The Fences Between Us

by Kirby Larson

  This war stinks.

  Later

  All deals are off. I don’t care if God strikes me dead for writing this, but I wish Hank had been hurt, like John.

  It’s not fair. It’s not fair. He’s a hero. He needs some rest. But we got a letter saying the Navy has put him on another ship, the USS Enterprise, which is heading to somewhere in the Pacific. Hank can’t tell us any more than that. He made a joke, saying he was like our old cat, Admiral, with nine lives. So now, after Pearl Harbor, he has eight left. I didn’t think it was a very good joke.

  He ended the letter with a promise that he would take care of himself. That he would come home to us.

  I bet you that’s what Del told his family, too.

  Wednesday, January 14, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Margie had homework and Pastor Thomson had picked Pop up for a meeting with a church committee, so I took the bus to go visit John. One of the stores downtown on Yesler had a big sign in the window that said NO JAPS.

  I brought along the photo album I’m making for Hank. John had asked me to. I told him it wasn’t finished but he said he didn’t care. Teddy Baker, one of the other guys from the Arizona, wanted to look, too, so we went to the family waiting room. They parked their wheelchairs on either side of me. The three of us sitting in a row there made me think of the Three Musketeers. Even though John was smiling and joking, I could see pain deep in his brown eyes and wondered if he was thinking of them, too.

  I started flipping through the pages. “Here’s our church Christmas tree, and this is the squirrel that our neighbor leaves peanuts out for every day, and these are some pictures of our backyard.”

  “Slow down, Piper,” John said. “You’re going too fast.” He turned back the page and pointed to one of the pictures. “Is that the tree house you and Hank built?”

  I said yes, and then tried to tell them as much about each photo as I could. I cannot imagine, for the life of me, why John and Teddy wanted to look at Hank’s album, but I noticed that by the time I reached the end, John’s good hand wasn’t shaking anymore and Teddy was smiling.

  He looked at me and said, “‘Course we don’t have many pine trees or mountains in Kansas, but these here pictures made me feel like I took a trip home. Thanks, ma’am. Thanks a million.”

  John nodded. “This visit’s been better than any medicine, Piper. You’re a good egg.”

  I guess Pop’s right — it is better to give than to receive.

  Thursday, January 15, 1942

  DeeDee —

  President Roosevelt says we’re all soldiers in this war. What he means is that we have to pitch in here at home. Right now, Pop’s watching the miles he puts on the Blue Box because it’s going to be hard to get new tires, what with the new tire rationing rules. Even though he was always kind of a lead foot—hard to believe of a preacher! — he’s sticking to the Victory Speed Limit of thirty-five whenever he’s on the road. The church is having a rubber drive on Saturday. Trixie and I went around the neighborhood, pulling her old red wagon, and collected three old garden hoses, four pairs of galoshes, two bathing caps, and one old tire.

  Today’s paper says these tire rations are only the first of the belt-tightening and predicts gas rationing within the next few months. Maybe food rationing, too.

  I better stock up on Sky Bars!

  Sunday January 18, 1942

  DeeDee —

  A bunch of people from church went to the hospital with us today. Mrs. Harada and the Ladies’ Circle brought Bibles and cookies for the men in the burn ward. Betty Sato came, too. She stood back in the corner, looking the way I looked on my first visit, I’m sure. At first the men didn’t seem very happy to see the Ladies’ Circle. I guess if I’d been at Pearl Harbor, I might have been kind of cold, too. Because they’re Japanese and all. But Mrs. Harada is a steamroller of love and it wasn’t long before she and the guys in the ward were joking around. She really took to John, treating him the same way she did Hank, all bossy like a mother hen. “You mind those doctors, John, so you get home soon-soon.”

  He said he would because he didn’t want her coming after him. She was tougher than his Chief Petty Officer. That made her laugh.

  When it was time to go, Mrs. Harada dabbed at her eyes and patted John’s right hand. Betty walked out behind her mom, slipping something onto John’s tray, between the coffee cup and dish of applesauce. I peeked at the tray as I walked out. It was a tsuru made of paper. A paper crane.

  That gave me an idea.

  Tuesday, January 20, 1942

  DeeDee —

  I got my courage up to call Betty and ask her about my idea. “I saw that origami crane you made for John,” I said. “It was beautiful.”

  “They’re for long life,” she said.

  “I know. And that’s why I think we should make a whole bunch for the guys on the ward. To let them know we want them to have long lives. To give them hope.”

  “There are a lot of men,” she said. “That would be a lot of work.”

  “We’ll get some help.” I was too excited by my idea to give up.

  “I’ll think about it,” she said. And then she hung up.

  Well, she didn’t say yes … but she didn’t say no!

  Thursday, January 22, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Betty called me today. She didn’t even say hello, but started out with, “What if we get all the Sunday school kids to help?” she said.

  “So you’ll do it?” I jumped up and down. “That’s great.”

  “It’ll take a lot of paper,” she said. “Where are we going to get it?”

  “Let me handle that.” I had a pretty tidy nest egg saved up in my piggy bank.

