by Asha Lemmie
And then Nori knocked.
In an instant, the door flew open. Standing there was a plump woman in her late forties, with streaks of gray in her dark hair. Her maid’s uniform had a spot of jam on the apron.
“My God,” she breathed.
There was no mistaking her.
“It’s good to see you, Akiko-san.”
Akiko threw open her arms, and Nori fell into them. They stood that way, both shaking, for a long time.
“I’m so sorry,” the maid sobbed. “I’m so sorry, little madam.”
Nori shook her head. There was nothing Akiko could have done. In this world, there were those with power and those without.
“I don’t blame you,” she said simply.
Akiko drew her inside by both hands, shouting at someone to fetch the gentlemen, and refreshments.
Before Nori could blink, someone had taken her things and run them up the stairs.
Akiko guided her into a chair and knelt at her feet.
“My God!” she exclaimed again. “Let me look at you. Such a beautiful young woman you are. And if you aren’t the image of your mother.”
Nori inclined her head. “You’re very kind.”
Akiko’s face was streaked with tears. “It is so good to see you. Alive and safe and well. Thank God.”
Nori smiled and said nothing.
Akiko grasped her hands. “I wish I could have . . .”
“I know, Akiko-san.”
“I prayed for you,” she whispered. “Every night I prayed . . . and then I heard that the young master had . . .”
“Yes,” Nori cut her off sharply. She couldn’t hear his name. That was the one thing she really couldn’t bear.
Akiko fell silent. She knew this.
“And I have a daughter now,” she said, wiping at her face with her stained apron. “She’s twelve. Her name is Midori.”
Green.
Nori managed a small laugh. “That’s lovely. I’m so happy for you.”
Akiko reached up to press her palm against Nori’s cheek.
“I tell her of you,” she whispered. “I tell her all the time.”
Nori bit her lip. After all these years, in front of Akiko she felt like a lost little girl again.
“Thank you.”
There was a commotion in the other room, and Akiko shot to her feet.
“And these are your third cousins,” she said rapidly, in a low voice. “They will explain everything to you. I’ll be just outside.”
The look on Nori’s face must have betrayed her, and so instead Akiko retreated into the corner, silent but there.
Nori rose to her feet. Two gentlemen, both in dark suits, came into the sitting room and bowed.
There was an air of mockery about it that she did not like.
“Noriko-sama,” the first one said. He had an L-shaped scar on his right hand. “It is my great pleasure to welcome you back to your ancestral city. I am Hideki. And this is Hideo.”
He gestured to the man beside him, who smiled but did not speak.
“You wrote me the letter,” Nori said, ignoring the pleasantries. “Didn’t you?”
“Indeed I did,” Hideki said smoothly. “And may I say how pleased we are that you chose to come so promptly.”
Nori clenched her fists behind her back. “There was no need for your veiled threats,” she said flatly. “Now, please give me whatever it is that you need me to sign. I do have to be getting back soon.”
Hideki bowed his head. “I did not mean to threaten, my lady, of course. Your grandmother gave clear instructions that you were to be treated with all due respect.”
“So give me what I asked for, please.”
He exchanged a bemused glance with his cohort.
“We were told you were a shy, stuttering mess.”
Nori raised herself to her full height. “I was. Now, the papers, if you please.”
Both of them bowed simultaneously. “You must forgive us again, little princess.”
She felt a cold wind blow. “Why?” she said, through numb lips.
“Your lady grandmother gave strict instructions. It was not our intention to deceive you. Please know that we take no pleasure in it.”
There was a high-pitched whirring sound in her ears. The ceiling and the floor swapped places for a solid five seconds.
“What are you talking about?”
“Your grandmother will explain everything.”
The faces around her began to blur together like a grotesque watercolor painting.
“My grandmother is dead,” she whispered.
“Alas, no, my lady. She is upstairs, waiting for you.”
Nori felt it then. The sick fear that told her she was, indeed, back where she belonged. This was her true homecoming.
Once again, she was caught in the spider’s web.
* * *
AKIKO
She is horrified, as I knew she would be. I was vehemently against the plan to deceive her, but then, what I think has never made a difference.
I show her to one of the guest rooms, and I sit by her side as she collects herself. As she begins to calm down, she looks more annoyed than anything, and I smile at her defiant spirit.
She starts to ask me something, but then her mouth twists and she leans over the side of the bed and vomits into the trash can.
I fetch her a damp towel to clean herself with and frown. “Let me call a doctor.”
“I’m fine. Damn airplane made me nauseous.”
I take her in. Her face is flushed and her hands are shaking. Something in my gut tells me she’s not fine.
“I’m calling a doctor,” I declare.
She starts to protest again, but then she smiles ruefully and sighs.
When the doctor arrives, she answers his questions with a minimum of fuss. When he is finished with her, he crooks his finger at me and we retreat to the doorway.
