The Painting (14 page)

Sato looks up from his pipe.

He’s scattering her memories, she thinks, smearing them into a dirty mess. That odious smoke from his pipe. She tentatively unfolds the crinkled painting. The drop of paint has spread, smearing her lover’s face. Shade and dark edges, she thinks. What was the texture of his skin? The exact color of his eyes? She rips the painting into pieces, and when she is done, her hands are shaking, her breathing thin and rapid. Above Sato is that horrible painting. That mother holding her infant, that loving, soft look on the mother’s face, her gaze only for the baby. And the baby looking at the mother, the soft, pink cheeks and red ribbon lips, a penetrating look, as if they could never be separated, as if they are the same person, as if the mother will grow old and watch the baby become a child, a young girl, a woman. As if the baby will never die.

She stands abruptly and runs down the hallway, wavering and jagged. Without thinking, she heads to the temple. She steps inside. What is she doing here? She grabs a cushion and sits on the floor. For a long time, she stares
at the weave of the tatami. The quiet bears down on her. Sato is not to blame, she thinks. It is she, her shortcomings, her failings; she has not been diligent with her painting, her way of visiting him. She has been disloyal to him, and he senses it, he is slipping away. She sits and takes a handful of hair, rubs it against her lips, feeling its smoothness, trying to calm herself.

Sato strolls into the room.

When she doesn’t say anything, he sits beside her. When is the last time you saw this man? he asks.

Her face darkens and she drops her head. Why hasn’t he ever come for her? she thinks. Is something wrong with her? What is wrong with her?

Ayoshi?

And when she tells Sato, she almost gasps. Two years.

You’ve never told me his name.

She is silent for a long time, staring at a bag of rice. The sound, two years, beating like a heavy heart.

Urashi. His name is Urashi. She’s about to say more. Her stomach tightens, something grips her throat. She feels dazed, falling.

Sato retrieves a bottle of sake from the pile of offerings, along with two sake glasses. He pours the sake. We can put this to better use, he says.

She drinks it all, pours herself another. They sit this way for a while, feeling the burn of the rice wine on their throats. She looks at all the twirling dust in the air. There, the circular flow of this dust, she thinks. Round and round, rising to the ceiling and coming back down. There is her hand. She knows the dust is there, on her palm, but why can’t she feel it?

Perhaps it will all work out, he says, his tone tender.

I was going to have a baby, she says. But my father—

He watches her face. It looks like putty and her mouth is doing something strange. She bites her lip as if to hold it still.

Urashi’s.

He touches her shoulder.

She lowers her lids. I wanted to keep. The child. I wanted. The child. To marry Urashi. Did I tell you he is Ainu?

Sato feels his face drain of color. Who would marry her after such an affair?
he wonders. An Ainu, an untouchable. Her father must have been enraged. Such shame to the family, such dishonor to their name. Sato smiles gently.

She watches another swirl of dust.

What happened to the child? asks Sato.

She knots her hands tightly and sets them in her lap. After a long while, she tells him. It died.

He takes her in his arms and she leans her face onto his shoulder. He feels her relinquishing, her body softening, surrendering. He rocks her, gently kisses the top of her head. He puts his hand on her head and strokes her hair. Rocks her in his jittery arms.

H
AYASHI FINISHES HIS BOWL
. It’s the same design he’s sculpted for the past seven years. Inert, he thinks, stagnant. But he doesn’t know what else to make.

He quickly washes his hands and steps outside. The clouds are stringy and the air is cold. The long grass bends and the branches scratch the bluing sky. He didn’t sleep well last night, anxious about having that man, Sato, in the house. What does he want? Shouldn’t he be on his way? He looks toward the big house. They’re probably in there, their heads bowed, laughing and talking over breakfast. She seems so at ease with him. Maybe they’re making their plans for the day, or inventing a silly game. He’s about to walk to the house, but stops. What will he say to them? They’ll look at him, expecting something from him—what does he have to give them? He feels a sudden unending emptiness.

He turns to the studio, but the thought of the bowl repulses him. How long he stands there, he does not know. The clouds whirl by, the birds, the wind, he stands rigid, as if frozen. Gradually, he becomes aware of someone staggering toward him. A figure clad in the familiar brown robe, the thick twine around the waist. A monk, walking slowly, his legs hesitating before each step, as if weighing whether to keep going.