  But when I told Pop what we’d planned, he offered to buy all the paper we’d need. Then he hugged me and said, “A tree is known by its fruit.”

  Whatever that means.

  Sunday, January 25, 1942

  DeeDee —

  All the Sunday school classes — even the four-year-olds — folded cranes to take to the hospital to cheer up the men. We made over two hundred! More than we hoped.

  Tuesday, January 27, 1942

  DeeDee —

  So much for good deeds. The hospital wouldn’t let us take the cranes around to the rooms. Wouldn’t even let us leave them.

  Nothing Japanese allowed. Some mucky-muck said it would be bad for the men’s morale.

  How could a token of goodwill be bad for anyone’s morale? I tried to argue with the duty nurse but she just held up her hand. “Nothing I can do about it, kiddo,” she said. “Now, get out of my hair. I’ve got work to do.”

  That box of two hundred cranes had been so easy to carry to the hospital. Afterward, I could barely manage to drag it onto the bus, to lug it home.

  What had been a box full of hope was now a box of despair, heavy as lead.

  Like my heart.

  Friday, January 30, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Pop left the Seattle Times on the breakfast table when he went out this morning. It was folded open to a headline: ALIENS IN NORTHWEST MAY BE MOVED.

  Even I knew what “aliens” meant: Issei. Like Grandma Harada or Mr. Tokita. They were born in Japan, not here. But moved where? How?

  And what about their families? What would they do? Mrs. Tokita couldn’t run the grocery store and take care of little Kenji by herself.

  Just when you think things can’t get worse, they do. It’s all so unfair.

  And scary.

  Sunday, February 1, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Bud came over in the afternoon with news he’d heard. Planes from two American bird boats attacked Japanese bases on the Gilbert Islands.

  One of the bird boats was the Enterprise.

  I set up the game board while Bud counted out the Monopoly money. I was so distracted I even let Bud use the top hat, which is my good luck piece.

  Bud rolled the dice again. “Ten spaces. Get out of jail free card!” he gloat
ed as he added the card to his stack.

  I picked up the dice and rolled. “Two.” My Chance card said, “You crash your Studebaker into the mayor’s house. Pay $200 fine.”

  As I counted out my money, Bud said, “Too late now! You didn’t collect rent from me.” He pointed to where his top hat sat on St. James. “That’s the third time this game. Where’s your head at?”

  I shrugged. I didn’t want to talk about where my head was at, which was far away, somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. It’s hard to care about a game — even Monopoly — when your brother’s ship could be involved in another battle. “Keep him safe” was the prayer I shot up to God, over and over again, like a toy arrow.

  Margie asked Bud to stay for supper. She’d made wienies and beans but he acted like it was steak and had seconds. Pop looked impressed when Bud offered to help with the dishes, though he kept making excuses to come into the kitchen to check on us while we cleaned up.

  Margie gave me the thumbs-up after Bud went home. “He’s a keeper,” she said.

  Bud is nice, but I would trade all the boyfriends in the world to have my brother home.

  Tuesday, February 3, 1942

  DeeDee —

  I stayed out of school today to babysit Mrs. Tokita’s baby. Pop drove her and Mrs. Harada to the post office downtown. All “aliens” have to register, so they can get identification cards. When I handed the baby back to her after she got home, I noticed the ink smudge on Mrs. Tokita’s finger.

  Pop said they had to get fingerprinted, too.

  Isn’t that what they do to criminals?

  Wednesday, February 4, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Pop’s at another meeting and Margie’s out with Stan. But I didn’t mind being alone tonight.

  I listened to Eddie Cantor — “It’s time to smile!” — on the radio and added more pictures to Hank’s welcome home album. The one of Stan and Margie after their engagement turned out good — they look so happy. And I got a cute one of the Tokitas’ baby doing patty-cake last time I babysat. I even put in the one of Bud.

  I didn’t put in the picture I took of the Sunday school making paper cranes.

  Thursday, February 5, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Pop picked at his meat loaf tonight so I knew something was up. I know he thinks I’m too young to understand what’s going on, but Margie wasn’t home for him to talk to so I dove in and asked what was bothering him.

  He didn’t answer right away but poked at his string beans. It turns out that Mr. Sato, Mr. Harada, and Mr. Tokita, along with some other men, maybe forty in all, were going to be sent to this place in Montana called Fort Missoula.

  Pop had spent all day trying to find out exactly when so he could make sure to be at the train station when they left. But so far, no one was telling him anything.

  “Does Betty know about this yet?” I asked.

  Pop said she did. I thought about that for a minute, about how scared she must be. I know I would be, if it were my father. “When you find out, would it be okay if I came along?”

  “I think these families need all the support they can get.” Pop sighed. “Mrs. Tokita told me that baby Kenji said his first word yesterday. It was ‘Da-Da.’”

  There was spice cake with buttercream frosting for dessert but neither one of us had a taste for it. It didn’t seem like there was anything sweet enough in the whole world to make this sour news go down any easier.

