Part 6 (1/2)
”I'll do this because it's a debt I owe.” She paused to reflect on how low she had fallen in this world. ”And because it is the life of a baby at stake.” Without another word she stood and left the room.
Chapter Eight.
Kohala, 1931 As Kazuko pressed steaming, hot rice into triangular shapes between her lightly salted and oiled palms, she looked at her brown and leathery hands with regret. How different these hands were from the white, soft hands peeking out from the hem of her silk sleeves. Those same hands once had nothing more arduous to do then pour tea now labored with the deft a.s.surance of a peasant over hot stoves as she prepared Tetsuo's bento of hot rice shaped into musubi, fried fish, pickled daikon, and an occasional egg. Her belly now held their fifth child. Kazuko hoped for a boy with a quick mind.
”Plantation life is not for us,” Tetsuo said from the table with the faded checkered tablecloth.
Kazuko arranged the food into a double-layer tin container: rice on the bottom layer, the rest of the food on top. Placing the tin pail and a corked bottle of tea into a denim lunch bag, she knotted the top and slid Tetsuo's lunch to the side.
”I want our own homestead,” Tetsuo got up and stood next to her. ”I talked to Han san.”
Kazuko kept making musubi, ”Why do you talk to that garlic eater? You're the only j.a.panese who does. You face the disapproval of the entire j.a.panese community for doing so.”
”I don't care, he's a very smart man, even though he's a Yobo,” Tetsuo ran his fingers through his thick hair. ”Every Sunday, Han san organizes the c.o.c.kfights and betting at the Filipino camp. He says he sometimes makes sixty or seventy dollars in one day. Imagine!” He stepped closer to her and put his hand on the counter. ”Han san says men like to gamble, to forget, to pretend for a little while life is not so hard and maybe they too will make a lot of easy money.”
Tetsuo touched her elbow and turned her around so that they faced each other. ”He says we can run hana fuda games. We would be the house, so we always make money as long as we don't gamble too much ourselves. He says he can show me how to do it. He wants me to help him with the c.o.c.kfights.”
Kazuko shook him off and continued making her children's school lunch.
”Kazuko?”
”I have to finish making musubi before the rice gets cold.”
Tetsuo sat down. Kazuko shot furtive glances his way and saw how his fingers played with the knot on top of the denim lunch bag. He always played with objects when he was anxious or nervous.
While she shaped the rice, she said, ”I don't trust Han san. How do you know he won't cheat you?”
Tetsuo stopped playing with the knot and rubbed his rough hands together. ”Han san told me I have a reputation for honesty and a trustworthy face. He knows how to make money. And he says I have a face people trust so we would make a good partners.h.i.+p.”
Kazuko stopped and rubbed her reddened hands on her rough, burlap ap.r.o.n.
”Han san has a car, a house with an inside bathroom, an icebox, and his own land. Tetsuo waved his hand at their mean surroundings. ”Would you have us live this way forever?”
Kazuko raised her eyebrows. ”A house like Han san's...perhaps you're right. We must do what you think best.”
”So, it's settled. I will talk to Han san today. We will make the deal.” He stood up and reached for his bento. There was a noise from behind him and he turned. Seven-year-old Mariko stood a few feet away with her arms outspread.
”Papa. You forgot my Eskimo kiss.”
Mariko ran into Tetsuo's arms. Bending down, he rubbed her nose with his before kissing her cheek.
”Sayonara, Papa,” Mariko rubbed his coa.r.s.e cheek with her soft hand.
”Sayonara, Mariko.”
As Tetsuo released Mariko and turned to leave for the fields, Kazuko noticed the slight stoop to his shoulders, the gnarled hands, and the thick, wavy black hair laced with too much silver for his age. As his bent, gaunt figure disappeared in the gray morning mist, Kazuko shook her head. Ten years in the cane fields was no life for a man.
