He nods back, lighting a cigarette, and leans against the door of the pool hall, where Frankie used to dupe guys out of their money when he got bored. It’s abandoned now, its windows papered over.
Next to me, a couple of ketos are haggling over the American flag Dad used to fly from our stoop every day. One of Mas’s eyelids is twitching the way it does when he’s trying not to cry. He loves that flag almost as much as Dad did, kept flying it after Dad died.
Gaman, I remind myself.
Grin and bear it.
Bend over and kiss your own ass.
But ever since that night out with Frankie, my anger’s been filling me up. Every day, it’s there inside me, buzzing louder and louder like a malfunctioning transformer until sometimes it’s all I can hear or feel.
“No deal,” I say suddenly. “Get outta here!” I wave my arms at them, and they hop away like irritated gulls.
“Shigeo!” Mom says.
“What?” Buzzing. “That’s Dad’s flag. It’s worth more than a quarter.”
She combs my hair with her fingers, like she used to when I was little, but even that doesn’t quiet my anger. “It’s not about what it’s worth,” she says. “It’s not about what we deserve. It’s about what they’re willing to give us.”
“Shit,” Minnow says, looking up from his sketchpad. “All they’re willing to give us is shit.”
“Watch your mouth, Minoru,” Mas snaps. He looks like he’s about to crack in half like a brick in an earthquake.
But he doesn’t. Not even when Dad’s flag goes for fifteen cents an hour later.
No, it’s Mom who breaks, that afternoon.
She’s wrapping a set of red-and-black lacquerware, placing tissue paper between each dish to protect it, and she just starts crying. It was her grandmother’s lacquer set, you know? One of the nicest things she brought over from Japan when she married Dad.
She never let us or Dad touch it, not even to clean it. She displayed it on the highest shelf in the living room and dusted it herself with a soft brush. It was hers, and it was precious.
Now some hakujin strangers are going to take it. They don’t want our alien faces in their neighborhoods, but they don’t mind our lacquerware in their homes.
Inside me, the buzzing is so loud, I can barely hear Mom crying in my arms.
The vulture shifts uncomfortably as Mas passes her the lacquer set, but she doesn’t do anything, at first. Guilt and pity pool behind her glasses.
After what seems like a full minute, she tries to hand him another dollar. A whole goddamn dollar. It hangs limply from her fingers like a dead thing.
He doesn’t take it. “We already agreed on a price,” he says flatly.
“But—”
Mas crosses his arms. He’s almost six feet tall with the build of an Olympic wrestler. He can be real intimidating when he wants to be. “Thank you for your business,” he says, and she scurries off, the dollar flapping uselessly in her hand.
* * *
In one of the trash piles, I find a shoebox full of origami: frogs and birds and balloons, pinwheels and boats and even a potbellied pig.
I guess Mom knew the whole time. She must have been collecting all those little things Dad was making.
And we can’t keep them. We don’t have the space.
THINGS THEY’VE TAKEN
my home
my friends
my community
I’m with Yum-yum when her mom sells her piano.
Lucky for them, they own the building, so they can rent it out while they’re gone. Or, technically, Yum-yum owns it. It’s in her name, because the California Alien Land Law doesn’t allow Issei to own property here.
But, homeowners or not, they’re as Japanese as the rest of us, so they still have to move. They still have to store or get rid of the things they can’t rent or take with them.
We would’ve lent them a hand even if Mr. Oishi hadn’t been arrested, but me and the guys make an extra effort to help Yum-yum’s family. Together, we heave the piano down the stairs and onto the sidewalk to be picked up by a Bekins Moving and Storage truck.
Don’t tell her, but we all hated hearing her play at first. The piano was already old when she got it, beat up and out of tune, and you could hear every swampy note as she banged out her scales, up and down the keys.
But she’s good now, and we all lean in when she sits at the piano bench and lays her hands on the keyboard one last time.
Yum-yum’s always been pretty, but today she’s beautiful, and strong, too, sitting there, fingers still, like she’s saying goodbye with her silence.
She begins—loud, then real soft. The music is heavy as fog crawling down the San Francisco streets, heavy as the footsteps of two guys out at night, wanting to break things.
It builds and builds, getting darker and darker, when all of a sudden it speeds up, and the notes are sparks, they’re catching things on fire, the whole street is filled with them. They’re explosions. All the buildings collapse, crashing into the road in heaps of luggage-shaped rubble. If she could, I bet Yum-yum would tear down the whole city with her music.
But by the end, it’s soft again, and her face doesn’t betray any of the violence and turmoil inside her. Standing, she walks into my arms, and I hold her until the truck comes to take her piano away. She doesn’t cry.
And I get it, finally. Gaman.
The ability to hold your pain and bitterness inside you and not let them destroy you. To make something beautiful through your anger, or with your anger, and neither erase it nor let it define you. To suffer. And to rage. And to persevere.
* * *
When I get home, I find out we got a letter from Tommy.
Dear Mas, Shig, and Minnow,
Well, we’re all settled in at Tanforan now. The house, or horse stall, has two rooms. Mom, Dad, and the twins sleep in the back; Aiko and I sleep in the front. They do a head count every morning at six thirty (and again in the evening), and since I’m the oldest, and the only boy, in the front, it’s my job to tell them we’re all here.
I don’t know if you’ve gotten your evacuation notice yet, but wherever you go, bring your saw, hammer, and sockets. There’s no furniture anywhere except the army cots, so everyone’s having to make chairs and tables out of scrap wood. If you find out you’re coming here, I’ll try to save some for you.
The food is pretty bad. Yesterday we had potatoes, meat innards, and bread. It’s served by hakujin workers they hire from outside, and they touch everything with their bare hands. When we eat, there’s a line two or three blocks long, so you better get in line early!
Mas, some men in camp are driving instead of taking the buses. They load their cars with all sorts of things, like canned fruit and handmade soap. Maybe you can pack up the Chevrolet and bring in some food from outside. I’ll take a chocolate bar as a thank-you.
Take care of yourselves,
Tommy
P.S. Say hello to Twitchy and Frankie.
P.P.S. I’m sorry for writing in pencil, but I’m trying to economize on ink.
THINGS WE HAVE TO FIND SPACE FOR
tools
food
gaman
It’s the night before we have to leave, and me and Minnow are lying on the floor of our bedroom. The walls are bare. The mattresses have been sold off. All we’ve got are our suitcases and the things Mas is going to pack into the Chevy.