Unbreak My Heart

by Lauren Blakely

  “No, I mean it.”

  “I know you mean it.”

  “I’m just saying, there’s no substitute for experience.”

  She arches a brow as we near an intersection. “I think we both know what would happen if we embarked on that field trip.”

  We stop at the light, and I look her in the eyes. “What would happen?”

  She answers matter-of-factly. “We’d never leave the bedroom.”

  I groan at the images flickering before my eyes. Holland stripping off the yellow T-shirt she’s wearing, sliding out of those jeans, peeling off her panties. “I’d be fine with that. Also, thanks a lot for putting those ideas in my head right before I meet my brother’s girl.”

  “I suspect you had them in your head already,” she says, then gives me a flirty look.

  She’s flirtier over here, and I half wonder if it’s something in the water, or if it’s the escape from Los Angeles, a city that had become the epicenter of so much loss in my life.

  I wink at her, since I like the flirty zone—it’s a happy place, and that’s where I’d like to be. “That is true. Those ideas are pretty much always present, especially after you launched yourself at me this morning in front of the vending machine.”

  Her eyes widen. “It was a mutual launch.”

  “All systems were go.”

  She points to the small park across the street. “Also, there she is.”

  I follow her gesture to find a woman tossing scraps of bread to squirrels.

  “She’s a squirrel feeder,” I say in wonder as I see Kana in the flesh for the first time.

  “Just like us,” Holland adds quietly. “Only a different launch pad.”

  Instantly, I catalog the woman, as if her appearance will unlock clues. Red buckle shoes prop her up a few inches taller, and her purple blouse ripples in the breeze. She wears a short black skirt, pleated and a little playful. She fits in so well with this city—colorful, but not outrageous.

  Holland shouts to her in Japanese, saying “Hey girl,” I think.

  As the dark-haired woman turns, the moment slows to a surreal crawl, and that’s my fault because I’ve invested it with so much, like Kana is a vessel for all the secrets of the universe. Or mine, at least.

  But now I see she’s just a woman a few years older than we are, who’s feeding wildlife in a city park.

  Time speeds up when she waves back, then ticks faster as she sees me. We close the distance, but she’s speedier, walking to me, her brown eyes wide and earnest, her lips curved into a smile.

  Before she can say a word, and before I can mouth an awkward hello, her arms are around me.

  “It’s so good to finally meet you.” It sounds like it’s as much of a relief for her as it is for me. As if she needed this too.

  Like that, the weirdness disappears.

  We separate, and Holland says, “Guess I don’t really need to introduce you two.”

  “I feel like I know you,” Kana says to me, with only a trace of an accent. I remember Ian telling me she went to college in the United States and lived in San Francisco for a few years before returning to her home.

  “It’s good to meet you,” I say, since I can’t really say the same—I don’t know her at all. But I want to know her better.

  “Come. Sit.” Kana points to the park bench. “We can chat.”

  Holland waves goodbye.

  “You’re leaving?” I ask her.

  She smiles. “You guys don’t need me.”

  And I suppose she’s right. If she stayed, she’d be a safety net, and this isn’t about her.

  “I’ll see you later?” I hope so.

  She mimes typing on her phone. “You know where to find me.”

  Holland walks away, and I watch her for a few seconds, her bright blonde hair a contrast to the rest of the city.

  “You look like Ian,” Kana says.

  “People usually say that.”

  “But he was better looking.”

  I crack up at her dry humor. “Can’t say it’s a bad thing that you think that.”

  She smiles again, and it’s a warm, winning kind of grin. “I’m so sorry we never met before, but I want to let you know, if you need anything while you’re in town, I’ll do everything I can to help.”

  I rub my palms on the fabric of my shorts. “Thanks. I’m not sure what I need.”

  “How long are you here?”

  I glance up at the sky as if the answer is in the clouds. “I’m here for as long as I have to be, I guess.”

  She smiles softly. “I understand. You want to know the sides of Ian you feel you didn’t know.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m not sure I had a special view into him, but I’ll do what I can to share.”

  Since she’s being so direct, I cut to the chase. “What do you know about the meds? Did he stop taking them?”

  She offers a rueful smile, and in it, I sense she’s about to tell me some sad truth. “I didn’t keep track of that,” she says, surprising me. “We honestly didn’t talk that much about his illness.”

  That’s not what I expected to hear. “You didn’t?”

  She shakes her head, runs her slim fingers through her thick black hair. “We talked about a million other things. We talked about music, and the best type of soba noodles. We talked about books, and whether mango boba tea was better than milk tea. We talked about baseball, and he tried valiantly, even until the bitter end, to convince me the Dodgers were the greatest.” She leans back on the bench, her eyes far away for a moment, then she meets my gaze. “But I remained loyal to my Tokyo Giants.”

  “And he remained ever loyal to the Dodgers.”

  “And he liked to come see me play.”

  “Play? Baseball?” I furrow my brow.

  She laughs, shaking her head. “Don’t I wish I could hit a fastball? No, he came to see my blues band. I play saxophone with some friends, and he’d watch me perform, and afterward, we’d drink tea, or eat mochi ice cream, or track down a noodle shop as we walked around the city at night.”

