“Kikuko?”
Kiku meant chrysanthemum, and the young woman thought Kikuko was a strange name for a future ama who would spend most of her life under the swells of the sea. She could imagine a delicate yellow flower becoming soggy and discolored until it disintegrated into nothing more than raggedy bits suspended in the water.
"But the kiku is the last bloom of fall," the baby’s father said as he stroked the yellow petals of a chrysanthemum by their front gate. With his other hand he rubbed his wife’s very pregnant belly.
"It's a funeral flower." The woman put her hands on her hips.
The man crossed his arms and stared off at the horizon. "It's the crest of the Imperial Family."
"Then it's not only bad luck, it's disrespectful." The woman turned to walk down the stone pathway onto the sand. She continued walking until she was ankle deep in the sea: she wanted to be closer than him to the horizon.
“What do you want to do, bring the wrath of the gods down upon us all?” she whispered, as if pleading to the waves.
Some months later, the priest rubbed the cheeks of their baby's beaming round face, remarking that she reminded him of a flower in bloom, and it was decided: Kikuko.
Kiku meant chrysanthemum, and the young woman thought Kikuko was a strange name for a future ama who would spend most of her life under the swells of the sea. She could imagine a delicate yellow flower becoming soggy and discolored until it disintegrated into nothing more than raggedy bits suspended in the water.
"But the kiku is the last bloom of fall," the baby’s father said as he stroked the yellow petals of a chrysanthemum by their front gate. With his other hand he rubbed his wife’s very pregnant belly.
"It's a funeral flower." The woman put her hands on her hips.
The man crossed his arms and stared off at the horizon. "It's the crest of the Imperial Family."
"Then it's not only bad luck, it's disrespectful." The woman turned to walk down the stone pathway onto the sand. She continued walking until she was ankle deep in the sea: she wanted to be closer than him to the horizon.
“What do you want to do, bring the wrath of the gods down upon us all?” she whispered, as if pleading to the waves.
Some months later, the priest rubbed the cheeks of their baby's beaming round face, remarking that she reminded him of a flower in bloom, and it was decided: Kikuko.
********
“Kiku, kiku!”
Kikuko thought her future husband had shortened her name to mean ‘chrysanthemum’, but Akira was making a joke. “Kiku, kiku!” he called with his hands cupped by his mouth as if calling “Listen, listen!” from a great distance because he had something important to tell her. Kiku could mean 'chrysanthemum' or 'listen' depending on which kanji was used. Kikuko laughed when Akira grabbed her tightly around the waist, and she dared to hope that he wouldn’t ever let go. “Kiku, kiku, how many children should we have?” he asked as he picked her up and started walking into the sea. “But…, No! We’ll get all wet, and everybody will know!” Kikuko was giggling in spite of her doubts. Akira kept walking into the water, towards the horizon line. |
It is a good omen, her name, Akira thought, she will be a considerate wife. He pressed his cheek close to hers to whisper in her ear, “Do you know that my name means 'anchor'?"
Kikuko stopped kicking her legs and felt the water swirling up around her waist as Akira carried her into deeper water. Later, back on the beach, they held each other, discussing their plans, and then imagined the successes of their eight children-to-be, agreeing on every little detail. From that day on, every discussion began with, “Kiku, kiku...” |
********
It had been a reasonable haul. Kikuko was slicing open huge scallops to collect the meat. She discarded the ruffled pink shells into another bucket on the deck. Akira was winding up the lines, whistling, and occasionally turning to wink at her. He stopped to kick at a loose plank.
“Replacing that plank will be no problem,” she said. Akira grunted in response and kicked at it some more. Little bits of wood splintered and slid across the deck.
Kikuko shook her head, and went back to her scallops. “Don’t you buy that boat,” Kikuko said, “we can’t take the debt and you know it.”
“Kiku, kiku!” Akira said as he kicked at another plank which seemed to disintegrate upon impact. “Look at this! It’s all rotting away. And the new designs are faster. Think of the how far we’ll go.”
Kikuko felt the beginning of a cool evening breeze on her cheeks.
“A big, expensive, complicated, new boat,” she said in a monotone voice.
Akira had pleaded with her, then gave up—and bought the boat anyway.
“Kiku, kiku…,” he said, a few days later. She grumbled and swatted at his head with a dishtowel when he unrolled the deed in front of her face. At the sight of that paper, she felt herself begin to droop like a flower in the hot sun.
“Replacing that plank will be no problem,” she said. Akira grunted in response and kicked at it some more. Little bits of wood splintered and slid across the deck.
Kikuko shook her head, and went back to her scallops. “Don’t you buy that boat,” Kikuko said, “we can’t take the debt and you know it.”
“Kiku, kiku!” Akira said as he kicked at another plank which seemed to disintegrate upon impact. “Look at this! It’s all rotting away. And the new designs are faster. Think of the how far we’ll go.”
Kikuko felt the beginning of a cool evening breeze on her cheeks.
“A big, expensive, complicated, new boat,” she said in a monotone voice.
Akira had pleaded with her, then gave up—and bought the boat anyway.
“Kiku, kiku…,” he said, a few days later. She grumbled and swatted at his head with a dishtowel when he unrolled the deed in front of her face. At the sight of that paper, she felt herself begin to droop like a flower in the hot sun.
********
The boat was no longer new, but they still had the debt years later. Now, Akira stands on the deck fiddling with the ropes while Kikuko leans forward to dive into the sea. The stone weights tied around her waist will pull her all the way down to the bottom.
“The children are growing up. The older ones are even bringing in some money. We’ll be fine,” he calls out at Kikuko's masked face before it disappears under the water.
