J-Boys Page 2

  Tatami: Straw mats used as flooring. Traditional Japanese floors are not wooden or carpeted but are made up of straw mats called tatami. A tata­mi mat is about the size of a sleeping body, or 3 feet by 6 feet, and the size of a room is described by the number of mats that fit in it, usually 4½ or 6 mats. Nowadays, many Japanese homes have only one room with tatami, but in Tokyo in the 1960s, homes and apartments were more traditional and had mostly tatami-mat rooms.

  Kazuo had never thought of his house as small. After all, his buddies lived in small houses, too. Nobuo’s had the family butcher shop on the first floor, and a space the size of Kazuo’s house on the second. That was where Nobuo lived with his older brother, parents, and grandmother—five people altogether. When Nobuo came to play at Kazuo’s, he would always say, “Wow, you’ve got your own desk and your own room, even if you have to share it with Yasuo.”

  Hearing this, Kazuo felt fortunate. But he also knew there were people in the world who lived in much bigger houses. Even in West Ito, there were houses up a slope in District 4 that in no way resembled the small company housing units strung together like cars in a freight train. Most of the District 4 houses were two stories high with yards or gardens. Kazuo figured daily life in houses like these must be just like in Leave It to Beaver, an American TV show he really liked.

  Leave it to Beaver: An American TV series that ran from 1959 to 1963. It was about the Cleavers, a “typical” American family with two boys, Beaver and his brother, Wally. The show was broadcast in Japan in the 1960s as Beaver-chan. Many Japanese kids who watched this show hoped to one day live like the middle-class American Cleaver family.

  The main character in Leave It to Beaver was a boy named Beaver because his two front teeth were big, like a beaver’s. In Beaver’s house, the mother and father had their own bedroom, and Beaver and his older brother each had their own bedroom, too. The family ate their meals in a dining room. They also had a living room with a large sofa and fireplace for sitting around talking and watching TV.

  Whenever Kazuo walked through District 4, he couldn’t help feeling a little envy. So he often repeated a pet phrase of his mother’s: “If you’re always looking for something better, you’re never satisfied.”

  His little brother, Yasuo, also wished they could live in a home with a big yard and not in company housing. That was because Yasuo wanted a dog. But pets weren’t allowed in company housing, where the most you could have was a fish in a tank, or a bird that stayed in a cage. Dogs barked, so they in particular were strictly forbidden. But Yasuo was always petting dogs he saw on the street.

  Kazuo didn’t really know why Yasuo liked dogs. Sometimes he thought it was because of TV shows such as Lassie and The Littlest Hobo and The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin. But even before last year, when his parents bought the family’s first TV to watch the Olympics, Yasuo had liked dogs and would stare at picture books with dogs in them. Mother was always telling Yasuo not to go up to just any dog, because some might have rabies. “Rabies is a scary sickness, Yasuo. If a dog with rabies bites somebody, the person will begin to drool just like a dog and die in a fit of moaning.”

  Lassie: An American TV series about a loyal collie and his master, a boy. The show began in 1954 and lasted 19 years. Lassie was always rescuing people and solving problems. In Japanese cities, few homes were large enough to have a dog. The Littlest Hobo: A Canadian TV series about a German shepherd that travels from town to town, helping people in need. At the end of each episode the dog would go off on his own. In the Canadian TV version (1963 to 1965), the dog did not have a name. In the Japanese version the dog was named London. The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin: Another American TV series about a dog, this time a German shepherd. In the late 1800s, Rin Tin Tin and his owner, Rusty, were adopted by troops at a U.S. Cavalry Post called Fort Apache AZ. The show aired from 1954 to 1959 and was broadcast in Japan in the 1960s.

  Whenever Mother told him that, Yasuo would say, “Really?” with a slightly pale face. Then he’d avoid going up to dogs for the next two or three days. But soon he would forget about Mother’s warning and go back to petting every dog he met.

  After Mr. Yoshino died, every day a man from a shop called Imamura Tofu came to sell tofu in the neighborhood just after five o’clock. That gave Kazuo a lot of time to work on his Bob Hayes training. Today, as usual, Kazuo headed to the empty lot with Nobuo after school. Yasuo used to wait in the schoolyard for them, but lately he had started going home by himself. Again there was no sign of him.

