Gina in the floating wor.., p.4
Gina in the Floating World, page 4
Mr. Yakumasei had trouble standing up, much less supporting himself on his two feet. He hovered over the table while I slid out and then he staggered after me. On the dance floor, his large arms encircled me in a boa constrictor’s grip. We swayed to the music, and he loudly whispered in my ear, “Gi-na. Gi-na. Gi-na,” while groping my rear end. When he planted an oily kiss on my neck, I stiffened. Stone-faced, Chief watched us for a couple of minutes before returning once more to the kitchen. Mr. Yakumasei lost his balance, which had been tentative at best, pushing me onto a table and almost collapsing on top of me. Somehow, I managed to disentangle myself and get us both back to the booth. Chief reemerged with coffee. The evening came to an end not long after. It was only eleven o’clock, but it felt like the middle of the night.
After final bows, Mr. Tambuki said something to Chief. I thought I heard my name. Then, he turned to me. “I will see you again, Gina.” It sounded like an order, not a statement of hope or even intent.
Hana and I picked up the cups and glasses and wiped down the tables. Berta was now minimally functional and let us do most of the work.
“How you doin’?” she slurred.
“Mr. Yakumasei was slobbering all over me.”
“Yeah, he’s more of a pig than some. Most of them are all bark.”
“And he doesn’t speak a word of English,” I replied, realizing that was a silly thing to say. After all, I was in Japan.
“If you’re lucky, they’ll use the few words of English they remember from grade school.” Berta took one last swig from her glass before Hana removed it.
“Mr. Tambuki was quite fluent.”
“The exception in this boondockland.”
“He seems different from the others, and he’s kind of cute for an older guy.”
“You can have him. They all look the same to me.” Her eyes were at half-mast.
“You seemed to be enjoying his company.”
“Pffff,” she said. “He’s Mr. Tambuki. Whaddya going to do?”
I had no idea what she meant, and I didn’t ask her to elaborate, given her state. Chief had to shake her when it was time to lock up. He didn’t say anything to me.
I slipped upstairs to the refuge of the futon, which I pulled from the cupboard and fell on after yanking off my clothes. I knew I couldn’t do that job another night. Besides, it was hardly something I could include on my resume. Surely, I could find other ways of making money that didn’t involve drunken men.
CHAPTER THREE
I didn’t wake up until after noon, and I couldn’t wait to leave the Club. There was no shower, just a tiled toilet hole and small sink on the first floor, the same facilities the clients used. I put on my navy suit and my two-day-old underwear. As I walked downstairs, I heard someone rustling in the kitchen. I ducked into the bathroom first. It smelled of piss, and the floor was sticky. I splashed my face with cold water.
When I emerged, I almost ran into a young woman wearing a thigh-length turquoise blue cotton robe tied with a matching sash. She headed into the main Club room, holding a plate of rice, vegetables, and some kind of meat.
“Oh, hello! You’re new, aren’t you?” she asked in accented English. With her free hand, she pushed her long sun-streaked hair away from her face.
She plopped down at a table in the Club, the ashtray still brimming with cigarette stubs, and shoveled vegetables in her mouth with a pair of chopsticks.
“I was just here for one night,” I said, still standing.
“Oh, you’re not working for Chief?” She looked up from her food, her chopsticks two elongated pincers poised in the air, still grasping their prey. Her large green eyes, rimmed with dark liner, and her violet-shaded lids gave her the appearance of an alert, nocturnal animal, even though it was daytime.
“Oh, no,” I said, perhaps a little too quickly. “I’m here on a banking internship.”
“I haven’t heard that one before. You’re from America, aren’t you?”
I nodded. “And you’re from?”
“Australia. I’m Victoria.”
“Dee Dee.” I eyed her full plate.
“Say, are you hungry? I have way too much food here.” She laid her chopsticks down.
“That’s okay.”
“No, really. If I eat all this, I’ll get fat.” Victoria dashed to the kitchen and returned with another plate and, much to my relief, a fork. “You’re not vegetarian, are you?”