  I picture the two of them, and now I can see it. What was blurry moments ago is clearer. My brother was just a guy seeing a girl in her hometown.

  “Sounds a lot like dating,” I deadpan.

  She laughs. “Yes, it was exactly like dating.”

  “He was here a lot,” I say, fishing around for something, but I’m not sure what exactly.

  “He was, and yet it felt like never quite enough.”

  Those words hit me in the gut. That’s how it goes when you lose someone you love—you feel as if you never had enough time, enough memories with them.

  Then again, I had more moments with Ian than anyone else was lucky enough to have. There’s no one on earth who amassed more hours with the guy than I did.

  And yet, what I wouldn’t give for another day.

  Another ball game to cheer at.

  Another chance to dunk his head underwater in the pool. And to be dunked.

  Another pizza and a movie night.

  My throat tightens, but I push my way through, returning my focus to Kana, who also wanted more time.

  “Were you in love with him?” Maybe it’s strange to ask. Maybe it’s fucking obvious. All signs point to yes. But even so, I want to hear from her.

  Her smile is soft, and her eyes are true. “Very much so.”

  It’s not that I doubted that she loved him, but Kana has always been abstract to me. She’s someone Ian talked about from time to time. She’s someone he visited. But she hasn’t been entirely real to me.

  Until now.

  I’m not the one to give comfort, but it feels like an affront to the universe if I don’t let her know how much she mattered to him. “He felt the same way about you.”

  She nods and whispers a quiet thank you.

  But dating, and loving, involves harder stuff too. I clear my throat, pushing past the prying nature of the question I need to ask. “May I ask if you went with him to h
is appointments and stuff? Like Dr. Takahashi?”

  “I did, but Ian didn’t see him every time he was here. He saw him perhaps a half dozen times,” she says. That’s another puzzle piece, but I can’t quite slide it in. I don’t know if a handful of appointments means Takahashi was a voodoo doctor or something else. “He brought me along because he loved to spend time in the Asakusa district of town, where the doctor is, and he wanted to share it with me.”

  “He did?”

  She smiles. “After his appointments, we’d walk through the nearby shopping arcade. You know the kind that sells fans and little cat statues with the waving arms?”

  She mimes the movement, and I nod.

  “And we’d grab chocolate-dipped biscuits or jelly crepes. He liked to joke that it was a good thing the doctor was located in such a cool area.”

  “I need to see the doctor. I left him a message a few days ago. But I went there today, and there was no answer.”

  “Oh,” Kana says, her expression turning sad.

  “What’s that for?”

  She winces as if she has bad news. But I can handle bad news. It’s what I do. “He’s in Tibet for a few weeks. I came to know one of the ladies who works there, a receptionist. She mentioned it to me during one of Ian’s appointments while I was waiting for him. The doctor treats the indigent for no charge for a month every summer.”

  “He’ll be gone for a few weeks?”

  She nods.

  I sigh heavily then shrug. “I guess that means I won’t see him for a few weeks, then.”

  She flashes a smile. “Tokyo is not a bad place to pass the time. I’ll be working, but I’m happy to show you around when I can. Maybe to see some of Ian’s favorite places?”

  She’s an angel. “I would love that.” Feeling a bit like a cartoon character batting his or her eyes, I ask, “Can you take me to the teahouse?”

  “Yes, but it’s closed right now. Would you want to meet again on Wednesday to go?”

  I would love to. That’s another step closer to knowing Ian better. Already, I’ve learned the person who drew my brother to this side of the world is exactly the kind of woman I’m glad he spent his final year with—one who is passionate, kind, and loving.

  That’s a damn good thing to uncover.

  Even so, a tinge of sadness hangs over me as I look back on the last few months I had with him. I was so damn busy with school. Hell, he’d wanted me to stay busy. He’d urged me to focus on classes.

  And I still wish . . . I still fucking regret that I didn’t toss out the final semester and finish law school another time.

  Ian would have killed me if I’d done that, though, and that thought makes me laugh out loud.

  Kana smiles curiously. “Everything okay?”

  “I was just thinking how I wish I had ditched all my classes last semester to hang out with Ian more.”

  She cracks up. “As if he would have permitted that.”

  I crack up too, picturing the look on his face. “Yeah, you’re right. He would have won that battle.”

  “He definitely would have won that battle. In fact, I think he did.”

  “He got what he wanted.”

  “You finished.”

  I nod, smiling. “I did. He wanted that.”

  And maybe that’s more important than what I wanted.

  19

  Andrew

  The next morning is different.

  I know what to say to Holland when I wake up.

  Andrew: What’s on the agenda today, tour guide?

  Holland: I’m your tour guide now?

  Andrew: Um, yeah. Hello? Sidekick duties call.

  Holland: Oh, but of course. Part of sidekick duties includes serving as your tour guide. Let me go check the TripAdvisor in my brain.

  Andrew: It’s right next to your Yelp reviews.

  Holland: It is! Let’s see . . . I need to pick up a few things for my apartment, so we could run errands or . . .

  Andrew: I love errands. But I like the “or” better.