She bursts the surface fifty seconds later.
“Soon they’ll marry and go off on their own, leaving us with nothing but this debt.” Kikuko leans her head back towards the sun, gasping. “Why don’t you do more tuna runs to bring in some money?”
His father died on a tuna run, entangled in the lines and pulled under the boat. The other men dove into the water to cut him free, but had been struck by frenzied fifty-kilo fish. The village lost a total of four fathers that day.
Akira grimaces. That woman surely could pick a fight. She knows very well that he doesn't like doing tuna runs, and the new boat is supposed to help him avoid them.
“Yeah, and I’ll take Nobu with me!” he says as he ties a knot into a rope which he then drops onto the deck.
“He’s not old enough."
“I started when I was even younger than him.” Akira grins a bit to himself, knowing that there is not much she can say to this.
Kikuko re-sets her mask under her nose.
“Those googly eyes!” Akira grins at his wife's face, which always appears goofy in her mask, like some strange sea creature up from the deep.
She is frowning back at him, little drops of water spraying from her lips, her chest heaving. He stares off at the horizon to avoid provoking her further. The surface of the sea is calm today; a stunning azure color.
Akira looks back at his wife, but Kikuko has already grabbed the weighted pulley and plunged herself into the water.
“The children are growing up. The older ones are even bringing in some money. We’ll be fine,” he calls out at Kikuko's masked face before it disappears under the water.
She bursts the surface fifty seconds later.
“Soon they’ll marry and go off on their own, leaving us with nothing but this debt.” Kikuko leans her head back towards the sun, gasping. “Why don’t you do more tuna runs to bring in some money?”
His father died on a tuna run, entangled in the lines and pulled under the boat. The other men dove into the water to cut him free, but had been struck by frenzied fifty-kilo fish. The village lost a total of four fathers that day.
Akira grimaces. That woman surely could pick a fight. She knows very well that he doesn't like doing tuna runs, and the new boat is supposed to help him avoid them.
“Yeah, and I’ll take Nobu with me!” he says as he ties a knot into a rope which he then drops onto the deck.
“He’s not old enough."
“I started when I was even younger than him.” Akira grins a bit to himself, knowing that there is not much she can say to this.
Kikuko re-sets her mask under her nose.
“Those googly eyes!” Akira grins at his wife's face, which always appears goofy in her mask, like some strange sea creature up from the deep.
She is frowning back at him, little drops of water spraying from her lips, her chest heaving. He stares off at the horizon to avoid provoking her further. The surface of the sea is calm today; a stunning azure color.
Akira looks back at his wife, but Kikuko has already grabbed the weighted pulley and plunged herself into the water.
She paddles along the sandy bottom in an area that truly is more accessible with the new boat. The rocks are covered with abalone so that her basket fills up even before her lungs can empty. The extra money garnered from this catch would be useful, Kikuko admits to herself.
She pulls twice, sharply, on the rope around her waist, and is immediately propelled up towards the light, the bottom of the boat dark against the sky. On its deck, she knows her husband's muscles are taut, dripping beads of sweat which glint in the sun as he cranks the pulley handle to help bring her to the surface. More shells; there are so many. Kikuko fills up her basket.
She knows that her frustration at being ignored makes her harp on Akira, but she can’t stop herself. If that boat weren’t such a drowning debt, they could just laugh and tease each other like they usually did. Pairs of lobsters crawl hand in hand--or claw-in-claw--along the sea bottom. Kikuko often saw them doing this. She doesn’t have a spear to jab at them, but then she doesn’t really want to break them up. Imagine the other’s shock at suddenly having their partner not there: not there; snatched up to the surface by some unknown enemy at the end of a long, sharp stick. She’ll leave the lobsters be for today, and stick to abalone. |
He reaches out one hand to pull her to the boat's edge, “Kiku, kiku! What a great haul!”
Kikuko re-catches her breath after quite a few deep inhales. “One good haul won’t even pay for one plank of this boat.” “Then you better get to it, woman.” Akira pats the top of her head, then stops, both fearful of and pleased by the crease in her brow which reveals that he has, without a doubt, succeeded in annoying her. Why was she always complaining about the boat? What else could they have done? They needed it. That was that. |
********
Akira nods to himself, thinking happily about their full bellies, yet says, “Woman, can’t you dump that basket fast enough?”
|
Kikuko knows Akira is panting from his part of this job; hauling the lines and cranking the pulley, but says, “It’s heavy. You do it! You’re doing nothing up here but sunbathing anyway.”
|
He picks up the basket and empties it for her as she rests. Akira glances at her repeatedly, but she doesn’t acknowledge him. He begins to feel that panicky sensation he gets when they are about to fight; really fight. It is like seasickness. What kind of sailor admits to seasickness? Please, kiku, kiku, Akira finds himself begging in his own mind. He’ll be sure to scrub the catch buckets well tonight, to make her feel better.
|
********
Akira has always pulled her to the surface precious seconds faster than her father and brothers had been able to do. She could sometimes harvest another few shells in the extra time Akira allows her under the sea. That adds up to a lot by the end of the workday.
This thought relaxes her, but then Akira grunts, "That basket really is heavy. Now that it's empty again, I'll give it back to you, dear. You should have no trouble with it.”
Akira speaks in an unnaturally high voice, like a young girl afloat on the swells of infatuation. As he wiggles the basket above her head, Kikuko cannot bring herself to respond with more than a weary smile. If she looks up at him, she knows he will flutter his eyelashes and blow kisses at her. But she won’t give him the satisfaction of making her laugh, not yet.
