On my first visit to Kyoto fifteen years ago, I was enchanted by the lively scene along the river. Friends, families, and dogs enjoyed picnics and socializing, but I was most charmed by the couples. Were they on first dates or were they established couples completely at ease with each other? These thoughts led me to imagine someone reminiscing about a first date, enjoying the memory of an innocence we can only experience once.

I remember how we packed our bentos for our first picnic and how you carefully prepared everything so lovingly. Onigiri, carrot salad, rice, sliced fruit, rolled tamago.
I remember how you snuck glances at me, your shyness one of your greatest attractions.

I remember how we walked along the banks of the Kamogawa. How I wished I could hold your hand. How we picked a spot not too close to other people. How the old man warned us about the tonbi. “Watch your food,” he said, pointing to the sky. How we nodded and dismissed him, because of course we would watch our food.

I remember how we nibbled at our snacks. How we talked awkwardly, pretending we weren’t nervous, trying to muster an appetite. How your hand brushed mine as you passed me the onigiri.

I remember sipping mugicha from the same thermos and how I felt connected to you with that gesture. How we both eagerly opened our bags with our special donuts. The ones we had traveled out of the way for—taking two buses, and missing the connection. Gourmet donuts. Crème Brûlée for you. Chocolate raspberry for me.

I remember how the tonbi swooped down and grabbed them right out of our hands before our first bites. How we laughed and laughed until our sides hurt and we collapsed on the blanket. How the old man turned and started to scold us. Then smiled and left us to our private moment.

I remember how we sat there quietly when the laughing was over. How the silence was loudest of all. And how much we understood about each other, about us, in that moment.

I remember how you gently took my hand and led me away from the river.

Instead of barging in with a mid-morning snack, he entered his office and settled at his desk in his ergonomic chair, ready to delete the hundreds of emails sent to Mitsuki by fans around the world. He would read them all, of course, and reply to a handful. And he would share anything that he thought might amuse, intrigue, or inspire her.

The fan mail was a warm-up for the more serious business — the licensing agreements, the press queries, the gallerists, and the billionaire art collectors seeking to buy her work. As Mitsuki Ono’s personal assistant, he dealt with all that.

The first twenty messages he opened that morning were from fans, expressing their awe and delight at her work. One included a selfie of herself taken with “Sparkle Pony,” which was a repurposed carousel horse that Mitsuki had covered with pink paint and glitter. “It changed my life,” the woman wrote. “After I saw it, I gave up my job as a legal secretary and trained to become a manicurist.”

Aki chuckled. Mitsuki might get a kick out of this one. He printed it out and set it aside for later.

There were a couple of marriage proposals in the day’s batch of emails as well — one from a man in Iceland, another from a woman in Brazil. Aki deleted these without replying to them, but he sent a sweet letter to a woman in hospice care who wrote that her last wish was to receive a message from her art-world idol.

He sent standard rejections to bloggers and YouTubers who wanted to interview Mitsuki on their platforms, though he couldn’t blame them for trying. After all, only the scrappy survived. For inquiries from more prestigious publications, he would check with her first. It always depended on her mood. For example, she’d said “yes” to that celebrity magazine sold at supermarket checkouts in the United States a few months ago, but a week later she’d said “no” to The New York Times. With her name or image on the cover, the issue would sell out, or elicit tens or hundreds of thousands of clicks. Her very name was clickbait.

He breezed through dozens more, until he paused upon a note with the subject “Are you my mother?” It was from a woman named Kayla Brown who lived in South Carolina. She and her twin sister had been abandoned as babies in front of a fire station in Tennessee. Whoever had left them there had tucked a garland of origami cranes in the box with them, which made them believe that their birth mother was Japanese. Aki felt a pang in his chest when he read these words. She had included a photo of herself sitting in a restaurant before an array of stemmed glassware and gold-rimmed plates. Her chestnut hair was piled on her head, a few curls falling across her forehead, but he could just make out her widow’s peak. Her eyes were large, luminous, and set off by eyeliner and shimmery brown eyeshadow. She was smiling, her full lips parted slightly revealing perfectly aligned teeth. Pretty. But she’s an American. Nevertheless, he printed out the message, photo and all.

Just before noon, the door to the studio burst open, and Mitsuki shouted out, “Aki-chan, tea, please!” By this time, he had finished going through the emails. Whatever came in during the rest of the day, he would deal with tomorrow. He minimized the screen and went to the kitchen to prepare a bowl of matcha.

Although he been trained in tea ceremony, he didn’t bother with all the rituals for Mitsuki’s tea. Instead of sliding around on his knees on tatami, he stood at the counter and opened a cannister of powdered green tea. He used a bamboo spoon to scoop tea into a ceramic bowl, added hot water from an electric dispenser on the counter, and whisked the tea with deft motions of his wrist. He put the bowl of tea on a lacquer tray along with a sweet made of mochi and mashed, sweetened adzuki beans settled on a small plate. Then he carried the tray to the living room where Mitsuki was sitting regally on an embroidered cushion at a low table, taking a break.

“Here you are, Mother,” he said.

She smiled, her whole face lighting up. “Thank you, Aki-kun.”

She bowed slightly, lifted the bowl, and settled it on the palm of her left hand. With her right hand cupped around the side of the bowl, she turned it three times toward her before slurping it down.

“Ahh. That hit the spot,” she said, stabbing the beancake with a tiny wooden knife.

Aki waited until she had swallowed the last tiny bite before presenting her with the messages that he had printed out. He’d also made copies for himself, in case she didn’t feel like reading them.

“Shall I begin?” he asked.

Mitsuki nodded. She made no motion to lift the pages, closing her eyes instead. It helped her to concentrate.

He went through the various invitations and media requests.

“Art in America?”

“No.”

“Brazilian Vogue?”

“Yes.”

“The Japan Times?”

“No.”

Aki sorted the messages into two piles. Next, he read the letter from Kayla Brown. Sometimes, bored by the ramblings of strangers, she would cut him off. But this time, she listened to the end. When he got to the part about the fire station in Tennessee, he thought he heard her gasp. Halfway through, her eyes opened, and she gazed intently at the wall. Aki glanced over, expecting to see something there — maybe a spider, or a shadow. Or a ghost. By the time he reached the end of the message, her lower lip was quivering. She pressed her hands on the table in front of her as if she were bracing herself against something.

He paused for a moment after reading, “Regards, Kayla Brown.” Somehow bringing this to her attention suddenly felt like a terrible mistake.

“Invite her to come visit,” Mitsuki said in a steely voice, still staring at the wall.

“Pardon me?” There was no way that this woman and her sister could be her daughters. Or could they be? He looked over at the portrait of Mitsuki and Joseph Heinz, one of only two photos that she displayed on the credenza —the other was of her as a child with her enormous family — and tried to discern a resemblance between them and the woman. Yes, both this woman, Kayla, and Mitsuki had a similar hairline, a widow’s peak, and her nose was sort of tall and hooked like his. Joseph had been the love of her life, her only love. And they had never had children. Or at least that’s what Mitsuki had always told him. Had she been lying?

Now, Mitsuki looked straight at her son and said, “Book a ticket for her as soon as she can come. We will welcome her.”

Aki tried to remain stoic. Sure, she had enough money to fly some stranger over at a whim, but this Kayla person might be some sort of con artist. Maybe she was trying to get access to Mitsuki for a book or an article or some ridiculous podcast. He couldn’t imagine welcoming this random American woman into their midst. Did Mitsuki intend for her to stay with them under the same roof? Finally, he took a deep breath, and let it out in a long stream before replying. “Shall I tell her that you are her mother?”

“No.” Mitsuki laughed. “Tell her that I would like to offer her a job.”

Aki could only nod. He had no idea what kind of job she had in mind for this person, but he knew that his own job was secure. He also knew from experience that she would never change her mind.

Now that their business was out of the way, Mitsuki softened, morphing into her maternal role. “Do you have any plans for this afternoon?” she asked.

Aki nodded. “I’ll be going to visit Kono-san in the nursing home.”

“You’re a good boy,” she said, reaching over to pat his shoulder.

He accepted her praise, but they both knew that his sitting by the old woman’s bedside, listening to her ramble about the past, wasn’t entirely altruistic. He was being paid by the woman’s son, who was working for a bank in London, to visit his mother and pretend to be him. He had met the man via video and mastered a few of his quirks and stock expressions. His mother, Kono-san, who was in the latter stages of dementia, seemed to accept that Aki was her son. Or at least she pretended that she did.

Aki had other acting jobs as well. Although when asked, he said that his job was working as Mitsuki’s assistant, he considered acting his real job. He had actually appeared in a film, one made on the streets of Kyoto by She, Whom He’d Rather Forget. He even had an IMBD page as evidence of his participation. He rarely mentioned that, though. And most of his work involved showing up at real life events and participating in someone else’s deception. He’d been a mourner at a funeral more than once, sort of like those hired wailers in the Middle East. He’d escorted women who’d lied about having boyfriends to family gatherings. And he’d once pretended to be a little girl’s father at a PTA meeting. Sometimes he would become so engrossed in his role that he would forget that he was Aki Ono, lonely boy. Strangers would hug him and clap him on the back. They’d fill his cup with beer or sake, and hand him gifts as he made his exit. He would begin to believe that he was surrounded by dozens of family members and friends who truly cared about him, that his life was, and always had been, overflowing with love. Maybe someday he really would find someone who was related to him, who would say, “I’ve been looking for you all of my life.”

The following extract is taken from my forthcoming book Spider Lily: Six Toxic Tales from Japan, which comprises six darkly themed stories, each centred around a symbolic flower. The book explores themes of sexual discrimination, power harassment, and other social issues.

This particular piece was inspired by the concept of hana kotoba—the language of flowers. For example, red camellias are associated with passion, while the spider lily (the title of one of the other stories in Spider Lily: Six Toxic Tales from Japan and the subject of the attached photo taken last October) is linked to farewells, among other meanings.

“The Language of Flowers” revolves around the female proprietor of a flower shop in feudal-era Kyoto who wishes to teach ikebana but is held back by the patriarchal structure of the time: instruction was passed down the male family line, and flower arrangement, according to my research, was regarded as a male pursuit designed to prepare men for the battlefield.

In addition to these obstacles, the proprietor is gaslit by her assistant, Taro, who tries to convince her that she is losing her mind in her old age.

As will hopefully be apparent upon reading, to those familiar with regional accents around the UK, Taro speaks with a Yorkshire lilt. He frequently drops his articles and employs the glottal stop (something frustratingly difficult to capture in writing). This stylistic choice was intended to convey the roughness of Taro’s Banshū dialect against the old lady’s refined Kyoto style. Perhaps if I’d been born American, Taro would’ve spoken with a Southern drawl, or if Australian, an Aussie twang. 

Anyway, that’s all I’ll say for now. Hopefully, the extract will speak for itself and the spider lilies will be in bloom again in just a few weeks. 

Thanks for reading.

—Andrew Innes

A flower shop with a thatched roof stood on a dirt road that curved past a dense bamboo grove. It was an old wooden structure with sliding paper doors and a tiled roof, nestled among several other businesses on a quiet street in rural Kyoto. A small river wound through the neighbourhood, and several ducks were now navigating their way around the partially frozen surface of their home.

The wooden walls were adorned with hanging baskets of seasonal flowers: bright pinks and yellows that sparkled in the last of the day’s winter sun. Inside, an old lady was putting the finishing touches on an arrangement commissioned by an extremely important customer. The wind chime by the doorway signalled the arrival of a customer as a shy-looking young lady pushed open the sliding door and started browsing. She wore a faded indigo kimono and kept her eyes low; her cheeks flushed after the chill of Kyoto’s winter streets.

“Hello. Do you need any help, dear?” asked the old lady.

“I’m just looking, thank you.”

The old lady smiled and returned her attention to the arrangement. A few minutes passed, with the young lady occasionally leaning forward to read a label attached to an arrangement or to smell the perfume of something that caught her eye. The air inside the shop had a different quality to it—warm and somehow alive.

“Can I ask a question?”

Most customers got down to business and asked for what they wanted the moment they walked through the door: an arrangement for a funeral or a wedding, or perhaps flowers to say thank you for something. Yet, occasionally, a customer danced around what they really wanted to say, lost for words as the old lady waited patiently for what she knew was coming—matters of the heart.

“Yes, dear. How can I help?”

“There is someone in my village. A man whom I respect and admire.” The young lady turned to inspect a bunch of pink flowers as she spoke. “We have courted a couple of times, and, well, surely that would mean that we are on the path to becoming husband and wife?”

The old lady nodded as the young lady walked around the shop, inspecting the leaves of an exotic plant that towered over a water feature in the corner before stopping to gaze out of the window at the snow that fell outside.

“He acts as though we have all the time in the world to get married, and yet I am already twenty-one! It’s like he’s more interested in fishing with his friends or playing shōgi at all hours. At this rate, I’ll end up an old spinster.” The young lady turned from the window to face the old lady.

“Well, dear, sometimes flowers speak when words fail us.” As the old lady said this, her assistant emerged from a door at the back of the shop carrying a bowl of ramen noodles. Taro was a lanky lad in his twenties who spent most of his shift leafing through a book of haikus when he thought he could get away with it, and yet his manner with customers was less than poetic.

“Nosegay.”

“I beg your pardon?” the young lady said.

Taro took a long slurp from the bowl. “Don’t pin it on’ right side o’ yer cleavage, though. Gives a bloke’ wrong idea.” Taro placed both hands on the bowl to warm them, his fingers poking out from the tips of his cotton gloves. The young lady cocked her head to the side and shot him a quizzical look.

“Signifies friendship, nothin’ more.” Taro traced a hand through the air. The customer looked over at the old lady as though she could shed some light on what this unruly young man was talking about. “Pin it right over yer ‘eart. Now that’s an unambiguous declaration o’ love.”

Taro didn’t speak with the same soft dialect of Kyoto as the old lady. His turn of speech suggested that he’d grown up in the rural parts of Banshū, where people rolled their Rs, and the main event of the year was the Fighting Festival, held down by the port.

“Oh, that’s just a fad that’s sweeping Europe right now, dear. They say it’s less about the language of flowers and more about covering up the smell of death and disease that pervades the streets.”

“Well, from what I ‘eard on’t grapevine, that famous kabuki actor, ‘Aseba Satori’s been sayin’ the trend’s gonna tek Japan by storm, ‘n ‘e should know. Ee’s at all the parties these arty types go t’.” Taro raised his eyebrows and gave a quick nod while holding the young lady’s gaze.

“Haseba Satori says a lot of things, and not a lot of them comport with reality. Besides, this young lady needs our help.”

“Flowers for a man y’ like, eh? Red camellias should do’ job. They signify love, don’ they?” Taro leant on the counter and gestured with his eyes towards the bucket by the door, where a few glossy red blooms floated in shallow water.

“Red camellias mean love, yes. But alone, they’re too bold, bordering on boastful. They speak of love, but they can overwhelm someone who’s not ready for such directness. She doesn’t want to scare him off now, do you, dear?”

“No.”

“Okay, whaddabout them bright yellow chrysanthemums over there? Cheerful, right? They’ll show ‘im she’s happy t’ be around ‘im.” Taro tipped his bowl in the direction of the flowers, steam curling past his grin as he downed the ramen broth with a loud slurp.

“Yellow chrysanthemums can signify neglected love. Are we trying to send out the message that this woman is happy to be ignored?” The old lady shot Taro a quizzical look.

“All right, then. Hold me ‘ands up.” Taro flicked his hands up. “Roses. Y’ can’t get more direct than a rose, can yuh?” Taro shot the young lady a quick wink.

“You’ve been listening to Haseba Satori and his obsession with Western conventions again, haven’t you? This is supposed to be the first whisper of a lifelong romance, not the final act of a kabuki play.”

“Alright then, yuh got me stumped. What’d you suggest, boss?”

The old lady nodded outside to a cluster of flowers that were weighted down with snow.

“White camellias?” Taro screwed up his face like he was being force-fed a raw onion.

“White camellias’ endurance through the cold winter months symbolises the quiet strength of unspoken admiration. Pink camellias represent beauty and love, while red camellias signify humility. Harmony, dear, something you’d do well to study.” She tweaked a blossom, her eyes never leaving the display.

“All right, all right. Well, how about throwin’ in a couple o’ yellow tulips?” Taro snapped his fingers a few times, trying to recall what they meant. “Unrequited love!” he burst out, jabbing a finger toward the old lady.

“Your arrangement would be more of a presentation than a whisper. A white camellia hints at a romantic interest but without overwhelming the recipient. It’s a patient, respectful message that shows that the intention is untainted by ulterior motives. Again, something you’d do well to study, dear.”

“What’s this fella do feh’ livin’, anyway?” Taro narrowed his eyes and scanned the young lady’s face.

“He’s a gardener.”

“A gardener, you say?” The old lady’s face lit up at the mention of the suitor’s profession. “Well, that explains a great deal. I hold a special kind of respect for someone who shapes nature with their hands.”

“He’s very skilled. He tends to the pine trees at the daimyō’s estate. His pruning is so precise. It’s like art.” The young lady gazed out of the window as snow fell onto the plum blossom trees, their buds still hiding from the cold.

“Then he must be conversant in the language of flowers, and you must match his craft with a gift that speaks to his passion and skill, dear. Wait here.” The old lady grabbed a pair of gloves and headed out into the garden.

“You mist mitch his craaft with a gift thit speaks to ‘is passion ‘n skill,” Taro pulled a face as he mimicked his boss’s voice. “Right, never mind the old bag. This chap clearly knows ‘is roses from ‘is daffodils. If you really wanna capture ‘is attention, you gotta go big, show ‘im you’ve done yer research. Here …” Taro started picking various flowers from around the room and placing them on the counter.

“Mountain azalea shows ‘is connection t’ earth.” He nodded, his eyes wide as he locked eyes with the young customer and grabbed a cluster of the pale pink blooms from a nearby vase. “Sturdy little things, grow right outta’ rock, they do. Perfect if y’ want t’ say he’s grounded, dependable. If e’s as sharp as ‘e seems, e’ll take it as a sign t’ mek a move. You wait,” Taro said with a wink.

He checked a chart on the wall titled The Language of Flowers and ran his finger down it while licking his lips in concentration. He found what he was looking for and gave it a couple of taps.

“Pine. Right, this symbolises longevity ‘n steadfastness. A sprig or two’ll show ‘im that yer thinkin’ of a lastin’ bond, not just a quick frolic on’t tatami.”

