Cherry Blossom Baseball Read online

“Off the highway, just before the village.”

  “And you’re going to walk?”

  Michiko shrugged. What else can I do? Then she remembered the change in her pocket. “I’ll just catch the bus,” she said, trying to sound as if she knew what she was doing.

  “The bus?” the boy said with a laugh. “With this shortage of gasoline, you could wait up to two hours. And if you get on, you’d have to stand for at least half an hour.” He shook his head from side to side. Then he looked at his watch. “If you want to wait a few minutes, you can catch a ride with me.”

  Michiko pawed the grass with the toe of her boot. Her mother had told her again and again, Never accept a ride with strangers. She didn’t know what to do.

  “What’s your name?” the boy asked.

  What is my name? Michiko asked herself. Who knows? Do I say Michiko or Millie?

  “Mich—” she started to say as the horn of a truck sounded at the side of the road. Two men in a pickup truck waited at the gates.

  “Well, Mitch,” the boy said, “my name is Eddie. If you don’t mind sitting in the back of a truck, we can give you a lift.”

  Michiko watched as he wheeled a lawnmower up to the pickup truck and lifted it into the back. “Are you coming or not?” he asked. “I got to get to ball practice.”

  “You mean baseball?” Michiko ran to the back of the truck.

  “No other kind of ball,” Eddie said, grabbing her hand to help her up. It was a new experience for her, touching the hand of an older boy, especially one this good-looking. She flushed at the sensation.

  “Most of the boys in my grade are in army cadets,” Eddie said. “But I made the Ontario Summer League. We practice behind Bronte School.” He banged the side of the truck, and it started up. “You a baseball fan?”

  Michiko nodded. “The radio at home was always on for the World Series.”

  “That was one showdown,” he said. “Those Cardinals won over a hundred games.”

  “And the Browns only got one homer the whole series,” she replied.

  Eddie nodded. “Baseball would be a lot better if most of the players weren’t overseas,” he said. “Look out, Hitler, the Yanks are coming, along with the Indians, the Red Sox, and the Tigers,” he yelled through cupped hands. He went quiet for a moment. “I hope Stan Musial doesn’t enlist. Did you catch that two-run homer he clubbed?”

  Michiko nodded with a grin. Her father had hopped around the kitchen like a chicken that day. She began to recognize the area and decided she better get off at Billy’s farm. Even though Hitch a ride to save gasoline was written on the chalkboard at school, her parents wouldn’t be pleased to see her hop off the back of a truck.

  It would be best if no one found out.

  MAIL

  Instead of putting her name on the list for the Knitting Club, Michiko had accidently signed up for the Pen Pal Club. Once a week, this small group of girls was to gather to write to the Canadian soldiers, sailors, and airmen overseas. She sat with the end of her pencil in her mouth listening to the teacher’s instructions.

  Miss McIntosh peered over top of the tiny wire glasses perched on the end of her nose and announced, “Mail from home boosts a serviceman’s morale. Our letters must be full of cheerful news. We will start by composing a group letter. Everyone will then copy it and send it out as their introductory letter.”

  “Do we put on our name and address?” a girl asked.

  “First name only,” the teacher replied. “The mail will be sent to their headquarters and forwarded from there. They will use the address of the school to write back or your own if you wish.”

  “What about stamps?” someone else asked.

  “We will provide them for you.”

  Michiko made her copy of the group-composed letter in her notebook.

  “After receiving a response, you can write your own letters to better suit the sender,” Miss McIntosh said as she handed out boxes of greeting cards and stationery. “What you don’t finish today you can continue at home. Sign the Christmas card and enclose a copy of the letter in each.” She handed Michiko a box. “Don’t forget to bring the boxes back for parcels.”

  At home, Michiko finished wishing the seven servicemen on her list Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and enclosed a copy of the letter. She sealed the last card and then moved to her bedroom window.

  In the house behind them, Mr. Palumbo sat at the table reading a letter with his small stump of a pipe clenched between his teeth. Mrs. Palumbo walked past the kitchen window in her floral apron and headscarf, waving her hands about her head. She talked a lot, but Michiko never understood a word she said.