“She’ll be all right,” he says, wiping at his sweaty face. “But I must advise against any undue stress. It’s not wise in her condition.”
I look at him blankly. “Condition?”
He frowns at me. “Well, yes. The lady is expecting.”
I croak like a frog, covering my mouth with my sleeve too late. “That’s quite impossible,” I say firmly.
But then I remember that she is not a child anymore, but a twenty-four-year-old woman who has been away from me for over a decade. I don’t know anything about her life now.
He looks at me like I’m a peasant.
“By various ways I can tell,” he says pompously. “I’d estimate she’s about three or four months. I’d need her blood to be certain of the progression. But one look at her told me she’s with child. I would bet my house on it.”
I look at the little madam, waving away another maid who is trying to get her to drink some tea. One glance at her face tells me that she doesn’t know.
He follows my gaze. “Oh,” he says. “Is she unmarried?”
His voice oozes condescension, and instantly, I am on the defense of the girl I could never protect.
“None of your damn business and you will mind your tongue in this house,” I hiss, “or I’ll have a word with my mistress about you.”
He bows his head. “I meant no offense. I can tell her the news, if you like.”
I don’t even consider it.
“I’ll take care of her. You may go. Speak nothing of this.”
He goes out. I dismiss everyone else from the room and the surrounding hallway, including that vulture Hideki with his beady, soulless eyes.
I smooth her hair away from her tired face.
“Now then, my dear, let’s get you into a hot bath.”
I guide her to the bathroom and fill the large tub up with steaming water,
just as I used to do. I strip her naked and brush her hair, as I used to do.
I note the fullness of her breasts and the ever-so-slight curve of her stomach, and I know what the doctor said is true. My eyes are drawn to a jagged scar, just above her heart. I know better than to ask how she got it.
I wash her back and agonize over what to say to her, how to break the news to this gentle creature who has already suffered so much.
“Tell me of your life,” I say, and she smiles.
She talks for hours, until the water goes cold. She speaks of the inhumane with grace; she shrugs off the unbearable with a grim smile. Her voice breaks when she tells me of Akira-sama, but she doesn’t cry. I think the only way she survived that loss was to carve out a piece of her heart.
He was everything to her.
When she gets to the part about her life now, I see her face light up with joy.
“And your lover, this boy . . . he is to be your husband?”
“As soon as I return to London.”
I feel truly sick at what I have to tell her.
“And what if you didn’t go back?”
She gives me a bewildered look. “Why wouldn’t I go back?”
“Your lady grandmother—”
“Is dying,” she cuts me off. “Yes, they mentioned. She has called me halfway across the world to absolve her old soul.”
I bite my tongue as I have done so often before. It is not my place.
There is only one thing I have to tell her now.
“Little madam . . . have you been feeling ill?”
She shrugs.
“I’ve felt worse.”
“Yes. But have you been . . .” Have you been with child? I’m an idiot.
She turns to face me, her amber eyes full of alarm. “What’s wrong?”
“My dear girl . . .”
“Tell me quickly,” she demands, and I am reminded that she is used to bad news and there is no point in me dragging it out.
“You are with child,” I say, as gently as I can.
She blinks at me. “I am not.”
“You are, my dear. Listen to your body and you will know. You haven’t bled for some time, have you?”
Nori-sama raises herself out of the tub, splashing water everywhere. She heads for the door, hastily covering herself with a towel.
“You are quite mistaken. I don’t want children. Ever.”
Why does this not surprise me? After the life she has had, this must be her nightmare.
She sits on the bed, and I manage to coax her into a silk robe. Her eyes are blank; her hair clings in wet tendrils to her face.
I pat the sides of her cold cheeks.
“It will all come right,” I promise her.
Nori-sama closes her eyes. “I can’t deal with this, Akiko-san. Not now. Not when I have to face her.”
She looks so very young, but she sounds so tired.
I realize that it is taking every scrap of resolve she has just to stay afloat. This is one burden too many. She will accept it later. But right now, her denial is a necessity.
And when she chooses to feel, I will be here.
“So you’ll see her, then? For the money?”
She laughs, and it is full of bitterness. “No. Not for the money.”
She looks up at me as if I can help her. “Will you dress me?” she asks shyly, and I think how dear she is, this girl.
This, at least, I can do. I can fix her hair and bundle her into an expensive silk kimono; I can put jewels in her ears and makeup on her face.
I can make her shine like polished silver.
“Yes, little madam. I can do that.”
She sits like a doll as I brush and plait her long hair. I pull out three kimonos, and she chooses the one of dark blue with gold stars embroidered on it.
I put some blush on her cheeks, to try and cover the pallor in her skin.
In her hair, I put a simple diamond clip.
“There,” I say softly. “You look lovely.”
She smiles as if she does not believe me and pats my hand. “Where is Obaasama?”
