Cherry Blossom Baseball

by Jennifer Maruno

  Michiko nodded.

  “She could make you one too,” Annie continued. “Then we could pretend to be twins.”

  Michiko smiled at the little girl’s silly thought.

  Annie glanced at the small drawstring bag that Michiko carried. “What’s in the bag?”

  “Gym clothes,” Michiko said. She realized that even the longest of answers wouldn’t stop Annie’s inquisitiveness, so she kept them short.

  Michiko had been surprised when Miss Barnhart told her to write gym outfit on her list. Her mother wasn’t, however, and the next day she came home from school to find a navy blue jumper with a bib top, large pleated skirt, and matching bloomers on her bed. A dress for physical education? Michiko wondered. “What about running shoes?” she asked in a voice full of hope.

  “They weren’t on the list,” her mother replied. “Besides, winter boots come first.”

  “But I can’t do gym in my saddle shoes,” Michiko complained. “They’re too hard.”

  Eiko thought for a moment. “Then take those with you.”

  Michiko looked down at her battered corduroy house shoes. The rubber soles curled in at the edges, and there was a worn spot over each toe. “You want me to wear my slippers at school?” she shrieked. She threw herself face down onto her bed and covered her head with a pillow.

  Eiko frowned and put her hands on her hips. “There are far more important things to spend money on in this world,” she said as she left the room.

  Michiko turned to the wall and sighed. If she wore slippers for gym, Carolyn Leahey would never stop making fun of her. She’s just like George King, Michiko realized when her mother left. He had made her life miserable in her old town, and Carolyn was doing the same here.

  “Billy is going to join the chess club,” Annie said, bringing her back to reality. “He told my dad he’s going to learn how to beat him. What about you?”

  Annie’s question set Michiko thinking. She’d completely forgotten about Sign-Up Day. The school offered special clubs in the winter months, and once a week classes would be dismissed early for extracurricular activities. Because of the war, daylight savings time was observed all year long. Town students needed written permission to walk home or had to be picked up. Carolyn made a big production of offering anyone a ride home in her father’s old car. She never stopped bragging about their new convertible that would arrive in the summer. She claimed her father had chosen the green colour to match her eyes.

  Michiko was just going to have to stay out of Carolyn’s way as much as possible, and that meant making sure they were not in the same club. Then she had an idea.

  “Annie,” she said as they got off the bus, “would you like to do me a favour?”

  “Sure,” the little girl said, her eyes lighting up as she broke into a wide smile.

  “Do you know a girl named Carolyn in my class?”

  “Carolyn the Creep?” Annie rolled her eyes. “Billy complains about her all the time.”

  “Would you find out what club she’s going to join and let me know at afternoon recess?”

  Annie nodded and dashed across the playground to get in line.

  “Don’t forget to put your name on the club lists before you leave,” Miss Barnhart reminded the class at dismissal. “The sheets are on the bulletin board outside the office.”

  Michiko followed the line of students down the hall. Anything but choir, she told herself as she stared at the labelled sheets of paper before her.

  Checkers, Chess, Choir, Cooking, Junior Horti­cultural, Indoor Sports, Junior Farmers, Knitting, Pen Pals, Sewing, and Stamp Collecting were the choices. These choices aren’t that much fun, she thought. In their Japanese clubs they had learned origami, which was how she knew to make paper flowers. Some kids, like her friend Kiko, learned taiko. Her aunt taught odori. Michiko looked up and down the lists again.

  “Hurry up,” someone called out from the back, “I ain’t got all day.”

  “Yeah,” Carolyn’s shrill voice rose above the others. “Hurry up, Jap Girl.”

  Michiko froze, holding her pencil in midair.

  “She’s Japanese?” someone asked. “I thought she was Chinese.”

  “Aren’t we fighting the Japs?” someone else asked.

  “You’re not kidding,” a boy said. “Kamikazes sank a carrier in the Pacific last week.”

  “What’s a kamikaze?” another boy asked.

