At the time, I assumed he was going to dump the baby in the woods or in the ocean. I only heard about the adoption many years later. When I entered junior high school, my mother told me that the baby had been left at an institution in central Okinawa and that later he had been adopted. So the baby was alive! When I first found out, I felt as if the arrow in my heart had finally been removed. But what about my sister? How did she feel? When she heard the explanation from my mother, did she feel the same way? That was unlikely.
Talking about the baby was taboo in our house. If any of us mentioned it, my sister would fly into a crazy frenzy, and my father would fly into a violent rage. Even my young brothers understood this. The implicit agreement continued up until the present, twenty years after our father’s death. During the summer O-bon festival, the New Year holidays, and the Seimei festival (when the family gathered at the family tomb), I usually stayed with the older of my younger brothers, the one responsible for the family’s gravesite and mortuary tablets. But we never mentioned the baby, even when talking about our sister in detail. But what about my mother and sister? What did they talk about when they were living together? Did they ever mention the child that had been sent to foster care? If the baby was still alive, hed be sixty years old now. That was difficult to imagine. I could only hope he was leading a happy life, wherever he might be.
I gazed out the window at the sugarcane fields. The plants, still no taller than human beings, were swaying in the wind. In the winter, when their leaves turned silver, it’d be like entering the world of a fairy tale. Now, the plants seemed to be trying to get in some last-minute growth before the extreme heat and dryness of midsummer. I could almost feel their youthful vigor.
A schoolgirl in her uniform was walking along the sidewalk. Since it was too early for school to be over, I wondered if she was cutting classes. I again recalled the girl who’d asked about the baby. For too many years, I had closed my eyes to the truth that should never have been forgotten. Perhaps that’s why I had reacted so negatively to her frankness. With this thought, I tried to settle down. But I couldn’t.
After my father died, my mother and sister lived together in peace. I pictured my sister just after she turned sixty. She had light skin and few blotches or wrinkles, probably because she never went outside. When she was emotionally stable, she looked much younger than her age. I disliked that I looked so much older, due to the daily pressures of my life. On the other hand, I knew that I was the happier one, though I always felt guilty about that.
As soon as I graduated from high school, I moved out just like my brothers. Apart from O-bon and the New Year holidays, I rarely returned home. Though my father didn’t yell as much as before, he was as unpleasant as always. I hated seeing him drunk and out of control. What I hated even more was how he looked at my sister. His look was a mixture of anger, disgust, scorn, hatred, and every other negative emotion you could imagine. Just thinking about that look made it impossible for me to remain calm.
My mother told me on the phone that my father’s attitude changed after my sister had learned how to operate a sewing machine and started earning some money at the dressmaker’s next door. I was happy to hear that, but when I visited for the New Year holidays, I could see that he hadn’t changed at all. In fact, his hatred seemed to have increased.
At my father’s wake, I lifted the white cloth from his face and looked at his closed eyelids. I’ll never have to see that look again! I thought. Although I didn’t want to admit it, I knew that I was secretly pleased. However, I was more of a coward than my father. He had never run away. Certainly, his behavior was unforgivable, but he had faced my sister and his own powerlessness every day. That’s why he suffered and sometimes became violent. I, on the other hand, merely escaped. Pretending not to notice my mother’s and sister’s suffering, I buried my memories in my heart. Even after my father’s death, I used the pressures of daily life as an excuse for avoiding them.
With my father gone, I no longer had anything to fear. Yet I never once visited my mother and sister. During O-bon and the New Year holidays, I scolded my children for wanting to stay there and took them back to our apartment in central Okinawa. Even when talking with my mother on the phone, whenever she asked if she should put my sister on, I always said no and avoided talking to her. One day, my younger brother called and said that he wanted to put my sister in an institution. He explained that our mother was growing old and our sister was mentally unstable, so my mother couldn’t take care of her anymore. I had noticed the problem much earlier, but made excuses to avoid saying anything. I felt ashamed of myself.
My mother stubbornly opposed putting Sayoko in an institution. Saying that she’d look after my sister herself, she insisted that we call and cancel the admission application that my brother had gone to so much trouble to submit. This really annoyed us.
—What’re you saying? said one brother. You can’t even look after yourself!
—The place has nice scenery, said my other brother, and everyone will look after her with