Taro checked the chart again while making a tutting sound. “Let’s throw in a coupl’u daffodils; just a hint t’ warn ‘im not t’ get too comfortable in case ‘e turns out t’ be a wrong ‘un. A few roses to hammer the point home in case ‘e’s a bit thick, tie it all up with some gold ribbon, and if ‘e don’t take the bait, e’s not wuth bother, anyway.”

Taro leaned back and cracked his neck from side to side like a boxer readying himself for a prize fight. The young lady frowned at the assemblage of flowers of different sizes and colours laid out on the counter as Taro consulted the chart and began totting up the bill with a wooden abacus.

As this was taking place, the wind chime over the door tinkled as the old lady walked back in, holding a bunch of white camellias. She swept Taro’s flowers out of the way, laid hers on the counter and placed a single pink one in the centre.

“Now, dear, in ikebana, we call this the Earth Line. It represents the foundation of your message, in this case, unspoken longing.” She added a sprig of pine needles, arranging them to arc delicately above the blooms.

“Pine,” the old lady said, “shows him that your feelings are not fleeting, like clouds passing across the sky.”

She then took a few plum blossoms, their soft pink buds still tightly closed, and positioned them near the camellias but slightly apart.

“Plum blossoms are the Man Line. They add depth and harmony. They say, ‘I wish for a future with you that is as beautiful as the spring.’ The closed buds show that your relationship is about to blossom but needs warmth.”

The final touch was a single purple iris that stood tall and proud in the arrangement. The old lady placed it with deliberate care, allowing its height to draw the viewer’s eyes upward.

“The iris is the Heaven Line and represents future aspirations. Together, they form a balanced composition that reflects the interconnectedness of all things. If he’s conversant in the language of flowers, it should encourage him to find the courage to make his intentions clear.”

The young lady clasped her hands together, her face glowing.

“It’s perfect,” she whispered.

Taro shrugged and swept a few leaves off the counter onto the floor, muttering something under his breath as the old lady added the finishing touches to the display.

“How much is that?” she asked.

The old lady gave a price that was well below what the arrangement was worth. The young lady paid the money and left the shop, a cold breeze blowing inside as Taro stared in disbelief at the measly pile of money on the counter.

“I’m never gonna earn a decent livin’ at this rate,” he muttered.

“What was that?”

“Oh, nothin’,” Taro said as he stuffed a couple of the crumpled notes into a wooden money box and turned the key before pocketing a couple for himself. “Although, don’t you think an arrangement like that is wuth just a bit more? Y’ could’u charged ‘er twice as much ‘n she’d’uh no more batted an eye than bitten yer’ ‘and off.”

The old woman’s fingers hovered above a half-trimmed camellia stem, her gaze steady on the arrangement. “A proprietor must weigh more than aesthetics, Taro. Reputation, yes, but also a customer’s means.” She raised her eyebrows again. “Had the young lady been betrothed to the gardener’s father, the daimyō himself, I might have reconsidered.”

Taro scratched the back of his neck and grimaced. “That’s not really what I’m gettin’ at.”

She snipped the stem with a crisp click. “Then explain.”

He shifted his weight, glancing toward the doorway where sunlight shone across the floorboards. “I mean, you’ve got these big ideas about teachin’ ikebana’n all that, but don’t yuh think focusin’ on’t financial side o’ things would be f’ best?”

She turned slowly to face him. “And what, in your estimation, would be ‘f’ best’ from a financial point of view?”

He gave a shrug, his eyes drifting to the flower arrangement by the door as if it might explain things for him. “Dunno. Japanese haute cuisine.”

The old lady tilted her head slightly, one brow lifting as she reached for a fresh stem. “You mean kaiseki? I’m not following.”

Taro lifted both hands, as if tracing a narrow alley. “Ponto-chō, Shijō Dōri. All them little restaurants that cost a fortune. You’ve seen ‘em: paper lanterns, polished counters, some feller wi’ topknot bangin’ out fancy grub.”

The old lady sighed and rolled her eyes.

“Now think how hard it is to set up shop there. Not just anyone gets in. You’ve got to be’ best or not bother.”

“Could you please get to the point, Taro?”

He leaned forward, elbows resting on the counter. “Right. Those fancy kaiseki places charge a fortune, but their overheads are also sky ‘igh. Now, one street over, Tanaka-san’s got his udon stand. Nothing fancy. Just bowls o’ simple food that fill a feller’s stomach of a night. That’s the kind of thing common folk queue fuh.”

She looked down at the chrysanthemum in her hand. “Not everyone is just looking to fill their stomach, Taro.”

He gave a crooked grin. “Maybe not. But they all eat, ‘n the question you’ve gorra ask yerself is this: are you gonna be forever tryin’ t’ be the fancy kaiseki gaff or just accept things ‘n settle for the udon stand?”

“What’s that supposed to mean, ‘accept things and settle for the udon stand’? Is that a metaphor for my business?”

Taro shrugged, pushing the broom across the wooden floor with slow, deliberate strokes. “Just sayin’. Folk line up for udon ‘cause it’s simple.”

The old woman narrowed her eyes.

Taro kept sweeping. “Maybe sell this place ‘n try a stall at the market. Buckets o’ blooms, cheap and cheerful. Pile it ‘igh, sell it cheap. I mean, when was the last time some rich samurai ‘ad one of ‘is servants rock up ‘n commission an arrangement fer ‘is decorative alcove, anyway?” Taro asked as he nudged a clump of fallen leaves towards the corner of the shop.

The old lady nodded towards the arrangement she was working on.

“What do you think this is?”

“Impressive.” Taro stuck out his bottom lip and nodded. “Just so long as ‘their payin’ y’ the kaiseki rate, mind.” Taro held the old lady’s gaze and nodded his head. “Anyway, there’s summat else I wanted t’ talk t’ you about.”

“Oh, lucky me,” the old lady said as she checked the various aspects of the arrangement.

Taro hesitated before sighing. His broom stopped mid-sweep. “How can ah put it?” He bit his bottom lip, his eyes scanning the worn floorboards as if the right words might be hiding in the grain. “You’ve, ah, dropped a few clangers recently.”

The old woman straightened a stem in a vase, her hands pausing. “I’ve dropped a few clangers?”

“Right, ‘ear me out.” He lifted his hands. “That couple last week. Y’ gave ‘em wrong flowers. They wanted ‘n arrangement wi’ white lilies, but y’ gave ‘em yellow chrysanthemums.” Taro counted out a one on his thumb.

“An’ then, there were that temple order f’ New Year. Y’ sent plum branches, when thid asked f’ pine. The bald bloke in charge said not t’ worry, but ‘e looked a bit taken aback.” Taro held out a second finger.

“And I did, once you’d pointed it out.”

“Well, yes. Just, mibbe think about slowin’ down a bit.” Taro let the broom handle rest on his chest. “‘N ‘ave a think about changin’ business style.” The old lady tilted her head and pretended to inspect the arrangement for just a little longer as Taro walked outside.

Grass encrusted with ice like diamond dust sparkled in the sunlight and crunched underfoot as Taro headed over to a small shed. His breath rose into the air in white clouds that dissipated above the plum blossoms as he grabbed a shovel and began clearing the snow off the path. As he busied himself outside, the old lady gazed out through the frosted glass of the window and thought about what Taro had said.

She would never admit that she was losing her touch, but had Taro really been right about the monk and the couple, not to mention the merchant’s wife? She was aware that Taro had his sights set on taking over the business and sometimes got the feeling that he was trying to speed the process up.

It was time for a cup of tea …

We who have associations with Kyoto are familiar with Marc Peter Keane’s work. (Just as one example, I reviewed his book Of Arcs and Circles, Stone Bridge Press 2019, for Writers in Kyoto in December 2021.) Marc is a garden expert who has created many beautiful gardens, both in Japan and overseas, notably the Empty River garden in Honen’in Temple, Kyoto. His website may be found at www.mpkeane.com

This time Marc has written a novel, a lengthy one with a very interesting premise. Briefly, an epigeneticist working in a big facility near a big city experiences a life-threatening cosmic phenomenon which creates great anomalies in electrical power, meaning that the internet, etc. are no longer available as one example, and creates a temporary but devastating environment in which panic ensues and much life is lost. This woman, the researcher, manages to survive the ensuing weeks and to gather a group of fellow survivors with whom she travels into the countryside, knowing that is their only hope. Her research previously centered around the possibility of the electric field of eels being transferred through a virus to other life forms, and she injects herself with the virus quite early on to see what would happen, and later, some of the other survivors. The combination of this virus and the effects of the cosmic event result in a completely new form of human being.

Fast forward three hundred years, when the descendants of these survivors have formed their own civilization based on a kind of telepathy with other living things and each other, and learning about and caring for the cycles and infinite detail of the great Nature, not only visible organisms but also the great network of living things underground, that they find themselves a part of. 

Each chapter has both a section about that far-off future society, with inspiring passages about how Nature revivifies itself, and also a section about the way that it began: notes of the researcher at a university surviving a cosmic event, injected with a special virus that has vast consequences for this remnant of humanity, travelling with a group of survivors who formed the ancestors of that future society.  

Without going into too much detail, I can see that this visionary book carries us on two pathways, that of the survivors of the cataclysmic cosmic event and of their future descendants. As a person who lives in the countryside of Japan and has often lamented at the state of nearby mountains which were once so painstakingly cared for and now are nothing at all to the vast majority of the population, I rejoiced to read the accounts of people for whom every living thing, every cycle, are of great importance and must be observed meticulously, and for whom the richness of the land, and its gods, are living and important parts of the human beings’ lives.

The society created draws upon many taproots of our society as well as on its major system, that of Nature itself; the language of the descendants, which the author depicts sparingly, has a few words from other languages as well as Japanese mixed in, and it is a good mental exercise to imagine what the original word might have been. (I communicated with Marc on this subject, and he admits a fondness for books with language anomalies which must be figured out; but for non-Japanese speakers, he has created a lexicon, downloadable from the website, in a PDF file of words used and their ordinary English meanings. 

A quote from the researcher who has led the small group of survivors past an erstwhile nuclear power plant, the area around which is dusty and lifeless, a hellish landscape:

“… reminded me of the ancient chronicles … life and death, all the same thing. Two faces of the same coin. susanoo, the god of the sea, is unhappy and searches for hahanokuni, the land of his mother. to find it, he must enter yomotsukuni. the path to life is through death… this godforsaken place is not a mistake, or a challenge. it is none other than the very road we need to take.”

Marc Peter Keane has drawn on his considerable knowledge of Japan and Nature to create a very thought-provoking book of great breadth and depth. The book is divided into six parts, each of which begins with a Japanese seasonal word and illustration by the author, very evocative and beautiful. The cover is also his illustration.

Even the stories not overtly about mother and child have to do with familial obligations and resonate with tales of characters seeking fulfillment outside their responsibilities.

Kamata’s writing is visceral and vivid, her characters complex. The settings are various—urban and rural—but all are a slice of life. They leave us in the middle of a person’s journey, with no real resolution but often at an important juncture.  

The book starts with what I thought was a memorable opening sentence, but turned out to be a perfect opening paragraph.

Every time Savannah speaks, a thousand magnolias bloom in my head. Her voice is liquid and sweet, like honey drizzled in the ear. There is none of the redneck twang that fills up the pool halls and laundromats. Her voice is worth imitating, and as I drive home after my shift at the restaurant, the smell of grease clinging to my hair and polyester, I sugar my syllables and speak into the night. (p. 8)

A lyrical paragraph, it works our imagination with its rich descriptions and contrasts, and takes us from the ethereal and heavenly to the greasy polyester realities of this waitress.

“Day Pass” tells the story of a woman who befriends a resident of the Women’s Correctional Institute on a work release program. The narrator is obsessed with the young enigmatic convict, but the story goes sideways when our narrator realizes that she may be in for more than she bargained for. This is a gentle yet riveting tale.

But “Day Pass” is only one of many beautiful stories. Some of my other favorites include “Blue Murder” about a farmer who falls in love with a kingfisher. He is a husband and father who feels unnecessary in his household and unappreciated. When he discovers this bird, he finds joy and purpose. He is mesmerized by it and believes “…that this bird had been sent to him in this moment of difficulty to ease his pain.” (p. 32)

“Down the Mountain” is written like an epistle or perhaps even a story told around a hearth to a daughter, warning her to leave her mountain village and pursue life in the larger world.

An American woman teaching English in rural Japan is the subject of “Lessons.” She is successful with the businessmen and children, but the housewives are challenging. In the end the lessons are reversed and it is the women who make their mark on the teacher.

In “The Snow Woman” we have a legend blended with a story of a Japanese mother obsessed with her mountain climbing. It is about a daughter who tries to understand why her mother would “… love mountains more than her daughter?” (p. 102)

In “Julia in the Desert,” a woman on vacation in Las Vegas with her family wonders, “What if I drove off the road, into the desert?” (p. 122) The title of the story, “The Lump,” is self-explanatory, and is enough to scare a woman into re-evaluating her marriage.

I have highlighted just a few, but all of the stories are worthy and should not be missed. They are thought-provoking and artfully written. All the characters are memorable including a rock-climbing violist from Prague named Greg Samsa, and a woman who prefers her ant farm to the Girls’ Day display. These two teach us that desire is transformative.

There is a mental patient in love with all things French, as well as an anthropologist fascinated with maiden sacrifices. And there is a family who feuds over everything, from meals to the atomic bomb, but it is in an A&W fast-food restaurant where they finally find a temporary peace.

I mustn’t forget the titular story. “River of Dolls” is a poignant tale about a woman struggling with infertility against the backdrop of the Girls’ Day Festival and the dolls central to that holiday.

These stories are set mostly in Japan, and are written with a deep understanding and appreciation for Japanese culture, and yet they are saturated with American sensibilities as well. It is a fascinating blend.

River of Dolls is ultimately a social commentary about how women’s identities are forged and about how difficult it can be for a woman to be just a person and not a mother, a daughter or a wife. It speaks to the responsibilities and the compelling needs of others as they compete against a women’s own needs and desires. Both touching and unsettling, River of Dolls will stay with you long after you close the book.

Why did her father always ask questions about death? In his last letter he’d asked if she knew anyone who had visited Aokigahara, the so-called Suicide Forest. He said he’d read about it in National Geographic, that you could sense the spirits when you walked through the trees. And did her husband, Paul, know anyone in his office who had died of karoshi — death from overwork?

Sophia pushed the letter back inside her bag, at the same time re-counting the six blister strips of painkillers with her index finger. Reassured by the feel of them, the whisper and rustle of the foil, she snapped the clasp shut and picked up her coffee cup.            

The café was usually busy, but that afternoon it was almost empty. For the first time she was aware of the low, slanting light pouring in through the windows, the shoals of yellow leaves in the gutter, and she realised the season had changed without her noticing. Most people were taking advantage of the weather, enjoying the warmth of the October sunshine on their skin.

She drained her cup, stood up to leave, and as she crossed to the door the staff called out their thanks in unison: four ringing voices rising above the hiss of the Synesso machine and the background jazz.

‘Arigato gozaimasu!’

Sophia still found it impossible to tune out the everyday clamour of Tokyo: the cuckoo signals at pedestrian crossings; the J-pop and chirpy adverts blaring out from every shop; the cacophonous din of the pachinko parlours; the over-cheerful TV shows with their sherbet-pastel sets. At night, the lights added an extra layer of silent noise; a busy, bright chatter of flashing neon that crowded her head.

She’d been told that even in the villages it was rarely quiet. Her Japanese teacher, Fumiko, explained about the announcements and jingles which were broadcast through tannoys in the streets, how the sound carried on the wind to the rice paddies. When she asked why they didn’t complain, Fumiko shrugged and said there was nothing to be done. Shikata ga nai. It was not to be questioned, it was just part of life.

Sophia had tried to quieten the commotion inside her own head with a daily routine of coffee shops and art galleries, with the hush of museums and books, with endless walks through unfamiliar streets. But inner silence eluded her. She often remembered something her father said when she asked him why he spent so much time in the woods. He told her that solitude was the best companion, that in the wild outdoors it took on a different character, became in itself a connection to the world, an invisible cord between you and your true self.

‘I’m alone in the woods,’ he said, ‘but I’m never lonely.’

Sophia called out her thanks and goodbyes as she left the coffee shop, and by the time she reached Yoyogi Park she knew what she must do.

When Paul first announced he’d been offered a transfer to Tokyo, part of Sophia had held back, wanting to say no. Yet it was clear Paul thought it was the right time to go and that the move would be good for them.

He could no longer face seeing her grief, visible and raw, like an open wound, but she knew he’d simply stored away his own, buried it so deep that there were no longer any surface ripples. The loss of a baby wasn’t something to ‘get over’, it wasn’t a hurdle to leap and leave behind. It was a defining line; a line from which everything would be measured from now on: the time before Calum’s death and the time after Calum’s death. Grief had already become a part of the warp and weft of her, and at random moments it would rear up unexpectedly with a clatter of hooves. When it did, it was deafening. And unlike the everyday clamour of city life, the noise of grief couldn’t be silenced by earplugs or soundproofing.

They flew to Tokyo two weeks before Paul started work, moving straight into the tiny house in Yanesen which had been found for them by Himari, his new assistant. They could have lived in the company apartment block in Roppongi, but Sophia didn’t want to be in that part of the city, renowned for its nightlife, its brash expat community. She’d emailed Himari and told her she would rather live somewhere quieter, more traditional.

Himari had picked Yanesen, the area where she herself had grown up, with narrow streets and traditional shops, old wooden houses and a hillside location. A chance to breathe in the city. They were lucky; she found them a house rather than an apartment — albeit tiny. Two traditional tatami-floored rooms, one up, one down, with a small kitchen area partitioned off at the back.

When they viewed the upstairs, Himari opened the sliding screens in the bedroom to show them the enclosed veranda. It overlooked a pocket square garden of moss and raked gravel, shaded by three neatly manicured trees. The largest was a mountain cherry. The blossom had already fallen, and yet Sophia could picture it in full bloom, its pale pink petals newly unfurled. She imagined lying beneath it, looking up at the laden branches and the oblong of perfect blue sky above. The garden was edged by high fencing faced with bamboo screening, and houses similar to their own pressed in around every side. However, the outside space, Himari confirmed, was theirs alone.

‘I love it,’ Sophia said.