  “Yasuo isn’t a baby anymore,” Nobuo told Kazuo.

  “I don’t care if he goes home on his own, but my mother gets all worried and says I should keep an eye on him.”

  When Kazuo and Nobuo reached the empty lot, they started on their running. Deep down, Kazuo knew that neither of them would ever be able to run like Bob Hayes, no matter how hard they tried. Both of them were starting to get a little tired of their project.

  After four o’clock, it turned chilly. Soon, they were sucking in startlingly cold air as they practiced.

  “Let’s head home,” Nobuo said.

  “Yeah, let’s go,” Kazuo answered.

  By the time Kazuo got home, it was starting to get dark. When he opened the front door, he could see Yasuo watching TV in the dim living room without the light on. Sitting on his knees, Yasuo was staring into the set at Shonen Jet. He looked up when Kazuo entered.

  Shonen Jet: A Japanese TV action show for kids, broadcast in the early 1960s, featuring a boy detective named Jet and his dog, Shane, who fought against evil.

  “Oh, Oniichan, you’re back.”

  “Hey, Yasuo, at least turn on a light.” Kazuo pulled the string of the light fixture in the center of the room.

  “Did you bring home your leftover bread from lunch?” Yasuo asked. Students who could not eat all of the bread in their school lunch had to take it home.

  “Bread from lunch?” Kazuo said, sitting next to Yasuo. “Why are you asking me? You’re the one who can never finish.”

  “Yeah, I know, but . . . ” Yasuo pouted a bit, then gazed off.

  Kazuo looked at his brother closely. “Hey, Yasuo, you’re keeping something from me, aren’t you?” He grabbed Yasuo in a headlock and squeezed his head. “Come on, out with it.”

  “Oww, stop it, that hurts! I’m not hiding anything!”

  The front door opened. Mother was home. “What are you two doing?”

  Kazuo quickly unwrapped his arms from Yasuo’s head.

  “You’ll bother the neighbors!”

  “Okaasan, Niichan’s picking on me!” Yasuo whined. He ran to hide behind her.

  “I’m not picking on you. You’re the one who’s keeping secrets.”

  “Kazuo!” Mother raised her voice again. “You’re older, so you shouldn’t pick on your brother, you understand? Now I want both of you to stop watching TV and finish your homework.”

  Kazuo stuck his lip out in a huff. “Come on! Why do I always have to be the one to get scolded? You and Dad always take Yasuo’s side.”

  But there was no arguing with the stern expression on Mother’s face. Kazuo turned off the TV. Then he took his books out of his bag and began to do his math homework.

  The next day, after Kazuo went to the empty lot with Nobuo, he got home to find the house completely dark. The front door was still locked. He opened it and turned the lights on throughout the house. Yasuo was nowhere, and his school bag was missing as well.

  “That idiot! Where on earth did he go?” Kazuo grew anxious, thinking both about Yasuo and what Mother would say. Wondering if he should alert a neighbor, he hurried to put his shoes back on. Just then the door opened. Yasuo’s face appeared in the darkness, wearing a dejected expression.

  “Yasuo, where the heck were you?”

  “Niichan, I’m sorry.” Yasuo stepped into the living room and slipped off his school bag. “I didn’t go anywhere. I was just playing at my friend’s house.”

  It was the time of day when Shonen Jet
was starting, but Yasuo made no move to switch on the TV. Instead, he sat down glumly next to the table.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, really.”

  Kazuo could tell that Yasuo was keeping something from him again. But Yasuo looked so pitiful, Kazuo didn’t have the heart to press him about it. He just reached over and turned on the TV himself.

  Dinner that night was boiled flatfish, miso soup with the new tofu from Imamura’s, and pickled vegetables—a very boring meal to Kazuo. He felt that dinner would be much more enjoyable if they were having croquettes or curry rice, to say nothing of the beefsteak and whole roasted turkey he saw on American TV shows. But if he said that, he was sure to get a lecture from his mother:

  “Be grateful for what you have, Kazuo. If you’re always looking for something better, you’re never satisfied. You should be thankful that you get three square meals a day.”

