The Sun Gods

by Jay Rubin

  Mrs. Niiyama helped them carry their packages up to Bill’s room and then left them alone.

  Bill hugged Mineko, and the warmth of her kisses told him that her earlier misgivings were gone.

  After dinner they carried their towels and water scoops, soap and shampoo to the neighborhood bath. The rain tonight was little more than a cooling mist, and he hooked the handle of his closed umbrella over his forearm. He saw her to the door of the women’s section and entered the men’s side, where he undressed and quickly began to scrub every inch of himself almost as if he were bathing for the first time in his life. Now everything he did would be for her.

  He washed and soaked and washed again. In the bank of mirrors, he saw the glow of reborn flesh. He was ready, and he knew that she would be, too. They had not spoken of a time to meet outside, but he was stepping into his sandals when the outer door of the women’s bath opened and she emerged, fresh and bright. He took her hand as she stepped down beside him. The rain had stopped, but he raised the canopy of the umbrella over them nonetheless. They glided along in their own little envelope of air. He could feel the warm fullness of her breast against the arm she took.

  Tonight, nothing would come between them. Standing in the half-light of his lamp, they revealed their glowing bodies to each other, touching and probing and caressing.

  Between the cool sheets, their bodies intertwined with infinite gentleness and then an urgency through which his whole life passed before his eyes. All of it was good and his heart opened to the farthest reaches of light and life. In the beginning was his father, and the spirit of his father moved upon the face of the deep within him. In his arms he held the world. So vast was his love for Mineko that he could not withhold its power from anyone. All was one, and all was forgiven.

  When he opened his eyes in the morning light, she was smiling down at him. Again they kissed and touched and shared themselves unstintingly. Slowly, as they lay there, the sounds of the surrounding daily bustle began to rise about them.

  “Will you marry me?” he asked.

  She nodded, smiling.

  “Today?”

  Again she nodded.

  He sat up. “You know,” he said, “I just realized that I don’t have the slightest idea how to go about getting married.”

  “I don’t either,” she said with a titter.

  “I always thought of marriage as something imposed on people by society. Suddenly I feel completely different about it. I want people to know that we belong to each other.”

  “Maybe Mrs. Niiyama knows about getting married.”

  And indeed, she did. “It’s complicated,” she said. “You have to rent a hall and hire a Shinto priest and have the bride fitted for a kimono and headpiece and wig and invite all—”

  “No, Mrs. Niiyama, without all those things. Just the two of us.”

  “Oh, then it’s the simplest thing in the world. Just go register at the ward office. It costs forty yen.”

  “That’s it? Eleven cents to get married?”

  “That’s all there is to it. Oh, I almost forgot. You have to bring a copy of your family register with you.”

  Their first stop that morning was Koganei City Hall, where Mineko obtained a fuzzy purple copy of the Fukai family register. They gazed at the document’s old-fashioned characters while sitting side-by-side on the train to downtown.

  Bill said, “It’s funny seeing your name surrounded by all this stiff, formal writing. ‘Showa ten-nine-year, four-month, ten-seven-day.’ April 17, 1944.”

  As an American citizen, Bill was legally domiciled in Minato Ward downtown, where the American Embassy was located. At the ward office, the five minute transaction took place that made them man and wife, the one proof of which was the cash register receipt showing they had paid their forty yen.

  The more complicated procedures of signing and oath-taking at the Embassy brought the reality of it home somewhat more forcefully, but by 1:30 that afternoon, they were married and pleasantly full of sushi.

  Visits to real estate agents that Mrs. Niiyama had recommended took up the rest of the day, with discouraging results. None had small enough houses available for rent, and the few apartments they saw faced either railroad tracks or enormous avenues.

  In the evening, Bill brought Mineko to meet his friends, the Greens, who woke up their sleeping son with their cheers.

  “I thought something fishy was going on!” said Martha, eyes shining behind her black-framed glasses. “We never see you these days. So that’s what you’ve been doing! Maybe you can take Mineko to Meiji Shrine and tell her your discovery about holy infants and—.”