For the next two weeks they explored the area, bought new futons and bedding, vintage kokeshi dolls from a junk shop, slipware bowls and handmade wooden spoons from the hardware store. Himari suggested they have Western beds delivered, a dining table, but Sophia said no, she was happy with the house as it was: the low table and red floor cushions, the sliding cupboard doors decorated with mountain scenes.

The smallest things gave them joy each time they returned home: placing their shoes on the rack in the entranceway, seeing their indoor slippers side by side at the top of the step, inhaling the dusty scent of the tatami matting.

On their third weekend in Japan, they took a trip to Hakone, arranged by Himari and paid for by the company; a last chance to spend time together before Paul started work.

The bus from the station in Odawara was full of backpackers and sightseers, but as they wound through the main villages and resorts, the tourists steadily disembarked in ones and twos. The foreign tourists waved maps at the driver, checking and rechecking they were at the right stop, communicating in little more than sign language. As the bus climbed higher, Sophia suddenly noticed the tip of Mount Fuji through the trees. She grabbed Paul’s arm, her words tumbling out as she pointed, and the Japanese couple across the aisle beamed with pleasure at her excitement.

‘Fuji-san is very shy!’ the woman said. ‘You are lucky!’

The cloudless sky was cobalt, the snow-capped mountain a dazzle of white; a fleeting glimpse of something so beautiful that it snatched her breath away. At that moment, Sophia knew it was a sign of luck; she could feel it at her core. She sensed a calmness in these trees and mountains, knew she would never feel lonely in this landscape, that there was something essential waiting just beyond her reach. She had uncovered the edgelands of solitude. 

After a kaiseki dinner served in their room, they made love on the tatami floor, a blue kimono spread out beneath them. It wasn’t urgent or hurried like the brief couplings they’d sought to try to block out death – those violent, bruising encounters that felt like bone on bone. It was slow and considered, and it confirmed, without words, that things could be good again.

Sophia’s fledgling happiness was short-lived. Paul was required to work long hours, and Sophia was expected to attend dinners with his British and American colleagues.

She found them unbearable. The men were self-important and rude to waiters. Their wives were brittle creatures with helmet hair and heavy jewellery. They spent their days shopping and lunching, and in the evenings they moved their expensive food around on bland restaurant plates and clawed at their husbands’ arms with scarlet nails. She was lonely and awkward in their company, out of step, just as she’d been uncomfortable in the London world she’d been pushed into before: champagne-fuelled celebrations in the boardroom accompanied by mutual backslapping; painful lunches with her boss; nights out at the latest West End bar with endless free drinks and unlimited bitching; Christmas parties at Quaglino’s. Her mother tried to tell her she would never fit in, that her Yorkshire accent and inability to conform would hold her back.

‘They’re not your people,’ she said, and Sophia knew she was right.

She had nevertheless tried in London, for the sake of her career. Here in Tokyo there was no need. Sophia didn’t want to fit in — didn’t need to fit in — to this sneering world of dismissive expats. She found reasons not to go out with them, until Paul eventually stopped passing on her excuses, and finally she was forgotten.

At first, Sophia enjoyed being alone: the peace of her tiny garden, shopping in the local markets for food, exploring the area. But as the summer wore on, she felt suffocated. Even the garden became too hot, the surrounding houses trapping the humid air. The only place to stay cool was in the air-conditioned room downstairs, and she felt hemmed in by its gloom. In Yanesen, the shopkeepers and locals were getting to know her, but they didn’t speak any English, and their reciprocal bows and smiles, their improvised sign language, could only take her so far.

She asked Paul if Himari could find her a suitable Japanese teacher, and she began to travel across the city to Shibuya three mornings a week to meet with Fumiko.

Fumiko dressed in linen shirts that were the colour of oyster shells and faded sky. She wore a thin gold chain around her neck which caught the light, and her hair was cut in a perfect bob. Sophia envied her quiet containment, her patience with mispronunciations and forgotten vocabulary. There was something about Fumiko which made Sophia want to try her hardest, and slowly she moved forward, adding new words day by day, words she was sure would reconnect her to the world.

She began by asking Fumiko questions about herself, but her responses were brief and reserved, and when Sophia suggested they went for a coffee, she politely declined.

‘I am sorry, Sophia-san, it would be very difficult for me,’ she said.

In the evenings, if Paul came home early, she tried to practise her Japanese on him over dinner. He was always tired and barely listened to her, switching on the portable TV as soon as the dishes were cleared, searching for English language news channels. He told her very little when she questioned him about work, and if she called him at the office, Himari would apologise politely and tell her he was too busy to talk.

Sophia was ignored, avoided, silenced, shut down. She was still disconnected, on the wrong side of an invisible barrier she couldn’t push through. Yet the noise of the city and the chatter within her head were both as loud as ever.

Emboldened by her new language skills, she began to explore every area of the city, to take day trips to surrounding towns, to spend time planning journeys to temples and mountains, often returning only at dusk to the house in Yanesen. Her anonymity made her invisible; a ghost moving through the crowds. No one gave her a passing glance on the streets, and in coffee shops and bars, although the staff smiled and nodded excitedly when she ordered in Japanese, they looked puzzled if she tried to engage them in any further conversation.

But after a few weeks, she no longer felt out of place in Tokyo on her own. She knew she could never make the city hers, that she was sliding along its surface and there was no way inside, yet it ceased to be important. She explored the streets and parks and galleries, the temples and the teahouses, and every other day, after her class with Fumiko, she drank coffee in her favourite café in Shibuya. As the world strode by the café window, Sophia looked on with calm detachment, and when she was tired of watching, she wrote in her journal.

She wrote about their neighbour, Mrs Kobayashi, who would knock on Sophia’s door and offer her a jar of homemade bean jam or a bag of anpan buns, and about their gardener, Kaito, who appeared every Wednesday morning.

He wore a twill waistcoat covered with pockets, from which he pulled clippers and twine and gloves. Standing on the wooden stepladder, he trimmed the small trees with the topiary shears from the storage box, then took the rake and the shuro broom from their nails on the wall and combed the gravel, tended the pot plants, swept away dead leaves. The first time Sophia saw him she went out to talk to him, but Kaito seemed uncomfortable in her presence, and even though she spoke in Japanese, he scarcely replied. So now she opened the screens before he arrived, then watched him from her chair on the veranda, soothed by his calm, measured movements, by the gentle, rhythmic snips of the cutters and the drag of the rake through the gravel. She sensed his contentment, the beauty and peace of his solitude, and she wished she could feel it too.

She recounted her walks through the city, wrote about the man she glimpsed changing his shirt in a doorway. He revealed a torso that was a riot of fish, flowers, geisha and warriors: the ink badges of a yakuza gangster. He was as colourful as the street fashionistas, but just like many Harajuku teenagers, his attempt at diversity only served to reinforce his conformity.

And she described the row of shoes — a man’s, a woman’s, a small girl’s — which she saw lined up inside an open doorway. Sophia imagined the family, laughing and talking over dinner, and the daughter, sleepy-eyed, as her mother kissed her goodnight. More than ever, she ached for the life she’d lost, yearned for a new life she barely understood.

She wrote often of her longing for silence, and of how only suicide prevented a Japanese train from running on time.

She never wrote about Calum: her panic as she’d reached into his cot, her clumsy attempts to revive him, about the guilt and the grief and the never-ending heaviness that pulled at her heart.

She didn’t write about the way Paul silenced her as soon as she tried to talk about their son, about how he drank every night after work in the hostess bars and entertained clients in the geisha districts. She didn’t mention that she sat on her own in their garden, waiting for him to come home while she listened to the neighbours’ chatter and laughter floating down from the open windows.

She didn’t write about how sad all of this made her.

Sophia met Akiro one evening when she was walking through the backstreets in Shinjuku. He was taking a cigarette break, standing in the doorway of the Night Owl bar, when he saw her peering up the steep steps. She had been wondering which of the tiny bars to venture into, reading the clusters of neon signs that flashed above the doors. He bowed and ushered her upstairs with a sweep of his arm. She ducked her head beneath a low beam as she went in through the hammered metal door, then sat down on the nearest bar stool. She was the only customer.

Akiro told her his name, asked Sophia hers as he placed a clean beer mat and a hot towel on the bar. Then he poured her a pale ale and lined up two small dishes of rice crackers. She drank the beer too fast, watched a black and white Kurosawa film on the screen behind Akiro’s head, listened to the thrum and pulse of music playing through two large speakers as tall as the bar, a tangle of electronic noise and hypnotic whispers which coiled around inside her head. He nodded towards her empty glass and smiled, opened two more beers, then reached beneath the counter for a bottle of whisky. And around ten o’clock, when no one else had come in, he told her she was beautiful and quietly locked the door.

He stood behind her, reaching around to slide his hand inside her shirt, but as she turned towards him he pulled away, pointing to the back of the bar. She walked in front of him, then stopped, unsure where they were heading. Akiro pointed to the table in the corner and nodded. He asked her a question, and although she didn’t understand the words, she knew straight away what he wanted, knew what he needed, knew that he had intuited she needed it too – a basic human connection, flesh against flesh. No eye contact, no words, no false promises.

Sophia turned away from him, undressed quickly, aware of him behind her as he unfastened his jeans. She gripped the edge of the table without turning to look at him and arched her back towards him. His breath was warm on her neck as he pressed her forward onto the cool metal surface, and when it was over she realised she was crying.

As she walked to the station through the neon-bright streets, the laughter and chatter of drunken salarymen spilling out from every bar, she understood that all the city could offer her was a different sadness, a constant feeling of jet lag, of disconnection, of things being not quite as they seemed. She was blinded by Tokyo’s density. There were no panoramic views, only a set of close-ups at point blank range, the disorientation of an unfamiliar landscape, the knowledge that she was slowly dissolving.

When she arrived home, she tiptoed up the stairs, holding her breath, then stared at her face in the bathroom mirror as though examining a stranger. She slipped her shirt over her head and noticed how grey her skin appeared in the fluorescent light, how dark her eyes were. She opened the cupboard door and took out the first aid box, reassured herself by counting the boxes of paracetamol and co-codamol. When they first moved to Japan, Sophia had been sure Paul would prove himself to be stronger than her, that he’d be her saviour. But although she thought about the pills less and less frequently, they’d always been there: a reassurance, a promise of a way out, a talisman perhaps – their presence a lucky charm in itself, their very availability warding off the possibility that she would ever need them.

For the first time since they’d arrived in Tokyo, she took out three of the boxes, dropped six blister strips into her bag and pushed the empty packs back into the cupboard with the rest.

She went through to the bedroom and saw straight away that the room was empty. As was so often the case, she was alone.

And the following afternoon, as she left the café in Shibuya, she made up her mind to find her own peace, her own solitude. She looked up at the trees in Yoyogi Park, the light shining through the red and gold leaves, the long shadows dappling the grass. She knew what she wanted and what she needed to do.

Without telling Paul or leaving a note, Sophia packed a bag and took the train to Matsumoto, then a bus to a village at the foot of the mountains. She walked up the steep hill to the temple lodgings, and they agreed she could take a room for as long as she needed.

She woke early the next morning, collected a map of the walking trails from the temple office and set out before the sun had risen over the higher ridges. She started her ascent through dense forests of larch and beech, following a trail marked by fluttering red ribbons tied haphazardly to branches and rocks. Her footsteps were muffled by fresh leaf fall, and she breathed in the scent of damp, mossy earth. There was a sharp screech from above, a rustle of leaves and cracking twigs as a family of macaques swung overhead.

As she climbed higher, she heard distant birdsong and the tap-tap-tap of a pygmy woodpecker. Her heart missed a beat as she crossed a narrow log bridge, gasping at the unexpected drop and the rush and tumble of white water cascading down the rock face. Eventually, she cleared the tree line and heard a bear bell tinkle faintly in the distance as a lone climber descended from the highest ridge: a yellow splash against the grey of the rock. Dropped into the silence, every noise had a clear meaning, each sound demanded her attention. She was finally connected.

Later that evening, Yua, the cook, asked Sophia to walk down to the pond with her to feed the carp. She told her how beautiful it was when the fireflies came, and of the Japanese belief that the tiny lights were the souls of soldiers who had died in battle.

Sophia thought about the fireflies as she lay on her futon, pictured one of the lights glowing brighter than the rest, imagined it was the departing soul of her own child. As she drifted between waking and sleeping, she watched it disappear above the temple and knew something within her had shifted.

She slept well that night, yet she was awake again at dawn, because as she’d already discovered, the mountains were as full of sound as the city. Outside her room she could hear the dry scrabble of birds’ feet in the guttering, the papery whir and flutter of their tiny brown wings. When she walked in the fields she was enveloped in the buzz and rasp and thrum of insects, the rustle of dry grass. At dusk there were the temple bells, the soft lull of the monks’ chants, and the gentle clink of pots and pans from the kitchen below her window.

And within this new noise, Sophia finally found her silence.

Amanda Huggins’ short story, “An Unfamiliar Landscape,” was first published in the anthology Same, Same but Different (Publisher: Everything With Words, 2021) and appears in the collection, Each of Us a Petal, published May 31st by Victorina Press.

Each of Us a Petal

The stories in Each of Us a Petal are all set in Japan or heavily reference Japanese locations in flashbacks within the pieces. The collection is unique in that the stories are told from many different perspectives: Japanese nationals, short-term residents, tourists, and those looking back on their time in Japan and its continuing influence on their lives.

This collection of short fiction takes the reader on a journey through Japan, from the hustle of city bars to the silence of snow country. Whether they are Japanese nationals or foreign tourists, temporary residents or those recalling their time in Japan from a distance, the men and women in these stories are often adrift and searching for connections. Many of the characters are estranged from their normal lives, navigating the unfamiliar while trying to make sense of the human condition, or finding themselves restrained by the formalities of traditional culture as they struggle to forge new relationships outside those boundaries. Others are forced to question their perceptions when they find themselves drawn into an unsettling world of shapeshifting deities and the ghosts of the past.

I set my stories in many different locations, but it is the people, landscapes and culture of Japan which continue to influence and inspire the aesthetic and sensibility of my writing more than any other destination. That said, I claim to understand nothing more than what it feels like to be human, whoever and wherever we are, and I hope that you will forgive me for sometimes writing about a Japan which exists only in my imagination. As Oscar Wilde wrote in 1889, “The whole of Japan is a pure invention. There is no such country, there are no such people.”

Amanda Huggins

To see Amanda’s prize-winning entry for the Writers in Kyoto Competition, please click here.

In both her critically acclaimed novel, The Baseball Widow, and her newest publication: Cinnamon Beach, Kamata’s signature multi-POV storytelling style deepens the narrative as we experience it from all angles. This results in a deeply emotional ride through The Baseball Widow, making it a haunting read for some. This is softened however in Cinnamon Beach thanks to the warm tropes of a romantic beach read. 

Crossroads and coming home

Cinnamon Beach is a story about moving on from heartbreak as experienced through the three POVs: protagonist Olivia, her sister-in-law Parisa, and her daughter Sophie.

Olivia has brought her two teen twins to the States in order to spread the ashes of her late brother, Ted. Burned out by a toxic work environment and her (secret) divorce, Olivia begins the story feeling like she has failed at everything, and is deeply uncertain of her future.

Returning home can be hard. Olivia, opines in the opening chapters how disconnected she is from much of the family updates, even the really big ones. Her old life in Japan looms large in her thoughts, but, as with any good beach read, a past romance promises to distract her and deliciously complicate everything.

Parisa, bereaved of her best friend and husband Ted, is faced with all the dangling responsibilities of her life with him. Decisions about the restaurant Ted built and the failing health of his parents compete with possibilities of building her small fashion business into something more.

Different people want different things from Parisa, but the question is what she wants from herself, now that the life she imagined is gone.

In comparison with the adults, Olivia’s teenage daughter Sophie starts her story happy to be away from home, in Tokushima, Japan. Home is comforting. It’s where her teachers, community and favourite festivals are. But thanks to her mixed genes, she is doomed to forever stick out. In addition, her deafness means she is often left out of her brother’s adventures. Embracing her invisibility from the first chapters, Sophie’s story branches off from the rest of the narrative as she enjoys her independence and a romance of her own.

Spice

The most comforting aspect of a beach read book are the fantasy love interests that inhabit them. Vicarious readers require lovers who are thoughtful, kind, blessed with a high density of muscle tone around the abdominal areas, and, most importantly, an unwavering and obvious interest in the protagonist.

Olivia’s story leans into the trope hard. An old flame from her college days has moved into the neighbourhood, only now he is a world famous musician. While he seems to be 100% on team Olivia, she has reservations and doubts that first need to be settled. Luckily, country & western superstar Devon has never had a biography written about him, giving Olivia plenty of opportunities to wield her tape recorder while asking more intimate questions.

Meanwhile, Sophie enjoys a sweet summer fling with Dante, a surfer boy who learns how to sign for her, and takes her to see the turtles. He is the perfect first love: respectful, curious about both the girl and her culture, and quick to text back. Through Dante, Sophie begins to navigate her first steps into adulthood.

Though less spicy than many modern romantic readers may expect, Cinnamon Beach brings warm fuzzies as the characters negotiate the tensions of their own will they/won’t they relationships.

An authentic touch

What makes Cinnamon Beach such a thoughtful read is how it synthesises Kamata’s realistic and relatable style of writing with more fanciful tropes expected of this genre. The feelings and emotions of all the characters come from a very real place, as do some of the events in the story. A truly infuriating section details the pervasive academic power harassment suffered in many tertiary institutions, for example. Olivia’s biography shares similarities with her author – a caucasian woman working in Tokushima, Japan, mother to two children, a boy and a girl, with a Japanese husband. Kamata herself is always quick to point out that her stories are fiction, but these insights into the world she has inhabited for decades gives her works a unique dimension.

Final thoughts

While Cinnamon Beach certainly touches on the pain of loss and the complexity of redefining one’s identity after grief, the novel balances this heaviness with the warmth of second chances and self-discovery. Kamata invites readers to connect with each character’s journey while delighting in the genre’s escapist pleasures.

The nostalgic seaside setting of Cinnamon Beach serves not only as a place for reflection but also as a subtle metaphor for the tides of change in each woman’s life. A backdrop that is both healing and serene. A place we all wish we could visit when at our own crossroads.