  “Did you get our mail yet?” her mother asked as she popped her head in the doorway. She switched on Michiko’s desk lamp, moved to her side, and then glanced out Michiko’s bedroom window. “That woman does nothing but complain,” she said.

  “How do you know?” Michiko asked. “She doesn’t speak English.”

  “I can tell what she is saying by the way she uses her hands and her eyes.” Her mother pulled the curtains shut, giving the room a warm, dusky glow.

  Michiko lifted her coat from the hook by the door. Outside, the smell of smoke from her father’s bonfire drifted through the cold air. All the brown leaves of the gladioli bulbs had been removed and were now being burned. She had watched her father clean the corms with a little wooden brush. Michiko thought they looked like large, flat, hairy chestnuts lying in their long, thin boxes of sawdust. Hundreds and hundreds of bulbs would wait out the winter on their specially built shelves in Mr. Downey’s barn.

  Right now her father would be sitting at the long wooden table in the barn writing out the names of the different kinds of flowers in his private notebook. People expected him to know which kinds they were talking about when they called to place an order. With forty-seven and a half acres of flowers, there was a lot to remember. Sometimes he worked late into the night making small sketches and Japanese symbols next to bulbs with names like American Beauty, Friendship, and Snow Prince.

  Her mother would often take him a hot drink and stay to help. But Michiko wasn’t allowed. If she accidently knocked a bulb to the ground, it couldn’t be sold.

  Michiko walked along the dark laneway until she came to the mailbox that sat on a post of the wooden fence and pulled down the little metal door. Picking up the mail at the end of the lane was much better than visiting the musty old general store with its creaky wooden floors. Evening sounds were different as well. Living close to a main road, she now heard the screech of tires and once in a while the wail of a siren. Michiko missed the sounds of her previous home, the soothing gurgles of water rushing across the stones in the creek bed to the lake and the short sharp caws of the crows. It was hard to believe that at one time she had been afraid of the beautiful, haunting call of the loon. The howling wolves used to send chills down her spine as well, but she missed them, too.

  Michiko pulled out the mail. There was nothing from Clarence. She decided to give up on the idea of him ever writing her a letter. There was nothing from Mrs. Morrison either. But Aunt Sadie’s letter excited her. She couldn’t wait to hear it. She rushed back to the house to hand it to her mother.

  Dear Family,

  I hope my letter finds you all well. I am sure the children are growing fast and it will be no time before little Hannah is walking. Michiko must write me about her new school.

  Winter has settled in the mountains once again. Edna and Ralph have brought out their sleigh for moving about in the snow. She looks so royal sitting up front in her new fur hat.

  I found out that the Sakamoto family is now living in Toronto. Ed, who used to work in a bank, was only able to get a job at Eaton’s stocking shelves. Apparently there is a terrific shortage of workers for non-essential industries. I believe there are so many places that Kaz could fit into, if he would rid himself of the idea of donning a uniform. But he hasn’t, in fact ...

  Eiko paused in her reading. Michiko watched
her mother’s eyes move back and forth across the tightly-written lines before she said, “Sam, listen.”

  … he found out the Canadian Army Japanese Language School is seeking candidates. The RCMP gave a man in Slocan clearance and a permit to leave.

  Michiko’s father put down the work boot that he was cleaning.

  No sooner does Edna’s husband come home than mine packs to leave. That’s right. Kaz got his wish and will soon be in uniform.

  “What team is he on?” Michiko asked as she wiped little Hannah’s mouth.

  Sam and Eiko looked at their daughter in surprise.

  “Team,” Eiko repeated. “What do you mean team?”

  “What baseball team signed him up?” Michiko asked. “What’s his uniform?”

  Eiko looked at Sam. He shrugged as if to give her permission to explain.

  “Kaz joined the army,” Eiko said quietly, then went back to the letter.

  He sees it an act of faith, as if donning a uniform was a pledge to be a loyal Canadian.