“Uhghh,…the rocking is making me queasy.” Akira feigns seasickness. He clutches his stomach and leans over the edge. “How about if I just go home while you stay here?" He drops the basket so that it splashes her face when it hits the water. "You can swim to shore,” he smiles as he says, “I’ll even lay out the futon for you.”
Kikuko covers her smile to glare up at him, squinting her eyes to try to appear more frightening. Akira lays out the futons every night.
He goes silent, and his lips begin to part as he scans up and down her torso bobbing in the water.
“Horny beast!” Kikuko cries out, refusing to throw her head back and laugh. She pushes herself back from the boat, her legs kicking in the open sea water.
“Take this weight, woman.” He swings the stone weight towards her. As she reaches up out of the sea to grab it, a satisfied "ahhhh…," slips out: her curved body visible through her cotton hakama. Akira grins.
Soon even the bottoms of her bare feet have disappeared under the sea.
Just what we don’t need, another baby, Kikuko thinks as she twists her knife to pluck shell after shell after shell from the rocks. But, she is bubbling with anticipation like a young girl in love.
At home tonight she’ll say that she's too tired from her hard day of work, but maybe Akira would ‘revive’ her. Kikuko smiles inwardly, but keeps her lips tightly closed. She learned long ago not to actually smile under water.
Afterwards, Akira would fall asleep, and then she would get up to do some chores, humming as she strolled from room to room along the otherwise still and silent hallways. Maybe she’d even prepare his nets for the next day, so he could enjoy an unhurried sunrise. He’d like that.
Kikuko separates the kelp leaves with her hands; thick and dark as a forest, and slick too. They wave back and forth in the current.
More abalone. This will be quite a catch, she thinks, almost nodding her head in satisfaction under the water. Today’s success reminds her of satisfactions from the past, like the first time she and Akira had made love a few days before the wedding.
At the end of one of many parties, they’d stolen away from the revelers to stroll on the beach, their bodies touching as they walked. Akira picked her up and carried her deep into the water. He spun them around and around until they didn’t know which way was which.
But the sea knew. It was like being made love to by the sea. As they clung to each other, the sea had rhythmically pushed them towards the beach until they landed on shore, waves washing over Kikuko’s hips, her fingertips pressing into the sand.
Kikuko relaxes just thinking about that time. She places more shells in her basket.
Behind this wall of kelp is another large group of rocks with more abalone; abalone everywhere. Kikuko's lungs start to cramp, but she flicks one more shell off of the rock.
It tumbles to the sand.
She reaches over to pick it up, but when she tries to jam it into the net, it falls again-- her basket is already overflowing.
She grasps the shell, thinking she will carry it to the surface in her free hand, but, when she reaches out to yank the signal rope, a trick of the current picks her up off of her feet. Her throat spasms in fear and she almost gulps seawater before she can manage to clamp it closed again.
The current flips her upside down and pushes her backwards into a kelp field. The kelp is so thick it almost blinds her, its leaves brushing against her face. Her lips begin to murmur under the water, but not even she knows what she is trying to say.
The current pushes her further and further along, bouncing her, with that one last abalone still clutched in her hand, on the sea floor. A speck of bright yellowish light— sunlight above the water-- becomes smaller and dimmer. Her free hand claws at the rocks on either side of her.
This wasn’t the first time she’d been carried off by a trick current. But those times, she had managed to find the rope that connected her to Akira.
This time, her one free arm flails out beside her, the other pressing that one abalone close to her chest. Her fingernails break, her fingertips bleed, but she cannot gain hold against the force of the current.
This thought relaxes her, but then Akira grunts, "That basket really is heavy. Now that it's empty again, I'll give it back to you, dear. You should have no trouble with it.”
Akira speaks in an unnaturally high voice, like a young girl afloat on the swells of infatuation. As he wiggles the basket above her head, Kikuko cannot bring herself to respond with more than a weary smile. If she looks up at him, she knows he will flutter his eyelashes and blow kisses at her. But she won’t give him the satisfaction of making her laugh, not yet.
“Uhghh,…the rocking is making me queasy.” Akira feigns seasickness. He clutches his stomach and leans over the edge. “How about if I just go home while you stay here?" He drops the basket so that it splashes her face when it hits the water. "You can swim to shore,” he smiles as he says, “I’ll even lay out the futon for you.”
Kikuko covers her smile to glare up at him, squinting her eyes to try to appear more frightening. Akira lays out the futons every night.
He goes silent, and his lips begin to part as he scans up and down her torso bobbing in the water.
“Horny beast!” Kikuko cries out, refusing to throw her head back and laugh. She pushes herself back from the boat, her legs kicking in the open sea water.
“Take this weight, woman.” He swings the stone weight towards her. As she reaches up out of the sea to grab it, a satisfied "ahhhh…," slips out: her curved body visible through her cotton hakama. Akira grins.
Soon even the bottoms of her bare feet have disappeared under the sea.
Just what we don’t need, another baby, Kikuko thinks as she twists her knife to pluck shell after shell after shell from the rocks. But, she is bubbling with anticipation like a young girl in love.
At home tonight she’ll say that she's too tired from her hard day of work, but maybe Akira would ‘revive’ her. Kikuko smiles inwardly, but keeps her lips tightly closed. She learned long ago not to actually smile under water.
Afterwards, Akira would fall asleep, and then she would get up to do some chores, humming as she strolled from room to room along the otherwise still and silent hallways. Maybe she’d even prepare his nets for the next day, so he could enjoy an unhurried sunrise. He’d like that.