Hayashi rushes toward him and bows deeply. When he looks into the young man’s face, he is shocked by his beauty. Despite the look of despair and
exhaustion, there is a deep glow to his smooth skin. Small black stubble sprouts on his cheeks and once-shaved head, and there is dried spittle at the corners of his mouth. His robe is matted with dirt. But beneath the layer of dirt and weariness, the monk’s body seems muscular and powerful and full of a certain dignity. Hayashi bows lower, and as he rises, he decides the monk looks like a Western sculpture of a god made of rose marble.

I heard of you, says the monk.

The monk wobbles and nearly falls into Hayashi. He takes the monk by the arm and leads him slowly to the moon-viewing porch. The monk sits and lets his chin drop to his chest. He tells Hayashi he’s been walking for three days without food.

I came down from the mountain monastery and got lost, he says.

Hayashi’s face turns pale.

I was told to go to you. My teacher knew of you.

The monk folds in half, as if the last of his resources were used up by speech. Hayashi lifts the monk up and, holding onto his arm, helps him to the house. The monk insists on going straight to the temple. To pray, he says.

T
HE MONK SITS IN
front of the Buddha and begins to chant. After a short spell, his throat becomes too dry. He rises to find some water. Exhaustion slows his gait as he shuffles outside, crosses the path to the house, and enters through the side door. He hears pattering in the hallway. A soft, graceful sound, only a whisper. Such a slight human being, he thinks, perhaps a boy, or a frail elderly man. He almost runs into her. She is walking so rapidly, her eyes red and puffy, as if she was crying. But what does he know, he’s never seen a woman cry. Perhaps something was in her eye, or she just chopped a bushel of wild green onions.

As she rushes by him, he stammers an apology. When she disappears behind a door, he glances at his arm, certain it is on fire. He returns to the temple, terribly shaken. His teacher did not say Hayashi had married. A wife. He can barely remember his mother, and his sister was only a baby when he left at the age of four. His teacher’s words of warning reverberate in his head: Women are distractions, they lead you astray. The young monk clenches
his jaw, sits with his legs folded on the floor in the temple, and with more determination, resumes his sutras.

Hayashi cracks open the temple door and watches the monk. For the first time he lets himself feel his fear: It’s dangerous to let the monk stay. His fingers nervously twist his earlobe. What will the government officials do? What harm is he inviting? His concerns deepen: What if the monk wants to hold a regular prayer service? The government officials will find out. Maybe the monk won’t ask. And if he does? He doesn’t want to think about it right now because he’s not sure what to do.

How can he turn him away? There is the sound of the monk’s low voice slinging off the walls. Water music. He closes his eyes, leans his head against the door frame, letting the water pour over him. How long has it been since he’s heard such a full-bodied voice chant the sutras? A pure sound, a beautiful sound the monks recited in the early morning, midday, and in the evening. And now that music is here, as if he never left the monastery.

He’ll tell the monk he can’t wear his robe, though he wishes otherwise, wishes he could please the monk, not upset him. That’s what he’ll do. And if the leaders ask, Who is the new member of your household? A houseboy, he’ll say. He smiles. Yes, a houseboy. Someone who tends to things, and he’ll gesture toward his feet.

As he closes the temple door and walks toward the main house, he sees in his mind the monk’s face. The striking beauty, only slightly smudged with a bitter experience, though what it might be, Hayashi can only guess. In the kitchen, he finishes preparing the monk’s lunch, chopping up some pickled carrots and beets.

The maid scurries into the kitchen and stands awkwardly beside Hayashi, not sure what to do.

Surprised to find me in the kitchen? says Hayashi, laughing.

Well, yes, sir, she says. Should I take over?

No, no. Please. We have an honored guest. A most honored guest.

Fine, sir, she says. She tells him that Ayoshi and Sato left for town to buy more food and supplies. Ayoshi-san said I should work on your feet.

I feel fine, he says.

She stares at him in disbelief. Are you sure? You’ve worked all morning in the studio, and I thought—

He laughs again. Go, go, he says. My feet are fine.