I shook my head. My first night home after my freshman year at college, I consumed only the mashed potatoes and canned peas on my plate, leaving the meat loaf with its slimy gravy untouched. Bad idea. My mother yelled at me that if that was what they were teaching me at college, maybe I shouldn’t be allowed to return. I shut up and ate the damn meat loaf. I vowed that one day I would eat whatever I wanted.
“I was a vegetarian when I was in India, with cows being sacred and all, but here it’s just easier not to be too fussy.” Victoria slid food from her plate onto the second one, which she placed across from her seat.
“Thank you.” Grateful for the friendly attention, I sat down. “You were in India?”
“Among other places. Let’s see, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Burma, Nepal, Vietnam, Hong Kong, and now here.” Before settling into her chair, she paused to count on her fingers. “Ten months total.”
“That’s a long time to be moving around.” I put a hunk of chicken in my mouth. It was a little dry.
“Not really. Lots of my friends from Australia do this after school. I’ll stay here a while and then maybe go back to India and camp at the beach in Goa. Perhaps America after that.”
“Are you planning on college?”
“No, I just want to get married and have a family.”
How could someone who seemed so adventurous be so conventional at heart? She reminded me of my sister Carol, who at sixteen used to sneak out at night and cruise around with her boyfriend in his convertible. Two years later, barely a year after Robert died, she married a guy who took over his father’s Oldsmobile dealership and settled into her life of church suppers, PTA, kids’ soccer games, country club membership—the whole nine yards of boring, suburban life. I guess she was happy. We weren’t that close.
But I could make polite conversation with Victoria in exchange for the meal. “Are you working for Chief?”
“At his wife’s Snack, two towns over. Today is my last day.”
“What was it like working for Chief?” I asked.
“It was fun.”
Fun? “You didn’t find the men rude?”
“Nah. Nothing ever happened I couldn’t handle. In Singapore, I worked for an escort service. That was more of a nail-biter.”
“An escort service?” I once saw a notice for an escort service in a men’s magazine that someone’s boyfriend left in our dorm lounge. “Luscious ladies. All shapes and sizes, all nationalities.” We all had a laugh. We couldn’t imagine what kind of low-life woman would sign up for what surely was a cover for a prostitution ring. Now my face must have shown my surprise.
“It’s not what you’re thinking. You just sit in a room with other women, and if a guy chooses you, you go out to dinner and maybe dancing with him.” She bit her upper lip. “Some of the blokes tried to get sex for free. But mostly, it wasn’t so bad. I’ve met kids here doing all kinds of things.”
“Oh?” I asked, leaning forward.
“Yah, I had a friend who worked in a no-panty coffee shop here in Tokyo.” Victoria looked around like she was making sure no one else was listening. “They have mirrored tables, so the blokes can see the girls’ private parts, and then they get so hot and bothered, they have to be jerked off in special booths in the back of the shop.” She shook her head.
“Wow.” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, but I felt intrigued, like the time I found a copy of Peyton Place stashed at the back of my parents’ bookshelf. I was twelve. My parents, who professed to be so religious and made me go to church, owned dirty books. Reading it by flashlight under the covers at night, I was both horrified and titillated. It was the first graphic description of sex I ever read.
Victoria concentrated on her rice and then glanced up at me. “One of the blokes she met set her up with her own apartment, so she didn’t have to work there anymore.”
“Like his mistress?”
Victoria gripped a piece of chicken between her chopsticks and nibbled at it. “I hadn’t thought of it like that. Here we are, so far away, and no one knows us. We can do whatever we want and make money however we want to make it. It’s not the same as at home. The rules don’t apply.” Victoria abandoned the chicken and stood up. “I’m going to make myself some tea. Want some?”
“Sure,” I said. I needed something to wash down all her perplexing comments.
She picked up the plates and left the room.
The rules don’t apply? I wondered. Doesn’t everyone have a personal moral code? Okay, sometimes we regret our bad decisions, like mine in taking this horrible job. But that indicates our moral code is still working.