  Michiko thought about the boys who came to school to show off their cadet jackets with the word CANADA on the shoulder. Then her face took on a puzzled look. “Is Uncle Kaz going to fight in the war?”

  “Yes,” Sam replied.

  “Why?”

  “Why not?”

  “Because he is Japanese.”

  “He is Japanese-Canadian,” Sam said. “It’s no different from being Italian-Canadian, like the Palumbos.”

  Michiko thought about Mrs. Morrison’s husband. His ship was attacked, and he was lost at sea before she learned he was safe. “It could be dangerous for him,” she said, looking down at her feet, “like the other soldiers.”

  Sam lifted his other boot from the newspaper covering the kitchen table and gave it a quick brush. “Your Uncle Ted tried to sign up with the Canadian navy,” he said.

  “He did?”

  “They wouldn’t take him,” he said. “That’s why he took the job building houses.”

  “Did you ever want to wear a uniform?” Michiko asked.

  Sam spat on his boot and kept on cleaning.

  He’s not going to answer my question. Michiko rose from the table to head for her room.

  Sam put down his boot as the colour drained from his face. When he spoke, his voice was thin, and it quavered. “I have lived and worked in Canada longer than I did in Japan. They still don’t see me as a Canadian because of my face.” He looked down.

  Eiko put her hand on his arm.

  Sam lifted his head and cleared his throat to make his voice sound strong again. “But we need to put all these things behind us now,” he said. “We can spend the rest of our lives blaming the war, the government, the camp, the prime minister. Instead of complaining, we should work hard to make things better.”

  “Things will be better when it’s baseball season,” Michiko said, trying to cheer him up.

  Sam gave her a wide smile. “Like the games in the ghost town,” he said. “Everyone stopped looking at the colour of other people’s skin and started looking at their batting average.”

  Michiko had one Christmas card left. She decided to send it to her Uncle Kaz. Mrs. McIntosh would know how to get it to him.

  Christmas preparations brought a small tree that filled their little house with the scent of pine. To Michiko’s and Hiro’s delight, their mother purchased lights and a box of tinsel.

  “When I was little,” she told them, as they decorated, “the pine tree stood outside the house, near the front door.”

  Michiko looked at her in surprise.

  “Your Uncle Ted used to go with Geechan to the woods to cut it down.” She inhaled the scent of pine and smiled. “Your grandfather would always say, ‘If the pine tree is strong and always green, our house will be blessed with strength and long life.’” Eiko turned to Michiko with a broad smile. “Sadie was the one who insisted the tree be set up indoors, like those of the rest of the children in her class.”

  Christmas morning, Michiko was thrilled with the books from her parents. Aunt Sadie had sent them a game of Snakes and Ladders. Uncle Ted made Hiro Noah’s ark, complete with four pairs of animals. The tiny red rowboat and set of oars was for her. Mrs. Morrison put a whole dollar bill in their Christmas card just for Michiko.

  That afternoon, Mrs. Palumbo left a covered casserole dish on their kitchen table. Eiko lifted the lid to reveal a large square of cheese and tomato sauce.

  “What is it?” Michiko asked as she sniffed at the steaming dish.

  “Tonight’s dinner,” her mother responded, as she placed Mrs. Palumbo’s masterpiece into the oven. “Mr. Palumbo told your father she would be sending it over.”

  Christmas night, the Minagawa family gathered at the kitchen table, anxious to try the dish that filled the house with its spicy aroma. The strange food didn’t give Michiko the usual feeling of happiness as she unfolded her napkin. Her father’s hand shook as he accepted a plate of this unfamiliar dish the Palumbo family called lasagna. But to everyone’s surprise, the frilly noodles, the delicious savoury meat, tomato sauce, and sharp cheese blended together perfectly.

  There were other treats as well. Mr. Downey had given their family a fancy wrapped box. When Eiko lifted the lid and opened the wax paper, she discovered a cake of dried fruit and nuts, topped with white icing and glazed cherries. She served it with dishes of red Jello.

