Memorial(32)

* * *





I watched Eiju pat his pockets for keys.

I watched him tug on his hoodie.

I watched him reconsider.

He gave this little wince. But that was it, nothing else.

I leaned on the stairs. Waited for him to crash into me.



* * *





My father nodded my way as he passed.

Then he walked a little farther, nearly turning the corner.

And then I watched him shake his head.

Flip right around.

There wasn’t any anger on his face. Just the barest confusion.

Then, recognition.

And then he was pissed.



* * *





I thought he’d hug me or grab my arm or punch me in the face, but none of that happened.

My father’s first words to me in sixteen years, in his loud Kansai dialect, were: What the fuck?



* * *




? ? ?

Eiju’s bar didn’t get its first customers until around ten. That’s when the streets were at their apex. A few hours before the trains finally stopped for the night. The temperature dropped to a chill and you couldn’t see your breath but I’d blow on the windows anyway, tracing my name or a plane or stick figures fucking until Eiju finally told me to cut that shit out.

One night, we ran through that very same routine. I was mopping the tile. Eiju wiped at the counter.

You’re not a fucking child, he said.

I’m your fucking child, I said.



* * *





Hana and Mieko usually arrived first. They were coworkers at some advertising joint. They’d sit side by side, ordering two rounds of sake apiece, showing up straight from the office, where they worked into the evening, throwing faded jean jackets over their blouses, and whenever they stepped through the bar’s sliding door, without fail, they laughed and laughed and laughed.

My first night at Mitsuko’s, Hana asked me, straight off, if I was my father’s son.

Eiju shined some glasses beside me. His face said, Say no.

Everyone asks me that, I said. Think of me as a nephew.

Shit, said Mieko. Eiju’s got plenty of those.

All nephews and no sons, said Hana. Like some sort of gigolo.

But you’re not from here, she added, turning back to me.

It’s that obvious?

No offense, said Hana.

It’s fine, I said.

Your Japanese is blocky, said Mieko. Like you learned it from a book.

But good for a foreigner, said Hana.

Should be better than good, said Eiju, pouring the women another round.

No excuse, he said.

There are plenty of excuses, said Hana. I dated an American once.

Shit, said Mieko. You did.

He was the worst, said Hana.

Holy shit, said Mieko. The worst.

He thought he knew the way things worked here, but he didn’t. Not really. And I wanted to say, it’s okay! You don’t have to pretend! I appreciate it, but don’t.

You couldn’t take him anywhere, said Mieko.

He’d cause these scenes, said Hana. He had to know everything. And he needed you to know that he knew everything.

Both women ducked their heads for a moment, reminiscing.

I glanced at Eiju, who’d crossed his arms.

So why’d you stay, he said. If this man was so terrible?

Hana made a face. Mieko jabbed her with an elbow. Eiju poured them both another glass, nodding at me to replace the bottle.

After a while Mieko said, I know why.

He was good at that, she said.

What, said Eiju.

You know, said Mieko, raising her palms a respectable distance.

Anyways, said Hana, in the end it couldn’t work. He had to go.

All I’m saying is that you shouldn’t break your back over it, said Hana, looking at me. Don’t stress out. Your uncle’s friends don’t bite.

You’re not my friends, said Eiju.

Bullshit, said Mieko. I don’t know what you’d do without us.

He’d just sit in here by himself, said Hana. Wiping those glasses like a turtle.

He wouldn’t survive, said Mieko. He’d just fall over and die.

They both pantomimed the action, the collapsing, and the thud, and Eiju just laughed and laughed.



* * *




? ? ?

This was the same man who, a decade ago, threw our apartment’s landline against the wall when Ma got a call from another man.

The man was her boss. He was calling about her schedule at the jeweler’s.

Eiju asked why he had our apartment number, why my mother was fucking around.

And Ma said that if only he could see himself, then he wouldn’t have to ask.



* * *




? ? ?

Hana and Mieko were usually followed by a trio of salarymen: Takeshi, Hiro, and Sana. Three blind fucking mice. We were all around the same age. They’d stumble into the bar, already wasted, though sometimes it was just Hiro who was fucked up, and other nights it was one of the others. They kept some sort of running system about who got the drunkest each night, I could never figure it out, and they were jovial, always asking if I could fix one of them a sandwich. When I told them bread wasn’t on the menu, they told me 7-Eleven was right up the road. When I told them that I didn’t fucking do that, that I wasn’t their fucking maid, Hiro or Takeshi or Sana called bullshit, clapping, and then they’d pivot their tone, saying, Sorry, and Please, pursing their lips and fluttering their eyes and pawing my elbow, creating a big fucking production.