  “Never mind!” Bill cut her short.

  A real estate agent from Nakano called the first thing the next morning to say he had a house that had just been offered for rent. A childless couple being sent to the Paris branch of the husband’s company were hoping to rent out their house complete with furniture.

  They met the agent, a slim man in his early forties, at Nakano Station. He led them through winding back streets to a place called Momozono-cho—“Peach Garden.” The narrow house was squeezed in among its neighbors like all the other houses in this quiet section. It had a Western living room, matted sitting room, kitchen and bath downstairs, plus two matted rooms at the top of a steep, ladder-like stairway. The light poured into the upstairs rooms. It was perfect, but the agent seemed reluctant to close the deal.

  “What’s the problem?” Bill asked, but he couldn’t wring a straight answer from the man.

  “Let me try,” Mineko said, launching a rapid-fire negotiation in hushed Japanese.

  “He doesn’t think we can afford such a nice place,” Mineko said, turning to Bill with a smile. “He thinks we’re too young.”

  Bill laughed and gave the man his card. “Here, call the Fulbright office. They’ll tell you how much they’re paying me. It’s just an ordinary American student income, but here it seems huge. And they’re going to give me an extra hundred dollars a month now that I’m married. That alone will more than pay the rent.”

  The agent turned bright red and bowed as low as Bill had ever seen anyone bow in Japan, apologizing. “The only problem,” he said, is that the house will not be available until July 1.”

  “That’s even better,” Bill said. “We’re going to take a trip.”

  “We are? Where?” Mineko asked.

  “I’ll tell you later.”

  She gave him a puzzled look.

  He had long dreamed of visiting the temples of Kyoto, he told her that night. Once, too, he had vowed to himself to walk those ancient streets with Mitsuko, and a honeymoon there with Mitsuko’s niece would compensate somewhat for the loss of that hope.

  “That would be lovely,” she said. “On the way back.”

  “On the way back? From where?”

  “Remember I told you I’ve always wanted to go to Itsuki? Especially now that it’s brought you to me, I want to go more than ever.”

  “Yes, the mountains and Momigi are very beautiful,” agreed Bill. “But meeting Aunt Yoshiko might be discouraging, even sad.”

  “I’ll take the chance,” she said. “If the years have been as cruel to Aunt Yoshiko as you told me, I might not have much time left to meet her.”

  After the long trip on the Hayabusa, they waited in the heat and humidity for the local in Yatsushiro. Finally, the steam train arrived, and it chugged lethargically up the river valley. The windows were wide open to catch any breeze, but also let in soot and ash.

  They stayed in Hitoyoshi for the night to soak in the bath and make a fresh start early in the morning before the sun grew too strong. They rented a small Honda two-seater sports car for the ride up the Kawabe River to Toji and Momigi.

  Morning shadows still lay over the valley by the time they pulled into the parking area near the suspension bridge in Momigi. Leaving their bags in the car, they walked down the path through the trees to the bridge. The forest buzzed with the languid cries of cicadas, and a
light breeze moving up the gorge stirred the trees. The mists that had shrouded the gorge in the early spring were gone now. They stopped in the middle of the bridge, and Bill saw for the first time how deep the drop was to the sparkling stream below. The breeze rocked the bridge gently.

  “I’m surprised she’s not standing here,” he said to Mineko, “praying to her sun gods.”

  “Let’s go,” said Mineko, leading the way.

  He directed her up the path that skirted the terraced rice fields, where heavy stalks now swayed in the breeze that rippled the surface of the dammed-up water. The old, thatch-roofed farmhouses they passed were quiet enough to be empty, and the tea hedges beyond lay open to the sun, unattended. He took the lead through the cedar grove that separated Yoshiko’s house from the others, and when they came to the crooked front door, he pulled it open and loudly announced their presence.

  The old house swallowed his voice. He looked at Mineko, who could only return his questioning gaze. They stepped across the worn threshold into the dirt-floored entryway.

