T is for Tezuka
December 31 — Monday
Dinner the night before had been a quiet, odd affair — Mr. Tezuka preferred to eat in his workshop and Sana begged off to her room to do some homework that needed to be completed over the holidays, which left Rin, Tetsu, and Mrs. Tezuka to finish the big bowls of ramen Rin’s mother had prepared. Rin sat on a small table about half the height of, and beside the dining room table - this let her manipulate her bowl with her feet, and keep her more or less at eye level with everyone else. It was more of a very large chair, equal in size to the small-ish dining table; clearly a well-established practice at the Tezuka household, given Rin’s `table` had been fitted with a back rest so she didn’t have to constantly tense her stomach muscles to sit up straight while eating — an innovation that appeared to have been added by her father.
“I guess dining together really isn’t something they do - for the holidays, or ever, maybe.” Tetsu thought to himself - a family absorbed in their own individual pursuits and minds. Living just outside of a secluded village overlooking Osaka, they retained knowledge of the larger world around them - entering into it on their own terms.
Tetsu hadn’t had the best night’s sleep - Rin’s old bed was, well, old - and also Rin-sized, and as much as they enjoyed cuddling, there’s a minimum size of bed beyond which every toss and turn is directly communicated to one’s sleeping partner, interrupting their sleep.
Plumbing the depths of sleep deprivation, Tetsu zoned back in frantically when he realized Mrs. Tezuka was speaking to him —
“.. plans for tonight?”
Tetsu hadn’t quite mastered Rin’s trick of being able to play back conversations in his head on demand, but it was pretty clear what was being discussed.
“Not yet — this is Rin’s home field; I was hoping she’d suggest something,” Tetsu said, looking to Rin.
Rin nodded — “The porch out back - it looks out over Osaka Bay where the big fireworks display will be. I thought we could bundle up in blankets and watch it from there. That’s where I’d sit to watch the city lights when I was younger ..” she added, unnecessarily — being home seemed to bring out a more child-like side of her; endearing, but also less confident.
Breakfast was simple - eggs poached in miso soup, nori, and a bowl of rice with a side of pickles; they finished quickly and, despite Tetsu’s offering to help, Rin’s mother insisted on cleaning up by herself - “I’ve been doing this on my own this long, no need to stop now,” she commented, with an indefinable air.
—
Tetsu and Rin were preparing to spend part of their day walking around the rural area outside of Rin’s parent’s home. The house was set back in a pine and bamboo forest; a small village was walking distance down a well-maintained, but infrequently travelled road.
The air was chilly, but not cold - Tetsu helped Rin put her coat and boots on, then dressed himself; Mrs. Tezuka gave them each one of her extended hugs, but Rin’s father was nowhere to be seen.
“Don’t mind Chihiro — he’s in his workshop almost continually. I had to put my foot down when he wanted a full bathroom installed just off the workshop — if he didn’t have to come into the house occasionally I don’t know if I’d ever see him!” said Mrs. Tezuka with a dry laugh.
“I can see where Rin gets her work ethic from.”
Sana chose this moment to sail through the main room on her way to the kitchen —
“Obsessiveness you mean. We tried medicating her, but it didn’t take.”
“.. fortunately,” thought Tetsu. Rin stared daggers at Sana, but said nothing. Sensing trouble in the offing, Tetsu opened the front door —
“OK, let’s get going before we over-heat. We’ll be back .. I don’t know when we’ll be back. Rin?”
“This afternoon. Probably. Maybe,” offered Rin.
—
They walked along the main road and, after passing a conbini, a small grocery, a cafe - and a bunch of shuttered storefronts - found themselves on the other side of town. “Blink and you miss it,” thought Tetsu. Ahead of them, just inside city limits, was a generic-looking public building.
“My old school,” commented Rin, with something approaching nostalgia in her voice, but not quite.
The building was closed, but there were windows by the front door - Tetsu looked in and saw glass trophy cases, and what looked like some of Rin’s artwork inside, at least he assumed it was Rin’s work - cruder in form and with more primary colours than her current work, but the style was unmistakeable. Even as a child she’d been a disturbingly distinctive artist.
“Your art?” Rin shook her head.
“No?”
“No - not this me. A littler me.”
Tetsu tried the door - it was unlocked.
“Should we be doing this?” Asked Rin.
“Should we not? I’d like a closer look at your art.”
Rin seemed uncomfortable with the idea, but also intrigued.
“What should we tell them if we get caught?” Tetsu asked.
“Tell them I needed to use the washroom - which is true.”
Tetsu held the door for Rin and the went in - a big sign above the door said ‘Welcome’, so worse coming to worst, they could argue they’d had an invitation.
There were staff washrooms just past the foyer and they quickly availed themselves of it after making sure they were unoccupied. Returning to the foyer undistracted, Tetsu looked at the contents of the display case and found them to be startlingly reminiscent of home - if you ignored the fact that all the writing was in Japanese; trophies, pennants, some small arts and crafts - all dusty. It appeared that nothing had been added to, or taken from the cabinets in some time.
“How many students were at the school when you were here?”
