Her husband, as if thinking along these same lines, continued. “You’re not a privileged young girl anymore, working for pocket money.” Then, more gently, “I know something of this world. I know it isn’t kind or respectful to women over a certain age who work for their food. And you’d barely support your children on what you’d make.”
“He’s right, dear,” said Mrs. Asaki. “Servitude in some office isn’t the answer.”
They were silent. Baby Masako flung out an arm in sleep. Little Yoko hunched over her bowl, picking out one grain of rice at a time with her chopsticks.
“Besides,” said Mr. Asaki, “how many multinational companies are there in Kyoto anyway?” He leaned back and took a swallow of tea.
“Let’s think on it, ne, dear?” said Mrs. Asaki soothingly. “We’ll put our heads together and come up with a really good plan.”
It was then that the wheels in her mind began to turn.
chapter 25
The morning after Yoko’s death, Mrs. Nishimura headed down the lane with a bulky bundle-food and various supplies-wrapped in a purple silk furoshiki cloth. Mrs. Asaki stood on the upstairs balcony, hanging up socks and handkerchiefs to dry, and watched her go. Her daughter looked up and waved with her free hand. She waved back.
Later that day Mrs. Nishimura came home with a wealth of information. She recounted it all in painstaking detail, as if to ease her mother’s mind by being as transparent as possible.
There would be no funeral, she said. Since Yoko had married into the Rexford family, it was technically not the Kobayashis’ place to give her one.
“I’m sure the funeral in America will be very nice,” Mrs. Asaki said.
Momoko looked doubtful. “I heard they don’t even have cremation ceremonies in America,” she said.
“That doesn’t matter. At least they do cremations.”
By all rights Mrs. Rexford’s ashes should have stayed overseas as the property of her husband’s family. “But it’s not as if there’s a Rexford cemetery,” Mrs. Nishimura explained, “or even a Rexford family.” Apparently Mr. Rexford had always planned to have his ashes scattered over the ocean. While that option was fitting and right for her father, Sarah had thought it wrong, somehow, for her mother. Although Mrs. Rexford had never actually stated her burial preference, other than to say she wanted cremation, Sarah felt sure she would have wanted to be buried in her homeland.
“Well, naturally!” said Mrs. Asaki.
Over the next few days, Mrs. Nishimura took charge of the wake preparations. While Mr. and Mrs. Kobayashi dealt with the voluminous paperwork for the temple’s genealogical records (they were complex and highly accurate, going back for centuries), Mrs. Nishimura transformed the parlor. She set up a long low table, covered with a ceremonial white cloth, in front of the tokonoma alcove. She sifted through family photographs to find the most recent picture of Mrs. Rexford, which she framed and decorated with a black funerary band. This would stand on the low table, along with the cremated remains when they arrived. She bought incense sticks and small prayer candles for visitors to light when they came to pay their respects. Since incense had to be burned round the clock until the burial, she stocked up on special twelve-hour sticks that would burn through the night. She placed an order to have a personalized tablet made; this would be placed in the family altar after the burial.
More news followed. Mrs. Kobayashi had made private arrangements with the temple authorities to have her daughter’s ashes laid to rest in the Kobayashi family plot.
“How did she manage that?” cried Mrs. Asaki in astonishment. “Yo-chan married out of the family line!”
“No one knows,” said Mrs. Nishimura in her soft voice. “But a bereaved and determined mother can do surprising things.”
Mrs. Asaki laughed and clapped her hands. “Well, that’s Yoko for you,” she said. She had always been fond of her plucky niece, and she felt extraordinarily pleased that Mrs. Kobayashi had managed to pull this off. “Even in death, she doesn’t follow the same rules as everyone else!”
The burial, at least, would be traditional. It would take place thirty-five days after death, following a formal sutra ceremony. In the meantime, the Kobayashis were holding a monthlong wake in their home. Sarah would arrive in two weeks and stay until the burial.
Mrs. Asaki dropped by the Kobayashi house every so often, prayer beads tucked into her clutch purse, to offer up a prayer and discreetly check on the situation. She brought little gifts: flowers for the funerary table, a monetary envelope to help pay for So-Zen Temple ’s sutra services during the wake, a plate of altar-worthy fruit. It wasn’t that she expected to catch them at anything. After this many years, it was unlikely that anything would happen. Even if it did, they would be far too careful to risk being caught. So it was a masochistic exercise, really. But the old woman had always believed in the power of prevention.
Today she approached the Kobayashi house with an armful of peach blossoms. The air in the lane had a caressing, restless quality peculiar to spring, as if it had just floated in from distant, sun-warmed fields. She sniffed with appreciation but also a little sadness, for this year she didn’t feel part of it. A new physical weariness had been dragging at her lately. The changing of seasons was always hard on the body, but this tiredness was different. In the last few weeks, she had increasingly felt the full weight of her eighty-three years.
Mr. Kobayashi was standing outside the kitchen entrance, smoking a cigarette.
“Aaa,” he said in greeting, bobbing his head with a friendly nod. He lifted his face and exhaled a mouthful of white smoke that floated up into the low-hanging cherry branches overhead, blending in with the white blossoms.
“Is it mist, or is it cloud,” she quipped, quoting a line from the classic cherry blossom song.
Her brother chuckled and nodded his head again. They always treated each other affably, although they weren’t particularly close. There was no animosity; they simply didn’t have much to say to each other. Even in childhood she had been closer to Shohei, who was small enough to cling to her after their mother’s death. Kenji, the middle child, was an independent boy who moved in his own orbit. It was odd, she thought, how two people so biologically close could end up being practically strangers.
“Such a thing, ne…,” Mrs. Asaki said now, referring to the death. She wondered what he was feeling. He had a soft spot for his stepdaughter, she knew. Over the years, as he gradually lost interest in his own son, he had come to admire the child his brother had left behind. He had admired Yoko’s intelligence and her accomplishments, which brought him honor over the years, and he had also admired her fierce and loyal spirit, though he himself had never been on its receiving end. It reminded Mrs. Asaki of his unrequited feelings for his wife. She felt a rush of pity for her brother.
“Aaa, aaa,” Mr. Kobayashi agreed. He took another drag of his cigarette. Then, the conversation being over, he rolled open the kitchen door to accommodate her flower-laden hands.
Stepping inside, she smelled fish stock simmering on the stove. Mrs. Kobayashi and Mrs. Nishimura were seated together at the low dining table, sharing a quiet moment over tea. They didn’t look up as the door rolled open; they must have thought it was Mr. Kobayashi. In the brief instant before they realized her presence, Mrs. Asaki had a clear view of the soft, contented look on her daughter’s face.
She felt that old twist of jealous misery. She had often felt it when her daughter was in her teens, but that rarely happened now, with her daughter fully grown and the boundaries so fixed between the two houses. So this moment, coming on top of her fatigue, surprised her with its impact. She was no longer a match-she realized it now-for the sheer tenacity, the sheer life force, that was her daughter’s longing. It was like a stubborn mold spore that refused to die, biding its time for years and years.