Momo ran through the mud of the dooryard with a bundle of dried grass stems. She was helping her father, Shinbei, with repairs to the thatched roof of their farmhouse. Shinbei stood halfway up a handmade ladder leaning against the eaves, waiting for her. “Come on, hurry up, Momo! I have a lot of work to finish by nightfall!”

Momo put the bundle into his outstretched arm and as he climbed up the rest of the way, she raised her face to the sunlight and took a deep breath of the clean, piney, foresty scent that always surrounded the house, especially now that summer was almost here. The woods and the steep uphill paths of the mountains began just beyond their back door. She listened for the hammering sounds of woodpeckers looking for their lunch in the trees, and the sounds, which were everywhere, of hundreds of frogs trying to find their mates and fertilize the wobbly masses of eggs that would soon ring the swampy puddles, leftover from the recent rains, that had formed further down the valley.

Momo had just had her twelfth birthday (she was named for the peach blossoms that came out, magenta-colored and breathtaking, in May). She was barefoot in the mud and dressed in a hand-woven earth-colored kimono that came to her knees, a hand-me-down from her mother, with the extra material of the sleeves caught up and sewn at the shoulder, and the hem which flapped against her thighs heavy where it had been turned up and would be let down as she grew. Her long hair was tied at her nape with a spare piece of cloth. She had a flat, pleasant face, like her mother’s, now a little smeared with dirt.

Suddenly, a noise brought her father down the ladder and her mother stepping out of the doorway of the house, wiping her hands on her kimono. It was a noise of horses and shouting men, just within hearing distance, and it came from the mountain. As one, the little family turned toward the sound. From inside the house came the muffled cry of Momo’s youngest brother, two years old, awakened from his nap. The shouts turned to screams as they listened, and then they knew what they were hearing – not another military party come to requisition food, but a minor battle between samurai warriors in the years-long struggle for supremacy of the whole country of Japan. It was whispered that this involved all the high-class fighters in the region. Sometimes they heard the noises of fighting or marching in the mountains nearby, and occasionally a messenger would run through the village, carrying presumably important news from faction to faction. Sometimes they even heard popping noises, and Shinbei had told them, having heard it from someone in the village, that a new kind of weapon had been introduced after being discovered inside a shipwreck from far away – a kind of stick that was filled with black powder and could throw death from a great distance.

Shinbei herded his women into the house, pulled the door shut, and told Momo to make sure that her other two younger brothers, aged eight and six, were safe. They were – she had just seen them making rope from straw inside the house. The family would have to hide until nightfall, because there was a danger that wounded men would come down from the battle site and demand succor. So many military requisition teams had already come past their house, leaving want and destruction in their wake; if they couldn’t find what they wanted, they would push over an outbuilding or piss in the yard. The domestic animals – ducks and a pair of goats – were long gone, vanished down the throats of famished soldiers, and lots of other provender, carefully hoarded since last fall, was gone too. The hole where radishes had slept the long winter through under layers of straw was empty, and the mother and children had been foraging in the forest for ferns and fruits to eke out the time until the summer vegetables would be ready.

And that was not all. Momo’s two elder brothers had been taken as foot-soldiers, and her two elder sisters also taken by the armies, though Momo had no idea why. Those who were left of the family were either too old or too young to be of use to the military men.

The family hunkered down, breath caught and held, in the fragrant darkness pierced with a few lances of sunlight from the holes in the roof, listening for all they were worth as the screams died down and the ordinary sounds of birds and animals returned to the forest.

When the sunlight ceased to pierce the roof and darkness gathered in the corners of the house, Shinbei commanded his wife to light a lantern and took it in his hand, pushing the door open and conning the dooryard for signs of disturbance. There were none. Sighing, he stepped outside, took up a bundle of grass stems that had fallen from the roof, and said to no one in particular, “I hope it doesn’t rain tonight, I have to get that roof fixed tomorrow.” He handed the lantern to his wife and the evening’s tasks began.

 *            *            *          

The next day, and a few days after that, dawned bright and clear, and Shinbei, assisted by Momo, was able to fix the roof thatch. But as she ran to and fro with armloads of dried grass stalks, she noticed something new, and finally called up to her father.

“Father, do you smell something?”

“Like what?” he panted.

“Like when the goat’s baby died – something rotten.”

Shinbei sniffed the air, caught the ribbon of decay, and immediately stepped carefully over the straw to the top of the ladder. “That’s the smell of corpses that lie around after a battle,” he said as he climbed down. “Now that that smell has begun, dangerous wild animals have had their fill and won’t come near. Now is our chance!”

“Of what?” asked Momo, appalled by the vision of a whole valley of rotting corpses, lying in various awful poses among the trees.

“To go up there and see what we can take! Get ready to go, and don’t forget your foot covering.” Shinbei ran toward the house, where his wife was sitting on the bench by the door, busy with some task involving separating seeds from dried heads for planting. “Come on, we have to go now before some other villager notices that smell!” She stood up immediately, scooped up the baby from where he was playing in the dirt, and tied him onto her back, yelling for the other children to come as well.

In a few minutes Momo was following her father through the new bracken up the mountain, and the rest of the family were coming along behind. All of them wore hand-woven grass sandals to protect their feet from the brambles which were just starting to grow. They walked quietly, heads down, until they came to a clearing at the side of which a spring freshet bounced and tumbled over rocks. Here, under the morning sun, about twenty dusty and bloody heaps of rags were scattered about. A dead horse bulked next to the stream. The smell was much worse here, and Momo tied a piece of cloth, that she had worn around her neck, over her mouth and nose, which helped a little. She could see, out of the corner of her eye, the rest of the family doing the same. They advanced slowly into the clearing. Several ravens rose up cawing angrily at the intrusion.

Most of the corpses had already provided food for animals. Momo glimpsed an arm, half eaten, lying some distance away in the grass. The faces were not so bad, because the eyes were mostly gone, probably down the gullets of the very same ravens they had disturbed. Insects and worms had not had time to burgeon yet. Momo’s mother began to strip pieces of cloth from the corpses with her short knife. She and Momo collected pieces of cloth, tying them into bundles with other pieces. A few banners, white with indigo-dyed family crests on them, lay here and there. Cloth was mostly all that was left. Helmets, leather straps, metal fittings, and other gear would have been taken by the jackal people that always followed battles, looking for things to sell. But cloth, washed with ash in water and dried in the sun, could be sewn together to make raincoats or bedding. Momo’s mother was a thrifty woman, and woven cloth was valuable in ways that leather and gold weren’t.

Meanwhile Shinbei walked here and there with his sons, looking for something valuable that might have been overlooked by the jackals. He paused, looking sideways across the field to detect the glint of metal. Suddenly he straightened and ran toward the edge of the woods a little way away, where seedling scrub and young trees were just beginning to grow.

He let out an inarticulate cry as he came to a corpse that lay on its belly just where the mature trees began. The cloth that remained was better-quality than that which draped most of the other corpses. The arms and hands reached out toward the forest, as though the man had dragged himself this far in an attempt to escape. Protruding from underneath his body was a glint of gold.

Shinbei used his foot to roll the corpse over, and disclosed a short sword, scabbarded, with a golden hilt. It now lay on the ground half hidden in mud. Perhaps the man, who was obviously a high-ranking general, had had some idea of cutting his stomach in suicide if the battle didn’t go his way. But everybody had died in this battle, including this proud samurai. Nothing remained to show what clan he had belonged to. His face was almost unblemished except for a broad smudge of dirt down one cheek, and his fatal wound was in the belly, which had bled and stained the ground for a good distance around. His eyes, still intact, looked up at the sky. Shinbei bent and clutched the short sword as if in a dream. His family, attracted by his cry, gathered round. 

“Look!” said the father. “We will be able to eat again!” He tucked the sword into his sash and looked off into the distance as his wife and Momo rapidly cut the trailing cloth from the body and rolled it up into a bundle. The family instinctively knew that the foraging was over, and they started down through the forest toward their house at the foot of the mountain.

As they walked, Shinbei thought long and hard about where to stash the sword until he could sell it to an itinerant peddler. He had no idea of using the weapon himself; it was so high-class that everyone would know he had stolen it. Best to get rid of it quickly, turning it into something that his family could use. We can’t eat gold and steel, he thought with a grin. He decided to hide the sword under a pile of trash, old moldy mats and straw, in the barn. When they arrived at home, he immediately went and did so, without a word to anyone.

*          *          *          *

It took about a week for the smell of the decaying corpses to subside and for the breeze down the mountain to blow sweet again. It was a week of nightmares for Momo, but she knew better than to mention it to her parents. They resumed their spartan life. Shinbei asked discreetly among the villagers if a peddler was due any time soon. No one knew.

On a cloudy, humid morning a little while later, the sound of shouts came up from the village. A little while later, horses’ hooves sounded on the well-worn path that led to the little family’s dwelling. Shinbei looked up, startled, from his work of fixing a handle to a carved wooden hoe, and saw several men approaching. He put his hand behind his back and with it, motioned for his family to hide. He saw Momo move rapidly toward the house, but didn’t dare call out to give the alarm. The house door closed silently.

In a twinkling Shinbei was surrounded by three or four heavily armed men. One of them knocked him to the ground and put his foot on his back as he sprawled in the dirt. Another stood to one side and unfurled a piece of paper – it looked very white to Shinbei as he saw it from below, even though the sky was obscured by clouds. This man began to speak in a measured tone – he seemed to be reading from the paper, but Shinbei had never learned to read and didn’t know.

“By order of the supreme Shogun, all commoners are ordered to relinquish weapons! No commoner is permitted to possess a weapon from now on. If you have any weapons, get them out and give them to us!”

Shinbei thought quickly. Whether he gave them the short sword or not, he would probably be killed. They might not find it if they searched. His only chance was to lie. If he died, his wife might find the sword and sell it to save the remaining children.

“I have no weapons! I am just a simple farmer!” he shouted as best he could into the dust.   

The man above him ground his heel savagely into Shinbei’s back. “Shut up! How dare you speak! We will search.” He jerked his head toward the others, who moved right away toward the outbuildings. Shinbei swallowed and closed his eyes.

In what seemed like a very short time, one of the men returned brandishing the short sword. “Look what I found!” He gave it to the leader with the paper, then turned to the others. “Anything else? Knives, anything?”

They said no. One of them picked up the hoe Shinbei had been working on and held it aloft. “What about farm tools? They could be weapons!”

“Our orders are not to leave the commoners, especially farmers, with nothing to continue their lives,” said the leader. He thrust the short sword into his belt on the right side. “However, this man must be punished – it’s clear that he stole this sword from someone much superior to him, and he lied about it! Off with his head!”

One of the men drew his long sword from his hip scabbard and swiftly brought it down on Shinbei’s exposed neck. He had no time to feel any pain – his head rolled under a nearby cart and his body shuddered and relaxed. The executioner wiped his shining blade on a tuft of grass and returned it to its scabbard. The men mounted and rode away.

Momo and her mother watched them go through a chink in the house wall, and when they were well away, opened the house door and rushed to the body of the father. Momo recoiled when she saw her father’s eyes looking at her from underneath the cart. The mother took her husband’s feet in both hands and dragged his body out of the dooryard. “I’m going to bury this in the radish hole,” she said over her shoulder. “That way the smell won’t give it away. Don’t worry, we will manage somehow.”

Momo took a deep breath and plucked her father’s head from the dust, closing the eyes and cradling it as she followed her mother around the side of the house.

It began to rain.

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Rebecca Otowa is the author of The Mad Kyoto Shoe Swapper, At Home in Japan, My Awesome Japan Adventure, and the creator of 100 Objects in My Japanese House. Her many valuable contributions to Writers in Kyoto, including stories, interviews, and reviews, can be found throughout our website. Rebecca provided all of the photos for this story.

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No less incontestable, awesome, and powerful, was the Imperial Will of His Majesty the Emperor, the living god, which had long sustained and nourished both the glorious war and the ruined nation. Beyond the superficialities of mere technique, beyond the single-minded exhilaration, effortlessness, and triumphant artistry of a master swordsman, his will slashed and vanquished opposition with the certainty and unquestioned authority of a thousand years’ obedience. The thin moustache, a mere line above the lips, the expressionless, glacial face inherited through generations, he was resplendent and proud in Field Marshall’s uniform and immaculate white gloves, his rimless glasses deflecting the judgement of an outraged world. His Imperial Majesty graciously took upon himself the nation’s tragic and unavoidable burden, even as he nudged “Snow”, his uncertain mount, forward, with mirror-like jackboots and precipitous back.

A living god, he existed above all law, all sanction, all reproach. The weight of his sighs alone could crush – and did. The puniness of the merely human frame, slight and boyish, with its own needs, desires, frailties, and ill-fitting clothes, was irrelevant to the indwelling presence of the divine – Amaterasu, the Sun Goddess. To bestow his personal name, Hirohito, on a child, even by mistake, was a sacrilege that could be expiated only by suicide. The entitlements and prerogatives of divinity were merciless and unforgiving.

As hierophant and Shinto High Priest, he alone communed with his immortal ancestor, the ultimate source of life. He was her mediator and interpreter. None might touch his sacred person – not even tailor or doctor – or meet the sacred gaze, any more than one might touch or look upon the sun itself. The mystic oracles and revelations of Amaterasu, mingling with the ceaseless susurrations of the mysterious wind at Ise Shrine, the Holy of Holies, he alone knew and bore. There, among the intense solemnity of the great black pines, he prayed for guidance in the conduct of the Just War being fought in his name. Before the sacred Imperial regalia of mirror, sword, and necklace, the Voice of the Crane, heard by few, carried whitely to the departed spirits of one hundred and twenty-three generations of ancestors far above the clouds. The sacred authority of the Chrysanthemum Throne was unequivocal and absolute.

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To view Malcolm’s poetry, please see the links here and here. Malcolm has also hosted some Writers in Kyoto events at his home. In addition, Malcolm was the winner of the Japan Local Prize in our Seventh Annual Kyoto Writing Competition. Read his winning entry, “Plum Tree by the Eaves“.

We don’t know very much about the 12 Apostles of Jesus, his constant companions during the latter part of his life, except that Simon Peter and his brother Andrew, and another pair of siblings, James and John, were fishermen; and the writer of one of the Gospels, St. John the Divine, was the longest lived and became a hermit on the island of Patmos in Greece; two others, Matthew and Mark, were also writers of Gospels. Another Apostle, Judas Iscariot, is probably one of the most famous people in history for whom the conflict between his original morality and the opportunity to be another person entirely tore him apart. He was the Apostle who is said to have betrayed Jesus “for thirty pieces of silver”. This is always said contemptuously, as though the amount should be enough to make us hate him. How betrayed? He gave information about Jesus’ whereabouts, and this led to Jesus’ being arrested by a “great multitude” of “priests and the elders of the people” in the Garden of Gethsemane, on the evening before his death; Judas kissed Jesus to indicate to the people that he was the one they sought. Judas subsequently felt tremendously guilty (we assume) about his role in Jesus’ arrest and subsequent execution, and he is recorded as having committed suicide shortly afterwards. We don’t know whether these stories recount factual events or whether they are meant to be symbolic of greater truths; there are several versions, which correlate among themselves, in the Gospels, though the writers did know each other, and it is possible that they collaborated or discussed these events, which they supposedly witnessed at first hand, before writing.

The great drama of Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion was put in train by the actions of
Judas, making him indispensable to the story. In some versions, Jesus knew that Judas was slated to become his betrayer, in fact knew the whole scenario beforehand, in which case Judas the human being was simply playing a role that was appointed and necessary. This short story is based on my imagination of Judas’ home life and his feelings about the events he was caught up in. It doesn’t tell the whole story, but attempts to give his actions some motive, which is absent (for whatever reason) in the original tale. He is universally despised for taking the bribe and giving the information – but which of us can say they would never do the same? Those were parlous times, and I expect Judas was not a stupid man. He probably guessed that whichever he did, he would be hated, vilified, and doomed by one sector or another of the community. Was he helpless? Was he simply a puppet of events, why did he do what he did? Is he meant to represent all people who are sitting on the fence of history?

In the rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar, which retells these events from a slightly more modern perspective, Judas is the Apostle who recognizes that the whole system of Jesus’ teachings is losing momentum and going “sour”, and decides to betray Jesus, and thus end the situation, as a solution to the problem. He is racked by guilt when he sees Jesus dying on the cross, and with his final breath before he commits suicide, accuses Jesus of “murdering” him.

We don’t know whether the Apostles were married, but in that time and place, many of them would have to have been. The idea that Judas was married is not based on anything but my own imagination. He was in all probability a householder with a family and a place in the community, and all the obligations and complex feelings that go with that. At least, that is what my imagination tells me.

Based on the King James version of the Bible and the rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar, this story is not connected to the atrocities now being perpetrated in the Middle East in any way. It is just something that occurred to me.

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The sun was low in the sky, and it was still hot, when Judas came home, tired and dusty, from another day of trekking the countryside in the wake of Jesus and the group that always surrounded him. He entered his house, lifting the latch of the stout wooden door, and was met by his wife, who proffered a ceramic bowl of water for him to wash his face, hands, and feet. As he bent to the water, his children flocked around him, chattering busily, and he greeted them before grabbing the cloth his wife had left, wiping the parts he had rinsed off, and tossing the bowlful of dusty water out the door with a swing of his arms. The water landed with a smack in the midst of the small fenced kitchen garden in front of the house. He went in to supper with his family.

When the evening rituals were over, and the children had been herded off to bed, Judas sat enjoying the cool of the evening on a bench outside the front door. After a while, his wife came out, dipped a ladle into the water jar just outside the door, and took a drink before sitting down next to her husband. They sat together savoring the cool breeze for a moment, and then she spoke.

“The vegetables will grow nicely this year, everybody says,” she said as she looked at the small shoots growing in the kitchen garden. Then, looking sidelong at him, “We will need every scrap of food if you persist in this path you have chosen.”

They both remembered the recent twists and turns of their shared life – his meeting with Jesus of Nazareth and how he became a full-time follower, abandoning his work with his father-in-law in order to do so, and that meant that even with her parents helping them in various ways, there was no money coming in. Times were hard with the high taxes levied by the Romans, and there were many expenses. Judas was worried, and his wife more so. She continued,

“We need money. You are a family man, but you are not supporting us. I’m ashamed in front of my family and friends. Pretty soon the shame will turn to penury. Thank goodness my father owns this house, so we will not be turned out to become indigent beggars, like so many others, but still. What are you going to do? We can’t go on like this. You have to decide!” She got up restlessly and entered the garden, inspecting the young plants that grew there.