“About twenty - it was a small town then and it’s smaller now. If I'd stayed, I’d have gone to high school the next town over.”
Tetsu nodded as he came to the next case - here there were four framed paintings, in Rin’s style, and two others in a different style, but similar to Rin’s. It was odd to see the paintings framed - they were watercolours on standard school-grade construction paper, but it was clear someone at the school thought they were important enough to be displayed.
“Do you remember painting these?”
Rin nodded — “I remember her - me, then.” Rin paused as a rush of feelings came back - memories of emotions fresh and new, and perceptions of a world that was tightly bounded and easy to understand; the face of her teacher, her seat in class, her favourite brushes and colours, her personal care worker’s voice, the smell of freshly mixed paint.
“Rin? Is that you?” Asked a woman’s voice from down the hall.
“Miss Nakajima?"
A slight Japanese woman with grey hair and conservative dress came towards them - her feet were hidden by her skirt, but her steps were so short it appeared she was walking on tiptoe.
“Rin, it is you! I was just in over the holidays tidying up and preparing lesson plans for the new year. Not many students, but the work still needs to be done. I heard a noise, thinking some students had come by, and I was right - but not in the way I thought!”
“Oh you’ve grown - you’re not the tiny little Rin who ran around on my freshly polished floors with paint all over her feet,” she said, with amusement. Rin blushed and shook her head, looking up at the ceiling.
“Now now, you mustn’t be embarrassed - everybody was young once; even me!”
Collecting herself, Nakajima-sensei sized Tetsu up — “And who might this be? A friend of yours, hm?” She said with a hint of suspicion - Tetsu did rather tend stand out wherever he went in Japan; especially in a small town that rarely saw westerners.
“His name is Tetsu - he speaks Japanese; he’s my boyfriend. Nakajima-sensei was my home room teacher here.” Rin moved half a step closer to Tetsu, protectively. Tetsu bowed respectfully —
“Kaiyou, Tetsu — a pleasure to meet you. We’ve been visiting Rin’s parents over New Year’s.”
Rin’s teacher relaxed somewhat, but was still obviously unaccustomed to such a strange stranger in her school.
“We don’t want to keep you from you work - we should be heading back to Rin’s parent’s soon,” offered Tetsu, trying to make a graceful exit in light of Nakajima-sensei’s evident unease - and the fact that they were trespassing, `Welcome` sign or no.
Miss Nakajima bowed to them and, and - perhaps regretting that she had let her fears cut short a chance to re-connect with Rin - asked “Will you be in town long?”
“Just until tomorrow,” said Rin.
Tetsu, had been thinking on what was missing from the Tezuka household; he speculated that it was human connection, and an idea came to him —
“I don’t want to speak for Rin, but, perhaps, if you wanted to stay in touch, she has an email address. Do you use email?”
“Oh yes - I use it to keep in touch with my nieces at University. Would you be willing to share your email address, Rin?”
Rin nodded, somewhat shyly. As someone who lived life ever looking forwards, the feeling of nostalgia was unfamiliar to her.
“Tetsu - would you?” Asked Rin. Tetsu fished one of the simple business cards they’d recently had made-up for Rin out of her pocket, handing it over to Miss Nakajima with both hands.
Tezuka, Rin
Artist
xxxxx!mail!tezuka,rin
“Thank you so much .. I still think of you often, Rin. It will be nice to know how you’re progressing in life.”
They all bowed one last time, then Rin and Tetsu left.
“I hope I didn’t put you on the spot there.”
“No — I don’t think I would have done that, but it was the right thing to do. She was a good teacher - strict, but she cared a lot about me. I never told her that I knew it.”
“Now you can.”
“Now I can.”
—
Returning to the Tezuka household after a short walk, they found Sana reading in the main room.
“I’m tired - didn’t sleep well last night - going up to have a nap,” said Rin and she went upstairs. Wanting a nap himself, but knowing neither would get much of one if they both tried sleeping in the same bed at the same time, he figured he’d tough it out for an hour then crash. Unfortunately that meant sharing the main room with Sana. “What’s the chance she’s like Hanako and gets really involved in her books?” Thought Tetsu.
No such luck.
Tetsu had settled into the futon opposite the one Sana was reading on and had started writing in the pocket journal he had started carrying with him when he travelled.
“So - how long have you known Rin for?” A seemingly innocuous question, but like a meadow abandoned after a border war, Tetsu knew Sana contained landmines — they were generally named `Rin`, but a peaceful evening was on the other side of the meadow - so here we go, metal detectors at full extension.
“I met Rin not long after the start of the school year in April, although you couldn’t call it `knowing` Rin - I just helped her out with the mural she painted at school a bit,” answered Tetsu, hoping he could leave it there.
“You haven’t answered my question,” Sana responded, testily.
“I’m getting there.” Internally Tetsu facepalmed.
“Our first real conversation was at lunch, I think, near the end of June or beginning of July.” The exact date was in his journal, but he wasn’t about to submit to that precise a cross-examination - not by Sana.
“What did you two talk about?” Tetsu put down his journal and his pen - this meadow was getting bigger by the minute.
“Rin-things, like the sky, art, poetry.”
“Surely you talked about more than that ..”
