A Girl Like You: A Novel Part 22

"You are going home, then?" Satomi asks.

"Yes, we are going home." Eriko pauses, the words seem so strange. "Going home!"

"Haru will be pleased," Satomi says.

"Yes, he wrote as soon as he heard. He says that we mustn't let them relocate us away from the West Coast. He's keen on our rights to choose where we settle."

"Haru is right," Naomi says. "Who knows where they will send us this time if we let them? Another Manzanar, perhaps! We have heard the word 'relocate' before, I think."

"You must come with us," Eriko offers. "I don't know if we can get our shop back, we only rented it in the first place, but we must try. We left our furniture, even rice in the cupboard, we left everything. It's possible it's all still there, I suppose, but I hardly dare hope for it."

"Oh, Eriko, thank you, but I have to go to Angelina. We owned our farm outright and we left money in the bank, crops in our fields. My father would expect me to see that his life's work has not been stolen away."

"Then you'll come? After, when you have done what you have to, then you will come?"

"I can't, you know that. It would be wrong for me to live in the same house as Haru. He wouldn't want it, and neither do I."

"But what will you do, Satomi? Who will look after you?"

"I am near nineteen, Eriko, a woman. I will look after myself."

The words sound false even to her. What will she do? How will she live? A job somewhere, she supposes, a room of her own. She has longed for a room of her own, for privacy. The thought of it now, though, seems too strange to contemplate.

Tamura had advised her to go east if she had the chance.

"It will be better in the East," she had said. "The West will never forgive us for the Harbor."

The order has come from the War Department to demolish Manzanar. In its upheaval it begins to look again as dismal as it did when they had first arrived. Those who opt for relocation are already being s.h.i.+pped out to government housing projects, their barracks razed the instant they leave. The rats run for cover, the c.o.c.kroaches scatter as the empty barracks are reduced to piles of lumber. Before the authorities have a chance to gather it up, the wood is s.n.a.t.c.hed. With such a wealth of fuel, stoves blaze in defense against the bitter November air.

Outside the director's office, piles of papers are stacked high, waiting to be loaded onto trucks and sent off to the War Department.

"So many of them," Satomi says to Dr. Harper as they walk past on their way to the orphanage. "What are they, do you think?"

"Records of you all, I guess," he says, retracing his steps and scooping up a bundle, stuffing them into his bag.

"What will happen to them?"

"If I had to bet, I'd say they were on their way to the furnace."

The hospital wards, save for a bed or two left for emergencies, have closed. Tables and chairs are removed from the mess halls, the new school barracks are dismantled as the children are sent home to help their parents prepare for evacuation.

At the orphanage the children's things are being packed up too. When Satomi asks where the children are to be sent, one of the wardens shrugs her shoulders.

"Who knows?" she says. "We will be lucky to find places for them anywhere. n.o.body wants j.a.panese children these days."

"I'm willing to take Cora with me. She will be happy with me."

"Oh, Satomi, you couldn't look after her. It will be enough to manage yourself."

"If I have my parents' money we could manage, I'm sure.

"I don't think the superintendent will just give Cora to you simply because you ask. It's a foolish idea and probably against the law."

"No harm in asking, though."

"Don't get your hopes up, you're bound to be disappointed."

She must have hope, though. It's too hard to think about letting Cora go without a fight. She conjures up a family who might treat her badly, an orphanage where love has to be shared out so that no child ever gets enough. Just the thought of it sickens her.

Knocking on the superintendent's door, she tells herself that she mustn't lose her temper. If she can just keep calm, smother her desire to insist, things will go better. Nothing much, she knows, works out when she loses her temper.

"Surely Cora would be better off with me than in an orphanage?" she says reasonably.

"It can't be done, Satomi. Simple as that," the superintendent says. "But you needn't worry about Cora. She will be the first to find a family. Such a sweet, obedient child."

"But she already knows me. We are like sisters."

"But not sisters. And there is no guarantee that you will get this money you speak of. How would you manage then?"

"I'll get a job, of course. We all have to work."

"Look, Satomi, it's kind of you, but it is a foolish idea. You will have problems enough of your own. We all will."

"Cora should be with me, we should be together." She can't keep the fury out of her voice.