  Before he could call again, however, there resounded a few soft thumps from within. Slowly, Yoshiko came gliding past the pillar at the corner of the hallway to the left. Her face lit up when she saw Bill, but her smile turned into a puzzled frown.

  “I’ve brought someone who wants to meet you,” he said in English. “Your niece, Mineko.”

  Mineko touched his arm and moved closer to him. Yoshiko peered at her a long time, saying nothing. At length, speaking in Japanese, she told them to come in and led the way to her little sitting room.

  The corridor of the gloomy house was chilly, and the quilt was still in place around Yoshiko’s low table, just as it had been earlier to ward off the lingering cold of winter. The charcoal fire was not burning underneath the table, but the iron kettle on the blue hibachi kept up its tiny, bell-like ringing.

  Yoshiko knelt formally before the large wardrobe, bowing her head nearly to the mats. Mineko bowed as deeply in return, and the two exchanged the usual Japanese formalities.

  “You have grown up to be such a lovely young woman,” said Yoshiko, cocking her head to one side and studying Mineko. “Is it really you? You were so tiny … not even two years old …” She stared at Mineko as if she were trying to bring back a long-lost memory. “Your mother was so proud of you. She was more than thirty when you were born. Jiro was almost forty. They had given up any hope of having children.”

  “I must confess,” said Mineko, “I am not making my mother and father very proud right now.”

  “Oh? Why is that?” Yoshiko asked.

  “Because I took her away,” Bill interjected. “We were married four days ago.”

  Yoshiko’s smile faded. “Perhaps I should say congratulations.”

  “But … ?”

  “These marriages can bring much unhappiness.”

  “This one will be different,” Bill declared. “I promise you.”

  Yoshiko looked at him and at Mineko. Her eyes lingered on the face of her niece. Mineko lowered her gaze to the mats.

  “Why don’t we look at the pictures?” Bill said. “Aunt Yoshiko, do you think we could have some tea? I can show Mineko the albums.”

  Yoshiko motioned toward the wardrobe drawer and left the room.

  Bill got out the first album and turned the pages for her. Mineko laughed at the snapshots of her father as a small child. “I’d recognize those eyebrows anywhere!”

  When Bill pointed out Mitsuko as a young girl, Mineko said, “That’s strange. Aunt Mitsuko looks familiar. Maybe she looks like one of my elementary school friends.”

  In the later album, Mineko liked the wedding pictures of Yoshiko and Goro. “I didn’t know they were such strong Christians. I’ve never heard of such a thing in the family.”

  It struck Bill with a sense of liberation that he had joined himself for life to a woman about whose religious beliefs he had never thought to ask.

  Mineko flipped quickly past the group shots from the Seattle church, but she stopped short when she came to the picture of Bill in Mitsuko’s lap. He expected her to laugh at the little boy with rice smeared on his mouth, but she instead looked fixedly at the image of the woman.

  “Yes,” she murmured, “I thought I recognized that face in the childhood pictures. This is the woman, the very same woman. Is this Aunt Mitsuko?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “I know her,” said Mineko. “She came to see me once in Tokyo—at my school in Koganei.”

  “You must be mistaken,” Bill said as a chill shot through him.

  “No, I’m absolutely certain,” said Mineko. “She was a good deal older than this, but still lovely. She had her hair up in this same kind of bun. I remember she had a scar on her lower lip. How could I forget a face like that? My parents always told me not to talk to strangers, but I wasn’t afraid of her in the least. She was so kind, and she knew my name. She even knew it was my birthday. I was twelve years old that day. She gave me a beautiful little mirror for my birthday.”

  Bill grabbed her by the arm. “What kind of mirror?”

  “Please, Bill, you’re hurting me!”

  “Tell me about the mirror,” he insisted, releasing his grip.

  “You know the mirror I use. You must have seen it a hundred times. What’s the matter?”

  “Please, show me the mirror.”

  “All right. It’s here, in my purse, where I always keep it.”