Tetsu shrugged. “I don’t think those are small topics.”
“What attracted you to Rin?” `beep` `beep` `beep` went the mine-detector in Tetsu’s head. “Fuck,” he thought.
“The fact she was Rin - I was new to the school, new to Japan, struggling with the language, and was trying to make new friends. Here was a person who didn’t look to anyone else for validation - who might like me for who I was, because I was in no position to fawn over anyone. But that’s in hindsight - I really didn’t put that much thought into `why`, I was too busy thinking of `how`.”
“Aha! `How` what?” *click* thought Tetsu - I’ve stepped on a mine. How I get off of it determines whether I lose a leg, my life, or I live to do ballet another day.
“How to communicate with her. Like I said, I didn’t speak Japanese well - or at all - even though I understood a fair amount of it - second languages are funny that way - the understanding comes before the speaking. So I wrote to her on a notepad and she responded.”
“Sounds cumbersome,” Sana sniffed.
“It was - I think that’s why Rin learned sign language.”
“Why did you know sign language?”
“That’s .. another story.”
“Tell me,” Sana demanded.
“It has nothing to do with your original question and you’ve already indicated you don’t appreciate my going off-topic, or what you perceive as off-topic.” Tetsu had stopped caring about the frantic beeping in his head.
“Are you sure you weren’t trying to figure out how you could swoop in and save her? Carry her off her feet? A vulnerable person, unable to stand up for herself?”
“Have you
met Rin? If I’d tried to sweep her off her feet she’d probably have kicked me - and I’d have deserved it. Someone else might have thought she needed saving - they might have thought that of anyone at Yamaku - and they’d be wrong.”
Sana sat, arms crossed, staring sullenly at Tetsu.
“It sounds like you’re worried about Rin.”
“She’s my sister - I don’t have to like her, but I do have to care about her. Those are the rules.”
“You’ll excuse me if I choose to do both.”
“You have to - you’re her boyfriend. Those are your rules. Do you understand what it means to be her boyfriend though?”
“How so?”
“She’s not like other girls ..”
“I thought we’d established that.”
“I don’t mean like that. It’s a lot of responsibility - if you get tired of that responsibility, she’ll blame herself. She’d never say that, but it’s true. Did you realize you were signing up to be her personal care worker as well as her romantic partner?”
“You sound like Rin’s friend - our friend - Emi, but mostly Rin’s friend. Neither of you know Rin like I do. She has more strength than you realize, and no more vulnerabilities than any of the rest of us. And yes - Rin made sure early on that I knew what was involved in being there for her on a daily basis; and she’s no invalid - tying her shoes isn’t one of her strong suits, but she looks after herself very well without my help,” Tetsu said, somewhat protectively.
“Rin’s special though - she’s
di.. different.”
“You were going to say `disabled`.”
“Maybe I was.”
“She doesn’t think so - and that doesn’t define her even if she did, any more than my disability defines me. I won’t let it and neither will she. Rin doesn’t need me to defend her — Rin wants to take her own risks with her life; she could get bored of me as well and we could break up. Relationships can be fragile things - we’re both taking a risk that we don’t fully understand.”
“How are you even disabled?”
“That’s my business — I will say I wasn’t at Yamaku on a lark.”
“Tetsu’s right.” Tetsu and Sana turned - Rin had been sitting on the stairs, quietly listening.
“How long have you been sitting there?” Asked Sana.
“Long enough. As you said - sisters don’t have to like each other, but they have to love each other; you can resent me as long as you respect me.”
Sana appeared to collapse - the wind taken entirely out of her sails. This was a new Rin from the distant, laconic one she remembered growing up with - confident and able to stand her ground.
“You’re not the Rin I used to know.”
“Maybe not — trees grow, but I think I am still me — in my heart at least. Thank you for caring about me, but I think it’s Tetsu’s turn to have a nap before dinner.”
“Saved by the bell,” thought Tetsu.
“If you’ll excuse me ..” Sana ignored Tetsu leaving and went back to her book. As Tetsu passed Rin on the stair they shared a look of profound connection — something special had just happened; one day they’d figure out what it was.
—
“Dinner!” Mrs. Tezuka called out.
“Going to meet friends in town,” Sana responded, hastily shovelling dinner indiscriminately into a sealable bento box. She threw on her coat, grabbed her dinner and took off in the car with a grinding of gravel.
“Sana has friends now?” Asked Rin, flatly, after Sana had left.
“First time for everything, dear?”
—
Rin’s parents had gone to bed early - “Seen them before.” said Mr. Tezuka of the fireworks, as if there were vastly more interesting vistas inside his head - which was probably true. Rin’s mother followed soon after; not her usual chatty self, she was none the less in a good mood - she appeared to value giving Rin and Tetsu some private time together.
Rin prodded a wooden chest open - the scent of cedar planks wafted out from the heavy woven blankets within. “They were a gift from one of Father’s artist friends - he traded her a cedar chest like this one for them - they’re so warm.”
Tetsu gathered up the blankets and followed Rin out to the back porch, turning off the main room light on his way. They bundled up and prepared for the start of the fireworks.
--