Kazuko felt renewed respect for her husband. At least he hadn't given up his dreams. This was the Tetsuo who had found the courage to dream the unspeakable. This was the man who stepped over the strict caste system for her. Despite their hard times, she still loved him pa.s.sionately. But lately she wondered if his spirit had burned out of him like the harvested cane. Today she discovered it still smoldered inside. To fan the embers, she had acquiesced to Tetsuo, despite her apprehension about Han san.
She gazed at her daughter and gently put her hand on Mariko's head. Mariko looked up at her mother with her great, dark eyes that always seemed to see beyond their cane field existence. Tetsuo often said Mariko was like the dawn, full of promise and hope. Mariko admitted although she was sometimes reprimanded in school for daydreaming, she didn't much mind because she knew she was destined for something more than plantation life.
Kazuko stroked her hair. Mariko's greatest liability in this cursed land could be she had nothing of the peasant in her.
”Go feed the chickens,” Kazuko withdrew her hand and went back to her work in the kitchen. ”You'll be late for school if you don't do it right now.”
”Okay, Oka-san.”
”Okay? What kind of word is okay?
Mariko beamed. ”It's an American word mother. It means fine, everything is not good or bad, it's just okay.”
Kazuko shook her head as she watched her daughter fly out the door.
The Hans and the Matsubaras prospered despite the fact Kazuko only managed a grudging acceptance of Han.
After the birth of Kazuko's sixth child, a daughter Michiko, Tetsuo took her hand in his as she lay on the floor on futons with their child at her breast. ”It's a good day my love. Today I sign a lease for ten acres of land. In time, it will be ours.”
”It's good to have land.” Kazuko thought of her father's vast land holdings. Her family's land was the basis of her father's wealth.
”I have enough to buy a horse, chickens, farm equipment, and seed. I can work as an independent contractor in the cane fields.” Tetsuo smiled and gripped her hand tightly. ”We'll have our freedom.”
”I can grow produce to sell at the market. The children can help me.” Kazuko began to look forward to their impending move. ”But where will we live?”
Tetsuo kissed her gently on the cheek. ”I saved the best news for last. There is a house, much larger than this, with a bathhouse and outhouse on the property.”
Although she had deserted her G.o.d a long time ago, Kazuko disengaged her free hand and stroked Tetsuo's cheek. ”We must thank kami-sama.” For the first time since leaving j.a.pan, she felt optimistic. They would have their own house with land to cultivate which would eventually be theirs. And, they would still have some money put aside. Kazuko was happy their a.s.sociation with Han would be a thing of the past.
And although she still dreamed of j.a.pan and the family she left behind, Kazuko thought perhaps they could make something of this life in Hawaii after all.
Chapter Nine.
Kohala: February, 1935 When Tets...o...b..gan coughing blood, Kazuko knew he was going to die. As she trudged along the dusty road with her scarf-covered head bent, she thought of how she felt an icy hand grip her heart when she saw blood spit out of him. ”It's your bachi,” the wind seemed to mock her as it whipped her threadbare cotton dress against her legs. A silent mist brought a light drizzle. Kazuko clenched a thin shawl around her shoulders with her calloused hands. She stopped for a moment to catch her breath. It was six miles to the hospital from their homestead. Each day the distance seemed longer.
Tetsuo had been in the hospital for three weeks. She tried to visit him daily. Seeing him everyday made her believe she could forestall the inevitable.
When she brought him to the hospital with the help of her neighbors, the doctors whispered and shook their heads. She didn't have to understand the words because she could read their faces. To the doctors Tetsuo was just another patient. To her, Tetsuo was everything. She had left a world of luxury to create a life revolving entirely around him. Without him she felt she might go mad on this horrible island. But it looked as if he were going to leave her stranded in a tough world.
A cold wind chilled her to the bone. She had sacrificed everything for the right to choose her own life and destiny. Now kami-sama was mocking her by leaving her with six children, huge debts, and too many lonely years ahead of her. It was her bachi.
The fine mist turned to drops and the gray sky blackened. She heard running footsteps behind her. A small hand tugged at her shawl.
”Mama.”