The favorites: a novel - By Mary Yukari Waters Page 0,3

her early childhood here in Japan, how it had felt to board a streetcar or walk down a street: the baleful stares of children, the frank curiosity of vendors or those weaving people who lived on the other side of Murasaki Boulevard. Such people, of course, were the minority; their social graces were less polished than the rest of the population. But they betrayed the truth behind everyone else’s tactful facades of indifference. Young Sarah, who had grown up among Japanese faces (with the exception of her father, the only foreigner she knew), felt taken aback herself each time she passed a shop window and caught a glimpse of her own reflection: a pointy nose sprinkled with freckles, a sharp chin that was severe, almost foxlike, compared to the softer, more pleasing contours of those around her.

To shift the subject away from America, she announced to the table at large, “Granny Asaki waved to me from her balcony this morning.”

Mrs. Asaki, or Granny Asaki as she was known in the neighborhood, was Mr. Kobayashi’s elder sister. A longtime widow, she lived kitty-corner down the gravel lane with her daughter, her son-in-law, and her two grandchildren. The two houses, while bound by close ties, had something of an uneasy relationship. It had never occurred to Sarah to wonder why; she simply accepted it as the nature of her family.

As Sarah had anticipated, her mother and grandmother turned toward her with an air of sharp interest that, in the presence of Mr. Kobayashi and herself, they attempted to disguise with expressions of kindly disinterest.

“You saw her already? How nice,” said Mrs. Kobayashi. “Did she happen to be hanging up something on the clothesline?” The two women exchanged a brief, sardonic glance.

Sarah nodded importantly. This had happened less than half an hour ago. She had folded up the futon comforters, stowed them in the closet, and was heading toward the dining room when she was struck by a sudden urge to see the garden where she had played so often as a little girl. Hurrying over to the wall of sliding glass doors that opened out onto the garden, she had thrown open the heavy, floor-length drapes. The metal rollers slid back with a shhh, like a receding wave, and the room was suffused with green light.

The garden was pleasantly unchanged—although smaller than she remembered—with the same four-legged stone lantern in one corner and the familiar stepping-stones spaced at artistically irregular intervals. The roof’s extended eaves cut off the sky, intensifying the effect of mass foliage: maple and yuzu and bamboo and camellia, all at the peak of summer lushness.

From a slightly stooped position Sarah could peer up, under the eaves and over the wooden fence and the dwarf yuzu tree, and get a good view of Granny Asaki’s second-story balcony. Mrs. Asaki was pinning up handkerchiefs and socks on the clothesline. She, too, was unchanged: small and spry, with the faint beginnings of a hunchback, and dyed black hair slicked into a small bun at the nape of her neck. Immediately spotting the girl’s face at the window, the elderly woman leaned over the wooden railing and vigorously waved a wet handkerchief, causing a large crow to flap up from a nearby pine branch. Sarah waved back.

“It was almost like she’d been watching our house,” Sarah now reported to her mother and grandmother. From past experience, she knew that any evidence of Mrs. Asaki’s nosiness was guaranteed to hold their attention. But the Japanese code of conduct deemed that children—even teenagers—should remain unsullied by any awareness of adult conflict, so Sarah made her remark with an air of bland innocence.

To her satisfaction, the women once again exchanged knowing glances.

“Granny Asaki has sharp eyes,” said Mrs. Rexford dryly. Then, catching herself, she switched to a tone of bright geniality. “Not nearsighted, like the rest of us! Her health is remarkable, especially for someone her age…it must be the good family genes! Ne, Father?”

Mr. Kobayashi, who shared his elder sister’s robust health, chuckled with pleased pride, and his wife murmured that good health was indeed a quality to be envied. The two women turned back to Sarah with expectant faces. Then, perceiving that this was the extent of the girl’s contribution, they drifted off to another topic.

“That reminds me,” said Mrs. Kobayashi several minutes later, “I think you and Sarah should go visit them first. They usually finish breakfast by eight thirty. So eat fast and run over there, quick, before they show up