The Japanese Lover(60)
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Alma had many years ahead of her in which to carefully consider the way she had behaved in 1955. That was the year she was pitchforked into reality, and her efforts to avoid her nagging sense of shame proved useless: the disgrace at becoming pregnant, loving Ichimei less than herself, her horror of poverty, yielding to social pressure and racial prejudices, accepting Nathaniel’s sacrifice, not living up to the role of the modern Amazon she had imagined herself to be, shame at herself for being not only fearful and conventional but another half dozen adjectives as well that she punished herself with. She was aware that she had avoided the abortion more from fear of the pain and of dying from a hemorrhage or infection than out of respect for the being that was growing inside her. When she examined herself once more in her wardrobe’s full-length mirror, she could not discover the Alma from before, the bold, sensual young girl Ichimei would see if he were there, but a cowardly, capricious, and selfish woman. There was no point making excuses; nothing could lessen her feeling that she had lost her dignity. Years later, when it had become the fashion to love someone from a different race or to have children without marrying, Alma admitted to herself that her greatest prejudice was that of social class, which she never managed to overcome. In spite of the nightmare trip to Tijuana, which destroyed the illusion of love and humiliated her to such an extent that she took refuge in a monumental pride, she never doubted her decision to keep the truth from Ichimei. To confess would have meant facing up to her own complete cowardice.
On her return from Tijuana she arranged to meet Ichimei several hours earlier than usual in the motel they always used. She arrived with her head held high and with her lies well rehearsed, yet she was weeping inside. For once, Ichimei had arrived first, and was waiting for her in one of those filthy rooms where the roaches ruled, but which they lit with the flame of love. It had been five days since they had met, and several weeks since something obscure had been spoiling the perfection of their meetings, something that Ichimei felt was enveloping them like a thick fog but that she dismissed lightly, accusing him of being jealous and talking nonsense. Ichimei could tell there was something different about her: she was anxious, she talked too much and too quickly; her mood changed every few minutes, from amorous and affectionate to a stubborn silence or inexplicable bad temper. He had no doubt she was distancing herself emotionally, although her sudden passion and insistence on reaching an orgasm over and over again seemed to indicate the opposite. Occasionally, while they were resting in each other’s arms after making love, her cheeks were wet. “They’re tears of love,” she would say, but to Ichimei, who until now had never seen her cry, they seemed more like tears of frustration, in the same way that her sexual acrobatics were an attempt to distract him. With his ancestral discretion, he tried to discover what was going on, but she responded to his questions with mocking laughter or foul language, which, even if meant as a joke, greatly upset him. Alma slid away like a lizard. During the five days they had been apart, which she justified as a family trip to Los Angeles she could not get out of, Ichimei withdrew into himself. All that week he continued working the land and cultivating flowers in his usual selfless manner, but his movements were those of a man in a trance. His mother, who knew him better than anyone, refrained from asking him questions and took their stock to the San Francisco florists herself. As he bent over the plants with the sun on his back, silently and undemonstratively Ichimei surrendered to his forebodings, which rarely proved wrong.
When Alma saw him by the light filtering in through the torn curtains of their motel room, she once again felt guilt tearing at her innards. For a split second she hated this man forcing her to confront her most despicable side, only to be instantly overwhelmed by the huge wave of love and desire she always felt when he was with her. Ichimei, standing by the window waiting for her, with his unshakable inner strength, his lack of vanity, his tenderness and delicacy, his serene expression; Ichi, with his body like teak, stiff hair, green fingers, affectionate eyes, his belly laugh, his way of making love as if it were always the last time. She couldn’t look him in the face and pretended she was having a coughing fit to conceal the anxiety burning her up.
“What’s wrong, Alma?” asked Ichimei, without touching her.
It was then that she launched into the speech she had prepared with all the care of a legal clerk, about how she loved him and would do so for the rest of her life, but that their love had no future, was impossible, how family and friends were starting to become suspicious and ask questions, how they came from very different worlds and had to fulfill their own destinies, how she had decided to continue her art studies in London, and so they would have to part.
Ichimei received this battering with the resoluteness of someone prepared for an attack. After Alma’s declaration there was a prolonged silence, during which she imagined they could make love desperately one last time, in an ardent farewell, a final gift of the senses before they finally cut the thread of hope they had been weaving since their first fumbled caresses as children in the Sea Cliff garden. She began to unbutton her blouse, but Ichimei stopped her with a gesture.
“I understand, Alma,” he said.
“Forgive me, Ichimei. I’ve had a thousand mad thoughts about how we could continue to be together, to have a hideaway where we could make love rather than this disgusting motel, but I know it’s not possible. I can’t keep this secret any longer, it’s destroying me. We have to say good-bye forever.”