Judas stared out, past the garden to the houses opposite theirs in the village. He knew that he wasn’t pulling his weight as a citizen these days, and he also knew that many of his fellow villagers thought he was mentally defective, abandoning his regular life in order to throw in his lot with that hothead. The dream that Jesus had offered, of direct communication with the Father God, circumventing the priests of the temple, had been so alluring. But was it practical? The priests had everything sewn up in the lives of the villagers. The necessary rituals of life were their province, and theirs alone; and had to be paid for by “donations” which felt like just another form of taxation. Everyone knew that there was venality among the priests, some of whom allowed moneylenders and other scum to ply their trades in the temple precincts in order to line their own pockets; but religion was the lifeblood of the people, and whatever the priests said, the villagers had to do, in order to stay within the fold of ordinary folk, where it was safe, if expensive.

Judas knew that Jesus found it disgusting that the priests of the temple were more interested in money than in the spiritual health of the community – in fact, most of them seemed to be of the opinion that money – riches – were the spiritual health of the community, or at least one of its most obvious indicators. Jesus had led a raid on the temple recently, in which he laid about him with scourges, toppling the stands of the money changers and places where sacrificial animals could be bought, and said “Make not my Father’s house an house of merchandise.” The priests were angered, a lot of the temple’s income being derived from these stands, and Judas knew it was only a matter of time before they would seek restitution for this outrage. It was not enough that Jesus, and increasingly his followers, were rabble-rousers; there was also ample evidence that Jesus claimed that he was a child of the Father God, and that anyone could say the same thing. This was not acceptable to the priests, whose livelihood and very existence were endangered by this idea; in fact it was blasphemy, and illegal according to their system. Those priests were going to make sure that Jesus and his followers would be put down. Their ideas and actions were getting too dangerous. Life was already quite precarious with stress between the inhabitants and the government of Pilate, the governor of Judea under Emperor Tiberius of Rome; various insurrections had kept the well-armed Roman soldiers on every corner busy for months. The Romans held the locals in contempt, not least because of their belief in one God, which the Romans found ridiculous in the light of their own polytheocratic society. The whole thing was a powder-keg. And was Judas to go up with everything else when it blew? What of his family and village? Did he have the courage to stand up for the ideas Jesus taught and that he, as a follower, had helped to promulgate? And what good would it do for him to stand up for them?

Judas knew all this; his own family were suffering because of the situation, and he had exacerbated it by throwing in his lot with a known troublemaker. What should he do? Gradually an idea came to him: it was repellent, but it would quiet things down for the moment. And if he played his cards right, he would get some ready cash, which would mollify his wife and her family, as well as pacifying the priests and going a long way toward making village life, perhaps even national life, palatable again. He got up from the bench, resolved to meet with the priests in the morning. Calling a good night to his wife, he entered the house and went to bed.

＊　＊　＊

The next morning the villagers were out and about early, preparing for the Feast of Passover which was to be held later that week. Judas slipped out his door and joined the foot-traffic. He was due to meet Jesus and his followers soon in the center of town; but first he needed to talk to someone in authority, and institute his plan. After a sleepless night, he had awakened determined.

He walked to the temple gate and went inside, to the large and spacious area within. The stands of the money changers and other little shops were back in place all around the perimeter; it would take more than one enraged man with a whip, even one with many followers, to roust them out permanently. Judas skirted them and came to the colonnaded walkway where, he knew, some of the priests would be congregated, enjoying some discussion of the Holy Books after breakfast. There they were.

“What do you want?” One of a small group of priests addressed him as he approached.

“I have come about the blasphemer Jesus of Nazareth. I wish to talk to someone in authority.”

“You are Judas Iscariot, are you not?” As a householder, Judas was known to the temple – or at least his family was.

“Yes.”

“Follow me.” The priest who had addressed him excused himself from the group, scholars who spent their days, when not engaged in ritual, arguing over fine points of religious law. Judas and the priest walked into a doorway and up some stairs. He was ushered into a well-appointed room. In a very short while, three high-level priests, recognizable by their robes, came in. They sat down on marble benches nearby. Judas, not invited to sit, remained standing.

“Now what is this all about?” said one.

“I understand that Jesus of Nazareth has caused you some trouble.”

“That’s putting it mildly. We are at our wits’ end. This lunatic and his followers have broken several of our laws. There have been many outrages, including the recent one where this man incited a riot right in the temple grounds. The Roman government wants us to do something about it.” The three priests nodded to each other.

Judas swallowed. “Well, I have been in that group of followers recently, and I have become alarmed at the turn things have taken. Therefore I have come to you, to do what I can to help you to restore the status quo.”

“What can you do? Oh, if you have been a follower, you can lead us to him so we can arrest him. Would you be willing to do that?”

Judas hesitated. He was now afraid of his own decision, but he had already identified himself as one of Jesus’ followers. If he didn’t do what they wanted, they might come after him. Then what would happen to this family? He had to decide now which side he should be on. Finally he took the plunge.

“I can see no alternative. At the upcoming Passover feast, Jesus and his main followers will be at a certain place I know, and afterwards, in the evening, according to his custom, Jesus will be in a secluded garden, communing, as he says, with his Father God.”

The priests harrumphed and their eyes flashed. “Which garden?”

“The Garden of Gethsemane. That is his favorite, because it is so isolated.”

“Good. Of course we will pay you for this information.” The priests conferred in whispers. “How does thirty pieces of silver sound?”

Judas was flabbergasted at the size of the sum. That would go a long way toward getting his family out of the financial hole they were in. But at what cost! He had been living cheek by jowl with Jesus and the other main followers for weeks. He knew Jesus intimately and would have called him a friend. How could he do this? But his misgivings about the methods of the followers, and his money worries, were too strong. He spread his hands deprecatingly. “Well, I don’t want to take blood money …but I see no alternative. Since I have been a follower of this Jesus, my own income has dwindled and my wife and family are in danger of penury.”

“It’s settled then.” The priest laboriously stood up and exited the room, soon returning with a cloth bag that seemed very heavy. “Here you are.”

“All right, you and soldiers come to the garden after dinner on Passover, and I will point him out to you by kissing him on the cheek.”

“That is good. You have done the right thing, for your family and for your community. Now don’t forget your promise. We know who you are, and if it doesn’t go well, we will know where to look for you. We will arrange for soldiers to come with us.” The three priests filed out, and Judas was left alone.

The enormity of his action weighed on Judas even more heavily than the cloth bag, which he stowed away in his clothing before turning and making his way out. He was not to know that that bag of money – the thirty pieces of silver – would be coupled with his name and his deed, and define him, down through the ages. He knew only that he had made a hard decision, and had decided on the side of his family and community. He could have done nothing else. And yet…

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Rebecca Otowa is a long-time member of Writers in Kyoto and serves on the WiK Committee as Reviews Supervisor. She is the author of Tuttle publications At Home in Japan, My Awesome Japan Adventure, and The Mad Kyoto Shoe Swapper, as well as her self-published book of illustrations, 100 Objects in My Japanese House.

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Following is a short bio of the author.
Amanda Huggins is the author of the novellas All Our Squandered Beauty and Crossing the Lines as well as six collections of short stories and poetry. Her work has been published by Harper’s Bazaar, Mslexia, Popshot, Tokyo Weekender, The Telegraph, Traveller, Wanderlust, the Guardian and many others. Three of her flash fiction stories have also been broadcast on BBC radio.
She has won numerous awards, including three Saboteur Awards for fiction and poetry, the Kyoto City Mayoral Prize, the Colm Toibin International Short Story Award, the H E Bates Short Story Prize and the BGTW New Travel Writer of the Year. She has placed in the Harper’s Bazaar Short Story Competition, the Costa Short Story Award, the Fish Short Story Prize and the Bath Flash Fiction Award, and been shortlisted for the Bridport Flash Prize and many others. Amanda lives in Yorkshire, England and works as a freelance editor.

Marc writes: “I am very pleased to announce the publication of a new, illustrated book called The Name of the Willow, a philosophical folk tale which suggests that by changing the way we name things, we can change the way we see the world.  

Starting with a single willow tree growing on a riverbank, we come to discover all the things that shape the tree into what it actually is and, in doing so, we find that the willow is not a single, separate thing, but a confluence of streams, an aggregate of interactions. And, its true name includes all of the many things that make it what it is.

The journey to make this book has been a year-and-a-half long project working through all the illustrations as well as writing and laying out the book. It was printed in Kyoto and hand-bound by Kyoto artisans with a sewn spine in the traditional watoji method. The paper used in the book, Panshion 303 by Molza, is a special blend developed for contemporary printing presses that was created to evoke the soft, fibrous quality of Japanese mitsumata paper. The printing was done on Fujifilm’s high-end digital Jet Press 750s, using their proprietary Vividia water-based pigment inks.

The original illustrations were done on Kōchi mashi, Japanese linen paper, using pastels, inks, and graphite powder. Each sheet was first dyed with various inks before the drawing was started. The deep black was made using a custom-ground graphite powder. The distinctive green mimics the color used in Japanese nihonga paintings known as “ryoku shō“, which is made from finely-ground malachite.

Separate English and Japanese editions of the book are being sold directly from my studio.

“The Name of the Willow” (English edition)  —  PURCHASE HERE

“Yanagi no Na” (Japanese edition)  —  PURCHASE HERE

The story is based on an essay of the same name that appeared in my recent collection, Of Arcs and Circles, published by Stone Bridge Press.

“You’re an interesting person,” she said. Kazu’s heart froze. Emi’s smiles weren’t for him. They were a sales tool.

The panic attacks started soon after.

The yamabushi had no other acolytes. No sermons, no talk at all. Kazu cleaned, washed, cooked, and foraged for sansai —wild roots, greens, mushrooms. Maybe he’d catch a yamame trout, dredge it in salt, and broil it over glowing embers.

When he wasn’t working or sleeping Kazu meditated with the old man. The falling water smoothed and rounded the sharp shards of his heart. Heijoshin, equanimity, grew to fill the cavern of unrequited love.

For twenty minutes each morning they’d sit under the waterfall. But today seemed longer, much longer. Kazu stole a glance. The old priest’s head lolled sideways, cheek cupped in hand —Buddha enlightened —legs frozen in full lotus.

The local villagers insisted that Kazu leave immediately. He’d be a homicide suspect when the police showed up. They gave him fresh clothes, a bus ticket, and a bento for the once-daily ride back to Kyoto.

As the bus turned onto Shijo Dori in front of the department store, Kazu looked out the window, wondering. His heart had healed. Could his relationship with Emi mend as well? She wasn’t the person he thought she was. And now, neither was he.

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Stephen Benfey’s homepage with examples of his short stories can be found here. For his short story on gardening and rocks, see here. For a New Year story, click here. For his piece on foxes, see here. For Gaijin’s Redemption, click here. For his short story titled Tofu, see here.

On Reading David Joiner’s The Heron Catchers

Herons are lithe, elegant birds. Gliding over water, nesting in fields, or soaring through the air, the heron’s perceived ability to transcend the elements has led to fabulous fairytales, stately dances, and sublime paintings. Haiku poet Matsuo Bashō wrote verses about the heron and artist Ohara Koson immortalized the bird in woodblock prints. Now novelist David Joiner adds to our collection of heron lore and love with his hauntingly beautiful The Heron Catchers, published by Stone Bridge Press.

Set within the quiet green abundance of the Yamanaka Onsen village, some distance from the picturesque castle city of Kanazawa, The Heron Catchers promises a lovely idyll of rural life. As charming as rural life may appear from a distance, however, it too is rife with conflict and pain. Shortly after the novel opens, readers are confronted with treachery. Here, main character Sedge visits the famous Kenrokuen garden, at the heart of Kanazawa, to meet a woman:

He stood on a short wooden bridge over a stream winding away from Kasumagaike pond, admiring a newly blossoming cherry tree, and pines here and there recently freed from their protective winter yukitsuri ropes, when a snapping of branches made him spin around. To his astonishment, a wild boar burst from a bush, colliding with a heron upstream and sending a cloud of feathers in the air (10).

Sedge springs into action, covering the injured heron’s head with his jacket to both calm the bird as he attempts to rescue it while simultaneously protecting himself from its razor-sharp beak.

Treachery comes in other forms, too.  Soon we learn that Sedge has been deeply wounded by his wife’s infidelity. Nozomi has run off with the talented but volatile potter, Kōichi,—taking with her all of Sedge’s savings—and leaving Sedge the impossible task of running their Kanazawa craft store with no capital. Nozomi’s brother, mostly in an effort to protect the family name, invites Sedge to spend time at the inn he owns not far away in Yamanaka Onsen. Sedge can teach the employees English for room and board. It turns out that one of the inn’s employees, Mariko, is married to Kōichi, the man who ran off with Sedge’s wife.

When the rules at the inn become too oppressive—particularly those that prevent Sedge from seeing Mariko romantically—Sedge decides to strike out on his own.  Or rather, he moves in with Mariko. The comfort their strange alliance offers is threatened by the presence of Kōichi’s teenage son, Riku, who lives with Mariko.  He, more so than the adults, has been hurt by life’s cruelties. Like the injured heron, he is frightened and dangerous, lashing out at any who try to approach him.

Will Sedge and Mariko be able to find the solace they need to heal their own damaged hearts? Will they be able to rescue Riku? What has happened to Nozomi, Kōichi, and the money? These and other questions propel the narrative forward. But more than the trace of a plot, readers are captivated by the understated beauty of the prose and its shimmery profundity. There are truths buried here, truths about the fragile persistence of sorrow and love and hope. We brush up against them as we read but hardly notice.

When they reached the shrine, Mariko waved him to a narrower path he hadn’t noticed, which wound behind the shrine and through a copse of sugi trees. In a minute they emerged on the opposite side of the mountain, lower than where they’d been. Here the view opened even more. Despite the highway near the ocean, where cars were small as ants, he sensed that no one in the world could find them here (95).

We follow the characters as they travel deeper in their journey towards healing, a journey that takes them deeper into the mysteries and beauty of nature. There are missteps along the way. We watch as the characters stumble, uncertain in their pain.  And, we celebrate with them, too, when they learn to staunch their hurts as surely as they bind a heron’s broken wing.

Given my background in Japanese literature, I could not help but think of the folk-tale of the heron wife while reading the pairing of Mariko and Sedge.

In the Japanese folk-tale, a young man comes across a wounded heron, and he takes it in and nurses it back to health. When the heron has regained the use of its wings, he releases it, and the heron flies away.

Time passes and the young man meets a beautiful woman with whom he falls in love. They marry and live happily together. The young wife weaves cloth, which the man sells, and the two are able to support themselves.

But the wife places a constraint upon the man: He must never observe her while she is weaving.  Of course, the young man cannot resist the temptation to look, and when he does he sees a heron at the loom.

Now that her secret has been exposed, the heron wife can no longer remain in the human world. She returns to her flock, leaving the man bereft.

In The Heron Catchers as well there is an importance placed on seeing, control, and the power of knowing. In one scene, Sedge’s desire to see Mariko’s naked body in the moonlight reads with mythic overtones.

     She led him into her bedroom. Of the three curtained windows along her walls, only the one behind her futon had been left open for the sky to pour its light inside. It was enough to see her figure when she slid her yukata off, light and darkness moving over her body: her nipples, her navel, the space beneath her armpits, the barely visible bars of shadow between her ribs, the constellation of scars—the sea of skin that surrounded these things like water keeping islands afloat (172).

Unexpectedly, this romantic scene leads to tragic results that threaten to unravel the domestic happiness the two have struggled to achieve. This scene, and the one cited above, suggest the tug at work in the novel to get to the heart of some hidden meaning—to understand, to know, to read “the constellation of scars.” Much of the novel, therefore, carries readers into the characters’ inner worlds where time swirls round and round unanswered questions.

In an online interview between publisher Peter Goodman and author David Joiner, Goodman observes that David’s American characters do not walk through his narratives like the questioning outsider. The story does not draw attention to their otherness or make it the point of conflict but rather integrates them within their landscapes in a very natural way. The comment is astute. Readers know that Sedge is American, but we are never told what he looks like, what race, what religion, or any other identifiers. Rather, we identify with Sedge in a much more universal way, as a human being on a quest. “I want my characters to be on equal footing linguistically and even in some respects culturally,” Joiner noted to Goodman in response, “that allows me to go a lot deeper in their interactions with each other.”

And, deeper we go.

Part of the cultural landscape that Joiner’s characters explore is shared with haiku poet Matsuo Bashō, who traveled through Yamanaka Onsen and Kanazawa on his celebrated journey into “the deep north.”  For all his barbs and hard edges, the boy Riku is drawn to Bashō and his poetry. When Sedge asks him why Bashō made the trip, Riku replies that he did it to “escape the pain and sorrow of this world” (169). For Riku, haiku is an escape. For The Heron Catchers, Bashō’s journey offers the characters a model for the momentary epiphanies life offers. In the space between these sudden realizations, Sedge, Mariko, and even Riku take their own journeys deep into the interior where they are able to bind their wounds, meditate, and return.

Matsuo Bashō wrote a few poems on the heron. This one seems most appropriate to this novel:

inazuma ya               a flash of lightning
yami no kata yuku        into the gloom
goi no koe               goes the heron’s cry.

                         Translated by Geoffrey Bownas and
                         Anthony Thwaite

Author David Joiner, a Writers in Kyoto member, was born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio, but now makes his home in Kanazawa. The Heron Catchers is his third novel and will be available from Stone Bridge Press and other online outlets from November 21, 2023.

Joiner’s second novel Kanazawa, also published by Stone Bridge Press (2022), was named as a Foreword Reviews Indie Finalist for multicultural novels. See the review by Rebecca Otowa.

Reviewer, Rebecca Copeland, also a WiK member, is Professor of Japanese at Washington University in St. Louis, a translator, and a novelist. The Kimono Tattoo, set in Kyoto, was reviewed by Rebecca Otowa for WiK on July 6, 2023.

**********************

He’d only gone and done it again. Sitting on a barrel, Satoshi clutched a single bottle and surveyed the damage. Jagged shards of glass like shark’s teeth glinted menacingly under the strip lights of the stock room. Surrounded by a sea of alcohol that permeated the senses and intoxicated the very air he breathed, his head began to swim. He ran his thumb over a small salamander on the label that indicated this was a bottle of the brewery’s flagship product, his pride and joy. He knew that he really had gone too far. Having destroyed most of his stock, it was the last remaining bottle – the only one that met the strict standards passed down from one generation to the next. Slipping it safely under his arm, he walked outside to where the moonlight glinted off a river that ran past the centuries-old sake brewery and headed back into the sanctity of the family house.