  Holland: Meet me at the station in thirty minutes.

  I like this option, and I don’t even know what it is.

  * * *

  We exit Nakameguro Station, and after one block, we’re walking through a quiet residential area of the city.

  “This is unexpected,” I say.

  Holland nods excitedly. “One of my former co-workers lives here. She invited me to dinner last year, and I’d never been to this neighborhood before. I fell in love with it instantly.”

  As we wander down a cherry-blossom-lined canal, I can see why. There’s a calm energy here that’s a counterpoint to Shibuya. Tiny restaurants without English menus run the length of the canal, and little old ladies carry shopping bags with groceries, while young parents push strollers.

  “It’s a little escape from all the noise. Don’t get me wrong. I love the sounds and lights of the city,” she says as we walk to the edge of the canal, stopping at the railing. “But I love finding these little enclaves too. I used to come here now and then when I wanted to . . . go quiet.”

  “Did you need that a lot?” I ask, imagining her in this same spot a year ago, by herself, staring at the placid water below.

  “Sometimes. My job was a little crazy—late nights, wanting to impress the doctors. Every now and then I needed to recharge, so I came here if I couldn’t get away to Kyoto.”

  That’s where her folks retired to, three hours away. “Did you see your parents a lot?”

  She nods, her eyes sparkling as they do when she talks about them. “At least once or twice a month. Lunches, dinners, or just days spent shopping and wandering around the city. Sometimes I’d go to Kyoto for the weekend and crash at their place.”

  “That must have been nice.” I’m both happy for her and a little wistful too, wishing I could see mine for a weekend. “What else did you do while you were here in Tokyo?”

  “You want me to fill in the last three years?” she asks, with a laugh.

  “Kind of.”

  “Besides missing you?”

  I scoff. “You didn’t miss me that much.”

  She stares sharply at me. “Did you miss me?”

  “You know I did.”

  “And I missed you. I thought about you a lot,” she says, her words soft and tender, thawing a cold piece of me.

  “So we were sad sacks, missing each other,” I tease.

  “Maybe we were. I mean, look. It was hard, but I had to focus on school and so did you. We agreed to that, and I think we both did that. But I also didn’t ever stop thinking about you.”

  Her admission kick-starts another part of my engine. I reach for a strand of her hair because it’s almost impossible to not touch her at a time like this. “Did you think about me when you drew blood?” I ask, in a pretend-sexy voice.

  She laughs and responds in a smoky tone, “When I gave shots too.”

  I wiggle my eyebrows as I run my fingers along that strand. “What about when you took temperatures?”

  “All the time. Just like I’m sure you couldn’t stop thinking of me when you read case law.”

  “Torts, baby. Images of you got me through torts.”

  She laughs loudly.

  I let go of her hair, and she nudges my waist with her elbow. “It’s good to be here with you. To show you stuff. Want to see the neighborhood?”

  “I do.”

  We spend the rest of the day wandering through this quieter section of the city as she catches me up on nursing school, doctors she worked with last year on the job, friends she made, and days she spent seeing her parents and her sister. I notice she doesn’t mention a boyfriend, or any guys for that matter. I can’t resist asking, even if it’s sticking my finger in the flame. Maybe I need to know if it’ll burn. “Did you date? See anyone?”

  She shakes her head, and I relax slightly. “Not really, no,” she answers.

  “Not really or no?”

  “C’mon. They’re pretty much the
same. The point is I didn’t really date. I didn’t meet anyone I fell for. Did you?” she asks, turning the question back on me as we round a street corner. “Some pretty legal eagle?”

  My lips curve into a grin. “Not really. No.”

  “Not really or no?”

  “Holland, I didn’t meet anyone I fell for. That would be a logical impossibility.”

  She lifts her hand and gently runs her fingers over my hair. “Good. I don’t like the thought of you falling for someone else.”

  That’s one thing she won’t ever have to worry about.

  20

  Andrew

  The next day I meet Kana at the park, and she guides me through streets I never knew existed. I try to swat away a nagging worry that after all this, after five thousand miles, I might leave with no more than I came with. What if there’s nothing at the teahouse, and all I learn is Ian liked to drink tea? No conclusive evidence. Case closed.

  As we dart across a busy intersection, I make myself focus on Kana and what she’s saying about Tokyo. We turn onto a quieter road as she chats about how the city was built this way after the wars, with zigzag streets that crisscross haphazardly to make it tough for invaders to march straight through the town and seize it.

  “The city itself was designed to protect its citizens,” I say.

  She nods enthusiastically. “Such a smart strategy, but sometimes it backfires. I’ve lived here most of my life, and I can’t always find everything.”

  “You seem to be doing a pretty good job,” I say as she points to a narrow alley to turn down.

  At the end of a street that’s more like a narrow stone path, we reach a wrought-iron fence. Kana opens it, and I follow her into a small, fenced-in garden, then down a winding path, past trees and bushes. Behind the largest tree is a small teahouse, perched at the edge of a pond.

  When we reach an ancient-looking door with traditional Japanese writing across the front, she whispers with reverence, “This is the Tatsuma Teahouse.”