  But the feast they were all waiting for was New Year’s dinner, the biggest holiday of the year for the Japanese. Eiko had cooked from dawn, preparing thick rolls of nori-wrapped rice stuffed with strips of omelette and mushrooms. There was chawanmushi and chicken yakitori, too.

  Mr. Takahashi arrived in a dark suit, which was much too big for him and made him look thinner than usual. His wife’s red woollen coat covered her from shoulders to ankles. Her dark hair, sitting in a pile on top of her peony-pink face, gave her the look of a fat little robin.

  Mrs. Takahashi’s floral dress seemed so vivid against her mother’s white tablecloth that Michiko couldn’t help but think about the beautiful dresses her Aunt Sadie once owned.

  “How are your studies?” Mrs. Takahashi asked as her husband moved away from the table, in deep discussion with her father. Nothing seemed to escape her attention, and she asked a lot of questions. Almost nosy, Michiko thought.

  “Fine,” Michiko answered, but seeing her mother’s direct stare, she added, “I get As.”

  The woman smiled. “And your studies at home?” she asked as Michiko’s mother rose to take Hiro to bed.

  “I do all my homework,” Michiko answered.

  “I mean your Japanese studies,” the little woman said as she smoothed her napkin over her skirt.

  Michiko did not know how to answer. Speaking Japanese had been forbidden in the ghost town. Other than the Kairanban, their camp newspaper, no one even dared to write Japanese in public. “I haven’t ...” Michiko began.

  Mrs. Takahashi reached out and patted Michiko’s arm. “These days one can’t exactly walk into a store and ask for Japanese books,” she said.

  Michiko nodded and gave a small sigh, pretending it mattered.

  “But there must be something you can learn from,” Mrs. Takahashi continued. “Does your mother not have any letters written in Japanese? Something you could use for practice.”

  “I have some old letters of my grandfather’s,” Michiko said. “But how can I practice if I don’t know what they say?”

  Hiro raced past them, avoiding his mother’s attempt to put him to bed.

  “Your mother has her hands full,” Mrs. Takahashi announced. “Give me the letters. I will translate them.” She shook a small, fat finger in Michiko’s face. “Do not forget your heritage, and never believe the country of your father’s birth is as evil as everyone is saying.”

  Michiko excused herself and went to her room. She opened Clarence’s little blue box and removed the packet of thin blue papers. Then she reached across her desk to her jam jar of paper flowers and chose t
he paper iris.

  When her mother arrived in the living room carrying a tray of teacups, Mrs. Takahashi raised the flower to her nose. “It looks real enough to have perfume,” she said. “Thank you.”

  The smile on her mother’s face told Michiko she approved of the gesture.

  That night, Michiko listened to the gentle murmur of conversation and laughter that came from the living room. As the teacups clinked, Michiko thought how easy it seemed to be for adults to make friends.

  SNOWSTORM

  The pale light that filled her bedroom told Michiko there was no hurry to get up for the school bus. The heavy snow the weatherman promised had fallen. She pushed her feet into her slippers, wrapped her hanten around her, and pulled back the curtains. Michiko pressed her hand against the windowpane to clear a spot through the ferns of frost. Snow sculpted the wooden tripods of the pole beans into soft cones and turned the rest of the abandoned garden into strange shapes. The gladioli fields looked like blocks of tofu. She could see the gnarled branches of the black apple trees clearly against the white.

  “Schools are closed,” her mother said as she put her head around the door. “I heard it on the radio. With you here minding Hiro, I’ll be able to get a lot done at the big house.”

  Michiko sat back down on her bed. Of course, I will have to look after my little brother. Why did I think I would have a whole day to do what I wanted?

  Her father sat at the kitchen table cradling a cup of coffee, which was unusual. Most mornings he was long gone by the time she rose. Michiko reached for a bowl and took it over to the pot of oatmeal that waited on the stove. The thought of no school brought a small sense of relief. She was tired of moving about the building like an invisible person. At least back at the Hardware Store School she had friends to invite home. She had been at Bronte Creek Public School for six months and still had no one she could really call a friend.

  Hiro appeared, clutching his kitten. Michiko placed the oatmeal on the table for him and reached for another bowl.