Later that day, Satoshi arrived at the fancy hotel and headed up to the members’ club on the top floor. The smell of sake and the chatter of jovial conversation hit him as he opened the oak-panelled door and stepped into the crowded room. Around the perimeter, booths had been set up to showcase samples from ten different breweries who had been invited to the event. Satoshi headed over to the Tatsuriki sake table where he was instantly recognized with a bow of respect from the staff. He sipped a cloudy sake and surveyed the room.

The traffic lights had already changed to green some time ago. Drivers pipped their horns as Satoshi sat staring into space, oblivious even to the sound of the pneumatic drill and the blur of workers in orange jackets as they toiled under the midday sun. His mind had been elsewhere since leaving the clinic. He had been considering the consequences of his actions. The bottle, the blood, the screams. He saw the blue light from a police car light up the river as an officer waded in to take him away. He watched the tears and confusion in his daughters’ eyes as daddy was handcuffed and put into the back of a police van. He felt the shame and humiliation he had brought on his family as his neighbours watched on. He contemplated the end of the business.

************************

This story first appeared in a 2021 book by Andrew Innes (The Short Story Collective: 13 Tales from Japan).

When they walked across to the café for breakfast, they noticed signs at the visitor centre which chalked up details of recent bear sightings – none – and offered safety advice: Please walk with the bell for giving bear notice!

The campsite shop was filled with a plethora of jangling kumayoke suzu and Beth insisted they bought a shiny red bell. However, they still set off unarmed, James having decided that the constant clanking would disturb the birds they hoped to see, and scare off the elusive kamoshika mountain goats. He wrapped the bell in a bandana to silence it, then tucked it in the side pocket of his rucksack. Beth was still unsure, but somehow everything seemed safer when the sun was shining and crowds of Japanese tourists were strolling back and forth along the paths.

Their day’s climb started at Taisho Pond, a place Beth found strangely haunting. Blackened, withered trees reached up out of the clear water, a reminder that the lake was formed by the last eruption of a nearby active volcano. James had picked up a map of the different walking trails in the visitor centre, and Beth followed him up the lower slopes through the trees, jumping at the snap of a twig or the whir of a bird’s wings. James climbed fast, striding ahead, and as the canopy became denser and the forest darkened, Beth became more nervous. She wanted to turn back, even though she knew she was being foolish, and she found herself constantly looking over her shoulder, then up towards where the tree line ended, convinced she could see shapes moving in the gloom.

After two hours of climbing they emerged from the forest, and Beth stopped for a few moments in the sudden warmth, catching her breath before the final ascent, any fear of bears dissipated by the sunshine. James carried on, scrambling up the scree towards the higher path. He turned and shouted to her as he reached the top of the ridge.

‘The first of the mountain huts is up here, Beth, exactly where I thought!’ He pointed with his walking pole. ‘I’ll see you there.’

She followed him up the slopes, stopping occasionally to admire alpine flowers, turning to take in the view as she put some distance between herself and the tree line. She found the marked path which led to the hut and followed the route James had just taken. As she climbed the last fifty metres she was sure she heard the brief high-pitched beep of a text notification, and the sound filled her with dread and suspicion. When she reached the plateau of flat-topped stones, she caught James slipping his phone back into his pocket. He walked towards her, his face flushed with guilt and embarrassment, and she felt her stomach twist.

‘Let’s have our rice snacks and water,’ he said quickly. ‘There’s a great place to sit in front of the hut – fabulous views.’

She followed him and sat down on the flat rocks, her heart still racing, her ribcage aching with the familiar foreboding. Still high above them were the snow-capped peaks of Hotaka, and below them the river flowed like mercury through the valley. In the distance, barely perceptible wisps of white smoke hung in the still air above the sleeping fire dragon of Yakedake volcano, and Beth found herself shivering despite the warm autumn sunshine.

‘Was that your phone I heard?’ she asked.
‘Phone? Do you really think there’d be a signal up here? You’re becoming paranoid, Beth. Don’t spoil the day.’
‘Me? Me spoil the day? It’s you who’s made me paranoid. I’m on edge all the time, wondering about every text and every call, about where you are when you’re late home from work. If you’ve nothing to hide, then look me straight in the eye and tell me she hasn’t contacted you. Better still, let me see your phone messages.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous, Beth.’ He laughed, but he didn’t make eye contact with her, he looked up at the mountains instead.
She held out her hand. ‘Go on, give the phone to me. Show me you’re innocent.’
‘You’re being . . .’ He suddenly faltered, lifting his hand in greeting to someone on the slope above – a man in a red jacket waving a silver walking pole.
James stood up. ‘Quit it now, Beth; this guy is heading over here.’
‘I know it’s still going on, James, I absolutely know,’ she hissed.

As she finished speaking, the climber arrived at the hut, announcing his presence with the clanking of a large bear bell. Beth managed to feign a smile as he introduced himself to them, but she left most of the talking to James. Motoki spoke little English, and when he ran out of vocabulary the three of them communicated with exaggerated gestures. They laughed too loudly and nodded too wildly, and when Beth did join in the conversation there was a brittle brightness to her words.

They offered their new acquaintance chocolate, and he offered a flask of green tea in return. Beth and James didn’t exchange a word between them as they packed away the remains of their food, and when they set off, they began their slow descent close on Motoki’s heels. As they walked in silence, Beth completely forgot about the possibility of bears, her mind still whirring, wondering if James was telling the truth and if she was simply being paranoid. After all, was it likely there was a phone signal on the top of a mountain?

Deep in thought, she was caught off guard when Motoki’s outstretched arm brought them to an abrupt standstill. They froze mid-step as though competing in a game of musical statues. When she looked up, her eye was caught by a dense black rock just above the tree line. It stood out against the pale scree, and when she refocused, the boulder became bear. She could make out the tilt and sway of his salt and pepper muzzle as he tried to catch their scent, and the glint of eyes like polished coals. When they stumbled to a halt there was a mesmeric moment as he continued to walk towards them. As he reared up onto his hind legs, Beth swore he looked her straight in the eye, poised and sure, calmly weighing up his options. Not afraid to let her see what he was thinking, quite prepared to show his cards, to be clear about his intentions.

Then Motoki jangled the bell on his rucksack, and just as swiftly as he’d turned towards them, the bear dropped to the ground and loped away without looking back.

Dizzy with adrenaline, they remained motionless, stiff as statues, until Motoki gestured down the mountainside with sweeping arm movements to indicate that they should keep moving. Beth scrambled after him, pleased to have company and not to be alone with James, happy with their enforced silence, relieved to listen to nothing more than the clamorous clanking of the bear bell until they reached the campsite.

James dropped a short way behind them to take some final photographs of the views across the mountains in the afternoon light. It was the last chance to see Yakedake before they were plunged deep into the forest again. Beth turned back at one point, reluctant to lose sight of him despite her current anger. James waved her on, told her he’d catch up with them, shaking his belt to show her he’d clipped on the bear bell they’d bought that morning.

At the edge of the trees, Beth stopped for a moment again, sure she had heard something behind her: rocks tumbling; scree scattering; a muffled cry, eerily human; a soft growl. The sounds echoed across the mountain in the stillness, and her heart raced. She tried to call out, but the words stuck in her throat, and when she listened again all she could hear was the fading tinkle of a bell.

The story first appeared in the collection An Unfamiliar Landscape (Valley Press 2022), which is available from Amazon, Waterstones online etc, or via the Valley Press online shop.

Amanda Huggins is the author of the award-winning novellas All Our Squandered Beauty and Crossing the Lines and seven collections of short stories and poetry. She has won numerous prizes for her work, including the Colm Tóibín Short Story Award, the H. E. Bates Short Story Prize and the BGTW New Travel Writer of the Year. Her fiction has been broadcast several times on BBC Radio. See her award-winning entry in the WiK Competition.

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The fraying edge of rural life was patched with farmland. Roadside stands sold cabbage, broccoli, melons, on the honor system. John had noticed only one paddy field. There, in the shade of a gnarled plum tree, three obaa-sans, grandmas, sipped tea and nibbled rice crackers. Their paddy was no larger than John’s boyhood backyard, but it probably filled the women’s rice bowls, year-in and out.

Before the move, John and Eri had known only one street hawker. His roasted sweet potatoes had been a winter treat in the city.

___________________________________________________

They called him Ojii-san. It’s what they called every man his age.

As he pedaled slowly along the route he had plied since high school he scanned the street for his regulars. Nobody. Ojii-san tooted his horn. To the Japanese ear it sang out “to — fu — .”

___________________________________________________

In the distance, John saw a lanky man on a black bicycle. A large wooden box was lashed to its rear carrier. The man raised a toy-like horn to his mouth.

Down the street a neighbor appeared, waiting.

The lanky man braked, hefted his bike onto its stand, and sold her something from the wooden box.

___________________________________________________

Ojii-san made two batches of tofu every morning. The first was for the shop. The second for afternoon delivery. Just enough not to overload the wooden tub he strapped to the back of his bicycle. He had been a teenager when the box’s weight had flipped the bike on its side. The tongue lashing his father had meted out remained, a ghost at the edge of consciousness, watching, judging … yet receding. Its intrusions, though rare, whet Ojii-san’s resentment, setting him counting the steps remaining before the scowling face toppled into the abyss.

Now he was the father and the grandfather, the Ojii-san.

His father had been the eleventh generation of tofu makers of the Shimadera Clan. Ojii-san was the twelfth. None of his children wanted to be the thirteenth. Maybe one of his four grandchildren would step up. Wishful thinking.

___________________________________________________

“So …?” Eri said as John slipped off his shoes.

“Hard to tell. Old guy riding a bike. Toots a tin horn. Sells something from a wooden box.”

“I thought so,” Eri said.

“You thought that he was riding a bike with a wooden box on back?”

Eri’s eyes narrowed. “He’s a tofu seller. Why didn’t you buy some?”

John clicked his tongue. “I wasn’t carrying any cash. Besides, I was too far away to see what it was.”

“Seriously? Didn’t you hear his horn?”

“Sounds like a French police car.”

“Sounds like ‘to — fu — ’,” Eri corrected him.

John sighed.

“Next time, buy some; understand?”

John turned away, found the newspaper and hid behind it. Eri loved tofu.

___________________________________________________

Ojii-san’s children nagged him to quit the delivery route. He was nearly 80. What if a car shot out of a side lane? How could he veer away without losing his balance? What if he fell and broke a hip? He’d be bedridden, a burden.

All true, he had to admit. But nothing could erase his debt to his customers. He owed these people his life — allowing him to marry, raise children, and teach them to be honest and considerate adults.

Why couldn’t his children see the truth — that what he made and sold wasn’t a product? The way he made tofu, it was a link in a virtuous circle — the way the forces of the universe made the world go round.

Maybe if they had studied tea ceremony longer instead of following their friends to cram school. Then maybe they would have grasped Lao-Tzu’s words from the eighth hexagram of the I-Ching — Be like water, providing for people without competing, 上善如水 — the wisdom on the scroll above the shop’s counter — brushstrokes of a long-ago Shimadera grandmother, bold and fluid.

No. His children would listen to a Chinese sage the way they listened to Ojii-san himself — politely but not seriously.

___________________________________________________

It was a rainy day when John and Eri heard it again. To-fu-.

When John caught up, one woman was already buying. The lanky man in the navy blue poncho scooped a block of tofu from the tub, bagged it, and took a few coins. Then he bowed and said doumo arigatou gozaimasu. Thank you very much.

John was thunderstruck.

The tofu man waited for the dazed foreigner to say something.

“One block of tofu, please.”

Receiving the bagged tofu, John readied himself to listen, really listen.

“Doumo arigatou gozaimasu.”

The tofu man’s words sent a shiver through John’s body, a shining clarity that washed to his bones. It was as if the man had said, “This tofu — solid yet fragile like life itself — has brought us together. Savor it with your soul, and you will have good, honest tofu for as long as I live.”

This was to “Thank you” as “I’m blown away” is to “Interesting!”

A door opened in John’s mind. “From the bottom of my heart” wasn’t a turn of phrase, a shorthand for sincerity, but a dimension of reality he needed to explore, just as he was exploring his new neighborhood.

The way the tofu man said it, “Doumo arigatou gozaimasu” was no platitude. It had attitude. It drew a line in the sand.

The old man on the bicycle did not care for platitudes. If you don’t feel gratitude, your voice will betray you. The idea of platitudes as social graces slandered life itself. It was worse than factory-made tofu.

There is a saying: don’t let tofu travel – 豆腐に旅はさせるな. In Ojii-san’s mind, factory tofu couldn’t be real tofu — not if it could survive distribution to supermarkets. They must be using refined coagulants and additives. They were cheating the customer out of flavor.

The Shimadera family insisted on doing things the old way, the real way, using 100% nigari — the non-salty part of sea salt.

Curdling soy milk was so easy, anyone could make tofu. Just add vinegar. Why not?

But nigari won’t cooperate with just anyone. It bows to the worthy — those who have transmuted the dry soybeans, hard as rocks, into svelte white slabs softer than jello — day after day — month after month — year after year — until the tofu gods smile. To those acolytes, the deities reveal tofu’s calculus and bestow a feel for its variables: humidity, temperature, timing, water, nigari, soybeans; and the special knack of stirring the mixture of nigari and soy milk.

The reward is in the flavor. Real nigari tofu tastes like food, not diet food. You don’t want to stop eating it.

The curds are poured into molds and weighted to squeeze out the liquid, just as you separate the curds and whey in cheese-making.

Eri tasted the tofu and smiled. She thanked John for buying it. Her’s wasn’t the thank you of the tofu man but it, too, made John happy.

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Stephen Benfey’s homepage with examples of his short stories can be found here. For his short story on gardening and rocks, see here. For a New Year story, click here. For his piece on foxes, see here. For Gaiji’s Redemption, click here.

– Mom! Mom! Can you tell me really quick about that day you met dad?
Pleeease, it is for my school assignment.

***********************

Tetiana Korchuk was the winner of the Unohana Prize in WiK’s Seventh Writing Competition

Below is an excerpt from Chapter Two of The Secret Garden of Yanagi Inn, a modern Gothic retelling of The Secret Garden. Here is a synopsis:

Still grieving her mother’s death, American photographer Mari Lennox is sent to document Yanagi Inn, an old, dilapidated ryokan outside Kyoto. By day, Mari explores the inn and its grounds, taking striking photographs and uncovering layers of mystery shrouding the old resort—including an overgrown, secret garden on a forbidden island. At night, eerie weeping (which no one else seems to hear) keeps her awake.

Despite the warnings of the staff, Mari searches for the source of the ghostly sound—and discovers a devastating secret tying her family’s history to the inn, and its mysterious, forlorn garden.

********************

The dimmed cabin lights brightened to a rosy glow, mimicking a sunrise though it was late evening in Kyoto. I wiped the drool off my lip with the back of my hand, glanced at the passengers on either side of me. The elderly woman to my right was awake, watching Roman Holiday on her seatback screen—Mom’s favorite movie, one I’d watched with her three times in the hospital alone.

The smartly dressed blond woman on my left had her laptop out on her tray table. Her stockinged feet rested on carry-on luggage with the same floral print as the weekender bag Mom had picked up in England years ago.

An optimistically small bag for her hospital stay.

The woman was probably working. Her nails on the keys tick-tick-ticked away, knocking on the door to my brain, reminding me I should check my work email. I reached for the bag between my feet. And Risa would need to be reminded of where I’d left Ginkgo’s pills. She needed to know he wouldn’t take them without sticking the pills inside butter. She needed to know—

STOP IT, Mari. I pictured my little sister smirking at me, arms crossed, standing next to my white puffball of a dog. Relax—I’ve got this.

I leaned back in my seat, rhythmically twisting the too-loose ring on my middle finger.

The flight attendant pushed a drink cart down the aisle. She wore a fitted top and pencil skirt, a jaunty kerchief with the Japan Airlines red crane logo tied around her neck. “Green tea, coffee?” Her voice was quiet, soothing.

I raised my hand. “Coffee would be amazing, thank you.”

She smiled a practiced smile, set a small cup on her metal tray, and poured the coffee from a carafe. The two women on either side of me asked for green tea.

Even over the aroma of my coffee, I could smell their tea. I’d missed it, the slightly bitter scent, the warmth of it. A scent from my childhood.

Japan. I’m really going back. This is real. This is NOW.

I took a sip of the coffee, hissing as it stung my tongue. A sharp, cheap flavor like the instant crap Thad used to buy when he’d finished off my good stuff.

I should’ve asked for tea.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we will be landing at Kansai International Airport in approximately half an hour. We anticipate a slightly early arrival. Local time is 7:14 p.m.”

My cardigan was damp with sleep sweat. I’d take it off, but I was afraid of elbowing the ladies next to me, so I made do with pulling my hair back into a ponytail and hitting the button for my personal fan. It whirred to life, but the clicking annoyed me, and I turned it back off. In the row behind me, someone sneezed.

What the hell was I doing running away like this—abandoning my sister, my now ex-boyfriend, maybe even my job? Tears welled in my eyes and I fought them back, staring at the screen in front of me, at the image of the tiny airplane and the dashed-line trek it’d made across the Pacific Ocean. Even if Risa had made all the arrangements and basically shoved me out the door, it felt wrong to just leave.

Even if it was for only four weeks.

Deep breaths, Mari, deep breaths.

At first the timing of the grant had seemed fortuitous, if a bit rushed. But the closer I got to Japan, the more reality set in and the vague details of the NASJ grant paperwork felt more and more inadequate. Photograph an old isolated Japanese inn “for posterity’s sake”? It wasn’t much to go on.

Had I brought the right camera lenses? Would four weeks be enough time? It seemed an eternity to me right now, but I’d never been asked to document an entire estate, never even received a grant before. I was an artist, not a documentarian.

At least, I used to be an artist.

Maybe I should’ve splurged for the upgraded camera bag with better padding. I pictured the Roman Holiday woman next to me opening the overhead compartment and my camera bag tumbling out onto the floor. Contents may have shifted during flight.

Could she even reach the overhead compartment?

She was a tiny Japanese woman—probably in her seventies. I snuck a glance at her.

But Mom was sitting next to me.