  Kazuo kept his mouth shut and chewed. Now, he always forced himself to chew one bite of tofu before he swallowed the rest whole.

  “By the way, Kazuo.” Mother stopped eating for a moment. “I’m going to ask you only once. You haven’t been playing in that big empty lot in Hara, have you?”

  “The empty lot in Hara? You mean the one by the Hane­to River?”

  Mother nodded.

  The Haneto was a river of sludge that separated West Ito from the town of Hara. Both of the river’s banks were packed with small- and medium-sized factories that dumped their wastewater into it, so it always had a nasty smell.

  “I never go to that place. It’s far away and it stinks, plus it’s where all the kids from Hara Grade School hang out,” Kazuo said.

  “Really? In that case, there’s no problem.” Mother sounded relieved.

  “Did something happen over there?” Father asked.

  “I heard that there are some stray dogs living there. Apparently one of them bit a child, so tomorrow the public health department is sending the dog catchers in. They say it’s better to stay away until the dogs are gone, so I thought I’d warn the boys.” Mother picked up her chopsticks again.

  Father nodded, his face slightly red from drinking beer. “I’ll take some rice now,” he told Mother.

  She put some into his bowl.

  Then the four of them finished their meal as if nothing had happened. Only Kazuo had noticed that when Mother brought up the subject of the Hara lot, Yasuo’s body had stiffened, then trembled ever so slightly.

  At nine o’clock, Kazuo and Yasuo said goodnight to their parents and crawled into their bedding. In the living room next door, they could hear the old-fashioned speech of actors in a period drama their parents were watching on TV.

  “Yasuo, you awake?” Kazuo whispered.

  Bedding: In traditional Japanese homes, people sleep on a futon laid out on the floor. A futon set consists of a bottom mattress (a thick cotton pad) and a top blanket (a bit like a comforter). To make the sleeping area usable during the day, the futon is stored on a shelf in a large closet until it is needed.

  Yasuo did not reply, but Kazuo could hear his breathing from inside his blanket.

  “You went to the Hara lot today, didn’t you?” Kazuo asked him.

  “No,” Yasuo said in a small voice.

  “Liar.” Kazuo poked his head from under his blanket and put it under Yasuo’s. “I won’t tell Mom and Dad, so out with it. What happened over there?”

  “You really won’t tell?” Yasuo said, sounding ready to cry.

  “I won’t tell. I promise.” Kazuo stuck out his pinkie finger.

  “You really won’t, right?” Yasuo hooked his own pinkie around Kazuo’s. He took a breath and then spoke. “I was feeding a dog over there.”

  “What? You mean the dog Mom was talking about at dinner, the one who bit somebody?”

  “No, no, nothing like that! My dog is just a puppy. If somebody doesn’t feed him, he’ll die.” Yasuo was almost sobbing as he explained that he had discovered the dog four days earlier. One afternoon he’d decided to go to Hara, where he and Kazuo normally never went. In the lot, he’d found a black puppy. He knew he couldn’t keep a dog in company housing, so he’d been feeding the dog in secret.

  “That’s why you asked if I had any bread left from my lunch?” Kazuo said.

  “Yeah . . . But you know what? Today I saved all of my bread and margarine from lunch again and went over there, but the lot had a wire fence around it. Somebody from the health department was there, and he said I couldn’t go in. I was worried about the puppy, so I stayed around for a really long time, trying to see him.”

  Yasuo fell silent for a second.

  “Do you think they’ll catch that puppy tomorrow?” he whispered.

  “Do you want to go and see for yourself?” Kazuo asked.

  He felt Yasuo nod yes in the dark.

  “Wait in the schoolyard till my last class is over. We’ll go to Hara right after school.”

  “Really, Niichan?”

  “Really. I’ll go with you, no matter what. So let’s get some sleep.”

  Kazuo took his head out from under Yasuo’s blanket and burrowed back into his own. The place where he laid his head felt a little cold, but not as cold as when he had first crawled in for the night. It wasn’t long before Yasuo fell fast asleep, drawing soft, even breaths.