“She is in bed, little madam. She is very ill indeed. The doctors don’t think she will see the end of the month.”
Nori-sama rises from her chair. “I see. I’ll go and see her, then.”
“She indicated that she would send for you.”
She shrugs. “I will see her now or I will not see her at all.”
“I can escort you . . .”
“That won’t be necessary, Akiko-san.”
And then she goes out, without looking back. I remember the girl who used to cling to my hand and hide her face in my skirt. She had a smile that begged for love.
I think that little girl is gone forever now, ruthlessly dismembered by the people who were supposed to take care of her.
Including me.
* * *
It was not difficult to find the master bedroom.
Nori walked up to the double doors with the figure of a golden dragon etched onto them, located at the very end of the hall.
You have never met a defeat that you did not rise from, she told herself. Do not be afraid of a dying old woman. Now she is weak and you are strong.
She pushed them open and went inside.
The first thing that struck her was the smell. The room smelled sickly sweet, like dried rose petals and peppermint oil. It made her nostrils burn, and beneath the sweetness, she could detect something else: the stench of meat gone off, of something stale. It smelled like rotting flesh.
It smelled like the slow coming of death.
The room was dark; someone had drawn the thick velvet curtains over the windows, and the only light came from a small bedside lamp. Still, even in the darkness, Nori took in the oil paintings on the walls, the vase of chrysanthemums on the mahogany desk strewn with papers, the sewing thrown casually on the afghan at the end of the bed. Two swords in sheaths with dragons painted on them hung crossed on the wall above the bed.
She took a tentative step towards the grand bed, which was draped with heavy white curtains. For one ridiculous moment she thought that this was all a joke, that the bed would be empty and she would go out to find Akiko laughing, with a suitcase full of money, and she could go back to London and her new simple, happy life.
But then she took another step forward and there was a soft rustle, and then Nori saw her: Yuko Kamiza. Her grandmother.
She was half hidden by the shadows, but Nori could tell at once that this was no joke, that she was truly living her last hours. The woman she remembered was uncommonly tall for a woman, with hair so long that it nearly brushed the floor and brilliant gray eyes that missed nothing. This was not that woman. She looked so . . . small.
Yuko had the plush comforter drawn up to her breastbone; Nori could just barely make out the dark green kimono that she was wearing beneath it. She was propped up on a mass of silk pillows, and her once glorious hair was white and brittle as chalk. But it was braided neatly and left to fall forward over her right shoulder.
Nori took another step forward, and Yuko’s eyes snapped open, like a dragon alerted to an intruder in its lair.
Nori ducked her head, and before she could stop herself, she folded into a low bow. By the time she realized what she had done, it was too late. She could feel her face burning.
Slowly, she rose up to meet her grandmother’s pensive gaze.
“Obaasama,” she said quietly.
There. She had spoken. She could no longer pretend that this was all some fever dream, one of the countless she’d had before.
The ghost leaned forward in the bed.
“Noriko-san,” she rasped, in a voice that was unfamiliar.
Nori inclined her head in acknowledgment, but said nothing.
Yuko s
quinted at her and beckoned her forward with a long finger. “Come here,” she said. “Let me see you.”
She went unwillingly, making sure to keep her shoulders squared. She stopped a little ways away from the bed, and Nori could see her grandmother’s lips curl in a wry smile.
She crooked her finger again. “Closer. I’m an old woman, Granddaughter.”
Nori did not acknowledge the familiarity, but she did inch closer to the bedside, and now she could look fully at her grandmother’s face.
Her skin was like papier-mâché pulled over a skull, so thin that every vein was visible. But her eyes were the same and Nori felt a shiver down her spine.
Those gray eyes looked her up and down several times. And then, finally, Yuko spoke.
“You’re a real beauty,” she said at last. “Truly. I always knew you would be.”
Nori was thunderstruck.
Yuko said this without a hint of irony, as if they had seen each other yesterday and parted on the best of terms.
As if she did not bend me over a chair and whap my bare ass with a wooden spoon for some imaginary infraction; as if she did not bleach my skin and belittle my hair; as if she did not make me feel like some terrible ogre unfit to see the light of day. As if she did not sell me as a whore and then try to have me sent away. As if she did not steal my brother’s body before I . . . before I could even . . .
She bit her lip so hard that she could taste blood.
“Is that why you called me across the world?” she said bitterly. “To prove yourself right?”
The ghost smiled wryly. “No. I called you here because I’m dying.”
She paused, clearly expecting Nori to say something. When she did not get a response, she laughed, dissolving into a cough as she did so. She pressed a handkerchief to her mouth, and it came away stained with black blood.
“You’ve changed,” she said, and Nori could swear she sounded amused. “You’ve lost your shyness.”
Nori shut her eyes for a brief moment. She knew they were still far too honest.
“I have lost many things.”
“And about the exile . . . you will understand, of course. I was upset. I was understandably upset.”