I froze, my entire body turning numb.

Mom, leaning back in her seat, was watching the movie with a slight smile on her lips. Her platinum blond hair was tied back in a loose ponytail, but tufts had fallen out and were dusting her shoulders, her blouse, like dead leaves. She sipped her green tea.

I struggled for air. The sweat dotting my skin turned cold, clammy.

No, no, no. I’m just tired, didn’t get enough sleep. I closed my eyes, inhaled deep, gasping breaths. Mandarins, I smelled freshly peeled mandarins.

“Are you all right, honey?”

My eyes flew open. CEO woman on my left, with her slim laptop and flowered bag, stared at me. Her eyes were wide with concern.

I shot a glance to my right. The little grandmother had returned and was happily watching her movie, oblivious to my distress.

Am I all right? The dreaded question.

Did she mean “do I need medical attention?” Or was it more of the existential “all right” we all seem to strive for but never quite manage?

I smiled at the woman, responded with the only reasonable lie one can give to that question: “I’m fine.”

Deep breaths, Mari. Deep breaths.

The flight attendant in her perfect pillbox hat and red bandana came by again, this time with white gloves and a plastic trash bag. I handed her my half-empty cup of coffee with an apologetic smile.

I should’ve asked for tea.

*****************

Amber is an author, freelance editor, and university instructor. To learn more about her, please click here.

I’ve lit the candles and incense, rung the bells at the small shrine in my studio, bowed my head, all as if I’m about to start work. The sticks and the needles stand ready, lined up in their boxes; the ink in its jars, rows of blue and black, yellow, green, aqua, red. I used red a lot, for the sweeping arms of demons, the brilliant skin of the Goddess of Mercy, the sun rising from the sea, the leaping carp the surfers all wanted put on. But the ink is crusted inside the jars and dust lies over my worktable, so thick it’s almost furry. The table, with its black cover, is furry; the cats sleep there for hours, undisturbed. Bea is there now, curled in a tight cat knot. As I stare down, she unwinds, blinks her amber eyes up at me, yawns, curls up again. Soon, she is snoring. 

I am that insignificant. Now. 

Rain runs down the night window as I walk over in the one-bulb dimness, the straw matting of the floor smooth and cool. My left arm, the bad one, fat with trapped lymph fluid like a blown-up balloon, aches except for the fingers, which are numb and puffed; on days like today I can hardly move them, each a sausage ready to pop. I rub my arm absently with my other hand, press with my thumb to see how deep a dent it leaves. As big as the strawberries I used to buy by the carton, the expensive ones, when I had money for things like that, and an appetite. Months ago. 

I used to have two skinny wrists, my palms stained a rainbow of tattoo ink. I was busy every night until past midnight. Japan’s most famous female tattoo artist, my own entire body a canvas of the art. 

Before the cancer. Before my pride, my demon, lost her head, and I my breast. 

I wish there was thunder outside, and lightning, the sky filling with white and pink forks and torn sheets of light. But it’s a straight, calm rain, an ordinary night as the world goes on around me, without me. The dry cleaner across the street pulls down her shutters. Cars hiss along the street. A pair of young women whose heels tap staccato as they laugh in passing below. 

My doorbell buzzes. Harshly. 

I jump so hard I hit my head on the window, then hold my breath, willing the person below to go away. 

The doorbell buzzes again. Did it always sound that angry? And again. 

I stumble down the steep stairs I used to run up and down. The bell keeps ringing. My head is splitting. 

Finally I’m there. I wrench open the door, throw on the outside light. Clear my throat to yell go away. 

The man on my doorstep blinks in the sudden light, nearly drops the cigarette he’s sucking at. It’s not his first; there’s two butts down on the ground, and the damp, acrid smell of their dying. The hooded sweatshirt that shrouds him is gray, the color I’d used for dragon scales. His trousers are dark and forgettable. Soaked sneakers on his feet. He raises his head. 

“Sensei,” he says.

I snort, enjoy watching him startle. 

“Sensei,” he says again, faster. “I want a tattoo. And you’re the best.” 

His eyes catch mine. Smart eyes, canny eyes. Perhaps even sly as he raises the cigarette yet again. 

I stare at his hands. They’re long and very thin, the fingers slender, so elegant they belong on a concert pianist. The sleeves of his sweatshirt fall back and I see arms corded with wiry muscle but smooth skin, pale skin. A perfect canvas. 

I clench my teeth, tear my eyes away. “Go to hell,” I say, and slam the door. 

************************

Enter the ink. That’s the traditional phrase for old-style tattooing, everything by hand, the needles set in bamboo handles that prick-prick-prick the skin, spreading the rainbow. The ink enters you. And you enter the ink. 

It’s the only relationship that’s with you forever. Your parents will die, your friends move away. Your love will leave you. Your kids grow and go. But a tattoo is with you as you fly into ashes, lying there with you in your grave. It’s not just decoration – at least, not the way I do it. Those Western tattoo places, the flash markets? There it’s just buzz-buzz, bye-bye, you’re done. 

Not here. Not when you lie down on my bed and I start with the design we’ve figured out together, my right hand with the needle, my left hand on your skin, holding it smooth, holding it steady, feeling you quiver, grunt, disguise a whimper with a cough. I wipe away your chilly sweat and ply my needle. 

A midwife came to me, infertile, cradling new babies each day at her job but never one of her own.

She wanted safety, a prayer for each birth, everyone alive at the end. I gave her the Goddess of Mercy, hand raised in blessing, smiling, the light shining from her face. All across her back; it took us months. I made her a living amulet she takes to each birth, carrying beneath her scrubs the goddess. 

Divorced fathers get the names of their kids; construction workers get prayers for safety. I inked the God of Thunder across the stump of a trucker who’d lost a leg in an accident; he said the tattoo pain helped him deal with the loss, and got a prothesis to match. He’s proud of it now. 

I have a dragon on my back so I can fly, Buddhist scriptures on my scalp because I knew something bad was coming ahead of the tsunami, and wanted to try save the world. But it was the demon on my torso, from my belly to my breasts, that was everything: my self, my love, my strength, my art. The way my fingers could draw, could hold the needles, could smooth the skittish skin – it’s like poking a needle in a waterbed, you know – and get always the best results. I never make mistakes. 

I never made mistakes. 

I spent nights swimming in color, lapped in blues and reds and yellow as I dreamed, tattoos telling stories through my skin. But they betrayed me. For weeks before I found the lump, the demon bit me. There was a knotted feeling in my chest. 

The mastectomy that took my breast beheaded her. She’s blind now. Powerless. 

And so am I. It’s her revenge. 

************************

He’s back the next day, ringing and ringing. 

“No,” I say. 

Again. Staring through the door as I stumble to it, half asleep from a nap. 

“Fuck off.” 

I slam the door in his face. I wrench the wires from the doorbell. 

Knock-knock-knock, he taps now. Who the hell is this guy? Doesn’t he have a job? 

Two, three weeks it goes on. I pretend to be out. I pretend to be dead. I look down on him from the upstairs window and again, see those wrists. That pale flesh. My fingers start to itch despite me. I rub my bad arm and turn away. 

A night comes with the sky on fire. Thunder shakes the house, rain falling so hard the air is white. Good, I think, I’ll have quiet tonight. But I make the mistake of looking outside, and there he is. Drenched through. Hunched by the door. 

The hell with it; it’s a cliche, but I’ll bite. I don’t want his corpse on my doorstep, after all. The police would ask awkward questions. 

He jumps as I bang open the door and snarl “Come in already, you idiot,” scrambles in as if afraid I’ll change my mind, stands in the entranceway dripping. I fling a towel at him, which he catches nimbly, hands incredibly quick. Follows me as I lead him to the kitchen, wham the kettle down on the stove. I make us each a cup of tea, sit down across from him. 

“Well?” 

“I want a tattoo.” He stares at me, almost taunting. 

“I get that.” I stare right back. “I’m expensive. Very, very expensive.” 

His eyelids flicker. He sets down his cup, reaches into his pocket, flings a wallet onto the table. It’s Gucci. And it’s bulging. 

“More where that came from,” he says. 

“You work? Where?”

“Around.” He shrugs. “Ameyoko, Tsukiji. Sometimes Nakamise.” 

Mostly markets, all of them crowded. Touristy. My eyes narrow. “You don’t look like a guide.” 

“No. I’m in….finance.” His eyes flick to the table. 

I take a slow sip of my tea, I eye the wallet. He’s almost certainly lying, but it wouldn’t be the first lie I’ve heard. Far from it. 

“Why a tattoo? Why now?” I shouldn’t ask, but can’t help it. His sweatshirt falls back from his arms as he rubs his hands together, and there’s all that beautiful, beautiful skin. 

“Dunno.” He shrugs. “It just seems … time.” 

I’ve heard this before. The bad son, in jail; parents died; felt guilty. Got their memorial tablets on his back so he bears them every day, a steady worker now. The prostitute dreaming of a new life; I gave her a warrior princess. The cancer patient praying for strength, fighting on. 

And what have I done? I suddenly think, am just as suddenly ashamed. Defensively, I slam my bad arm down on the table. We both gaze at the puffy fingers, the fat, inflated hand. 

“Lymphedema.” I name my destroyer. “From surgery. They took lymph nodes with the breast. I had cancer.” 

I’ve said it aloud, I realize. Perhaps for the first time. 

He looks at me, blinking, then does a very strange thing. He takes my hand in one of his, begins stroking it with the other. From the tips of my fingers up across the back of my hand, up towards the rest of my arm. I’d snatch it away from him but it actually feels good. Warmth follows his slender fingers. I close my eyes. Rain spatters the windows. Five minutes pass, ten. Perhaps more.

I open my eyes, pull back my hand, move my fingers. Maybe I’m imagining it, but their movement seems better than before. 

“You have good fingers,” I finally say. 

“My gran.” He shrugs again. “Had the same thing. I did this for her. It helped.” 

We look at each other. The light emphasizes his cheekbones. He suddenly looks young, as if the toughness is all a pose. 

“All right,” I say. “Let’s go upstairs.” 

************************

His name is Tomo. It takes weeks of erratic night-time visits – he shows up and knocks, usually when nobody else is out, and glances around before slipping inside – until he finally points into one of my art books, says “That.” 

My eyebrows rise. I’d have thought he’d want the God of Wind or Thunder, but he’s chosen the Enlightened Buddha, symbol of salvation, on a lotus leaf for enlightenment. 

Another two weeks; I’ve sketched the design on paper. My strokes are hesitant at first, but gradually the sense returns. My lines grow firm and strong. I savor the colors as I draw. 

I’ve also been massaging my hand and arm as he did, easing the swelling slowly away. I can bend my fingers freely, hold vegetables steady as I slice them one-two-three for training. My strength grows. It’s the left hand that matters most, you see; the skin must be held firm, ready. Willing. 

“Good,” Tomo says, when I unroll the design. We both ink it in informal contract, and he pulls out his wallet for the down payment. Yves St Laurent, I see. Bulging just the same. 

We start the next week with a prayer together before the altar. The sweet scent of incense still flows around us as he takes off his shirt, lies down on his stomach. I take a deep breath, pick up a needle. Begin. 

It’s like riding a bicycle. It comes right back. 

Tomo’s a quiet one. No twitches or wiggles, asking to “use the bathroom” or “have a smoke” as an excuse from the pain. He doesn’t talk, either. Some do; over the months it takes for a full back tattoo, I hear about their life, their kids, their jobs. But he doesn’t say anything. Just comes, lays himself down, and lets me work. 

I learn a lot about him anyway; skin doesn’t lie. Not just wiry but skinny, as if he doesn’t eat much, as if he hasn’t eaten much for years. The scars, jagged white lines and perfectly round ones, that I ink across, changing the design to cover them.

And those hands. Those slim hands that at the end of each session pull out the wallet to pay. A different wallet every week. 

I start to wonder. I think of the design, its message of salvation. I ink and ink, and I say nothing. Tomo’s skin is cool and still beneath my hands. 

Except once. The time he’s forgotten to take out his wallet before lying down, so I have to ask him, and he lays it on the floor beside us as I kneel over him, waiting, needles poised. 

“New wallet,” I say, as I ink. 

He flinches; my needle slips. But I work around it, so no one can see the miss. 

I remember men still thin from prison, reaching for reform as they came. The way he’d said it’s time. 

Okay. 

After all, my tattoo will be with him forever. A reminder of salvation. A goal. 

************************

Nights, I breathe colors, bathe in rainbows. Finally, ride the sky again with my demon. 

And then, one evening, I ink the last area, and I sigh. 

Tomo gets up and stretches, pulls his sweatshirt back on. Pays me. His wallet is Dior today. 

“Thank you.” His bow is awkward. 

I follow him down the stairs, pull my coat and bag from their hooks in the entryway. 

“I’ll come with you to the station,” I say. “Need some things from the store.” 

He jumps but follows me outside, looking around. 

He’s tense, and silent, but smokes companionably. A car veers close on the narrow street, and when I stumble against him to get away, he steadies me. 

At the station, he bows again, scurries up the steps inside, and vanishes. I reach into my bag. 

My wallet is gone. 

It takes a moment to sink in; then pure rage fills me, red. But as I turn to dash into the station, a train rackets out above me. He’s gone. 

I stomp my way home and burn through the evening, re-igniting every time I see the ink on my hands. From Tomo’s salvation tattoo. 

It’s midnight when I finally realize. Yeah, my wallet is gone. 

But my hands are back. The colors are back. 

Mine again, now and forever. 

*********************************

Elaine Lies currently works for Reuters news agency as a correspondent – and writes fiction on the side. She has lived in Kyoto twice – once for a college exchange program and once on her own dime to study Japanese, which she describes as “a marvelous eight months which, despite an extreme lack of funds that had me eating home-made oden every night for over a week more than once, was such a wonderful time I consider it my 青春.” Her current stint in Japan started in 1987 with six years in Morioka, Iwate. Stories of hers run by the The Japan Times can be viewed here.

“Good morning, Emiko.”

Emiko, sitting at the counter, turned to the door when she heard the bells jingle and shook her head in consternation as Keiko hurried inside.

“Keiko, you left your shop door open! You are getting forgetful in your old age. Kyoto isn’t so safe that you can just leave your shop open anymore,” she scolded.

“Emiko, have you forgotten that we are exactly the same age?” Keiko replied tartly. “Are you calling yourself old then as well?”

“Most of our friends are grandmothers now,” she grumbled. “Let’s just admit that we’re old. Anyway, I’m glad you’re back. In gratitude for minding the shop, I think you should treat me to a cup of tea.”

“Hai, hai. I’ll get right to it. And Emiko, it was for your sake that I rushed out. I was fresh out of lemons for your tea so I trotted over to Mr. Morita’s to get them. 

Knowing that Emiko would stop by, knowing she’d want lemon tea—and ensuring that she had a lemon on hand—was an example of omoiyari. It  was a concept that she always enjoyed explaining to foreign students in Kyoto. There was no exact word for it in English and she felt it needed to be demonstrated to understand the true meaning. Though some people said it could translate as  empathy, Keiko thought that omoiyari was more action-oriented. She thought of it as the result of careful consideration and anticipation of  what would brighten a day or make someone feel good. Simply put, it was  quietly taking action to make things go smoothly.  If Keiko didn’t have omoiyari she would have just explained to Emiko that she had no lemons today, and that she could drink her tea with milk or sugar instead. How inconsiderate!

Keiko retied her apron and began making a cup of tea for Emiko. While she was doing that, two young women who worked in an office building a few doors down came in, sat down at a table by the window, and also wanted lemon tea with their morning set. Keiko was glad she had bought more than one lemon. She set out three cups and then thought for a second and took out a fourth. She’d have a cup of coffee as she chatted with Emiko. Emiko had switched seats at the counter to be closer to where Keiko was doing her prep work. The wooden counter was chipped with age, but it still shone nicely when she polished it each morning. It could seat up to eight people, though there were rarely more than six people even during lunch when Keiko was at her busiest. She heard the back door open as her cook, Minoru Tsuji, arrived. She served the lemon tea, measured out the coffee beans for her own coffee, and then went into the kitchen to greet Minoru.

“Ohayo gozaimasu. It’s a beautiful morning, isn’t it.” 

Her young bearded cook returned her greeting and nodded his head in agreement, as he chopped up some onions. 

“For lunch today I was thinking we could serve Chicken Piccata and I’ve already picked up the lemons to garnish it.”

“Did you get parsley? If we’re cooking western style chicken we’ll need that too as a garnish.”

The lunch menu at Den was filled with Western-style dishes such as Napolitan spaghetti, omuraisu, curry, and a Japanese hamburger plate. Yōshoku or Western food had been introduced into Japan during the Meiji Era and became more prevalent after World War II. In a sense, Keiko and her menu were both relics of past years, but she liked it that way. Yōshoku was more of a fusion style of food since it had been influenced by what was available in Japan and the palette of the Japanese people. For example, the curry served all over Japan was generally mild. Napolitan spaghetti was made with ketchup instead of tomato sauce. Some people thought yōshoku was embarrassing now that Japan had plenty of authentic restaurants serving foreign cuisine. But people of Keiko’s generation, who’d grown up with it, still enjoyed it and young people had recently “rediscovered” it so it was having its moment once again.

Her dinner menu was the same as the lunch menu, but lunch was her busiest time of the day. Her late husband had bolstered business by serving beer and sake in the evenings, but it was too much for Keiko to handle on her own, and rather than hire someone to serve drinks, she’d close the restaurant after dinner. 

Den had always been a neighborhood place and even with tourists filling the area it retained that character. The wooden tables and chairs were a little wobbly and didn’t have even a whisper of chic to them. It simply wasn’t flashy or intriguing enough for tourists. But different restaurants were always being highlighted in Kyoto tourist magazines and on television programs. She dreaded the day when her restaurant might appear in a trendy article called “Ten Hidden Places in Kyoto That You Must See.” Or something like that. Social media was all over Kyoto and fed off the tourism boom.

Keiko opened the refrigerator to show Minoru the parsley. She was pleased that she’d remembered the parsley and mentally congratulated herself. Maybe she wasn’t yet over the hill after all. She walked out of the kitchen and finished making her coffee. 