  Kazuo lay awake a while longer. He’d said, for Yasuo’s sake, that he would go with him to the lot tomorrow. But he had absolutely no idea what to do about the puppy when they got there.

  “Maybe I’ll get an idea tomorrow,” Kazuo murmured as he closed his eyes.

  The next day Yasuo was in a corner of the playground, hanging from the iron high-bar as he waited for his brother.

  “All right, Yasuo, let’s go,” Kazuo said. The two of them exchanged few words as they walked briskly toward the lot at Hara. It took a good twenty minutes to get there, and today those twenty minutes seemed even longer to Kazuo. He was still worried about what to do.

  Finally, they saw the Haneto River. Usually, they plugged their noses and howled, “Pew, it stinks!” But today they both said nothing as they crossed the concrete bridge and rushed toward the empty lot.

  The dog-catching operation was already underway. The lot, more like a small field, was surrounded by people who were watching, as if it were a show. Kazuo and Yasuo pushed their way through the crowd, finally finding a spot in the front row.

  In the tall, wilted grass, dog catchers were running around with big nets and poles that had wire hoops on the ends. “Over there!” they shouted. “No, over here!”

  “Have they caught any dogs yet?” Kazuo asked a man wearing a cook’s uniform.

  Truck with cage and sign: “Animal control in progress. Please go around.”

  “They got several already. Look, they’re in that truck over there.” The man pointed to a truck parked at the side of the road. A large cage covered in wire mesh sat on the freight platform in the back.

  “Is the puppy in there?” Kazuo asked Yasuo.

  His little brother hurried over to the truck to check. He returned a minute later.

  “He’s not in there,” he whispered, sounding relieved.

  Kazuo glanced back at the lot. That meant that the dog the catchers were now trying to capture might be Yasuo’s puppy. Again Kazuo wondered what to do. If one was the puppy, he could try begging them to let it go. Or he could act like a TV hero and undo the lock on the cage, setting all the dogs free.

  He kept his eyes glued to the dog catchers running around in the tall grass. “Right there!” a man yelled, and then the dog catchers began to close in on a particular spot. The high-pitched yips of a dog came from the center of the circle they had made.

  A round of applause rose from the onlookers.

  As the applause continued, a light-brown dog was led from the lot, yanked along by a dog catcher. The dog’s eyes were wide open with fright, his tail tucked between his legs.

  “Is that the dog?” Kazuo murmured.

  Yasuo sh
ook his head no.

  The dog stiffened its legs to resist being pulled forward any further. But there was no way the poor animal could escape with the wire collar around his neck. The dog catcher continued dragging him over to the cage and then threw him inside.

  After that, the wire fencing around the edge of the lot was taken down, and the spectators began to disperse little by little.

  Kazuo and Yasuo stayed right where they were until the truck finally left the lot.

  “I’m glad the little puppy didn’t get caught,” Yasuo murmured. “But I feel bad for that other dog.”

  Kazuo thought of the stray dog being dragged along by a wire ring around his neck and forced into the cage on the truck. “Yeah, I feel bad, too,” he said. Then he put an arm around Yasuo’s shoulders. “Maybe someone found the puppy and is taking care of him right now at home.”

  “I sure hope so,” said Yasuo.

  “Hey, maybe we can adopt a dog when we’re older,” Kazuo said.

  “Yeah, that would be great. What should we call him?” Yasuo asked.

  “Let’s think of some names,” Kazuo suggested. He rattled off every single name he could think of as they slowly walked home, the cold air nipping at their necks.

  Milk

  Every day at about eleven forty-five, just over halfway through fourth period, everyone in Kazuo’s classroom began to grow restless.

  That was because their attention would shift to the smells drifting down the hall from the large room where their lunches were being made. They would forget about their studies as they tried to guess what the day’s meal might be. They had, of course, received a menu from the teacher at the beginning of the month. It was printed on cheap brown paper and was also posted at the back of the classroom. But nobody ever actually looked at that sheet. The reason was that looking at the monthly menu took half the fun out of eating lunch. Everybody knew that imagining what was for lunch, based on the smells drifting in from the kitchen—just when everyone was beginning to feel hungry—was the first step in enjoying the school lunch.