Falling into the Dragon's Mouth

by Holly Thompson

  why aren’t you in juku?

  even they ask me

  even though they know I study

  in an English group

  once a week

  and my tutor comes

  twice a week

  what they mean is

  why don’t I go to cram school

  so I can test into a private school

  so I can avoid going

  to the local middle school

  where people like

  Shunta, Yuki, and Gō will rule

  together with other thugs

  from all three elementary schools

  that feed into our middle school

  I haven’t told them

  that I’ve already applied

  to an international school

  that I’ve already been accepted

  and could start right now

  I don’t want to tell them

  that the only problem now

  is money

  which is why

  Mom is teaching extra classes

  and why she’s not home on Wednesdays

  when Cora’s grade lets out early

  and why she’s trying to get a full-time job

  like Dad at a university

  and why she goes on interviews

  and fills out applications

  and tries to publish papers

  and speak at conferences

  and why I’m learning to cook

  and buy groceries

  and take care of Cora

  I don’t want to get into this

  with Yōhei, Shō, and Ken

  so I tell them

  I’m studying with my tutor

  but we just don’t know

  which schools I’ll apply to yet

  since my Japanese is weak

  they shrug

  and don’t ask more questions

  about schools

  just

  who’s on whose side

  for two-on-two soccer

  after barely a game

  they all have to leave

  so I go home, wash up

  and head out again, still with

  forty minutes till five o’clock chimes

  I ride my bike downhill

  in and out of back lanes

  to the butcher shop

  and order four skewers—

  chicken with scallions

  to go I say

  I wait while they grill the skewers

  and when they hand me an extra

  and say sābisu

  I ask them to add that

  to the bag, too

  I hang the bag from my handlebar

  ride to the main road

  then the side lane

  and park my bicycle

  along the riverside path

  where the motorbike

  must have been left

  and the sandal

  must have been dropped

  I take the bag to the gate

  and ring the bell

  when no one answers

  I ring again

  then that slurry voice

  comes over the intercom

  it’s me, Jason, the boy

  you gave the sandal to

  during the fire I say

  ah! the voice says

  dōzo!—come in

  I push at the gate

  the front door opens

  and he stands there

  I bow, hold out the bag—

  I brought some yakitori

  and suddenly I think

  this was a mistake

  because he’s scowling

  and maybe he can’t

  chew it

  or swallow it

  or digest it—

  can you eat it?

  yakitori? he says

  sure! come in!

  so I follow his

  flapping hand

  and step up to the

  entryway

  and into

  Takemura-san’s world

  Chapter 14

  BRAIN LEAP

  after my tutor session

  after Yūsuke has left

  after dinner

  in our room

  Cora is furious

  when I tell her

  where I went

  Takemura-san’s? the man with the stick?

  why didn’t you take me?

  I solved the crime as much as you!

  I was the one actually listening to him!