  “Why don’t you ask her?” Carolyn suggested. “They’re her people.”

  “What?”

  Several students moved forward to hear better.

  “Hey,” someone cried out. “Quit pushing.”

  “Settle down,” one of the teachers called out as he came out of the office. “Form a line and take turns, like good citizens.”

  Michiko could hardly see the paper in front of her when she signed her name. As she made her way to the bus, all she could think was, Not again, not here too.

  “Mr. Takahashi and Dad spoke Japanese,” Michiko said that night while doing the dishes. “But I didn’t understand most of it.”

  Eiko turned a plate over to examine its cleanliness.

  “What is jidosha and yakyu?” Michiko asked.

  “Jidosha means car,” her mother replied, “and yakyu means baseball. You should know those words by now,” she said. “That’s all your father ever talks about, cars and baseball.”

  “There was another word,” Michiko said, working to keep her voice even. “What does kamikaze mean?”

  Her mother put the dish on the table and looked at Michiko with a furrowed brow.

  “Kamikaze,” she repeated. “That’s really two words. Kami is the word for god or divine spirit, and kaze means wind.” Eiko shook her head. “What on earth could they be discussing?”

  “Probably just someone’s pitching style,” Michiko said, skipping off to her room. She closed the door and sat at the end of her bed. Those Japanese pilots must come out of the sky like lightning, she thought. She picked up one of her slippers and threw it across the room. Being Japanese is wrecking my whole life.

  The next morning, Michiko sat with her head in her hands at the breakfast table. Her mother placed a bowl of rice in front of her. She looked up and pushed it away. “Why can’t we drink orange juice and eat cereal like everyone else?”

  “How do you know everyone else eats cereal?”

  How could she possibly explain her constant embarrassment during morning health inspection? Carolyn, this week’s inspector, took her job of checking for clean fingernails, a handkerchief, and a good breakfast very seriously. Instead of asking, “Did you have a good breakfast?” Carolyn demanded to know what everyone ate and mocked their responses. She loved it when Michiko responded by saying “Rice.”

  “Rice?” Carolyn would repeat in a loud voice, feigning utter amazement. “You had rice for breakfast?”

  “I am the only one in my class who has rice for breakfast,” Michiko said to her mother.

  “Well,” her mother said, “it’s your father’s favourite breakfast food.”

  “Well, it is not mine,” Michiko said loudly as she shoved the bowl across the table. “He can have two helpings from now on.”

  ESCAPE

  The gladioli fields were now just row upon row of twisted brown spikes. Michiko’s father had told her bulbs couldn’t be left in the ground over the winter. After digging them out, he and Mr. Palumbo would braid the leaves and hang them in the barn.

  Michiko’s shiny dark pigtails swung back and forth across the wide blue straps of her new overalls as she walked to the village to buy stamps. She had hoped she would finally get to live in a city of tall buildings and department stores, but all the village had to offer was a hardware store, drug store, grocery store, and school. It was no different than the ghost town.

  Allen’s Pharmacy had both Canadian and American flags in the window. Inside, Michiko spotted the familiar things from their drugstore: tooth paste, soap, talcum powder, and red rubber hot wa
ter bottles. She grimaced at the large bottles of cod liver oil but noticed they sold giant chocolate bars and big bags of popcorn already popped. They had greeting cards, wrapping paper, and something called hair spray. There was even a cooler full of popsicles and little cardboard cups of ice cream. When the brass bell above the shop door tinkled, Michiko remembered how much she liked the friendly chatter of their customers at her father’s drug store, with all their bits and pieces of news.

  She stood in line reading the handwritten signs posted on the cash register. Bed Sitting Room $30.00 made her think how good it would be to have her aunt and uncle rent it.

  “Hello, Millie.” A familiar, unwelcome voice broke into her thoughts.

  Michiko pretended not to hear Carolyn, even though she could feel the girl’s warm breath on her neck. She moved her gaze to the ground, noticing the spotless white toes of the girl’s majorette boots. Her own brown leatherwork boots, even though they were brand new, felt out of place beside those snub-nosed boots with their perfect tassels.

