Chapter Eleven Ren
Chapter Eleven
Ren
“You can go ahead,” a secretary calls to me from the front of the WRA administration offices, where I’m waiting once more. My neck is empty without my pendant.
I nod, steel myself, and go into the office.
He’s there, sitting behind a desk. Boser. He looks up. Recognizes me and immediately looks sour. I tend to have that effect on people. I close the door, face him.
“Can I help you?” he asks.
“Yeah.” My caustic tone makes his lips tighten.
“You can. My sister is expecting a baby and hasn’t been well.
Dr. Suzuki is worried she’ll bleed out during labor and delivery.
There’s people who’ve been sent to Los Angeles County Hospital for care.
I want her to be one of them until she gives birth. ”
Everything on Boser’s desk is orderly. His pens are in a precise row, his nameplate sits right in front of them, his papers are in a perfect stack. Pisses me off. If everything is so organized here, why can’t the administration be organized enough to authorize a ride for Emi to the hospital?
“Fill out a request form, have a doctor sign it, and give it to the secretary.” He dismissively rattles off the protocol.
“We’ve already done that, and no arrangements have been made.” I grit my teeth, thinking about how form after form has disappeared into the black hole of Manzanar’s file cabinets, never to be seen again. The forms would be better used to wipe my ass.
“What do you expect?” Boser asks. He leans back in his chair and crosses his arms. “Everyone claims they deserve to get out. Thousands of forms have been filed, and I’d wager at least half are bogus.”
“How about you look into it for my sister?” I ask. Carefully, I reach into my pocket. My fingers loop around the leather cord that usually hangs from my neck. I pull it free, hold it up. “Remember this?”
“The relic,” Boser says. His gaze fixes on the pendant swinging from the cord. I swing it casually, back and forth like a metronome. Fascination fills Boser’s eyes, followed by something akin to a dark, deep desire.
“Yeah,” I say. “And you were right. It’s from the Edo period.” I’m making shit up, but he seems to buy it. “I inherited it from my father. It’s yours, if you want. You know what I want.”
Boser does want it. He wants it so much he’s practically spellbound by it. With effort, he lifts his eyes from it to me.
“Are you trying to bribe me? I’m authorized to confiscate suspicious items or anything that symbolizes loyalty to Japan. Give it to me.”
“I don’t doubt it but…” I reach into my pocket and dig out Mrs. Ross’s envelope. I set it down on Boser’s desk. He frowns at it, reading the return address. “I might have to let Mr. Ross from Pasadena know.”
“Who the hell is Mr. Ross?” Boser snatches up the thick, fancy envelope and flips it over to where it says Ms. Nanako Hamada and Ren Hamada in Mrs. Ross’s looping cursive.
“A former senator. His wife…knows us. She writes all the time and sends the letters and packages by courier. Last one had a sachet. If the Ross family is invested enough to pay for dead flowers to get here, I imagine they’d be invested in Emi’s health.
If anything goes wrong with her delivery, it might come back to bite you.
Especially since Dr. Suzuki says she should be in a hospital. ”
“A former senator…” Boser’s frown deepens into a scowl. His grip tightens on the envelope until it crinkles. Of course, I’m pretty sure Mrs. Ross is sending the packages behind her husband’s back, but Boser doesn’t know it.
“Yep. A G-man, just like you. Only, one who’s a little more”—I draw out my words, enjoying Boser’s growing frustration—“prestigious. If he thinks you’re not doing your job, maybe they’ll fire you, send you someplace even worse than here.
” I remember James saying Boser only got this job because of his daddy.
Guy’s a screwup. Of course, I’m one, too, but not quite in the same way.
“It’s up to you. You can also just have my fox and arrange for Emi to be transferred until she has her baby. ”
Boser sets the envelope down. Then he picks up one of his pens.
“What’s your sister’s name?”
“Emiko Hamada.” Boser holds it up so I can see it. I nod and drop the pendant onto the desk. It makes his pens roll in different directions. He scrambles to gather and reorganize them. I nod, ready to leave.
“Stop,” he says. I remain nonchalant, but the hair on the back of my neck stands up. Being in the same room with this guy makes me want to crawl out of my skin. “What are the instructions?”
“Instructions? Pretty sure it’s easy to understand—you just put the cord over your head and wear it.”
Anger spikes in Boser’s eyes, the same I saw right before he slapped me outside the warehouse. Makes my own rise in response. My hands ball into fists.
