating some of Mas’s anger away. He was short-tempered, even back in the days with his seven brothers and sisters in Hiroshima. His temper always seemed to get the best of him, and as he grew older, he thought his fuse had gotten much longer, only to find himself spontaneously combusting when a certain button was pressed.

  He found an old towel in back of his seat and wiped the sweat pooling in front of his ears. Removing his cap, he gave his whole face a good rub, tasting some remnants of lawnmower oil from the towel.

  Genessee’s words softened him. Had he been too hard on Spoon? He knew, perhaps more than anyone alive (well, maybe Haruo’s first wife Yasuko might know even better), what a mess Haruo actually was. Could Mas blame Spoon really for having doubts about him? Marriage at their age literally meant “until death do us part.” Here he was complaining about Haruo staying a couple of weeks at his place, and Spoon was facing a life sentence.

  Mas realized that he had indeed said too much to Spoon. Maybe he should have minded his own business and not gone over to Hina House. He had to offer her something of an apology. So he headed over to Montebello, picking up a six pack of Coca-Cola and, as an extra bonus, a can of cashews from a corner liquor store. If this didn’t say, “I’m sorry,” Mas didn’t know what did.