Victoria returned with two chipped mugs without handles. She checked the large clock on the wall with the cracked face. It was one o’clock. “Oh, God. I’ve got to be somewhere at two.” She chugged her entire mug of steaming tea and dashed up the stairs.
“Thanks for the meal,” I called out. I took a sip of my tea, which seared the roof of my mouth. I poured the rest of it down the kitchen sink.
---
It was almost two thirty by the time I returned to the youth hostel. I wanted to phone Suki and yell at her, “How could you send me into this lion’s den?” But she didn’t know me. Maybe she thought she was doing me a favor.
As I entered the hostel, I saw Gabe in the lounge reading a book and puffing on the remains of a cigarette. He blew out a cloud of smoke and looked up. “The prodigal banker has returned. Excuse me if it’s not my business, but where have you been?”
“I’ve been to hell and back, thanks to you and your friend Suki,” I said, exaggerating for effect. But secretly I was glad to see him.
“I can see that,” he said, checking out my rumpled suit. “Do you want to tell me about it?”
I was relieved to have at least one temporary friend. “Maybe after I take a shower and reenter civilization.”
“I’m planning on going to a tea ceremony later. Want to come along?” He closed his book without marking his place.
“I thought you didn’t approve of Americans studying tea ceremony.”
“I’m not studying it. I’m experiencing it. They’re very soothing. This one is supposed to be the real deal.” He took a last drag on his cigarette and extinguished it in a green ceramic ashtray, the only remotely artful object in the place. “Anyhow, you can’t be in Japan and not go to a tea ceremony. It’s good for a cultural adaptability point.”
“I think I’ve earned a boatload of points in the last twenty-four hours, thank you very much.”
He nodded as though he knew what I’d been through. “You can tell me all about it after the ceremony. You need to be in a calm state of mind, and it seems like talking about whatever you went through might get you in a state of agita. Am I right?”
“Agita?”
“Agitation.” He patted my hand. “It’s okay.”
Of course he was right, but I was bursting to tell him.
The tea ceremony Gabe took me to was offered by a school that taught the “art of chado,” as they called it. A young woman in a cream-colored kimono ushered the dozen guests into a small teahouse inside a neatly landscaped garden. Gabe and I were the only Westerners. The room was unfurnished except for a simple flower arrangement. The woman kneeled and leaned back on her feet. We all copied her position. My pants felt too tight. After bowing, our host, a bespectacled man in a plain sea-green kimono, also kneeled. A tray of implements covered in a purple silk cloth rested in front of him. I watched him wash a bowl, ladle, scoop, and whisk, even though all appeared to be clean. My attention drifted through the following painstakingly precise and slow ritual of the tea preparation. My thighs ached, and my feet became numb. I looked over at Gabe, who was perfectly still. When I was finally offered an opportunity to sip from the communal bowl, I almost spit out the bitter tea. But I managed to swallow it and wipe the rim as had been demonstrated. Even the little sweets we were served didn’t remove the unpleasant taste.
After it was all over, I stood up and massaged my legs. My circulation returned. Gabe waited patiently, not saying anything.
“Did you actually enjoy that?” I asked.
“Enjoy is the wrong word. I feel spiritually clean. Don’t you?”
I shook my head. “To each his own. I don’t think I’ll be doing that again, but thanks for the opportunity.”
“One and a half points. I’ve given you a bonus half point,” Gabe said. “Now we’ll go have some fun.”
I was dubious. And I was tired. I looked at my watch. It was only six o’clock.
He smiled that dimpled smile of his, and I gave in. “Okay. But just for a while.”
First, when I told him I’d never tried sushi, Gabe took me to a small, brightly lit sushiya with four small wooden tables. He ordered in Japanese. Behind a low glass barrier, the sushi chef deftly sliced fish and shaped rice balls. Gabe urged me to try a deep-red piece he said was tuna. When the morsel slipped from my chopsticks and fell to my plate, Gabe demonstrated how to use them properly, grasping the top chopstick between his thumb and index finger and bracing his other fingers against the bottom chopstick to hold it steady. Then he mixed some of the spicy green wasabi with soy sauce on a small dish. He dipped the sushi in this concoction, swiftly bringing the fish to his mouth. “Don’t think, just do it,” he said.