“No.” His voice is cold and unrelenting.
“Your father gave it to you, correct? What did he teach you about it? How did he use it in worship? What types of powers does it have?” I’m not prepared for Boser to mention my father.
It startles me, makes my mind go blank. I stare at him as though I’ve lost my ability to speak.
His impatience grows. “Well? Tell me the sacred knowledge he passed on to you. He must have. Hardly anyone has these nowadays. Those who do care about their lineage. Don’t play dumb. ”
Boser’s words buzz in my ears like a strange, desperate mosquito that has gotten into my eardrum where I can’t get it out. Because I don’t know jack about the relic, never have beyond what it’s shown me itself. Just like I don’t know jack about my father.
“It’s good luck,” I finally say, and then shrug because that sums it up. It’s all I know. There was never anyone to teach me what to do with it. “You just…light a candle to your ancestors and say a prayer.”
“Which prayer?” Boser asks. “A chant? A sutra? A mudras?”
Damned if I know. Damned if I’ve ever known. I cross my arms over my chest, my nails digging into my skin. He seems to know more about it than I do. It kills me as I stand there.
“What’s it to you?” I grab on to the only response I can think of. “You’re American and work for the government. Most of you guys don’t even know what chopsticks are. I don’t think you’re supposed to be interested in our stuff. Might make someone think you’re a sympathizer or something.”
That’s enough to shut him up. He goes quiet and just stares at me for a long moment. Then he says flatly, “I’m doing my job. I’m confiscating Japanese paraphernalia and categorizing what it is. No one would believe you if you imply otherwise.”
“Maybe no one here, but Mr. Ross might.” I can’t resist giving him a self-satisfied grin as he glares at me. Then I remember to add something. “One other thing. Violet Aratani. Mail the letter to her father.”
At the mention of Violet’s name, Boser’s face tightens. Redness pigments his neck. The guy has got it for her bad. I can’t feel too superior because I do, too…and reality kicked me in the teeth because of it.
“She’s your sweetheart?” he asks, taking great care to sound unemotional. I think about Violet acting like she hardly knew me. Sweetheart? She couldn’t even acknowledge we’re friends. I swallow down a mocking laugh. Still, if it’ll make him stay away from her…
“Yeah, she is.” I feel haunted as the words leave my lips. “Leave her the hell alone.”
With that, I leave.
Once I’m outside and away from the administration offices, I put my hand in my pocket.
My fox awakens at my touch. I’m relieved my ruse worked.
Nice thing about carving a counterfeit relic out of cheap crate wood is that it drinks in liquid like a sponge.
I soaked the fake relic in my coffee ration to make it look old. Boser, the idiot, had no idea.
Shouting rings out. Startles me. Sounds like it’s coming from a council meeting, which is being held in one of the mess halls. I walk over to the door and glance in.
Adults sit at the picnic tables. Humidity fattens the air and draws everything out—makes faces glow even more bright and angry than they might be.
Mr. Nomura is at the front, along with a few other men and women.
A WRA official is there, too, along with a lady who looks like a secretary and one of the guards.
There’s been all sorts of talk about how we’re supposed to have our own self-governance here, but it definitely doesn’t seem to be happening.
Lady is taking notes like her life depends on it, probably transcribing every single word to send right up to our overlords so they can know what we’re saying and thinking.
While the adults are sitting, there are a bunch of teens and young people standing between the rows. Kai is one of them, I realize with a start. I step inside and stay by the back wall.
I look up and blink. For a second, I think I’m seeing things.
Akira’s not here, but his shadow is. It looms across the rafters, forming to his silhouette.
Then it morphs and creeps outward into an amorphous blob, almost covering the entire ceiling.
Holes appear in the shadow, each one the exact shape of an eye.
Then the shadow just…hangs there, drifting with the hot breeze coming in from the open windows and door.
Every now and then, one of the empty eyes blinks.
Kai speaks.
“We demand to know where the sugar shipments have gone! My father is a doctor. He’s been using the sugar to help underweight children.” The passion in his voice reminds me of the stirring speeches he’d give us during games when we were down and needing to rally. “The guards are stealing it!”
“Hey now!” the WRA official blares. “None of these rumors are true. Anyone disseminating them may be subject to investigation.”
Mr. Nomura rises and says, “Calm, calm. Everyone needs to stay calm.”
“You calm down, traitor!” James yells, standing next to Kai. “You’re eating out of their hands! That’s how you got elected!”