  “I said hello,” Carolyn said, with a nudge of her elbow. Her voice was friendly, as if there wouldn’t be a confrontation, but Michiko knew it wouldn’t last. She’d learned that much from George King. “I guess your thoughts are elsewhere,” Carolyn said with a smile. “I suppose your father is away fighting with the rest of the soldiers.”

  Michiko felt her face grow hot as the person in front of her turned to look.

  “Is he fighting for Japan or Canada?” Carolyn asked. “Remind me, what side is he on?”

  Michiko took a breath and faced the girl. “My father has no side.”

  “What do you mean he has no side?” Carolyn said in a voice she made loud enough for all customers in the store to hear. “Everyone has to take a side when there is fighting.”

  There were nods from the people who stood around listening.

  “He should be off fighting,” Carolyn said. “Everyone else is.”

  Michiko’s throat tightened as she moved forward in line.

  Billy stepped out from one of the aisles. “That’s not true, Carolyn,” he said. “Someone has to stay home for the country.”

  Carolyn turned her back on him and continued. “So if your father didn’t go off to war, what exactly did he stay home to do …” she paused, looked at Billy and said, “… for the country?”

  Michiko felt like a tadpole in a glass jar. She turned to Carolyn and took a deep breath. “My dad built roads,” she blurted out.

  “How do you build a road?” Carolyn let out a large, horse-like snort. “A road isn’t made out of wood and bricks, like a house.”

  “He had to use dynamite to blast through the mountains,” Michiko said in a voice she hoped was as loud as Carolyn’s.

  “Wow,” Billy said. “I didn’t know that. That’s just as dangerous as being in the war.”

  Carolyn gave the boy a look of disdain. “I think your father went to work in the mountains just to avoid getting killed, like all the really, really, brave men.” She made it sound as if getting killed was the only way to prove bravery.

  “And what is your father doing, Carolyn?” Billy asked. “Is he out fighting?”

  Carolyn turned on her heel and marched out the door.

  Billy took Michiko by the elbow and led her away from the counter after she’d paid for her stamps. “They don’t call her Carolyn the Creep for nothing.”

  Michiko nodded. “I guess your dad didn’t go to war either.”

  “My dad,” Billy replied, “says it makes him mad listening to all the talk about the men overseas doing their part. He’s doing his part, too, but no one seems to think that way.”

  Michiko left the drugstore aware of the contemptuous stares from Carolyn and her girlfriends standing across the street. Carolyn pried the cardboard lid from her ice cream cup, licked it, and tossed it on the ground. She said something to her friends before she dug in with her wooden spoon, and they all laughed.

  Michiko decided she would wait on a bench in the harbour until they left rather than attempt to walk past them. As she approached the parking lot, she spotted Naggie lounging in front of his grocery truck. She sat down amid the smell of the fishing boats tied up at the pier and listened to the slap of the waves. The breeze ruffled her hair as the seagulls engaged in their own arguments overhead.

  But instead of leaving, Carolyn and the girls moved toward her.

  The down on the back of Michiko’s neck rose. She walked to the back of Naggie’s truck and peeked around to see if they were really heading her way.

  “Hey, Millie,” Carolyn’s voice called out as they approached. “You visiting Chinky-Chinky-Chinaman?”

  Michiko mounted the steps, went inside the truck, and held her breath.

  Carolyn strode across the parking lot and called out, “Hey, Millie, where are you? I want to tell you something.”

  No, you don’t, Michiko thought. You want to make fun of me, like you always do, and you probably want to pinch me. The marks on her arm after their last confrontation at school had only just gone away. She pulled her ball cap from the back pocket of her overalls, stuffed her braids underneath, and crouched beside the stack of rice bags at the back. All she had to do was sit and wait for them to go away.

  The girls moved along the gravel lot to the side of the truck.

  “What you girls want to buy?” Naggie asked them as he followed them to the back.