"Don't blame me, Satomi. I'm j.a.panese. I have no authority in this place."

"Then I'll go to the director, he won't refuse me."

"If you must. Who knows, you may catch him on a good day."

The director, though, is too busy overseeing the dismantling of the camp to take time to see her. He smiles at her weakly on his way out of the office and directs her to one of his a.s.sistants.

"You'll need to write it all down." The a.s.sistant, busy with writing something himself, hardly looks at her. "Here are paper and pencil. Bring them back when you've finished."

The words are hard to find. The director doesn't know her, doesn't know Cora; how can she make him understand? She writes of the love they have for each other, of her hope for her parents' inheritance. We are like sisters, she a.s.sures him. Surely whatever the circ.u.mstances it is better that sisters should be together.

Her letter is put with others on a desk crowded with papers.

"It's very important," she says, noting the piled-high papers, the ones that have carelessly been allowed to slip to the floor. "Make sure that he gets it."

"Of course. I hardly need you to tell me how to do my job." He feels she has ordered rather than asked. "I can't guarantee that the director will have time to answer you."

But an answer comes a day later in the form of a brief note left for her at the orphanage.

What you request is not possible. It would be against American law for this office to grant you a child that is in the care of the state. You can rest a.s.sured that Cora is in good hands. Everything will be done to find all of the children suitable placements.

John Holmes a.s.sistant to Director Merrit Eriko says that she shouldn't blame the director. It takes a special kind of person to break the rules, a hero like Ralph Lazo. Courage is needed, she says, to go against the regulations, to take the human decision.

"Don't expect humanity to triumph in Manzanar, Satomi. It never has before."

In Satomi's distress, old dreams of Tamura disappearing return to plague her sleep.

"You call your mother's name out in your sleep," Eriko says. "It is natural, I suppose."

"I think that Mama and Cora have become one in my dreams."

"It's cruel, I know, Satomi, but you must not think of Cora so much. You are an orphan yourself, remember."

But it's impossible not to think of Cora, of the child's dark eyes, her sweet mouth, and her dented innocence. Only she truly understands Cora, no one else will take the time to note her little ways, calm her fears, learn the things that make her laugh. Such a rare little laugh, but so joyful when it spills out of her. Who now will make up stories just for her, tell her that she is pretty, that she is their special girl?

"I will keep in touch with Dr. Harper," she tells the orphanage superintendent. Will you at least let him know where Cora is? I must be able to keep in touch with her."

"I'll do my best, Satomi, but I can't promise anything. We must hope that she stays in California, at least."

"That would be better than Alaska, I suppose."

"Yes, Alaska seems like another country, doesn't it? I know it's hard to hear, but you'll forget her, you know. We all have to think of ourselves in the end."

Cora isn't in the general playroom when Satomi calls at the orphanage the next day. She is sitting on her cot bed swinging her legs, her little black shoes polished, her dress starched, a knitted wool bow in her dark hair.

"I'm coming with you," she tells Satomi, her eyes welling with tears. "When you leave, I'm coming with you."

"I would take you if I could, Cora, but they won't allow it. I will find you, though, wherever you go. We will see each other again."

"You won't come for me. n.o.body comes for me."

"I will come. When I am settled, Cora, I will come and visit you. You may have your own family by then, a mother and father to love you."

Cora's cries are pitiful, little mewls, m.u.f.fled sobs.

"We have almost a week left together, Cora. Perhaps they will show a movie, and school is finished, so you can come to Eriko's and play with your friends in the alley all day, if you like."

Just a week, she thinks. Seven days left to console Cora, to calm the little girl's fears, to gather herself.

Only the young are excited. For the rest, the fear of leaving the known is mixed with apprehension for what lies ahead of them. Some of the older ones would choose to stay in Manazar if they could. They have established it out of nothing and want it to live on. Once the majority have left, s.p.a.ce will not be a hard thing to come by, and they have had enough of the sadness of looking back, they want the world to forget them now.

"They must go," Lawson says. "The Supreme Court has ruled the camps illegal. In any case, how would they live? The mess halls won't be working, or much else, I imagine."