The next time, I was more successful, even with him watching me.
“Do you like it?” he asked. I nodded. A little soy sauce seeped from the corner of my mouth as I chewed. Gabe caught it with his finger and laughed.
After the sushi, we went to a place Gabe called a “coffee house,” although it seemed more like a bar. The tabletops were sawed-off, shellacked tree trunks. We sank into giant velvet cushions on the floor. A thick cloud settled around us even before Gabe lit up another cigarette. I realized I wouldn’t get very far in Japan if I couldn’t tolerate a little smoke.
“Want some saké?” Gabe asked.
“I’d rather have a coke, but I’ll try it to see what it’s like.” I didn’t want to seem like a complete drip, and I had managed to stay in control after the vodka and orange juice of the previous evening.
Gabe gave the young man dressed all in black our order and turned back to me.
The saké arrived in a small carafe. Gabe poured the warm liquid into two tiny cups. “Kampai!” he said as he raised his cup.
I raised my cup as well. “Kampai.” I took a tiny sip. It was not unpleasant.
“So, spill,” he said and sat back, his arms crossed over his chest.
I explained how Suki had gotten the ball rolling. Then I gave him an abridged, somewhat sanitized version of my evening, mentioning the key players and the basic flow of activity. I included one interesting detail to get his reaction. “One of the customers was missing part of a finger.”
Gabe leaned forward, his eyes widening. “He could have been a yakuza. Now I’m really impressed.”
“Yakuza—like a gangster?” I flinched. I remembered how Hiro had described them as bad men.
“Yeah. If they do something to upset their bosses, they cut off part of a finger as an apology.” Gabe made a slicing gesture.
“Yikes! Now you’ve really got me freaked out. Thanks a bunch.”
“You don’t want to mess with them. But it’s no big deal. I hear they come into the clubs all the time. They even own some of them.”
“It doesn’t matter. I’m not going back.”
“Why not? Didn’t you tell me that this was worth a shitload of cultural adaptability points? Isn’t that why you’re here?”
I took a larger swallow of the saké. “I’m here for a banking internship.”
He shook his head. “That’s just your cover. Like teaching is for me.”
“That’s not what you want to be doing?” I asked.
“It’s good for now.”
“Oh?” Was I the only foreigner in Tokyo with aspirations?
“You sound like you don’t approve.”
Once again, I had to rein in my judgmental side. “No. It’s just different from the way I think. I need to know where I’m going.”
“I used to make big plans,” he said, turning serious. “But I learned that life is short, so why not take some chances and see what happens? My dad taught me that.”
I downed the rest of the saké in my cup, letting its gentle heat flow through me. “How did he do that?” Taking chances for my parents meant trying a different brand of coffee.
Gabe was silent a moment. “My father had a delicatessen with big barrels of pickles. He always smelled of brine no matter how hard he scrubbed his hands. I loved that smell. Still do.” Gabe’s face lit up. “Sometimes, when I was small, I would help him at the shop, and he’d let me choose three cookies from a big stoneware jar he kept on the counter. Always three.”
He paused and refilled both of our cups. Outside a siren screamed.
“Except for the day of my mother’s funeral. I was ten,” he continued. “The deli was closed that day, but dad led me by the hand through the back, took the lid off the cookie jar, and told me to help myself. I chose three cookies, as I’d always done.” Gabe pantomimed laying out three cookies. “Dad upturned the jar. A whole mess of cookies tumbled out. I’d never seen him eat his own cookies before, but we both sat there shoving them into our mouths until we were beyond stuffed.”
I teared up.
Gabe rested his warm hand on my arm. “It’s not meant to be a sad story. It’s about doing what feels right at the moment. Anyhow, my dad had the good grace to wait to die until two days after I graduated from college. I had a bad draft number, so I took off for Canada before coming here.”