Kikuko separates the kelp leaves with her hands; thick and dark as a forest, and slick too. They wave back and forth in the current.
More abalone. This will be quite a catch, she thinks, almost nodding her head in satisfaction under the water. Today’s success reminds her of satisfactions from the past, like the first time she and Akira had made love a few days before the wedding.
At the end of one of many parties, they’d stolen away from the revelers to stroll on the beach, their bodies touching as they walked. Akira picked her up and carried her deep into the water. He spun them around and around until they didn’t know which way was which.
But the sea knew. It was like being made love to by the sea. As they clung to each other, the sea had rhythmically pushed them towards the beach until they landed on shore, waves washing over Kikuko’s hips, her fingertips pressing into the sand.
Kikuko relaxes just thinking about that time. She places more shells in her basket.
Behind this wall of kelp is another large group of rocks with more abalone; abalone everywhere. Kikuko's lungs start to cramp, but she flicks one more shell off of the rock.
It tumbles to the sand.
She reaches over to pick it up, but when she tries to jam it into the net, it falls again-- her basket is already overflowing.
She grasps the shell, thinking she will carry it to the surface in her free hand, but, when she reaches out to yank the signal rope, a trick of the current picks her up off of her feet. Her throat spasms in fear and she almost gulps seawater before she can manage to clamp it closed again.
The current flips her upside down and pushes her backwards into a kelp field. The kelp is so thick it almost blinds her, its leaves brushing against her face. Her lips begin to murmur under the water, but not even she knows what she is trying to say.
The current pushes her further and further along, bouncing her, with that one last abalone still clutched in her hand, on the sea floor. A speck of bright yellowish light— sunlight above the water-- becomes smaller and dimmer. Her free hand claws at the rocks on either side of her.
This wasn’t the first time she’d been carried off by a trick current. But those times, she had managed to find the rope that connected her to Akira.
This time, her one free arm flails out beside her, the other pressing that one abalone close to her chest. Her fingernails break, her fingertips bleed, but she cannot gain hold against the force of the current.
********
One minute.
Akira watched the line roll into the water. It moved quickly.
One minute five seconds…she hasn’t been under this long since they were teenagers and first married.
"I bet you can't stay down that long." Akira had stood on the deck taunting her.
"Yes, I can! I'm going to do it, too!" She used her arms to turn herself around in the waves. "Let's make a bet!"
"For what?"
"Hmm,…for special service at home, tonight."
When she said 'special,' she had let herself float in the water so the front of her body was visible, practically naked under the wet clingy white cotton.
"You're on!" He slapped his hand against a thigh.
Neither of them could really lose that bet, but in the end, she had won.
One minute and fifteen seconds.
Akira gingerly tweaks the rope which travels to her waist somewhere below the boat. It continues to wind out.
One minute twenty.
He taps the rope again, but still gets no reply.
One minute twenty-five.
He chokes and sputters, a few tears jumping from between his compressed eyelids. The rope has stopped, so she will surely be giving him the two-tugs signal soon.
One minute thirty.
He yanks back and forth on the rope to signal that he really is ready to haul her back up to the surface and out of the water.
One minute thirty-five.
He lets go of the rope and pulls at his hair.
One minute forty.
He crouches down in the boat, one hand over his weeping eyes, the other on the motionless rope.
One minute forty-five.
He jumps up and begins cranking in a frenzy.
Seagulls squawk above him. Akira stares so long at nothing but the end of rope dangling from the pulley that soon the winged scavengers land on deck and begin to pick at the day’s catch. He jumps into the sea after her, but since he can’t dive deeper than a few meters before his lungs give out, he barely even gets a view of the kelp waving up at him from the sandy bottom.
It is very quiet under the sea.
The current pulls him so far away from the boat that Akira nearly exhausts himself swimming back to it.
He returns to that very same spot with a pack of amas who search for any sign of Kikuko, but they find only abalone scattered across the sea floor.
Yes, it would have been quite a catch.
Akira tries to pay the ama for their services, but they refuse money. Instead they knock on his door at dinnertime, carrying large pots of rice in broth bursting with seasonal catch.
The boat-makers halve and extend the monthly payments on the boat, but he knows they should have cut it even more considering the money Kikuko had brought in for the family. He goes on tuna runs. The children take on more work, to bring in food and money. They were getting by, but Kikuko had been right about the boat; it was too expensive for them. It would have been too expensive for them even if she had lived.
Should he consult the match-maker about a partner for the oldest boy so that the new couple could run the boat? Should he sell it, and pay off the difference himself from some job in the city, leaving the children to do as they pleased? He would have to move so far from the sea if he did that. Then he couldn’t look out over the ocean, trying to get a glimpse of Kikuko.
One night, Akira cries himself to sleep: he cries so much and so long that he finds himself afloat, alone, on the sea of his dreams. He is cold, with waves slapping at his face, seawater stinging his eyes, until he too begins to sink under the water. Akira wakes up with his arms and legs flailing in fright at being lost in this vast blue sea.
Akira watched the line roll into the water. It moved quickly.
One minute five seconds…she hasn’t been under this long since they were teenagers and first married.
"I bet you can't stay down that long." Akira had stood on the deck taunting her.
"Yes, I can! I'm going to do it, too!" She used her arms to turn herself around in the waves. "Let's make a bet!"
"For what?"
"Hmm,…for special service at home, tonight."
When she said 'special,' she had let herself float in the water so the front of her body was visible, practically naked under the wet clingy white cotton.
"You're on!" He slapped his hand against a thigh.
Neither of them could really lose that bet, but in the end, she had won.