  “Nothing from you,” Carolyn snapped. There was a burst of giggles from the other girls. “We’re looking for someone.”

  “No one here but me,” Naggie said. He lifted his set of steps and placed them inside.

  Just go away, Michiko thought as Naggie shut the door. She waited a few more minutes to make sure they had gone and stood to leave, but Naggie had started the engine. The shelves shook, the goods rattled, and the truck lurched forward.

  Michiko fell backward onto a sack of rice. She picked herself up, but the truck turned a corner and she fell sideways. She scrambled to her feet and grabbed on to the wooden shelves to steady herself as the truck picked up speed. This can’t be happening. Michiko knew she had to get the truck to stop before it went too far, but how? She looked about in desperation.

  Holding on to the shelves for support, Michiko reached for a bucket and an iron skillet. She made her way to the small counter Naggie used for weighing and packing. Bracing herself against the counter, she pounded them together. The truck slowed down for a moment.

  Michiko waited.

  The truck sped up.

  This time Michiko pounded the bucket and stomped her feet.

  The truck slowed down and swerved to one side. Michiko prayed Naggie was pulling over, but she didn’t dare wait for the truck to come to a complete stop. If he found her in the back, he would turn around and drive her home. That would end in trouble. She would have to make a jump for it before he got out of the cab. She stumbled toward the door.

  Her kick broke the rickety latch and the door swung open with a bang. Michiko watched the road move away from her, the grassy lawns to each side a blur. Taking a deep breath, she moved on to the rickety tailgate, clinging to the other door. She could feel the truck slowing down. Now or never, she thought as the truck came to a rolling stop.

  Michiko leapt to the side of the road, stumbled, and fell. She picked herself up, ran to a large, thick tree and hid behind it. It seemed to take forever before the engine started up again, but she dared not look until she heard it moving down the road, its wooden door tied with a long piece of frayed rope.

  She brushed the gravel from her hands and the knees of her brand new overalls. Wherever she was, she had a long trudge ahead of her. All she had to do was figure out which way to go.

  The chestnut tree Michiko hid behind was one of many that formed a huge avenue of trees on either side of a long drive. She walked until she came to a high, ornamental, wrought-iron fence. The gate, with a pattern of leaves, branches, and apples, stood open. The perfect green lawns before her w
ere empty, except for a solitary robin bouncing through the grass. Michiko watched him cock his head to one side and fix his bright yellow eye on her.

  “I know,” she said to the bird, “it was a stupid thing to do.”

  She made her way across the lawn toward the large stone building that sat well back from the road in the middle of sprawling green grounds. This huge Victorian building, with brick turrets and gables, had tall windows tucked tightly into the stone walls. Like a place one would read about in a storybook, it gave her a fairy tale sense of doom.

  Beside the steps, someone was pruning the bushes. The young man in a white T-shirt and blue jeans looked up from his gardening in surprise. He locked his shears and pushed back his baseball cap to watch her approach. A shock of blond hair fell across eyes the colour of a summer sky.

  “I know this is private property,” Michiko said to him. “I just need to know where I am.”

  “How can you not know where you are?” he asked with a small smile as he pushed back his hair and straightened his hat.

  “Umm,” Michiko said. “A friend dropped me off, but I guess at the wrong place.”

  “You don’t know this place?” The young man extended his arms, seeming to have difficulty believing she actually didn’t know where she was.

  Michiko shook her head. An enormous feeling of fear brimmed up inside her, and she didn’t want to speak.

  “Well,” he said, with a shrug, “you’re on the grounds of Applegate School, the finest boys school in all of Canada.”

  “Oh,” was all Michiko could say, because this information still didn’t give her any idea as to how she was going to find her way home.

  “Where were you headed?” the boy asked.

  “Bronte Village,” Michiko said.

  He opened his shears, preparing to return to work. “You’ve got a bit of a walk ahead of you,” he said as he snipped a dead branch from a bush. “Are you outside of the village or in the village itself?”