  Friday, February 6, 1942

  DeeDee —

  In a funny turn of events, one of the newspaper reporters who has been hounding Pop and making him look bad in the paper was the one who let it slip that Mr. Harada and the others would be leaving from the King Street Train Station tomorrow morning.

  You can bet me and Pop and my camera will be there.

  Saturday, February 7, 1942

  DeeDee —

  It was raining pigs and chickens by the time we got to the train station. There were lots of people there but Pop and Pastor Thomson and I managed to find Mrs. Harada, Mrs. Tokita, and the Satos. I went over and stood right next to Betty. When the vans from the jail pulled up, all the Japanese men climbed out. Mr. Harada was last and he stumbled on the bottom step. Pop lunged forward to catch him, but the guards held him back. Mr. Harada caught himself on the man in front of him.

  “Tozuko!” Mrs. Harada tried to make her way over to him. But the guards blocked her path. This really skinny guard said they’d had their chance to say good-bye at the jail. Mrs. Harada said please, just for one minute, but he pushed her aside.

  Why would he treat her that way? She is one of the sweetest people in the whole wide world. Pop had moved toward the guard and was talking in low tones, trying to get them a few minutes together. But the guard wasn’t having any of it. He and the other guards started pushing the men toward the train.

  I wanted to yell at those guards. Ask them if they had families. Ask them if they’d ever heard of the Golden Rule. But I was pretty sure that would only make things worse. I had to do something, though, so I picked up my camera and started snapping. Mr. Sato walking backward so he could have one last look at his family. Mr. Harada dabbing at the rain — or was it tears? — on his kind face. It was so rainy and dark I didn’t even know if any of these pictures would turn out. But I felt like I had to try. Had to help in some small way. If the families couldn’t have proper good-byes, they could at least have photos of one another. The last photo I took that day was of Mrs. Tokita lifting up their baby, up as high as she could. She called, “Kenji! Kenji! Your son says good-bye,” even after the men were jostled into train cars with their window shades pulled down tight.

  When we got home, Pop asked if I was okay and I said I was probably catching a cold from standing around in the rain, that’s why I was sniffling. He gave me a big hug and said he loved me.

  What if Pop got taken away and I didn’t have a chance to say good-bye?

  Monday, February 9, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Trixie’s going to the Valentine’s Day Ball with Eddy.

  Bud has had plenty of chances to ask me.

  But he hasn’t.

  Friday, February 13, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Today’s Headline: TOTAL EVACUATION OF JAPS ON WEST COAST ADVOCATED.

  The papers aren’t talking about moving the Issei anymore; they’re talking about moving all the Japanese, even those who are American citizens. The mayor of Los Angeles said he thinks they’re more dangerous than the aliens! This is even scarier than when we had the blackouts after Pearl Harbor. Someone at school today said they heard the Japanese were all going to be rounded up and shot. Pop says that’s ridiculous and not to listen to rumors.

  People are acting crazy, too. Debbie Sue said her mom’s organizing a committee to fire all the Japanese who are working in the schools. And Betty said her aunt and uncle who own an apartment house are nearly broke because their tenants won’t pay rent to Japanese.

  Pop says there’s nothing for me to worry about but he’s got dark circles under his eyes the size of dinner plates.

  Saturday, February 14, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Who cares about a silly junior high dance? I hope Bud and Debbie Sue had a lovely evening. I know I did — because Stan and Margie got married! Sure, the ceremony took place in the living room, but that didn’t stop it from being romantic. She wore her navy blue suit, with a gardenia corsage, and a new hat from Frederick and Nelson’s. Stan looked dreamy in his freshly starched Army uniform. Pop did the service, of course, and it seemed like the sermon was extra long because he had so much to say about being a good husband and being a good wife so that when he finally got to the “You may now kiss the bride” part, Margie let out a whoop and threw her arms around Stan’s neck. His face turned bright red and we all laughed.

  Afterward, Mrs. Harada brought out her red velvet cake and paper cups of plum wine — I didn’t get any. I took lots of pictures so Hank would feel like he’d been the
re with us. It wasn’t like the society weddings they show in Vogue magazine, but it looked to me like Margie didn’t mind one bit.

  Monday, February 16, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Stan shipped out today. I heard Margie crying in the shower but when she came out, her face looked like it did on any other normal day. She did all her morning chores and even made a casserole for Mrs. Harada before she went to class. I guess you don’t need to wear a uniform to be a hero.

  Wednesday, February 18, 1942

  DeeDee —

  Margie got a job at Boeing! It means putting school on hold for a bit but she said if being a “Margie Mechanic” gets Stan and Hank home sooner, she’s game. She showed me her new toolbox. So far it has exactly two tools in it. Her boss had kittens when he saw it but she told him she couldn’t afford to buy more until the end of the month when she’ll get paid, and that was that. She’s something else! Everyone at work gets called by their last name, men and women. Since Margie’s married, it’s not “Davis,” but “Robinson.” The only person who doesn’t get called by her last name is this one girl whose name is Norma Schanzenbach. The boss calls her “Schanzy.”