One minute and fifteen seconds.
Akira gingerly tweaks the rope which travels to her waist somewhere below the boat. It continues to wind out.
One minute twenty.
He taps the rope again, but still gets no reply.
One minute twenty-five.
He chokes and sputters, a few tears jumping from between his compressed eyelids. The rope has stopped, so she will surely be giving him the two-tugs signal soon.
One minute thirty.
He yanks back and forth on the rope to signal that he really is ready to haul her back up to the surface and out of the water.
One minute thirty-five.
He lets go of the rope and pulls at his hair.
One minute forty.
He crouches down in the boat, one hand over his weeping eyes, the other on the motionless rope.
One minute forty-five.
He jumps up and begins cranking in a frenzy.
Seagulls squawk above him. Akira stares so long at nothing but the end of rope dangling from the pulley that soon the winged scavengers land on deck and begin to pick at the day’s catch. He jumps into the sea after her, but since he can’t dive deeper than a few meters before his lungs give out, he barely even gets a view of the kelp waving up at him from the sandy bottom.
It is very quiet under the sea.
The current pulls him so far away from the boat that Akira nearly exhausts himself swimming back to it.
He returns to that very same spot with a pack of amas who search for any sign of Kikuko, but they find only abalone scattered across the sea floor.
Yes, it would have been quite a catch.
Akira tries to pay the ama for their services, but they refuse money. Instead they knock on his door at dinnertime, carrying large pots of rice in broth bursting with seasonal catch.
The boat-makers halve and extend the monthly payments on the boat, but he knows they should have cut it even more considering the money Kikuko had brought in for the family. He goes on tuna runs. The children take on more work, to bring in food and money. They were getting by, but Kikuko had been right about the boat; it was too expensive for them. It would have been too expensive for them even if she had lived.
Should he consult the match-maker about a partner for the oldest boy so that the new couple could run the boat? Should he sell it, and pay off the difference himself from some job in the city, leaving the children to do as they pleased? He would have to move so far from the sea if he did that. Then he couldn’t look out over the ocean, trying to get a glimpse of Kikuko.
One night, Akira cries himself to sleep: he cries so much and so long that he finds himself afloat, alone, on the sea of his dreams. He is cold, with waves slapping at his face, seawater stinging his eyes, until he too begins to sink under the water. Akira wakes up with his arms and legs flailing in fright at being lost in this vast blue sea.
********
“I think it’s your mother’s!” Akira shakes a scarf in the children’s faces when they are at home by the hearth.
The children glance at each other nervously. They had heard this incredible story before. In frustration, the youngest boy shouts, “How can it be hers? How can you know it’s hers?” He throws his rice bowl across the room, then stomps down the hallway and out the door.
Akira picks up the rice that has scattered across the straw mats, chanting, "It's hers. I know it's hers," as he drops the grains one by one into the palm of his hand.
The youngest girl throws back her head and begins to wail, “Mother!”
A short time after Kikuko’s disappearance, Akira had gone to Futami with the other men for the festival. Just as they had done every year, they donned ama-like white cotton robes and swam out to Husband-and-Wife-Rock. As they prayed to the sun-goddess, the sun itself rose out of the sea and over the horizon before them.
Futami, or ‘Look Twice,’ village, was full of tourists gaping at two rocks jutting from the water. The rocks were connected by a straw ceremonial rope. Folded white paper, symbolizing a lightning strike, hung from the rope between the rocks. As he raised his arms to the sun goddess, Akira wondered who had decided that these two rocks were husband and wife.
Until today, he had just accepted the moniker and assumed the large rock was the husband like him. Kikuko had proven herself to be the large one, though he’d never admitted that to her.
His body swayed along with the swells. The devotees were chanting now. The tourists murmured; one hundred devotees raising their hands skyward in honor of the Sun Goddess must be an impressive sight.
Something floated up against his leg; he assumed it was some seaweed and ignored it. It did not float away, so Akira glanced down at what he then realized was a white cloth under the water. He reached down into the sea to pull it up. When he stretched the cloth out on the surface of the swells, Akira saw it was the headscarf of an ama. The scarf was, of course, embroidered in rich purple thread with the star and grid symbols of those in the trade. Kikuko had worn hers across her forehead like every other ama. Sometimes the star lay right across her forehead like a third eye.
"May the gods protect you," he had stared at those symbols and prayed to himself every time Kikuko's head vanished under the sea.
This scarf, found in the sea and now draped across his hands, had to be Kikuko’s.
The children glance at each other nervously. They had heard this incredible story before. In frustration, the youngest boy shouts, “How can it be hers? How can you know it’s hers?” He throws his rice bowl across the room, then stomps down the hallway and out the door.
Akira picks up the rice that has scattered across the straw mats, chanting, "It's hers. I know it's hers," as he drops the grains one by one into the palm of his hand.
The youngest girl throws back her head and begins to wail, “Mother!”
A short time after Kikuko’s disappearance, Akira had gone to Futami with the other men for the festival. Just as they had done every year, they donned ama-like white cotton robes and swam out to Husband-and-Wife-Rock. As they prayed to the sun-goddess, the sun itself rose out of the sea and over the horizon before them.
Futami, or ‘Look Twice,’ village, was full of tourists gaping at two rocks jutting from the water. The rocks were connected by a straw ceremonial rope. Folded white paper, symbolizing a lightning strike, hung from the rope between the rocks. As he raised his arms to the sun goddess, Akira wondered who had decided that these two rocks were husband and wife.
Until today, he had just accepted the moniker and assumed the large rock was the husband like him. Kikuko had proven herself to be the large one, though he’d never admitted that to her.