"So now this place is illegal." Satomi can't keep the sneer out of her voice. "Does it ever occur to you, Lawson, that to be American is to be governed by fools?"

"Well, you can vote them out now. That's progress, ain't it?"

Dr. Harper tells her that he is relieved beyond imagination that the camp is finally to close.

"You may not believe it, Sati, but you have been my conscience in Manzanar."

"I think that honor should go to my mother, Doctor, don't you?"

"No, your mother's sweetness was a gift to me, but it was your anger that stirred my own."

She visits Tamura's grave for the last time. She's here beneath my feet, she thinks, summoning to mind her last view of Tamura in her freshly laundered dress, blocking from it how her mother's body must look now. She thinks of the weather to come at Manzanar, of the sweeping winds and the deep snowdrifts, of the cold moon that will for always now s.h.i.+ne down on Tamura's little plot. She won't ever be able to think of the seasons at Manzanar without picturing Tamura's grave suffering them. She hardly knows anymore the little girl in her who whispers with a sob, "Goodbye Mama."

Out of the blue Dr. Harper has offered to drive her to Angelina, to help her with her claim to the farm, and to whatever monies remain in the Baker bank account.

"You will need someone on your side, Satomi. They won't take a girl of your age seriously. When it comes to money, such people don't take justice into account."

His wife is furious with him. She has seen the girl, a pretty enough one for a wife to be suspicious of a husband's motives. But when she thinks about it, Satomi is not pretty, exactly, she is beautiful, and, strangely, beauty is less of a concern to her than pretty.

Still, he is too old for the long drive. She knows it even if he doesn't. And he will be gone for days, and for what? To appease some ache in him, some need to feel he is paying an overdue debt to humankind.

"Don't ask me to go with you," she says. "It's a ridiculous idea."

"It will do me good to see a bit of this country," he says, hoping she isn't playing for an invitation. "And the girl needs help."

"There are plenty of others who need help. Why her?"

"I couldn't save her mother," he says, knowing that it's not a good enough explanation.

"No doctor can save everyone."

"No, but I would like to save her."

In the unaccustomed warmth of Eriko's barrack, Satomi takes her leave of the Okihiros. It is hard to believe that Manzanar is over, that she will never sleep in the barrack again. Despite the heat from the stove, roaring now with its belly full of unrationed wood, she can smell the familiar scent of mold, feel the damp. She squints to keep back the tears.

"It's painful to part," Eriko says.

"It's not too late to change your mind and come with us," Naomi offers.

Suddenly the offer is tempting, the idea of merging herself into the Okihiro family a comforting one.

"Thank you, Naomi, but I must go to Angelina. I'm determined to get some justice for my parents. They have to pay me the value of my father's land, allow me the savings he sweated for. They think that giving us twenty-five dollars and a few ration coupons will keep us quiet-it's an insult."

"They would like to wipe out our memories of this place," Eriko says. "Forget that we have been judged, imprisoned without trial."

"It doesn't matter what they would like, only the G.o.ds can take away our memories," Naomi reminds them.

Yumi is excited. "We are going home," she sings.

"I don't want to think of home," Eriko says nervously. "Not until we know for sure that we still have one."

Driving with Dr. Harper in his old Plymouth past the lines of people waiting for the same buses that brought them into Manzanar to take them out of it, Satomi turns her head for a last view of the mountains. Their summits are hidden in the mist, rocks in the wheeling clouds. At their foot the rubble of Manzanar is already being swept away by the winds, buried in the dust, their human stain scoured. The camp has been a grubby aberration on the map of the twentieth century, but soon it will be as though it never was.

Nausea stirs in her stomach, rises through her body, fills her mouth with a metallic wash. She is all emotion, frazzled, hurt, outraged. And she is leaving Tamura behind and is afraid now of what is ahead of her.

Reminiscent of that first roundup in Angelina, people mill around, sitting on their cases, looking agitated. Children with their family names now, rather than the old hated numbers pinned to their clothes, cling to their parents; old people wait to be told where to go by the soldiers, who have put their guns aside.

As they head toward the gate, they come across the orphanage children being shepherded onto buses. There's no room for them to pa.s.s and Dr. Harper slows the car to a stop and cuts the engine.