  She set her purse on the table and released the catch. From a pocket on one side, she withdrew a small leather case and handed it to him. She was right, he had indeed seen this case many times without taking special note of it or of its contents, but he knew already from the lightness of it in his hand what he was going to find. His fingers clumsily peeled back the stiff flap, and he watched in amazement as a mirror virtually identical to the one Yoshiko had given him slipped into his palm. He had studied his own mirror enough to know that certain details in the border work were different, but this was unmistakably a companion to the other, with its representation of the sun and the flying goose.

  “She’s alive,” Bill muttered.

  “Aunt Mitsuko? I thought you said she died in Nagasaki.”

  “I don’t know how, but she’s alive.” He got up and reached for Mineko’s hand. “Come with me,” he said, then called toward the kitchen, “Aunt Yoshiko, we have to go out for a few minutes.”

  Holding the mirror in his right hand, he grabbed Mineko by the arm and pulled her out of the house, releasing her only when they had staggered out into the sunlight. Almost without thinking, he started to run. He needed to move, to race through the air, to feel the earth flying beneath his feet.

  “Bill, wait!” Mineko cried.

  He soared past the fields and the houses, and his pace hardly slowed when he came to the bridge. The soles of his shoes began to slap against the moving planks. When he halted at the center of the undulating bridge, he clasped the mirror to his heart.

  “SHE’S ALIVE! SHE’S ALIVE!”

  His wild shouts echoed and reechoed between the rocky faces of the gorge, reverberating in infinite repetitions of the one truth he knew more certainly than he had ever known anything.

  The sweat was dripping from his face. He watched beads of it fly from him and go sailing far below, there to join with the gushing stream that would carry it to the sea. Then Mineko was standing beside him, panting from the run, and they embraced, the sweat of her body mingling with his.

  They returned to the end of the bridge, walking arm-in-arm to Yoshiko’s house. Beside the house ran an overgrown path that continued up into the hills. Wordlessly, he plunged through the brush, climbing higher and higher above the soaring roofs of the hamlet. The path gave out at a small, rocky plateau where a still, clear pool lay shimmering in the sun like an offering to heaven. Fed by tiny rivulets from higher up, it released its treasure slowly down the mountainside.

  He turned to face her as she joined him at the top of the ridge, th
eir breathing labored now, their clothes sodden with the sweat the sun had drawn from their bodies. He all but tore his shirt off, his eyes urging her to do the same. A moment later, they stood before each other naked and glistening. Droplets of sweat ran slowly down the hollow between her breasts. He knelt and placed his streaming forehead there, then he lapped the salt that was oozing from her flesh. The sun beat down upon his back, where her hands began to slide through the liquid sheet that clung to his skin. He pulled her down to the smooth stone bank of the pool, and their bodies melted together in the heat of the mounting sun, its limitless power focused and flowing through him into her—surging, surging, exploding in relentless waves of energy.

  Afterward, his arm lay limp along the rock, his fingertips trailing in the cool water. He brought the hand up to her face, touching her closed eyelids, which quivered and opened. She, too, reached down, and they began scooping handfuls from the clear mountain pool, smoothing the cool liquid over each other’s steaming bodies. He crept into the water, and she followed him in. Both ducked beneath the surface and came up clear-eyed and fresh.

  He reached for the clothes they had left scattered on the rock, plunging them into the pool, then spreading them out on the rock again to dry. They found a sheltered corner where the overhanging rocks provided respite from the heat of the sun. He held her mirror out into the streaming rays and sent them glancing across the water.

  “Now, tell me again about the woman who gave you this,” he said.

  “It happened over six years ago. I saw her for ten minutes, possibly fifteen.”

  “Didn’t she tell you who she was, or say anything about where she lived?”

  “No, nothing. She seemed to know me so well, I guess it never occurred to me to ask about her.”

  “And if you had asked, I doubt that she would have told you anything.”

  “It’s true, she was very secretive. She told me to hide the mirror from my parents and not to tell them how I got it. I never told them. I kept it hidden in a box of souvenirs—sea shells, pretty rocks. I almost forgot I had it until high school. I’ve carried it with me ever since, and my mother never really noticed.”