His body swayed along with the swells. The devotees were chanting now. The tourists murmured; one hundred devotees raising their hands skyward in honor of the Sun Goddess must be an impressive sight.
Something floated up against his leg; he assumed it was some seaweed and ignored it. It did not float away, so Akira glanced down at what he then realized was a white cloth under the water. He reached down into the sea to pull it up. When he stretched the cloth out on the surface of the swells, Akira saw it was the headscarf of an ama. The scarf was, of course, embroidered in rich purple thread with the star and grid symbols of those in the trade. Kikuko had worn hers across her forehead like every other ama. Sometimes the star lay right across her forehead like a third eye.
"May the gods protect you," he had stared at those symbols and prayed to himself every time Kikuko's head vanished under the sea.
This scarf, found in the sea and now draped across his hands, had to be Kikuko’s.
*******
She is dead; Kikuko knows this now. This is not some magical world under the sea. The sea itself had pushed her along without mercy until she found herself pressed against some massive rocks. She’d been jostled by that invisible current until her mask had shattered against the rock face.
Yet, she can still breathe. Not that she is actually breathing, but she doesn’t feel that usual burning in her lungs just before surfacing for air.
Why is she dead? Her greed and carelessness, she realizes, killed her.
She spends months-- or is it years?-- trying to swim against the current and up to the boat, to her husband. She weeps with sorrow. She is desperate to meet Akira again, to tell him how much she loves him. “I’m so sorry,” she wants to call out to him, “I made a mistake!”
He had held her when she cried over the miscarriage. He had held her when she was angry at being snubbed at the market. He had held her because she asked him to. He had held her just for the sake of holding her. She had done the same.
Kikuko’s lips move under the water. This time her ghostly self is saying what she should have said when alive: “My love for you is as wide as the sea. No, it is wider and bigger than anything I could ever say. How could anyone express such a love? It cannot be spoken. It is too big and powerful, so I will speak of it in this pale, little way.”
Still wrestling against the current, Kikuko is certain that she can find a way to tell her husband and family how much she loves them--until she realizes the rope which connected her to them is gone. It must have been severed on an undersea rock.
She floats, suspended in seawater, then begins to thrash about and shout nonsensical things, causing bubbles to float up in the water. Her arms and legs churn like the tentacles of a furious sea monster and she never becomes exhausted, despite her fiendish efforts. Her thrashing creates a froth.
She should not be here! She is stuck down here in trails of froth created by her own foolish thrashing. The froth floats away.
Froth, she thinks, masses of bubbles. Where do those bubbles go? They are floating up and away. They are floating to the surface!
Kikuko steadies her feet and pushes off from the bottom. If the bubbles can rise to the surface, then so can she. She will try again to reach her family, even if she has to swim for years.
How much time has gone by? She has no idea. Maybe it's too late. Maybe the children are grown and gone, her husband in an earthen grave on top of a dry, hard mountain.
Kikuko shakes her head “no” at this thought as she follows the bubbling froth. In this nothingness, her journey seems to take an eternity, but she eventually breaks the surface.
Above the sea is a terrible storm.
Kikuko climbs up onto the rocks, rain and wind flying right through her. From her view, she can see her home. Inside, candles have been lit against the coming night, making a lovely yellow glow behind the screens. Kikuko smiles to herself; she would have told Akira and the children to put up the wooden doors. Who knows what the wind might blow into the house on a night like tonight?
Huge swells rise and fall before her eyes. It is true that someone is living in their house, and they haven’t put up the storm doors. But could it be her family? Kikuko isn’t sure anymore; the swells have made her feel a bit seasick. She almost laughs at the absurdity: a dead sea creature feeling seasick in a storm.
Then, the door slides open to silhouette a figure which Kikuko recognizes as her husband. That was his taut but curved stance, and the tilt to his head. Akira is probably thinking of something silly right now, and would soon make them all laugh.
Kikuko calls his name and waves her hand, but a swell obscures him.
Afraid to lose him again, she dives in to swim closer.
*******
"It's just like that story," one daughter whimpers, "that scary story about the ghost!"
The sun is bright this morning, but the younger children are clutching each other, pressed cheek to cheek, as if that could hold back their gurgles of fright. The oldest boy points to the wet footsteps on the floorboards, the veranda and every room in the house. He wonders how such a thing could have happened?
Are the old stories true? he asks himself, incredulously. No, it’s just the rain, he decides. We should have put up the storm doors, but Father wouldn’t let us.
“Kikuko!” Akira smiles from his position on the veranda, touching his own shoulder which is damp. He must have fallen asleep there during the night, and Kikuko hadn’t wanted to wake him.
“Kiku, kiku!” he cocks his head to one side, but there is no answer.
The children move to the hearth now and sit down, silent but shaking.
Akira goes to the family altar as if to pray. He turns to the children and says, “Look! Your mother’s scarf, which has been resting on this very altar since I found it in the sea by Husband-and-Wife Rock, is gone. In its place is this yellow chrysanthemum." He picks the flower up by its stem to display to the children. The flower is as big and round as the sun, with long, delicate petals which curl at the tips.
“Is Mother coming back?” one of the girls asks as she wipes her tears. Akira smiles and bows his head in prayer. The girl runs over and kneels down to pray along beside him.
*******
They find a gift per day on the altar.