  after my bath

  Cora tries to keep me out of my our room

  hiding my box of international coins

  which I search for and know is missing

  the second I finally barge in

  so I scoop up

  stuffed animals as hostages

  and go outside to the laundry balcony

  and threaten to drop them over the edge

  to the dark ground below

  she screams

  Dad comes up

  yells at me

  and sends me

  downstairs to wash

  all the dinner dishes

  the rice cooker

  and even the smelly

  composter pot

  when I go up later

  Cora is the one who says sorry

  so after a while

  I sit down in the cave

  of her lower bunk

  and tell her about

  Takemura-san

  how sometimes his speech is clear

  but other times not

  how his mouth scowls

  from the Parkinson’s

  how he gets stuck

  and can’t move

  and how his daughter

  was there and showed me

  how to put my foot

  crosswise in front of his

  to make his leg think

  it has to step up and over I tell Cora

  which gets him moving

  in our bedroom

  I show her the way

  that Takemura-san’s feet

  seemed glued to the floor

  then I make her

  put her foot

  crosswise to one of mine

  and I unstick my foot

  and step over

  I don’t tell Cora

  how weird it felt

  being there in a stranger’s house

  in the home of a scowling old man

  or how at his kitchen table

  I wanted to escape

  as I listened so hard

  but couldn’t understand

  even after he repeated words

  again and again

  until finally his loud daughter came in

  the one who’d been standing with

  hands on hips after the fire

  and served us barley tea

  and explained things

  like the crosswise foot

  and that her father doesn’t smile

  because of the disease

  and that he looks angry but isn’t

  and that it’s okay to ask him

  to repeat his words

  again and again

  and again

  it’s like a miracle Cora whispers

  your foot making the top of a T

  across his foot

  the way it makes

  his stuck foot think

  it can move

  I don’t know about a miracle

  maybe more like a brain leap

  like mind over matter

  but then I’m thinking

  what if someone’s not with him?

  how long does he stay stuck

  before his feet

  move forward again?

  Chapter 15

  RESOURCES

  weekends are so much better than weeks

  because they start with double aikido

  on Saturday morning

  then soccer in the park

  and Sunday is a family hike

  then chore
s and homework

  but weekdays

  follow weekends

  and Sunday nights

  I have to center myself

  and prepare to return

  to the Dragon’s Mouth

  it’s not actually called

  Dragon’s Mouth anymore

  that name goes way back

  to when the school was connected

  to Dragon’s Mouth temple

  now the school’s called

  Ridge Way Elementary or

  Ridgeline Pass Elementary

  or however you want to

  translate the Japanese

  but Dragon’s Mouth

  seems a better fit

  to me

  this Monday at school

  I manage to hold my center

  all day long

  but by the time Mom and Cora pick me up

  I feel like I’ve been at the dojo for six hours

  alert

  ready every second

  my whole body trembling

  from concentration

  and exertion

  I sleep all the way to Yokohama

  in English group

  the olders and youngers both

  are still doing economics

  supply and demand

  goods and services

  then we olders have to look at photos

  and decide which are the

  human

  natural

  or capital

  resources

  and teach the youngers

  I’m so tired of this unit

  and can’t wait to start the next

  on marine ecosystems

  and intertidal life

  since Mom promises to take us

  down the coast of Miura

  to a place where the tide pools

  are full of everything—

  anemones

  crabs

  sea slugs that squirt purple

  urchins and abalone

  and sometimes

  an octopus

  but Trina’s mom announces

  that we’re extending this unit

  another couple weeks

  for a special project

  Trina and Ami seem happy

  since they think they want to start

  their own business

  in fashion or shoes

  but Nenita, Will, and I groan

  and use our capital resource—our brains—

  to petition the parents to also extend

  the marine unit by two weeks

  and we win

  hah!

  Chapter 16

  BROOMS

  just like Monday

  Tuesday morning

  at school goes okay

  so long as I’m always

  on alert

  but when lunch recess ends

  I discover

  someone has taken

  my indoor shoes

  it’s not the first time

  and I know the places

  I can look:

  toilets

  tops of high cabinets

  first graders’ cubbies

  but it’s cleaning time

  and I’m late

  so I head

  to the music room

  in my socks

  and late means

  the brooms and mop

  are already taken

  and I’m stuck again

  with the dustpan

  in the music room

  desks have been pushed aside

  Naho and Yuki are sweeping

  Mika’s riding a mop

  and Shunta and Gō

  have unscrewed and removed

  both of the wide broom heads

  and they’re running around

  waving the long handles

  like samurai swords

  cleaning in socks? Shunta says

  in fake surprise

  no indoor shoes? Gō says

  slicing the air above my head

  Shunta points to a dust pile

  and commands me to

  sweep it

  into my dustpan

  to use a dustpan

  you have to squat down

  and as soon

  as you start to sweep

  into the pan

  you lose your center

  and you can be whacked

  on the butt

  with a broom

  or mopped

  on the head

  the question is

  whether to duck

  and roll out of the way

  or not

  Naho taunts

  missed a spot she says

  I sweep

  here

  she points

  and here

  faster and faster

  I sweep up dust pile

  after dust pile

  then Yuki

  starts pointing at random

  do it

  she says

  I don’t

  and suddenly

  a broom handle

  cracks on my head

  just above my ear

  I drop the brush and dustpan

  put one hand to my head

  and keep my other hand

  fisted

  ready

  for the rest of cleaning

  I just sit on a desk

  in the corner

  my back to the wall

  facing them all

  it’s not bleeding much

  but I smear it over my palm

  so they can see

  and finally

  they leave me alone

  Mom yells at me

  for my filthy socks

  and makes me scrub them

  and hang them out myself

  I don’t tell her

  about my missing indoor shoes

  finally found with the guest slippers

  at the front school entrance

  I don’t tell her about the lump

  on the side of my head that I dab

  with a soapy washcloth before rinsing

  and climbing into the tub

  I don’t tell her that the floor

  in our school is filthy

  because brooms are not so much used

  for sweeping

  I don’t tell her

  because I don’t want her

  interfering at school

  making things in the Dragon’s Mouth

  even worse

  Chapter 17

  DANGO

  on Wednesday

  at the after-school center

  I take off my shoes

  nod to the women

  in the closet office

  and search for Cora

  in one room, two boys are

  climbing over stacks of foam blocks

  in another room, four kids

  play soccer with a book

  in a third room, kids hurl a rubber ball

  high speed, wall to wall

  I slide open the doors

  to the backyard

  step down and into

  some plastic sandals

  across the yard

  I can see Cora

  in the sandpit

  making dango

  not dango to eat—

  gluey balls of mochi

  with sweet sauces on top—

  but doro dango

  mud dango

  dirt balls

  Cora is a doro dango expert

  ever since preschool

  in the back garden at home

  there are always dango

  decorated with flower petals

  or blades of grass or leaves

  or sprinkled with dry sand

  or topped with a red berry

  Cora’s Doro Dango Recipe

  fill a cup of water

  from a tap

  dampen dark sand

  scoop a handful

  to mold

  add mo
re sand

  smooth it

  add more sand

  smooth it

  and smooth it

  to form a perfect sphere

  each takes five minutes or more

  and sometimes they break

  another girl is with her

  in the yard making dango

  and they have ten dango

  lined up along a tree root

  wow, you made lots

  I say to her in Japanese

  knowing better than to speak to her

  in English in front of a friend

  un—yeah, she says

  let’s go I say in Japanese

  mada—not yet, she says

  she’s polishing a dango

  I wait awhile longer

  say let’s go again

  and once more she says mada!

  so I switch to English

  we won’t have time for an adventure

  she smooths the dango

  gently sets it down

  by the tree root

  where it promptly splits

  I think we’re stuck here

  for another ten minutes

  but the other girl

  hands her a leaf

  Cora thanks her

  sets the leaf

  over the crack

  and turns to me to go

  she doesn’t speak to me in English

  until we’re outside

  practically halfway up the hill

  to our neighborhood

  it’s better there in the garden she says

  then she shifts back into

  her pain-in-the-neck sister self

  what’s our adventure today

  it better not be just a park

  and it better not be a fire

  do you even have a plan today?

  when I don’t answer

  she says see?

  so I start walking fast uphill

  which is pretty impossible since

  the road is so steep there are

  circles cut in the concrete

  to keep cars from slipping

  we trudge ahead

  crest the hill

  run down the other side

  turn left at our road

  climb again to our house

  and inside on the table

  in the kitchen

  is a note

  two cups

  two bananas

  and some coins

  Drink some water

  eat the bananas

  then you can buy snacks

  at the futon shop.

  But save enough money to buy

  milk on your way home!

  xoxoxoxoxoxo

  Mom

  Cora cheers

  and we eat our bananas

  fast

  the futon shop

  where we park our bikes

  is Cora’s favorite shop

  because this futon shop

  doesn’t sell only

  futons, pillows, and blankets

  but also dagashi candies

  soda-flavored sours