Though Den had no claims to pretension and wasn’t one of these upscale coffee shops, she still brewed coffee cup by cup as her husband had since the shop opened in the late 1970’s. First, she’d weigh the coffee beans on a small scale that they’d been using ever since she could remember. Then she’d grind the coffee by hand. She knew she was old-fashioned. But her husband had insisted that grinding by hand was the right treatment for coffee beans and she wasn’t inclined to go out and buy a fancy gadget. She also continued the tradition of making each cup fresh using the pour over method that every coffee shop in Kyoto used. That is, used to use. These days the chain stores would not use such a cumbersome and time-consuming method. It was all about volume and speed for them. But the traditional shops still made their coffee the old way. If you were in a hurry for coffee and your time was more important than the flavor then you’d best avoid places like Den. 

Kyoto was known in Japan for its delicious coffee and pastries. Foreign tourists didn’t realize this, and even Japanese from other cities in Japan mostly remained ignorant of the preponderance of bakeries. Tourists came to Kyoto to see temples, shrines, autumn leaves, and cherry blossoms without knowing what Kyotoites knew about their city. Was that a good thing or a bad thing? This was something that the neighborhood association was pondering right now. 

Tourism in Kyoto had increased rapidly over the last ten years. Keiko could remember back in the 1970’s when she knew most of the Westerners living in Kyoto, at least by sight. Of course most of them did not know her. She was just another Japanese face to them and very few of them would ever discover that she spoke English rather well. But nowadays English wasn’t the language you needed to speak to tourists since most of them were from China or Korea. They did not share a language, but they did share a common alphabet to some degree. A Westerner would have trouble telling a Chinese person from a Japanese person. As fellow Asians, perhaps they did look similar, though Keiko didn’t think so. And from a cultural standpoint they were worlds—perhaps universes—apart. Few Asian tourists ventured into Den. It wasn’t the kind of place that would attract them.

“Keiko, when is the next neighborhood association meeting?” Emiko’s words startled Keiko out of her reverie. 

“I think it is next week. We have to review the new prefectural guidelines for tourists. Have you seen the new brochure they’ve published?” 

“Is it in English? No, thank you.” 

Emiko had what was known as an“English allergy.” Though she’d spent time abroad in Europe, she’d always gone on tours and had not needed to learn any foreign language other than a few polite greetings. Like many Japanese women her age, she’d studied English Conversation as a hobby in her younger years and had even majored in English Literature in college. When Keiko and Emiko were in junior college English Literature was the most popular major for girls. It was thought to be a nice addition to their marriage resume and showed intellect. Studying English Conversation was as much of a necessity as flower arranging and cooking back then. But most of the women of their generation had little confidence in their ability to speak English and avoided it as much as possible. Emiko was typical of her generation of women and felt she was hopeless with the language. She was not at all shy about expressing her dismay when she was called upon to communicate in English. 

“The pamphlet is  multilingual!” Keiko sighed at Emiko’s reaction. 

Keiko was going to have to take the lead at the meeting. As more and more of her neighbors realized that she spoke English well and was comfortable with foreigners, they turned to her with questions and often sought her opinion. The neighborhood association was counting on her to help them adjust to this influx of tourists. Kyoto was flooded with tourists and Teramachi Street itself was surrounded by popular spots. While tourists might not deliberately come to their street, they’d certainly pass through it on their way to other areas. In fact, it was so conveniently located for tourism that a number of Airbnbs had sprung up.

The Teramachi Neighborhood Association was one of the older associations in Kyoto. Although Teramachi Street itself ran north to south through a large portion of the city, its character changed depending on the location. Keiko’s neighborhood was a shopping district of just 700 meters. It was bordered by City Hall on the south, and the Imperial Palace to the north. Teramachi, or “Temple Street,” was given that name because 400 years ago Toyotomi Hideyoshi moved the temples in the city to this street. Though the street was now home to more shops than temples, the north end of the street still held Gyoganji Temple (and a multitude of cats) which was across the street from a newer fancy hotel that was popular for wedding receptions. Emiko had told Keiko it was a “boutique hotel,” which amused Keiko. What on earth was that supposed to be? A code word for expensive, no doubt! What amused Keiko even more was that there were thirteen guest rooms. Hadn’t the architect or designer known that thirteen was considered an unlucky number in the West. Keiko had no idea why. In Japan, four was the unlucky number because it was pronounced “shi” which was the same word for death. No hospital had a fourth floor and no Japanese wanted a room on the fourth floor of a hotel. Or maybe times were changing. Keiko knew that the old hospital she’d given birth at in Kyoto certainly didn’t have a fourth floor.

“So, what’s in the brochure then?” asked Emiko.

“See for yourself. There are a few by the door.” 

Kyoto has several colorful and bustling craft markets. held monthly at shrines and temples, where people peddle unique wares: hand-made clothes, plant-dyed yarn, wooden cutting boards, knitted hats, honey, dried flowers, and tons more besides. As she lives in Kyoto, Mona has bought several skirts made of antique indigo-dyed fabric over the years at these fairs, but sometimes, because she wears them so often the old cloth frays and small holes appear. So this Saturday afternoon Mona is carefully sewing up one of the holes with a tiny patch, also made of antique indigo cloth. 

Unfortunately, her mind is not on her task. For, through one of the spiritual gurus on TikTok, Mona has learned about the thousands and thousands of reincarnations each person’s soul goes through, and her imagination is like an unhappily captured soldier. 

Reincarnation, which she had thought was careful, slow, curated and considered, turns out to be, if this guru is correct, more like washing up on the beach and then floating back to sea, and later reappearing, as lightly as sea foam or a piece of driftwood, on another promontory of land, ready and fresh for another life, thousands and thousands and millions of times! 

After some indeterminate period as a ghost, your hourglass is turned over again, and a just-born person springs up on a new shore, awakened to their material self, now present as a baby in the maternity wing in the hushed dead of night, a quotidian slice of moon visible through the window. 

And this baby grows up and then commences to slowly die all over again. In and out like the tide, like breathing. Thousands of times. Millions of planets are involved, in an infinite number of solar systems, not just here, but everywhere. And the baby might be a tree, a rock, a space alien. 

While Mona is being assailed by these momentous thoughts, across the dining table from her, Junpei, her husband, five years away from retirement, is busily scrolling through photos of old traditional houses in the Japanese countryside. It is their dream, it has been their dream for decades, to buy an old house for a song (that’s all they can afford) and retire in the fresh air, near a butterfly meadow and a tiny train station, for neither of them can drive nor knows the first thing about cars. 

But, understanding now about souls, Mona realizes, the countless journeys they take back and forth between being and nothingness, she wants to ask Junpei if there is any purpose to trying so hard and working so much for a goal, a house, that is just fleeting, like everything else in this material world. She knows what Junpei will say to her: “Well, we still have some time before we die. We should spend that time in a nice place.” 

Quietly stitching, Mona looks around the deathly cold old cheap rental house they live in. The main virtues of the house are its proximity to a tiny train station on the Eiden Line and the excellent grocery stores near Kitayama. However, built in the economically go-go 1960s, the house is neither old enough nor well-built enough to be solid, or beautiful, or traditional. On the plus side, it is spacious, made of real wood and has a couple of rooms with tatami mat floors as well as a small lush garden. On the minus side, an ill-considered renovation in the 1980s means that almost all the surfaces are covered with cheap pressed board paneling or dusty vinyl. The kitchen floor beneath their feet is an expanse of yellow plastic vinyl that was decades ago unfurled and pasted to the floor like a particularly large and heavy sticker. 

Yet she thinks she is about as happy here as she could be anywhere. Her university covers one-third of the rent, meaning they pay about as much for their house in the foothills of Mt. Hiei as an ordinary three-room apartment would cost.

Besides these practical matters, side-by-side in her mind with them is always the image of the galaxy as a night sea, souls floating, bobbing, little sprinkling lights of stars surrounding them like boats pitched in a torrent of waves. 

The thought silences her, stills her tongue, saps her ability to speak or to act decisively. It’s so ironic that she herself has finally become a dithering and effete Hamlet, only after she studied that play to death as a scholar. 

But then the soft span of indigo colored cloth, the color of her favorite blue hour of dusk, falls across her knees, dips and grazes her ankles. She clutches it and holds it as if it is her life itself pulling away from her, dropping her needle and thread. The thread, caught in the sway of fabric, pulls taut then comes out of the eye of the falling needle, which lands on the plastic floor. 

Watching this tiny matter of the needle, she realizes that she is still here, on this one particular alien beach, after all. Even Kyoto, as nice as it is, is still just one more alien beach, where needles fall and plastic reigns. 

Junpei, busily typing away on his PC, looks up at her quizzically, as she silently dips down to pluck the needle from the floor. Usually she can chatter on for hours without stopping. He must be wondering what’s gotten into her today. 

“What is the next place, waiting for me”, she can’t help but wonder as she stares at the threatening little sharp metallic point in her cold hand. And if I get there, will I still feel this way? Will I know then too that there are thousands of reincarnations and that it never stops, like a ghost ship sailing on, followed by a spectral albatross? She has never seen an albatross, and she wants to see one in flight. Another complication, isn’t it? Her eyes roll at this. Hasn’t she read somewhere that the brains of post-menopausal women are said to become more aware of spiritual matters?

She threads the needle again, on the first try. It is always like winning a prize if she can do it the first time. Then she puts down her sewing and decides, with finality, to tell him about the amazing vision of the thousands of lives souls go through that she has learned on TikTok. What if he is rendered similarly becalmed and amazed? But she knows already ‘that will never be’, as Macbeth once foolishly told the three witches. 

Maybe this is because Junpei is a man of action, not given to moping and moaning like she is, about being sent thousands of times off into infinite space? Maybe partly because he is Japanese, and the people here are inured to reincarnation, weathered to it, weaned on it. Hundreds of famous literary and anime characters have been reincarnated. A princess reincarnated as a spider monster. A man reincarnated as a magic cat. Everyone knows someone. He might even laugh at her. If reincarnation is now like a galaxy bordering a dark and infinite beach for her, it is no doubt different for Junpei. It must be more familiar and friendlier. Maybe a bell, a bird, or a bone? 

For Junpei, she realizes, reincarnation is like moss in a shadowy place, something that you are aware of yet not aware of, as you stand before an old temple garden in a corner of Kyoto and take it all in under sunlight filtered and dappled by tree leaves, there but not really there. Glance back when you leave through the gate, say your goodbyes slowly, for, as you now know, you have all the time in the world.

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For more by Marianne Kimura, please see her story of Last Snow. Or an account of how her second novel, The Hamlet Paradigm, was taken up by an independent publisher. Or her double life as academic and fiction writer, or her third prize winning entry for the Writers in Kyoto Competition. See also an extract from a work in progress, Seven Forms of Infiltration; an interview with her about goddesses and ninjas; or an extract from her first novel, The Hamlet Paradigm. For her original story, ‘Kaguya Himeko’, please see here, and for a short story about a witch see here.

Readers of this website may remember that I wrote a piece called “Insight on a Rainy Day” in August 2022, largely about the Heart Sutra (Hannya Shingyo) and its central message, “Emptiness is none other than form; form is none other than emptiness”. It was a surprising serendipity then, to hear Ruth Ozeki herself, in an interview to Guardian Live about her most recent (fourth) novel, The Book of Form and Emptiness, saying that the title came from that very phrase. She is a Zen priest and familiar with the Heart Sutra. I wrote to her via her website and asked her permission to write a review for Writers in Kyoto, and she assented, mentioning that she herself used to be a Writer in Kyoto back in the day and is very nostalgic for Kyoto. In the interview she said that her personal view is that “emptiness” (ku 空) is like an ocean, from which waves or “form” (shiki　色) appear for a time. They are what we know as “matter” or the “material world”, and include inanimate objects as well as human beings. We all, we members of the material world, have form for a time and then sink back into the ocean.

Ruth Ozeki is an American-Canadian author and Zen priest, born in 1956. Her mother was Japanese, but the name Ozeki is a pseudonym. She has written four novels in which environmental, spiritual, and social themes combine. She has received the Women’s Prize for Fiction with her latest book, and previously was awarded the Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction. 

She graciously gave me some details of her time in Japan. She lived in Kyoto 1976-1978 and 1980-1986, She did not study Zen at any Kyoto temple, but was more interested in the Zen arts, including Noh theatre and ikebana. She ran an English school called The Speakeasy near Ginkakuji, which emphasized language learning through theater and movement. She studied as a foreign student at Doshisha and Nara Joshidaigaku, and taught at Sangyo Daigaku. At the time she was trying to write fiction, but “didn’t really have the technical skills yet”. 

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The Book of Form and Emptiness, Ruth Ozeki’s fourth novel, which apparently took eight years to write, centers around a teenage boy who, after the untimely death of his father, begins to hear voices emanating from inanimate objects. This is the dime version of the plot, which is actually much more complicated. The novel seems to be set in a US northwest coastal city. The boy’s parents, Kenji (a Japanese jazz clarinet player) and Annabel (a would-be librarian, handwork enthusiast, and press cutter) are rudely separated when Kenji meets with a fatal accident and, soon after, Annabel finds her job put in danger by the rapid decrease in print media. Annabel painstakingly saves the original materials of articles she is paid to collect, and also craft materials that she hopes to make into things; she becomes a hoarder, in the way of such people – the things she collects attain a critical mass and she can no longer handle them. She falls deeper into a depression as, now a single mother, she must handle her grief at losing her husband and also the disturbing mental state of her son.

 After his father’s passing, Benny begins to hear the voices of objects. After one incident at school, he is evaluated, medicated, and sent to a children’s psychiatric ward for a time. Upon being released and having to resume his life, he finds a quiet retreat – an isolated corner of the public library, where he has some unexpected encounters. 

The novel is set up in a rather complicated way, since the book itself becomes one of the characters with its own voice. The various fonts used give some clue as to who is talking at any given moment, especially Benny’s conversation with his own story as told in the book. By encounters in the library, especially the defunct bindery department in the basement, he realizes that books themselves, whether blank or written, are a kind of “emptiness” or potential. In the interview for Guardian Live, the author said that “books only come to life when they are read”. In that sense they are both the completed thoughts of the author and the potential to become something else, or to add to the original idea, in the mind of the reader. 

She is sensitive to the way objects can tell their own story. They have lives (and deaths), they have things to say. There is elegance in the parallel between the main character Benny’s sudden ability to hear the voice of objects, and the many objects that clutter the space of his house and also the mind of his mother. In another thread of the book, Benny is diagnosed (by a sincere but very young and inexperienced psychiatrist) and put into a situation where he is unable to articulate what is happening to him, or to be listened to when he tries. The only people who accept that his new ability to hear the voices of objects may not be a mental illness, but a new and poetic way of hearing the world, are “outcasts” from society themselves. (Everyone has, no doubt, wanted to step outside the rooms of stultifying society and breathe the free air of one’s own truth. Encounters with these characters give the reader a sense of vicariously experiencing this freedom.) 

As a writer, Ruth Ozeki said she doesn’t make outlines of the plot or the development of characters. (I can relate to this, as in my fictional short stories, I imagined the characters and then just stepped back to see what they would do.) She has a biracial upbringing, and this has enabled her to have different perspectives and see different sides of reality. She became interested in Zen as a young girl when she would come upon her grandfather sitting in meditation, and learned to do it. She realized through a stormy adolescence that this kind of spiritual discipline was a good tool for life, and was ordained as a Zen priest in 2010. This latest book, and the previous one, A Tale for the Time Being, particularly, have many references to Zen ideas and practice. 

When I heard that this book had been published (it appeared on the WiK website) I immediately ordered it, as I had read her other novels and enjoyed them. At that time it was available only as a hardback on Amazon (I don’t use e-books). I ordered it as a hardback though I don’t usually do this, and I was glad I did, because this is a substantial book, with its own consciousness and presence, and I often stroked its covers as I was reading. I even took off the dust jacket – the book itself is a lovely sky-blue color – because its “naked” self evoked memories of libraries that have changed my own life. So much of the book takes place in a library. Ruth Ozeki herself appears there, as an observer in her own story.  

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To learn more about Ruth Ozeki and her writing visit her website here.
For more book reviews from WIK click here.

Natsumi opened the door cautiously and walked into the Starbucks. She was counting on being able to grab a chair at the window overlooking the Kamo River. But first, her eyes went to the menu on the wall. She could hardly believe it but today, finally, was the day that the S’Mores Frappuccino was coming to Japan!

Before Natsumi could confirm that today was indeed the day, her phone rang. She stepped back outside and drew in a long breath before she answered.

“Natsumi? We’ve got the results.”

“We’ve found the allergen. As long as you never drink a cup of coffee again, you’ll be fine. But, I’ll warn you. Just one more drop of coffee could kill you within 24 hours. I know you’re a coffee drinker, but as of this moment, you simply cannot imbibe. It’s an unusual but lethal allergy….”

Natsumi stood there absorbing the information. It seemed a simple choice.

She took a few steps away from Starbucks, but then stopped again and instead reversed her direction and went to sit on a bench overlooking the river. It was so  hot and muggy. Just like that summer so long ago in New Jersey, she mused.

Natsumi had only been eight years old when her father was transferred to the New York office of his company. They’d arrived in April. At school, Natsumi was the new kid. She spent a lonely three months in the unfamiliar classroom.

When school was out for the summer, her mother enrolled her in a day camp. On the last day of camp, they’d had a sleepover and cooked dinner over a campfire. As the night fell, the counselors came out with one more treat.

“S’mores!” 

Other campers knew just what kind of treat was coming, but Natsumi was puzzled. Marshmallows on a stick, and then something else? What was she to do with the graham cracker and chocolate? Surely you couldn’t roast chocolate, and a graham cracker would just burn. She watched the older kids carefully and saw that a S’more was a kind of sandwich. Yum! She had not liked American food very much. But this was a kind of sandwich that she could appreciate. She smiled in pleasure as she took a bite and the three different flavors came together. She’d finally found something about America that she really liked.

School went more smoothly in the fall. She made friends. And then a few months later it was all ripped away when her father was suddenly transferred back to Japan. She’d never had a chance to go back. But now she had a chance to recapture a memory and a taste of her past in a cup of coffee. What could be better? She could die a quick death having circled back to her childhood memories. Sometimes she felt so ready to go.

A flock of birds flew overhead and startled her from her thoughts. She shook her head and brushed back a few wisps of her graying hair. Had there really been any question at all here? She got up, smoothed her skirt and smiled. She liked green tea, too.

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Sara Ackerman Aoyama first went to Kyoto in 1976. Her last visit was in 2016 and she hopes she’ll be there again someday. She blogs her memories here.