The first son gets a ring for his betrothed. It had been Kikuko's, so she had gotten it out of her old jewelry box and laid it beside the chrysanthemum. The second receives a net mending tool, then the daughters get a huge collection of the shells which make purple dye. Kikuko had found these things at the bottom of the sea. There was charcoal for the boy who liked to sketch tall ships at full sail on open seas, and ink and brushes for the daughter who was good at her lessons. The other sons found themselves with scales; they wanted to manage stalls at the wholesale market some day. Kikuko had pillaged these things from the village, but more than paid for them in return with heaping piles of abalone. For Akira, she set her scarf beside his pillow.
“Kikuko,” Akira says as he lays down and crosses his arms behind his head in satisfaction.
*******
Her family loved the gifts and sat by the altar praying and laughing together every day. But they couldn’t touch or chat with their mother. Kikuko found that she could only appear to them from the sea. She could sometimes wave at them from the rocks, but on dry land she always became invisible.
What could she do next? What other gifts could she give them?
Kikuko throws down some sand-- she had been sitting on the beach redesigning an image of their home as a castle on a cliff-- and dives into the sea. She swims towards a tuna boat.
What if they could come to her?
The fish are springing through the air. Akira is up there on deck. Couldn’t she just bring him down to her? Then they could swim together to a cave, their hideaway, beneath the sea. The children, too. They could all be back together, here, under the waves. Why should she have to skulk alone under the sea? She could just pluck them off of the deck, or the dock, or the beach, and then they could all be together again.
At Futami she had hidden herself behind Husband-and-Wife Rock, peering out at the devotees. Her lips moved along with their chanting, but no one had heard her. Not even the gods could hear her. If they could, the gods would let her be dead, or let her be alive.
Kikuko stares up at that vessel bobbing on the waves above her, feeling her frustration build. Her arms and legs are starting to churn again like the tentacles of a giant sea monster.
"Clap! Slap! Klunk!" Akira above the sea steadies himself against these noises; the sound of hundreds of tuna bashing themselves against the thin planks of a wooden boat.
*******
“Off to the festival?" Akira pats his children's shoulders before they hurry down their respective paths. "Ok. I’m off to throw a net for mullet.”
He wades knee-deep into the sea and heads toward an outcropping of rocks behind which is the little hamlet where he and Kikuko had made love for the first time. He doubles over, breathless at the thought of another glimpse of Husband-and-Wife Rock and the memories it always evoked: Kikuko glancing back at him as she folded the laundry, tucked a blanket in around a sleeping child's body, or dropped a basket full of shells onto the dock. “I'm so…tired…today,” she sometimes said, “Do you think you could 'revive' me?" Then, she broke out into laughter. She’d never been able to stop herself from laughing when she tried to be coy.
Akira falls back into the water, exhausted by the effort of wishing for second chances, for another look.
The waves work at him until he is afloat.
The sea. Yellow strips of light reflect on its water. Akira finally understands that Kikuko isn’t the large rock or the small one, and they don't have to be bound together by straw rope made sacred by a priest. He doesn’t have to put on an ama suit and swim out to Husband-and-Wife-Rock to meet her.
She is the sea, the entire sea, washing over him. Akira weeps his sadness and joy into this sea, in a kind of ecstasy even greater than the sea. The sea has a name, but this? This does not. It cannot, for it is too big; it is too big and powerful to be spoken, so we speak of it in some pale, little way.
“Kiku, kiku…,” she calls out.
Akira listens.
Yet, she can still breathe. Not that she is actually breathing, but she doesn’t feel that usual burning in her lungs just before surfacing for air.
Why is she dead? Her greed and carelessness, she realizes, killed her.
She spends months-- or is it years?-- trying to swim against the current and up to the boat, to her husband. She weeps with sorrow. She is desperate to meet Akira again, to tell him how much she loves him. “I’m so sorry,” she wants to call out to him, “I made a mistake!”
He had held her when she cried over the miscarriage. He had held her when she was angry at being snubbed at the market. He had held her because she asked him to. He had held her just for the sake of holding her. She had done the same.
Kikuko’s lips move under the water. This time her ghostly self is saying what she should have said when alive: “My love for you is as wide as the sea. No, it is wider and bigger than anything I could ever say. How could anyone express such a love? It cannot be spoken. It is too big and powerful, so I will speak of it in this pale, little way.”
Still wrestling against the current, Kikuko is certain that she can find a way to tell her husband and family how much she loves them--until she realizes the rope which connected her to them is gone. It must have been severed on an undersea rock.
She floats, suspended in seawater, then begins to thrash about and shout nonsensical things, causing bubbles to float up in the water. Her arms and legs churn like the tentacles of a furious sea monster and she never becomes exhausted, despite her fiendish efforts. Her thrashing creates a froth.
She should not be here! She is stuck down here in trails of froth created by her own foolish thrashing. The froth floats away.
Froth, she thinks, masses of bubbles. Where do those bubbles go? They are floating up and away. They are floating to the surface!
Kikuko steadies her feet and pushes off from the bottom. If the bubbles can rise to the surface, then so can she. She will try again to reach her family, even if she has to swim for years.
How much time has gone by? She has no idea. Maybe it's too late. Maybe the children are grown and gone, her husband in an earthen grave on top of a dry, hard mountain.
Kikuko shakes her head “no” at this thought as she follows the bubbling froth. In this nothingness, her journey seems to take an eternity, but she eventually breaks the surface.
Above the sea is a terrible storm.
Kikuko climbs up onto the rocks, rain and wind flying right through her. From her view, she can see her home. Inside, candles have been lit against the coming night, making a lovely yellow glow behind the screens. Kikuko smiles to herself; she would have told Akira and the children to put up the wooden doors. Who knows what the wind might blow into the house on a night like tonight?