She hesitates.

He smiles. Please go.

She nods uncertainly and leaves. There is sharp pain in his left foot, and his toes sting, but he must return to the music, which is still coursing in his body, vibrating his teeth and gums, rattling his thin bones. He carries a tray with a teapot, cups, and a plate of sticky rice balls and pickled vegetables. The monk, on his knees, is bowing before the Buddha, touching his forehead to the mat, over and over.

Hayashi bows low and hands the monk a cup of green tea.

Thank you, says the monk, gesturing for Hayashi to sit with him.

Hayashi lowers himself to the floor.

The monk drinks and traces his hand across the top of his head. He bows his head. I am at your service.

They sit together quietly, and Hayashi waits, putting off the uncomfortable thing he must say. He looks at the Buddha, sees the crack, and hopes the monk doesn’t notice it. He must say it. To wait is absurd. He apologizes first, bowing low, then tells the monk he must wear layman’s clothes. For your safety, he adds quickly.

Something flickers in the monk’s eyes, a moment of stupefaction, and then it passes. Hayashi apologizes again, hanging his head, ashamed and riddled with guilt, as if it is his fault.

I have clothes for you, says Hayashi. I’m sorry, but these are difficult times.

They sit in silence. After a while, the monk turns his dark eyes to Hayashi and begins to tell him his story.

I
N THE MIDDLE OF
the night, I looked out the window of my hut and saw men in uniforms scurrying everywhere at once, says the monk, a hundred of them or more, running to the main temple, the garden, dashing to the ten-foot statue of Buddha in the garden. The soldiers held guns and axes and they raised a huge ladder and set it against the statue’s
shoulder. Two men scrambled up the ladder, and with big swings, chopped at the Buddha’s neck.

Hayashi remembers the statue.

As the young monk describes watching in horror the large head of the Buddha fall from its great height, the sound of it crashing to the ground, a reverberation that shook his hut, Hayashi feels sick to his stomach. He can see it, as if he’s the one standing at the hut’s window—he knows exactly which hut gave the best view.

Hayashi stares at the monk and tries to numb himself to this young man’s pain, to coax himself out of his reach, but their eyes momentarily meet, and he tumbles again down the dark tunnel of their gaze. He feels a heavy deepening in his own chest cavity. He must do something for this young monk. So much sorrow. Can I get you some water? asks Hayashi, shifting uncomfortably on his cushion.

The monk says nothing, as if in a trance, and then continues.

The soldiers rounded up the monks and marched them into the main room of the temple. The leaders said that under the new government, they were no longer considered monks. They must leave the monastery and find work. Civilian jobs.

I came to the monastery when I was a boy. How could I go? These soldiers were not my teachers. Why would I submit to these people?

Hayashi bites his lower lip. He is not one of these soldiers, he tells himself, but that does not stop hot shame from creeping up his spine. He is part of this new government. He is culpable.

The monks sat in a circle on the temple floor and began to chant. The leaders of these troops screamed to stop, and the soldiers stood around the periphery of the temple, holding their guns and axes by their sides, waiting for their orders. By midafternoon, the soldiers burned the small huts. They torched the ancient scrolls, shattered the porcelain bowls, and smashed the mummified bodies of sages dead hundreds of years. They set aflame the paintings of Buddha, the face of Buddha consumed by flames, and the smoke rose and choked the arch of the roof. That night, some of the monks, exhausted and weak, left the smoky temple and began walking down the mountain.

And those who stayed? asks Hayashi.

The monk swallows and tries to collect his words, but they come out in a rush. The soldiers chopped away at the temple and the walls crashed down. They died. Those who stayed died.

Hayashi feels his heart sag. The monk doesn’t say anything for a long while.

I left because my teacher told me to, says the monk. I didn’t want to, but he insisted. I had to obey my teacher. I had to go.

For a second, Hayashi’s eyes meet the monk’s, but the monk quickly looks away. Of course, says Hayashi. Of course, his voice softer.

Light drifts in and shines on the Buddha, but neither of them sees it, their heavy gaze fallen to the woven reed mats. Hayashi lifts the teapot, but his hand is shaking so badly, he sets it down again.