Huge swells rise and fall before her eyes. It is true that someone is living in their house, and they haven’t put up the storm doors. But could it be her family? Kikuko isn’t sure anymore; the swells have made her feel a bit seasick. She almost laughs at the absurdity: a dead sea creature feeling seasick in a storm.
Then, the door slides open to silhouette a figure which Kikuko recognizes as her husband. That was his taut but curved stance, and the tilt to his head. Akira is probably thinking of something silly right now, and would soon make them all laugh.
Kikuko calls his name and waves her hand, but a swell obscures him.
Afraid to lose him again, she dives in to swim closer.
*******
"It's just like that story," one daughter whimpers, "that scary story about the ghost!"
The sun is bright this morning, but the younger children are clutching each other, pressed cheek to cheek, as if that could hold back their gurgles of fright. The oldest boy points to the wet footsteps on the floorboards, the veranda and every room in the house. He wonders how such a thing could have happened?
Are the old stories true? he asks himself, incredulously. No, it’s just the rain, he decides. We should have put up the storm doors, but Father wouldn’t let us.
“Kikuko!” Akira smiles from his position on the veranda, touching his own shoulder which is damp. He must have fallen asleep there during the night, and Kikuko hadn’t wanted to wake him.
“Kiku, kiku!” he cocks his head to one side, but there is no answer.
The children move to the hearth now and sit down, silent but shaking.
Akira goes to the family altar as if to pray. He turns to the children and says, “Look! Your mother’s scarf, which has been resting on this very altar since I found it in the sea by Husband-and-Wife Rock, is gone. In its place is this yellow chrysanthemum." He picks the flower up by its stem to display to the children. The flower is as big and round as the sun, with long, delicate petals which curl at the tips.
“Is Mother coming back?” one of the girls asks as she wipes her tears. Akira smiles and bows his head in prayer. The girl runs over and kneels down to pray along beside him.
*******
They find a gift per day on the altar.
The first son gets a ring for his betrothed. It had been Kikuko's, so she had gotten it out of her old jewelry box and laid it beside the chrysanthemum. The second receives a net mending tool, then the daughters get a huge collection of the shells which make purple dye. Kikuko had found these things at the bottom of the sea. There was charcoal for the boy who liked to sketch tall ships at full sail on open seas, and ink and brushes for the daughter who was good at her lessons. The other sons found themselves with scales; they wanted to manage stalls at the wholesale market some day. Kikuko had pillaged these things from the village, but more than paid for them in return with heaping piles of abalone. For Akira, she set her scarf beside his pillow.
“Kikuko,” Akira says as he lays down and crosses his arms behind his head in satisfaction.
*******
Her family loved the gifts and sat by the altar praying and laughing together every day. But they couldn’t touch or chat with their mother. Kikuko found that she could only appear to them from the sea. She could sometimes wave at them from the rocks, but on dry land she always became invisible.
What could she do next? What other gifts could she give them?
Kikuko throws down some sand-- she had been sitting on the beach redesigning an image of their home as a castle on a cliff-- and dives into the sea. She swims towards a tuna boat.
What if they could come to her?
The fish are springing through the air. Akira is up there on deck. Couldn’t she just bring him down to her? Then they could swim together to a cave, their hideaway, beneath the sea. The children, too. They could all be back together, here, under the waves. Why should she have to skulk alone under the sea? She could just pluck them off of the deck, or the dock, or the beach, and then they could all be together again.
At Futami she had hidden herself behind Husband-and-Wife Rock, peering out at the devotees. Her lips moved along with their chanting, but no one had heard her. Not even the gods could hear her. If they could, the gods would let her be dead, or let her be alive.
Kikuko stares up at that vessel bobbing on the waves above her, feeling her frustration build. Her arms and legs are starting to churn again like the tentacles of a giant sea monster.
"Clap! Slap! Klunk!" Akira above the sea steadies himself against these noises; the sound of hundreds of tuna bashing themselves against the thin planks of a wooden boat.
*******
“Off to the festival?" Akira pats his children's shoulders before they hurry down their respective paths. "Ok. I’m off to throw a net for mullet.”
He wades knee-deep into the sea and heads toward an outcropping of rocks behind which is the little hamlet where he and Kikuko had made love for the first time. He doubles over, breathless at the thought of another glimpse of Husband-and-Wife Rock and the memories it always evoked: Kikuko glancing back at him as she folded the laundry, tucked a blanket in around a sleeping child's body, or dropped a basket full of shells onto the dock. “I'm so…tired…today,” she sometimes said, “Do you think you could 'revive' me?" Then, she broke out into laughter. She’d never been able to stop herself from laughing when she tried to be coy.
Akira falls back into the water, exhausted by the effort of wishing for second chances, for another look.
The waves work at him until he is afloat.
The sea. Yellow strips of light reflect on its water. Akira finally understands that Kikuko isn’t the large rock or the small one, and they don't have to be bound together by straw rope made sacred by a priest. He doesn’t have to put on an ama suit and swim out to Husband-and-Wife-Rock to meet her.
She is the sea, the entire sea, washing over him. Akira weeps his sadness and joy into this sea, in a kind of ecstasy even greater than the sea. The sea has a name, but this? This does not. It cannot, for it is too big; it is too big and powerful to be spoken, so we speak of it in some pale, little way.
“Kiku, kiku…,” she calls out.
Akira listens.
Gwyn Helverson is an academic, a writer, and an artist who. has lived in Japan for decades, where one of her many joys is learning more every day about how little she actually knows!
Use and/or duplication of any material on White Enso is strictly prohibited without express and written permission from the author and/or owner.
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